Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Ep 148: Attack From Mars Topper from The Electric Playground!
11 Plays5 months ago
There's a new AFM topper in town and it's by The Electric Playground. Join us as we deep dive with Rob and Alec on the new licensed AFM topper!
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Special Episode Tease
00:00:07
Speaker
Thanks for tuning into the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
00:00:09
Speaker
I am Josh Roop.
00:00:10
Speaker
With me, my co-captain.
00:00:12
Speaker
Scott Larson.
00:00:13
Speaker
And Scott, we have a special episode today.
00:00:15
Speaker
I'm excited for this.
00:00:16
Speaker
This is something new and interesting we've never done before.
00:00:19
Speaker
Right.
00:00:19
Speaker
But before we dive into that, let's talk about our sponsor just for a split second.
Sponsorship Highlight: Flippin' Out Pinball
00:00:23
Speaker
Okay.
00:00:23
Speaker
We have Zach and Nicole Minney at Flippin' Out Pinball.
00:00:25
Speaker
So they've always been really good to me.
00:00:27
Speaker
My friend just got his Godzilla 70.
00:00:32
Speaker
So, you know, I was able to set that up through them.
00:00:35
Speaker
I also was able to help facilitate two people buying the CE avatar through them.
00:00:42
Speaker
So they've always been really friendly, really good to work with.
00:00:45
Speaker
And if you're not looking for the new game, they actually have a pretty interesting back catalog of used games that people trade in.
00:00:52
Speaker
And so just whatever you're looking for, I'm sure they can help you out.
Guest Introduction: Alec and Rob's Innovative Toppers
00:00:56
Speaker
Zach and Nicole, many flipping out pinball.
00:00:58
Speaker
Yes.
00:00:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:00:59
Speaker
And we're going to move on to our guest right now.
00:01:02
Speaker
This is a duo that is making some waves in the hobby.
00:01:05
Speaker
I've been setting up a nose scene ever since they did the Godzilla topper.
00:01:09
Speaker
And it was insanely cool.
00:01:11
Speaker
And it was like, what's Stern going to do to match this?
00:01:12
Speaker
Because this was pretty out of bounds.
00:01:14
Speaker
This was insanely cool.
00:01:16
Speaker
If you haven't heard of the Electric Playground, you need to check them out because they are doing some amazing things.
00:01:21
Speaker
Speaking of which, one thing we're going to talk about today is the new Attack from Mars topper.
00:01:27
Speaker
Before we dive into that, I want to welcome our guest, Alec and Rob.
00:01:30
Speaker
Thank you for coming on.
00:01:32
Speaker
Yeah, thanks for having us.
00:01:33
Speaker
Appreciate it.
00:01:33
Speaker
Great to be here.
00:01:34
Speaker
Definitely.
00:01:35
Speaker
Okay.
Motivation and Creation of Interactive Toppers
00:01:36
Speaker
First off,
00:01:37
Speaker
Attack from Mars, the topper on that has been heralded as one of the best ever made, right?
00:01:42
Speaker
What made you guys, what convinced you to be like, you know what?
00:01:45
Speaker
Challenge accepted.
00:01:45
Speaker
We're going to one-up this.
00:01:48
Speaker
I think...
00:01:49
Speaker
You'll sense a theme in a lot of how we choose the toppers we want to work on is just games we love.
00:01:55
Speaker
And Attack is one of those games I cannot walk by and not put 50 cents in.
00:01:59
Speaker
It's impossible.
00:02:01
Speaker
No doubt CGC made an amazing topper.
00:02:03
Speaker
We love it ourselves, but we love to make something really unique and put our own spin on it.
00:02:08
Speaker
I think the thing that makes ours a little bit different is the interactivity that comes along with it, but we can get all into that when we get into specifics.
00:02:16
Speaker
Definitely.
00:02:17
Speaker
Definitely love making toppers for games that we love.
00:02:21
Speaker
You had it.
00:02:22
Speaker
It was one of your early games.
00:02:24
Speaker
I remember playing at your house.
00:02:26
Speaker
We also get asked for it a ton.
00:02:28
Speaker
Yeah, they made an amazing topper, but everybody that still wants it can't get it.
00:02:33
Speaker
That's a good point.
00:02:34
Speaker
It's not always available.
00:02:35
Speaker
That's part of the issue is supply and demand.
00:02:38
Speaker
I have the CGC one because it came with my LE.
00:02:43
Speaker
Definitely, there is a limit of
00:02:45
Speaker
Sometimes what you want is mainly not available.
00:02:48
Speaker
And so you have to look for alternatives and, uh, and actually sometimes the alternative can be a different slice.
00:02:56
Speaker
So for example, on my medieval madness back, back glass, um, I, I looks like you guys are working with Brian Allen, right?
00:03:03
Speaker
So not, not officially yet.
00:03:05
Speaker
This one was with Brad Albright.
00:03:07
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:03:08
Speaker
Sorry.
00:03:08
Speaker
Go ahead and cut that Josh.
00:03:10
Speaker
We love the word for Brian.
00:03:11
Speaker
Yeah.
00:03:13
Speaker
But, but I have, I have some alternative back glasses and some, some of my games and it does mix it up.
00:03:19
Speaker
It shows different things.
Features of the New 'Attack from Mars' Topper
00:03:20
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, that's a good point.
00:03:21
Speaker
I mean, with people who have customized their back glass, like with Brian Allen, and there's maybe some different things that they're looking for in it.
00:03:29
Speaker
So I think that, like Alex said, the interactivity on this is definitely above and beyond what CGC did.
00:03:35
Speaker
So we're hoping if we're not converting people, we're definitely getting those who wanted the topper originally back excited about their game with our topper.
00:03:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:03:44
Speaker
I mean, the reality is I don't know that we're going to get many people like you, Scott, to take off that awesome topper and put ours on.
00:03:50
Speaker
But our topper works with both the original and the remake.
00:03:53
Speaker
So there's a lot of people with that original that have wanted to put something on top maybe, and they haven't been able to.
00:03:58
Speaker
And I think ours is kind of like that perfect cherry.
00:04:01
Speaker
What if you haven't checked these toppers out yet?
00:04:03
Speaker
Like behind you two, you've got the big Lebowski.
00:04:07
Speaker
You got the new attack from Mars.
00:04:08
Speaker
You've got Godzilla.
00:04:09
Speaker
And you did a Twilight Zone, which you were showing off at Expo last year, which was insane.
00:04:14
Speaker
I mean, these are some really cool toppers.
Godzilla Topper and Company's Skill Evolution
00:04:16
Speaker
And if I'm not mistaken, I'm looking at the Godzilla topper.
00:04:18
Speaker
You've got some screens in that now with –
00:04:20
Speaker
What's going on?
00:04:21
Speaker
So we debuted the Godzilla Topper at Expo last year.
00:04:24
Speaker
This will be our second Expo.
00:04:26
Speaker
And it was awesome to get the feedback.
00:04:29
Speaker
We ended up getting best mod of the show, which was cool to just get an award for the Topper.
00:04:35
Speaker
Clearly, it's very different than the Godzilla Topper.
00:04:37
Speaker
But when we announced it, we said our ultimate vision was to basically...
00:04:42
Speaker
bring four screens to that topper.
00:04:43
Speaker
So we released that officially as far as shipping about a month ago.
00:04:49
Speaker
We've shipped about 10 of them so far.
00:04:52
Speaker
It literally has four 3.2 inch LCD screens on them.
00:04:56
Speaker
There's five interactive modes, but you can also customize these screens to whatever you want.
00:05:01
Speaker
So
00:05:02
Speaker
It comes with some amazing artwork, highlighting, collecting the monster monitors, heat ray, destruction jackpot, Rodan, and then the saucer, which is a saucer that goes up and down.
00:05:13
Speaker
But you can actually replace all that with classic GIFs from the movie, which is really cool.
00:05:18
Speaker
So the feedback's been amazing.
00:05:20
Speaker
And we've also got a black and white one, of course, because everyone's doing black and white stuff now.
00:05:25
Speaker
But there's actually a different paint job for the black and white versus the color.
00:05:31
Speaker
One of my favorite parts about the business and watching, honestly, Rob's skills grow and everything grow along with it.
00:05:37
Speaker
You know, we concepted what we wanted this topper to be before we had any idea how the hell we were going to do it.
00:05:43
Speaker
And but we had to get something out there.
00:05:45
Speaker
So the first version of the topper was an amazing step up from what we've done, you know, technologically speaking from from Twilight Zone.
00:05:53
Speaker
It's a huge leaps and bounds to where Godzilla is.
00:05:56
Speaker
But where we had to get to make the Conqueror's upgrade is even leaps and bounds beyond that.
00:06:01
Speaker
And we've been able to do this in such a short amount of time.
00:06:03
Speaker
It kind of blows my mind to see where we are today versus where we started.
00:06:08
Speaker
And I think Attack from Mars is a great example of that too, because we could have made that topper really early on, but we didn't have the skills to really do it justice until where we are in the iteration of the company.
00:06:18
Speaker
So having it be kind of the fourth generation topper
00:06:22
Speaker
It takes all
Licensing and Business Expansion
00:06:23
Speaker
the lessons learned from topper one, topper two, topper three, and puts it into kind of a complete package to where we are today.
00:06:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:32
Speaker
We've got a bunch of attacks going already.
00:06:34
Speaker
This will be the first time we've released a product where we've got actually 50 ready to go, which is exciting.
00:06:40
Speaker
But lots to talk about on attack.
00:06:43
Speaker
So we don't want to get ahead of ourselves.
00:06:45
Speaker
Definitely.
00:06:46
Speaker
So, okay.
00:06:48
Speaker
Attack for Mars.
00:06:49
Speaker
I know you guys said you're making these because it's games that you love, but this is your first official license topper.
00:06:54
Speaker
How did you, how did you convince Rick from Planetary Pinball to sign on to this?
00:06:58
Speaker
Well, I mean, you know, Rick's been great to work with as far as like giving us access to the license.
00:07:03
Speaker
Like in our promo video, we've got a ton of like audio clips and stuff, which we're not actually using on the topper, but he's been great.
00:07:08
Speaker
kind of opened it up to us.
00:07:10
Speaker
We always wanted to do stuff that was officially licensed.
00:07:13
Speaker
We really try to toe the line in terms of how blatantly we use intellectual property that we don't own.
00:07:21
Speaker
So you're not going to see blatant use of intellectual property on Godzilla.
00:07:25
Speaker
You don't see it on Twilight Zone.
00:07:26
Speaker
You don't see it on...
00:07:28
Speaker
Lebowski, but you do see it on Attack from Mars and because we wanted to get the license.
00:07:33
Speaker
So it was really a timing thing for us to like build some notoriety and some credibility.
00:07:37
Speaker
And also we wanted to go to Rick and be like, hey, we're the real deal.
00:07:40
Speaker
You know, we can make these things like
00:07:43
Speaker
It's not just a pipe dream idea.
00:07:44
Speaker
So we've been in touch with Rick for a while now, and this seemed like the right time to kind of make
Ethical Business Practices and Artist Collaboration
00:07:50
Speaker
this happen.
00:07:50
Speaker
And also we wanted to be able to build up some inventory.
00:07:52
Speaker
So we've really been able to build our team.
00:07:54
Speaker
We actually just moved into a new space.
00:07:56
Speaker
So this is a new space like three times as big as where we were so that when we launch this thing, it doesn't take us 18 months to build them.
00:08:03
Speaker
We want to ship some right away.
00:08:05
Speaker
We really want to build the whole business the right way.
00:08:08
Speaker
We're not doing this as like a pipe, like whatever, he's flashing the pan.
00:08:14
Speaker
We really want to give the artists the credit where it's due.
00:08:18
Speaker
We want to make sure that they're getting paid with their work.
00:08:20
Speaker
We both come from creative backgrounds.
00:08:22
Speaker
We've been on the other side of this.
00:08:24
Speaker
So we want definitely to pay the artists what they're worth, but also do, like I said, put our big boy pants and grow the business in the right way and do it.
00:08:32
Speaker
Yeah, I think that was a big step for us, for sure.
00:08:37
Speaker
I was just going to say you chose Brad Albright, which Josh and I have worked with.
00:08:42
Speaker
And Brad's always been great to work with.
00:08:45
Speaker
He, he did our goat shirt and he did, he did all the, that montage.
00:08:51
Speaker
If you get the shoes, like that, that was from Brad Albright too.
00:08:54
Speaker
So how'd you choose Brad?
00:08:56
Speaker
I mean, I know that he's been great to work with for us, but it's.
00:08:59
Speaker
Brad's an amazing guy, you know, super easy to talk to, you know, he's at all the shows.
00:09:04
Speaker
Not that we've been doing this for a real long time.
00:09:05
Speaker
This will be, we've done two TPS and an hour, a second expo, but talking him up, I mean, his stuff is amazing.
00:09:13
Speaker
He, along with, you know, some other known artists in this space, like just really have this amazing style that works for pinball.
00:09:19
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:19
Speaker
And kind of like with Rick, it was like we talked to him for a while and we're like, let's do this.
00:09:23
Speaker
You know, now's the right time.
00:09:25
Speaker
And he was, I mean, attack for Mars.
00:09:26
Speaker
Come on.
00:09:27
Speaker
You know, he was he was definitely ready to jump in.
00:09:29
Speaker
So we kind of worked out the specifics pretty quick and off to the races.
00:09:32
Speaker
Right.
00:09:33
Speaker
I've decorated my game room and my movie room as pretty much all Brad Albright.
00:09:39
Speaker
He gets me.
00:09:40
Speaker
We didn't know each other, but we knew each other.
00:09:44
Speaker
It was a bro-ship at first sight, right?
00:09:47
Speaker
To know Brad is to love Brad.
00:09:49
Speaker
It's easy.
00:09:50
Speaker
He's a great guy.
00:09:51
Speaker
He is a great guy.
00:09:52
Speaker
And his other stuff, if you guys have not checked out his other stuff, Motorhead and Led Zeppelin, he did these both as homebrews.
00:09:59
Speaker
If I remember correctly, it was David Peck that hit at these.
00:10:03
Speaker
Insanely cool.
00:10:04
Speaker
I'll put some pictures in the video.
00:10:07
Speaker
Which, by the way, if you're not watching YouTube, it's fine.
00:10:09
Speaker
You're watching the podcast.
00:10:10
Speaker
It
Quality Control and Business Strategy
00:10:11
Speaker
is whatever.
00:10:11
Speaker
But we're trying to do something a little different.
00:10:13
Speaker
So as you're watching and following along, we're going to have the picture and the video going along as we talk about it.
00:10:18
Speaker
at least i hope so if not well it is what it is you see our beautiful faces exactly so okay this is a really in my opinion this is a very competitive price point you guys are coming at 1279 uh as toppers go that's actually pretty good and you're limiting limiting this to 300 what what made you to do both those things
00:10:41
Speaker
Yeah, so Twilight, we didn't do limited.
00:10:44
Speaker
Lebowski, we did limited.
00:10:45
Speaker
We did 100 of those.
00:10:47
Speaker
They went pretty quick, I think like two or three days.
00:10:50
Speaker
And I really felt like what that did for us as a business is allow us to focus on a single product and build it and build it well, optimize margins around some of the materials, which continue to go up in terms of costs and stuff.
00:11:07
Speaker
And we wanted to just, we want to build this thing.
00:11:09
Speaker
We want to build however many we can sell and get it out there and move on to the next one.
00:11:14
Speaker
I mean, we've got more ideas with Planetary.
00:11:16
Speaker
We've got more ideas for other games.
00:11:19
Speaker
And also, you know, we want people to know
00:11:22
Speaker
like we're going to build this thing for you now, you know, it's not going to drag on.
00:11:26
Speaker
We can get it for you if you want it.
00:11:28
Speaker
And then we're going to move on to the next one.
00:11:30
Speaker
So there's a lot tied up with like choosing to go limited.
00:11:33
Speaker
I know some people don't necessarily love it, but as a business, especially in our current position, like getting the parts, building the thing and moving on to the next one is really important.
00:11:42
Speaker
That's it.
Pricing and Accessibility of Toppers
00:11:43
Speaker
I think what's the timeframe you're aiming for here?
00:11:46
Speaker
Yeah, so we're going to have 50 available to ship within two to four weeks of the initial sale, which will be early in October.
00:11:53
Speaker
And then we're going to move through the 300 if we hit that many or however many we hit within, well, by the end of 2025, I'd like to say within nine to 12 months is definitely realistic.
00:12:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:06
Speaker
Sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off, Alec.
00:12:08
Speaker
What were you going to say?
00:12:08
Speaker
I was going to say, I think an important point too is, you know, we're consumers just like everybody else and we see the price of things.
00:12:14
Speaker
And of course...
00:12:16
Speaker
Even when we started this business, we're looking at the price of toppers as they were back then and wondering who's paying this?
00:12:23
Speaker
Who are these people that are paying $1,000 for these things?
00:12:26
Speaker
And when you come to actually build and really mass produce a product, you quickly learn what goes in to actually making something like this.
00:12:34
Speaker
And everything is getting more expensive.
00:12:37
Speaker
we're still trying to find ways to create toppers at a lesser price point to make them accessible to all people.
00:12:44
Speaker
So we're not, this is where we are with Attack from Mars, but we're with the next iterate, whatever the next topper is going to be.
00:12:51
Speaker
We're always trying to see if there's a way that we can create an entry point that's more accessible for other people too.
Technical Challenges and Interactive Design
00:12:58
Speaker
Now, there's also some element of integration.
00:13:02
Speaker
And so that's what I do want to talk about with the Attack from Mars topper.
00:13:05
Speaker
I have some toppers who, you know, we found I found them off the market that, you know, I got a Simpsons one because obviously back in 2003, they weren't making toppers.
00:13:16
Speaker
So I got one of those.
00:13:17
Speaker
Basically, it just lights up.
00:13:18
Speaker
So it's kind of fun.
00:13:19
Speaker
You see it, but that's pretty much it.
00:13:21
Speaker
Now your topper, you were talking about integration.
00:13:23
Speaker
So tell me about that process because you actually have to take that to a next level where you are connecting it to the game.
00:13:30
Speaker
The topper has to know what mode you're in.
00:13:33
Speaker
It has to know what is going on with the game.
00:13:36
Speaker
So you really have to figure out how to splice and dice that into the game itself.
00:13:41
Speaker
Not only that, you're doing this between CGC's models and Valley Williams models too, where you're bridging the gap for almost 20 plus years of circuitry.
00:13:51
Speaker
Yeah, there's a lot that goes into that.
00:13:54
Speaker
I do want to celebrate some of the companies that have recently announced that they're doing more for mod makers.
00:14:02
Speaker
Dutch Pinball with their Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
00:14:06
Speaker
They're working to open it up so that you can connect directly into it.
00:14:09
Speaker
But we don't have that convenience.
00:14:12
Speaker
There are some ways that you can kind of tap into like the cat five cable, call it like a serial sniffer where you can kind of like try to infer what's going on.
00:14:21
Speaker
And some platforms like Pinsound do that.
00:14:24
Speaker
But what we decided to do because we didn't want to be reliant on like code updates, possibly bricking our topper for customers is we wanted to go a little bit more old school with it.
00:14:34
Speaker
So the way our system works is that
00:14:38
Speaker
there's a series of light sensors that you mount in various places throughout the game.
00:14:43
Speaker
And in some cases where that's a little bit of a tighter area, we actually build an entire harness that sits behind one of the boards in the game.
00:14:51
Speaker
So for with Godzilla, there's actually about 12 sensors of light that then gets processed by our own central computer on the topper.
00:15:00
Speaker
And then we do a light show based on which of those lights are on or off.
00:15:04
Speaker
And there's combinations of those that allow us to know different situations and different modes happening in the game.
00:15:10
Speaker
But essentially you're running a node board that comes with our topper underneath the play field.
00:15:15
Speaker
It's connected to the topper via cat five cable and ethernet cable.
00:15:19
Speaker
And then that node board has a bunch of sensors that kind of spider out into the game and pick up that light.
00:15:27
Speaker
So in the case of attack, we wanted to make it a little simpler than Godzilla because Godzilla has a lot of them.
00:15:32
Speaker
So there's only, I think, six sensors on attack.
00:15:36
Speaker
The topper is going to take you probably 45 minutes to install.
00:15:39
Speaker
It's not like a stern where you're just plugging it in and it goes.
00:15:42
Speaker
But at the end of the day, it does do all the things that you would want a topper to do in the modern age, different than like the Simpsons game you were talking about, where, you know, we've got about eight different light shows that play out on attack.
00:15:56
Speaker
And of course, we've got some articulation in the alien that shakes.
00:16:01
Speaker
So all those things kind of happen through this.
00:16:04
Speaker
not proprietary platform, but a platform that we've developed that we're now reusing across each topper that we release.
00:16:11
Speaker
But without making any major modifications of the game.
00:16:14
Speaker
Yeah, no cutting, no soldering of any kind.
00:16:20
Speaker
We really do want to focus on making it easy, but at the end of the day, we are picking up a lot of information through these light sensors.
00:16:28
Speaker
Well, and I like how you guys have taken Attack for Mars and you've taken some of the biggest moments from that game and somehow fit it all into one topper, right?
00:16:36
Speaker
Like...
00:16:37
Speaker
If you've seen, I don't know exactly how it's going to work if you guys are releasing the video before we release this or whatnot.
00:16:42
Speaker
But if you guys have seen this video, it's insanely cool.
00:16:45
Speaker
Like the big old beam, like you've got spots on the sides where they're sucking up the cow and the chicken because they've turned them big.
00:16:52
Speaker
And you've got, you know, extra ball.
00:16:53
Speaker
The whole thing's flashing orange.
00:16:55
Speaker
And that's the thing about the original CGC topic that was made was the articulation.
00:16:59
Speaker
It tied into like it was kind of harassing you, right?
00:17:03
Speaker
Well, you guys have a spaceship and an alien on here.
00:17:05
Speaker
They're both articulating and harassing you.
00:17:08
Speaker
It's like you've just kind of taken it to like level 11 or not.
00:17:12
Speaker
Yeah.
00:17:12
Speaker
You know, we talked about price earlier.
00:17:14
Speaker
I mean, to be able to build movement and, you know, kinesthetic things into a topper, it does require a lot of prototyping and then building out.
00:17:24
Speaker
So like we were trying to always have something that's highly interactive in the game.
00:17:29
Speaker
I mean, with the Twilight Zone, we had the ball like literally going around a habit trail.
00:17:34
Speaker
So we try to pull that in.
00:17:35
Speaker
So with Godzilla, you have a raising thing with attack.
00:17:38
Speaker
You've got movement.
00:17:39
Speaker
We didn't have movement in Lebowski, but we also wanted to make that kind of an art piece.
00:17:44
Speaker
So that kind of has its own kind of artistic style to it.
00:17:49
Speaker
But yeah, movement is awesome to have and it's not not easy to do for sure.
00:17:53
Speaker
Mm hmm.
00:17:54
Speaker
Yeah, it's easy when you pick games you love.
00:17:56
Speaker
You just want to design it to be, like you said, kind of that homage to the title, you know?
00:18:02
Speaker
Attack from Mars is like the game I grew up on.
00:18:05
Speaker
It's the first game I played that made me love pinball.
00:18:08
Speaker
I can't.
00:18:09
Speaker
talk enough about it my dad used to put me down on a bar stool when he was playing his band jobs and that was the game i got to play um and it's the first one where pinball made sense to me there was a mission you know destroy the saucer it just finally clicked in my head to what i was doing and i got the bug ever since so
Personal Connections to 'Attack from Mars' and Game Enhancements
00:18:26
Speaker
yeah being able to do something for attack has always been kind of a dream or whatever
00:18:31
Speaker
You also took it to integrating some of the rarer modes.
00:18:36
Speaker
Like I noticed you even connected it to the video mode, which I've been playing.
00:18:43
Speaker
I have Attack from Mars and I've been playing it.
00:18:45
Speaker
And there are times when I totally forget there's a video mode in it because it's not that common.
00:18:50
Speaker
It doesn't come up that often.
00:18:52
Speaker
That's like a guaranteed extra ball.
00:18:56
Speaker
That's always part of the strategy.
00:18:59
Speaker
Paint the side to side, baby.
00:19:01
Speaker
Just paint side to side.
00:19:02
Speaker
Yeah, we like to.
00:19:04
Speaker
I mean, we love pinball.
00:19:05
Speaker
We're deep players like we don't have huge collections, you know, four or five machines.
00:19:11
Speaker
So when we have machines, we go deep on them and we certainly like to celebrate those moments.
00:19:16
Speaker
So that those are a little bit of icing on the cake for those that are, you know, looking to really get excited about the game again, too.
00:19:22
Speaker
You know, it's like, hey, you know, pick up our topper and.
00:19:24
Speaker
see this cool light show and remember, you know, why you love this game.
00:19:28
Speaker
I remember though, I was like this year's old whenever like someone finally taught me that if you hit that start button, you get like one free, like swipe the screen on the video mode.
00:19:36
Speaker
I didn't know about that when I owned the game.
00:19:39
Speaker
I didn't know that until right now.
00:19:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:19:43
Speaker
So what they're talking about, if you're in video mode and as the saucers are coming down, if you feel like you're too much, like someone's going to touch down, you press the start button or the launch button and it wipes the whole screen.
00:19:56
Speaker
It's a combination of missile command and space invaders.
00:19:59
Speaker
That's kind of how it seems like it.
00:20:01
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:02
Speaker
That's cool.
00:20:02
Speaker
Have you seen the cow mode?
00:20:06
Speaker
I don't think I have.
00:20:06
Speaker
What's the cow push?
00:20:08
Speaker
There's a way.
00:20:09
Speaker
I don't know exactly how you get it to go, but there's a way that instead of whatever they're dropping, instead of saucers dropping, they're cows.
00:20:18
Speaker
Every time the cow does, it moves.
00:20:21
Speaker
There's a video mode, but it's cow mode.
00:20:24
Speaker
Okay, so there's got to be someone out there.
00:20:26
Speaker
There's someone out there who knows how to do cow mode.
00:20:28
Speaker
I've only seen it one time.
00:20:30
Speaker
Where's Bo and Karen's?
00:20:31
Speaker
Because I guarantee... The bullfrog, the WB frog, hello, my... You know, that one's from the B.A.
00:20:38
Speaker
Jones.
00:20:39
Speaker
Hello, my baby.
00:20:40
Speaker
It takes a certain path through the tunnels and actually pops you out to the bullfrog instead of... Yeah, anyhow.
00:20:46
Speaker
Hilarious.
00:20:47
Speaker
I love those little Easter eggs.
00:20:49
Speaker
Yeah, I love the Easter eggs.
00:20:51
Speaker
I'm not sure that I...
00:20:53
Speaker
I have the talent to get consistently the Easter eggs.
00:20:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:58
Speaker
There's a bunch of them.
00:20:59
Speaker
There's some, there's like a dirty pool thing on attack.
00:21:01
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:02
Speaker
Dirty pool.
00:21:03
Speaker
So if you, if you get the ball behind the, the attack target and then you shoot it in there.
00:21:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:11
Speaker
And also, you know, you have strobe light multi-ball, which I really, I've had the game for eight years and I think I've had it like five to 10 times.
00:21:19
Speaker
This is making me so sad.
00:21:21
Speaker
Like, I feel like we need to move on.
00:21:23
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:21:24
Speaker
It's possible.
00:21:25
Speaker
No, but it's just kind of funny.
00:21:27
Speaker
Like, no, it's to be, I also rotate from games to games.
00:21:31
Speaker
So I've been playing a lot of cactus Canyon, been playing a lot of Godzilla and,
00:21:36
Speaker
I was just back on attack for Mars, which I haven't played in a while.
00:21:39
Speaker
So that's part of the problem of having a lot of games is that you find a hard time of sticking with one.
00:21:46
Speaker
And so that's probably because my, um, my rules knowledge is not as deep as it would be if you only had five games, cause you would know them very well.
00:21:54
Speaker
Um,
00:21:55
Speaker
Well, they're both in Stroke of Luck, which is the mystery.
00:21:58
Speaker
Just got to get deep into those, and you'll find both the video mode and Stroke, which we have modes in our topper for that.
00:22:04
Speaker
So definitely check those out.
00:22:06
Speaker
You know, the thing that I love, and I think everyone loves this, the late Great Lyman knew when you were close to something, he was willing to give it to you via Stroke of Luck on Attack from Mars.
00:22:17
Speaker
I think it's brilliant because it's like –
00:22:20
Speaker
I really need this.
00:22:21
Speaker
I need it.
00:22:21
Speaker
I need it.
00:22:23
Speaker
It always seemed to be there in stroke of luck, and it was willing to give it to you.
00:22:26
Speaker
It's like Mario Kart.
00:22:27
Speaker
You're in eighth place.
00:22:29
Speaker
Blue Shell.
00:22:29
Speaker
Blue Shell.
00:22:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:32
Speaker
It was just wonderful.
00:22:34
Speaker
It's what made Lyman great.
00:22:36
Speaker
He knew what the player wanted or needed at that moment, and it was like, boom, here you go.
00:22:40
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:42
Speaker
Cows from heaven, not manna.
00:22:44
Speaker
Cows from heaven.
00:22:46
Speaker
So I've got on here.
00:22:47
Speaker
There's some people like me who don't have a tall enough basement.
00:22:49
Speaker
Well, I guess mine's tall enough to have toppers.
00:22:52
Speaker
But like I saw, I think her name was Jamie Murray, one of our listeners.
00:22:56
Speaker
They cut out the ceiling just so they could have the labyrinth topper.
00:22:59
Speaker
But they like built in into the ceiling.
00:23:03
Speaker
Basement around it.
00:23:04
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:07
Speaker
So I can't wait to see how that like when they list that house for sale.
00:23:11
Speaker
What's that one spot right there?
00:23:13
Speaker
OK.
00:23:13
Speaker
Now Vic did the same thing.
00:23:15
Speaker
Well, he didn't cut a hole in the ceiling, but because he had the Godfather and he couldn't put the topper, didn't he put it on the side?
00:23:22
Speaker
I think so.
00:23:23
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:24
Speaker
So, so on this topper, you can adjust the height.
00:23:27
Speaker
So the overall height is 12 inches, but you can go down to 10 and a half and it's 24 wide.
00:23:32
Speaker
How do you get to adjust?
00:23:34
Speaker
I'm slightly confused.
00:23:34
Speaker
Yeah, it's pretty simple.
00:23:36
Speaker
I mean, we, we didn't plan around it, but obviously this making toppers, you've got this issue that comes up a lot.
Design and Launch of 'Attack from Mars' Topper
00:23:43
Speaker
So whenever you get it, the aliens mounted on the back and there's actually like four holes.
00:23:49
Speaker
So it's a pretty typical system where you're just moving it down notches based on the height of your basement.
00:23:57
Speaker
But yeah, I mean, we put a lot of thought into this, both on the installation side and on the product itself.
00:24:03
Speaker
And this was one where it was clear we could do it.
00:24:06
Speaker
So we did it.
00:24:07
Speaker
So yeah, it goes down a little bit if you're tight on headroom.
00:24:12
Speaker
We only need that quarter of an inch.
00:24:14
Speaker
I can adjust it right here.
00:24:15
Speaker
Yes.
00:24:16
Speaker
Okay.
00:24:18
Speaker
So this is going to be available.
00:24:21
Speaker
Well, how do they get it?
00:24:22
Speaker
How do they get it?
00:24:24
Speaker
This will be available on October 9th, which is a week from the start of Expo.
00:24:28
Speaker
We're going to be having an Expo.
00:24:30
Speaker
But on the 9th, you're going to be able to go to our website.
00:24:32
Speaker
You're going to be able to put down a deposit of just a hundred bucks that gets you your official spot.
00:24:37
Speaker
We're going to fulfill orders based on how the orders come in.
00:24:41
Speaker
We've got about 50 ready to go or well, technically we had exactly 50 ready to go within the first two to four weeks of your order.
00:24:48
Speaker
Once it's ready to ship, we'll send you a payment link to complete the full payment and you'll have it.
00:24:54
Speaker
So yeah, this is unlike other toppers.
00:24:57
Speaker
We've got a bunch in motion.
00:25:00
Speaker
And then for the rest of them, we'll be working on them throughout 2024 and into 2025 and hopefully have most of them out by mid 2025.
00:25:10
Speaker
And say that website again.
00:25:12
Speaker
Where do we go to order this?
00:25:14
Speaker
Yeah, so the topper is at TEP Pinball.
00:25:18
Speaker
So TEP, the electric playground, pinball.com, TEP Pinball.com.
00:25:22
Speaker
That's the exclusive place to get it.
00:25:24
Speaker
So on our website.
00:25:25
Speaker
Perfect.
00:25:26
Speaker
Looking over some of the stuff too, one of the most, one of the coolest modes that is in this game is strobe multiball.
00:25:37
Speaker
You get this going.
00:25:39
Speaker
It's nervous.
00:25:39
Speaker
Especially in a dark room.
00:25:41
Speaker
Especially in a dark room.
00:25:43
Speaker
And watching the video coordinating with this mode is insanely cool.
00:25:48
Speaker
I'm assuming the whole room, if you've got a dark room, it's going to turn into a disco ball all of a sudden.
00:25:52
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:25:54
Speaker
was it just one of these things like it's a must have to do with the top or what how'd you do that you know yeah it was like we can make we can make it flash uh sorry if you have epilepsy with this one because this one's not gonna help uh yeah but uh this one was actually kind of interesting to get to work too because like again we don't know the data on the system so
00:26:12
Speaker
There's there's two unique situations with the lighting for both strobe and video mode with strobe.
00:26:20
Speaker
Only the lights in front of the attack wave, which is that thing that goes up and down, is lit and then no other lights are on.
00:26:27
Speaker
Uh, so we basically are looking at capture one, which is one of the orbit lights.
00:26:32
Speaker
If we see that's off, but we see the lights in front of the, uh, the up and down thing is on, we know you're in strobe multiball.
00:26:38
Speaker
That's the only time that the lights are set up that way.
00:26:41
Speaker
Um, and then we, we make the topper flash like in sequence with the light that is underneath the UFO.
00:26:47
Speaker
So you're, you're definitely adding to the effect.
00:26:51
Speaker
Uh, we've had a couple of people actually say like, Hey, you're lighting up my play field a tiny bit more.
00:26:55
Speaker
So I appreciate that.
00:26:56
Speaker
I can actually see.
00:26:58
Speaker
a little bit better, but it's a cool mode and it certainly is way more impactful with the topper.
00:27:03
Speaker
It's another one of those.
00:27:05
Speaker
Give me an extra ball mode.
00:27:06
Speaker
If you can do it right, you can get that extra ball.
00:27:08
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:09
Speaker
10, 10 hits on that, that bar in the front and you've got an extra ball.
00:27:12
Speaker
So definitely Scott,
00:27:14
Speaker
Don't skip over that one.
00:27:15
Speaker
All right.
00:27:15
Speaker
No, no, no.
00:27:16
Speaker
Sounds good.
00:27:17
Speaker
You know, one of my favorite moments ever in a pinball tournament, we were playing Attack for Mars, and I lined up all the shots, and I did the big billion hurry up.
00:27:27
Speaker
For those that don't know, the ramps and the orbits, if you hit them so many times as you're stacking them up, you know, every time you hit that final shot, it starts that, like, big O-beam.
00:27:39
Speaker
and you hit it and it gives you like 100,000 points.
00:27:42
Speaker
But if you're able to stack the four modes, the four or five, and you successfully hit each shot as each one's running, a billion hurry up.
00:27:52
Speaker
It's an insanely cool little Easter egg.
00:27:55
Speaker
And I was able to do this in a pinball tournament.
00:27:57
Speaker
And the person behind me, I did it.
00:27:59
Speaker
And obviously, all of a sudden, I went straight to first because I just got a billion points.
00:28:03
Speaker
And then I'm feeling like King Kong on steroids, right?
00:28:06
Speaker
And I walk away from the machine.
00:28:08
Speaker
And one of the competitors is like, what the heck did you just do?
00:28:12
Speaker
What did you do?
00:28:13
Speaker
What's the big bill?
00:28:14
Speaker
It's the big bill.
00:28:14
Speaker
And hurry up.
00:28:15
Speaker
And he's like, OK, walk me through this.
00:28:17
Speaker
I'm like, sure.
00:28:18
Speaker
Anyhow, yeah.
00:28:20
Speaker
This game is just so great for so many reasons.
00:28:23
Speaker
Now I'm wishing I had my limited edition.
00:28:26
Speaker
Why did I do that?
00:28:27
Speaker
It's funny.
00:28:28
Speaker
So we had a lot of fun with our promo video in terms of like bringing in audio.
00:28:31
Speaker
I downloaded like the ROM and I extracted it and like got all the audio.
00:28:35
Speaker
There's a ton of stuff in there that I don't think ever made it into the game.
00:28:39
Speaker
But there is one where the alien goes five billion.
00:28:43
Speaker
And I don't even know what that is tied to.
00:28:46
Speaker
But apparently there's a five billion call out as well.
00:28:50
Speaker
So that's a super deep one.
00:28:51
Speaker
But maybe it never made it in.
00:28:54
Speaker
I don't know.
00:28:55
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:56
Speaker
man, they did have it in.
00:28:57
Speaker
And then the code was just like, everyone's just going to go for that.
00:29:00
Speaker
This is all this is going to be.
00:29:01
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:29:02
Speaker
Like, like, I'm probably the pin bot, you know, everyone goes for the billion shot.
00:29:05
Speaker
And it's like, that's the thing you do with that game.
00:29:07
Speaker
That's what's known for.
00:29:08
Speaker
So, okay.
00:29:10
Speaker
So I want you to walk me through constructing your topper.
00:29:12
Speaker
Like, how do you go about and saying, Hey, there's always, there's, there's a lot of toppers, some of them better than others.
00:29:19
Speaker
And some of them you can see behind me that are
00:29:22
Speaker
better than others.
00:29:26
Speaker
You can actually see like what goes into it to say, you know what people, if they're going to spend, you know, X amount of money.
00:29:34
Speaker
So it's, if it's 500, if it's a thousand, if it's 1200, 1300, what is it about the topper that you want to bring to the, to the environment, to the game experience?
00:29:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:29:45
Speaker
Man, that's a great question.
00:29:47
Speaker
I mean, we've kind of dove at this into different ways and we usually prepare ourselves to answer this question because there is a lot.
00:29:52
Speaker
What do you start?
00:29:54
Speaker
When you look at the like just the how we started, we literally started with the games that we owned.
00:29:59
Speaker
Right.
00:29:59
Speaker
So Twilight was a game that I own is, again, just one of my favorite games ever.
00:30:03
Speaker
But.
00:30:04
Speaker
We had access to it.
00:30:05
Speaker
So, you know, we were looking at it and thinking, what if, you know, if we were to design something, what could we do to make it really cool and unique?
00:30:13
Speaker
And that whole idea came from just sitting in my basement, staring at the top of that game and staring at the play field.
00:30:21
Speaker
Kind of happened because Godzilla is Godzilla, you know, is the most popular game is just absolutely blowing down doors.
00:30:28
Speaker
We both owned it.
00:30:29
Speaker
We loved it.
00:30:30
Speaker
We got sick of waiting to see what Stern was going to do.
00:30:33
Speaker
And we want to make something for ourselves and then came up with a really cool concept that kind of took on a life of its own.
00:30:40
Speaker
Lebowski is just, you know, it's one of the greatest themed games of all time.
00:30:44
Speaker
And we both love the movie.
00:30:46
Speaker
So there's one to pay an homage to that attack kind of the same thing.
00:30:51
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, we look at the markets for the games, right?
00:30:55
Speaker
Like, you know, how much is the game moving is important, right?
00:30:59
Speaker
Like, you want to pick a game that people are excited about in general because, therefore, that's going to translate to them being excited
Designing Memorable In-Game Topper Moments
00:31:07
Speaker
about the topper.
00:31:07
Speaker
And then we try to create – we don't use the term topper moments, but we try to create, you know, the pinball moments of toppers.
00:31:14
Speaker
So, like, now it's less, of course, about what games we own and it's more about, like –
00:31:20
Speaker
How much does the market care about the game and whatever capacity that is?
00:31:24
Speaker
So like with Lebowski, it was obvious.
00:31:26
Speaker
We were kind of nervous about that one because of the volume.
00:31:29
Speaker
So we do look at volume pretty closely.
00:31:31
Speaker
Like that obviously hit the mark for attack.
00:31:35
Speaker
We look at the options.
00:31:36
Speaker
So with Twilight, there were no well-known options.
00:31:42
Speaker
So that was easy.
00:31:44
Speaker
We also don't probably we're probably not going to try to compete with Stern stoppers too much going forward.
00:31:50
Speaker
I mean, it's just like really tough to compete with, like having a mode, the simplicity of install, you know, that type of thing.
00:31:57
Speaker
I mean, we get asked about JAWS like all the time, right, because that one kind of is underwhelming.
00:32:06
Speaker
I guarantee you could make a more impressive one.
00:32:08
Speaker
I guess I'll put it that way.
00:32:08
Speaker
We could, but it's like how many people are really going to move on it after getting what they have?
00:32:14
Speaker
We kind of got that with Godzilla a little bit.
00:32:16
Speaker
I mean, I think we thought there would be just like way more interest than what we... I mean, we've done a ton of them.
00:32:25
Speaker
I think the Conqueror upgrade is going to go a long way, but it's like what we heard over and over again is like, I love your stuff.
00:32:30
Speaker
I love my Twilight Zone.
00:32:31
Speaker
I love my Lebowski, but I've already got the Stern topper.
00:32:35
Speaker
So we look at a lot of different factors, but I think the most important one is like, how can we create a really cool moment with it?
00:32:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:43
Speaker
And then if we can tie those two things together, the business and the idea, then we're off to the races.
00:32:49
Speaker
There's been plenty of times where, again,
00:32:51
Speaker
to my earlier comment where, you know, our skills kind of evolved over the, over the course of the business.
00:32:57
Speaker
And now that we know what we know now, what, what moments could we create?
00:33:01
Speaker
And then you start thinking about, okay, what, what games lend themselves to those, that type of, you know, that type of moment, you know, so,
00:33:08
Speaker
Twilight Zone's got the ball rolling around.
00:33:11
Speaker
Obviously, it'd be really easy to make the ball a boulder, and Indiana Jones could all of a sudden come in the mix.
00:33:18
Speaker
A lot of people have always said, why don't you just do the same thing for Indiana Jones?
00:33:21
Speaker
But we don't want to be like the...
00:33:24
Speaker
do the same thing over and over again and be a one trick pony, you know, like that's, we're not, we don't want to be the topper guys that just have the ball rolling around.
00:33:31
Speaker
That's not the goal.
00:33:32
Speaker
Right.
00:33:33
Speaker
But we know how to make that type of, of interactivity.
00:33:37
Speaker
Is there a way to make it unique for something, you know, a game like Indy or, or whatever, and, you know, allow that moment to shine that then that's kind of like something that we think about as well, of course.
00:33:49
Speaker
Well, on the notes you sent over, speaking of these different titles that you've been speaking about, you have on here that you're going to be doing more licensed series toppers.
00:33:58
Speaker
Can you give us a little more insight in that?
00:34:00
Speaker
How many toppers you're doing?
00:34:01
Speaker
Yeah.
00:34:02
Speaker
I mean, we haven't firmed up a specific plan yet.
00:34:06
Speaker
We actually are doing another topper that we're announcing at Expo.
00:34:11
Speaker
It's actually going to be the first commercially available
00:34:14
Speaker
interactive em topper uh so we are doing another pinball topper with planetary here in a couple weeks um that'll be announced that's going to be a lower price point so we're excited about bringing something different to the market but getting back to the kind of mainstream you know valley williams titles we're of course going to be looking closely at what they did with cgc because those are the titles people want you know you got
00:34:39
Speaker
a bunch of other games with really good toppers.
00:34:41
Speaker
And you've got a bunch of games that are being possibly remade or being entered in the pipeline for the first time.
00:34:48
Speaker
So we're looking at all of those.
00:34:50
Speaker
We're looking closely at like what Brian Allen has done, looking at like why he made some of the decisions he made and how to augment that experience for people where they've really taken their game like up a notch in a couple of different levels and tap into that type of buyer.
00:35:06
Speaker
Because at the end of the day, not everybody's into mods.
00:35:10
Speaker
Certainly not everybody's into toppers.
00:35:12
Speaker
And we need to be mindful of why they're doing things to their game and really give them what they're looking for.
00:35:18
Speaker
So we're definitely going to be doing more planetary stuff in the mainstream market.
00:35:21
Speaker
I just haven't really decided exactly which one
00:35:25
Speaker
yet and and we are a company of the people so come to us please come to the booth at expo talk to us like yeah if you want to see something we love to talk to you about it and explain to us why that should be our next topper yeah i mean what do you guys do you guys have any uh recommendations like among these titles because we're certainly like
Future Topper Ideas and Game Selection
00:35:45
Speaker
curious what people think they would like to see well i can't just off the top of my head uh
00:35:52
Speaker
I think of the ones that have great toppers already.
00:35:55
Speaker
Right.
00:35:55
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:56
Speaker
But I guarantee there's something you could do with something like whitewater.
00:36:00
Speaker
Okay.
00:36:01
Speaker
Where you could definitely, and it has the cool effect, but there's a lot of those you can't get at all.
00:36:08
Speaker
And there's a lot of people who are looking at, okay, what else could we do with Whitewater?
00:36:12
Speaker
Whitewater is such a great game that that would be my suggestion is to consider how to do that.
00:36:21
Speaker
Okay.
00:36:21
Speaker
I'll put it this way.
00:36:23
Speaker
And this is actually what we were getting down with on current companies that are releasing things.
00:36:30
Speaker
What makes a great game?
00:36:32
Speaker
Because a lot of times it's just whatever connection people have, whatever experience people have when playing it.
00:36:39
Speaker
Some people, a great game means a competitive layout, balanced scoring and something tournament ready.
00:36:45
Speaker
Well, there's a lot of games that don't fit that category that people still like having in their house.
00:36:52
Speaker
And so what is it about that that makes them fun and be able to keep them around?
00:36:58
Speaker
Yeah, you know, Whitewater is an interesting one.
00:37:00
Speaker
We've talked about Adams quite a bit, you know, which obviously tons of those toppers out there came with a topper.
00:37:08
Speaker
It would be an interesting business decision to try to compete with that.
00:37:11
Speaker
But I mean, imagine if we took the house to another level where it's almost like a cuckoo clock and like interactive things are happening in the windows and it's a $5,000 topper is where I'm getting at.
00:37:24
Speaker
No, but I mean, like there's, you know, we have a lot of fun with like,
00:37:27
Speaker
all these ideas.
00:37:29
Speaker
We have to think about licensing, even in the case with working with Planetaria, like we can't with Monster Bash, we have to work around all the different characters.
00:37:37
Speaker
Adams is probably going to be very difficult to do, even with the license.
00:37:41
Speaker
Whitewater is cool.
00:37:43
Speaker
I mean, in the sense of it's open from a licensing perspective in terms of a third party license, it would really come down to like, how can we tie a moment in the gameplay?
00:37:56
Speaker
So we would, if we did pursue that one, we'd probably sit down with someone like you, Scott, and be like, Hey, like, what is, what do you get excited about achieving in that game?
00:38:03
Speaker
And then how can we augment that?
00:38:05
Speaker
And then is that special enough to build a topper for?
00:38:08
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:09
Speaker
So I think the one that comes to my mind, I mean, it's because I've owned it for the last decade, is World Cup soccer.
00:38:14
Speaker
And I know from a third-party standpoint, FIFA is a pain in the butt to deal with.
00:38:19
Speaker
But just some of the moments in that game, when you score a goal, if you have the giant TV over the stands, it doesn't have to be the topper itself, but in the corner, if it just did goal on the back, they have fireworks incorporated in that thing.
00:38:33
Speaker
If you can make it look like fireworks... I know you're not going to have actual fireworks going off, but if you could do plastics...
00:38:38
Speaker
with the lights trailing up so it looks like they're fireworks going off, you know?
00:38:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:42
Speaker
A little crowd articulating.
00:38:44
Speaker
Every time you make a goal, they pop up and they cheer, you know?
00:38:47
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:47
Speaker
Just stuff like that.
00:38:48
Speaker
You almost make it like you're looking in on the stadium.
00:38:51
Speaker
You know, the jumbotrons in there and the, yeah, you can make the characters kind of come to life.
00:38:56
Speaker
And that one, we wouldn't really need to, to work with FIFA.
00:39:00
Speaker
You know, it's like with Adams, it's like, okay, you got to do some things to make it an Adam stopper.
00:39:04
Speaker
But with like world cup, you wouldn't have to like, you don't have to have the dog up there, you know?
00:39:08
Speaker
Yeah.
00:39:09
Speaker
Um,
00:39:09
Speaker
For example.
00:39:10
Speaker
So yeah, I like that one.
00:39:11
Speaker
I mean, that was my attack for you.
00:39:15
Speaker
You know, you said attack like that game was the one where it was like, okay, I get this.
00:39:18
Speaker
I'm scoring goals.
00:39:19
Speaker
I'm a kid and pinball is awesome.
00:39:22
Speaker
So certainly have a soft spot for that one.
00:39:25
Speaker
Well, even like Tim Kitzrow would probably even still be up for doing some more call outs.
00:39:28
Speaker
Because you said you did more like you did sound clips for the topper for Attack of the M. Well, that was for the promo video.
00:39:32
Speaker
So there's nothing in the topper, just to be clear.
00:39:34
Speaker
But there's a ton of great sounds.
00:39:37
Speaker
And we have talked about, you know, for some even classic EM games, we're not doing that.
00:39:41
Speaker
But like, how could you possibly build some sound stuff into it?
00:39:46
Speaker
We still want to build a topper with some smoke one way or another.
00:39:50
Speaker
Wow.
00:39:50
Speaker
That would be interesting.
00:39:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:39:55
Speaker
Okay, so here's what I did.
00:39:57
Speaker
I just pulled up Pinside Top 100 and just going down and seeing the games.
00:40:02
Speaker
So what I'm going to do is I'm going to kind of focus on games that are maybe the DMD, like pre-2010.
00:40:11
Speaker
And so I'm looking at games that I'm like, how could that take it to the next level?
00:40:16
Speaker
Okay, Lord of the Rings.
00:40:18
Speaker
Wow.
00:40:18
Speaker
Don't start.
00:40:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:21
Speaker
No, I know there's a lot of options, but there's also a lot of fantasy options that you could dance around and incorporate.
00:40:28
Speaker
We react that way because we've got an idea already that we're going to build at some point.
00:40:33
Speaker
I think it's pretty over the top.
00:40:37
Speaker
And it's we actually so we do a lot of collaborating with other mod makers.
00:40:42
Speaker
I'll give a shout out to Jimmy Lifham with 86 Pixels who builds.
00:40:48
Speaker
They did the screen on that for the back box of Twilight Zone.
00:40:51
Speaker
You know what I'm talking about?
00:40:52
Speaker
Oh, yes, I do.
00:40:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:53
Speaker
Pin Vision.
00:40:54
Speaker
Is it called Pin Vision?
00:40:55
Speaker
I think so.
00:40:56
Speaker
Okay, it may be called pin vision.
00:40:58
Speaker
So anyway, he made this like screen that sits in the back box of Twilight Zone and he may have done it for another.
00:41:05
Speaker
And it's really cool because it does it shows like different modes.
00:41:10
Speaker
And shout out to him.
00:41:11
Speaker
He spent a ton of time on the white star system, which is for Lord of the Rings, because we want to do some stuff with like jackpot one, jackpot two, jackpot three, because that's like a huge moment in that game.
00:41:23
Speaker
And we want to know that that's happening.
00:41:25
Speaker
And that's that's a difficult piece of information to know is happening in that game.
00:41:30
Speaker
So with Lord of the Rings, for example, it's like we know what we want to do.
00:41:35
Speaker
Now we got to figure out how to do it.
00:41:36
Speaker
And we've just got to kind of spend some time with him to kind of get there.
00:41:41
Speaker
But that that that's the type of game where we do like targeting that because we know people take that game really far.
00:41:50
Speaker
Right.
00:41:50
Speaker
Like we want to.
00:41:51
Speaker
That would be one of my issues with World Cup is like how many people out there are really taking that game to the ultimate destination, its ultimate self, because we need a lot of people doing that from a business perspective to build a top.
00:42:05
Speaker
You're saying buy the game, mod it, clean it.
00:42:07
Speaker
like who's doing that for what games?
00:42:10
Speaker
Cause they're not doing it for world cup.
00:42:12
Speaker
I mean, Circus Voltaire, I'll talk about it a little bit because it is on our radar.
00:42:15
Speaker
Like people do do that with Circus Voltaire.
00:42:17
Speaker
Like it is an amazing title for a lot of different reasons.
00:42:21
Speaker
People invest money.
00:42:23
Speaker
If you put the led option in the back box, it looks really good.
00:42:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:42:28
Speaker
So, um,
00:42:31
Speaker
That's one to where the volume wasn't crazy high, but the passion is there.
00:42:37
Speaker
It seems like an easier choice.
00:42:39
Speaker
They're not going to remake it, I wouldn't think.
00:42:41
Speaker
Maybe.
00:42:41
Speaker
I don't know.
00:42:42
Speaker
They made Funhouse.
00:42:45
Speaker
That would be a factor, too.
00:42:46
Speaker
Even with...
00:42:50
Speaker
thinking about doing something for Medieval Madness, they're going to re-release that game and they're going to make those toppers.
00:42:57
Speaker
We don't need to compete with that.
00:43:00
Speaker
But there's also Tales of the Arabian Nights.
00:43:03
Speaker
There's a lot of really good options there.
00:43:04
Speaker
Theater of Magic.
00:43:07
Speaker
Keep going down your list.
00:43:09
Speaker
You'll get to those.
00:43:11
Speaker
Yeah, let's see.
00:43:12
Speaker
Other things that popped up, and you could even throw up like ACDC because ACDC didn't have a lot of great options.
00:43:18
Speaker
I know you'd have to deal with licensing in the band, but you could also do a lot of hell themed on that.
00:43:27
Speaker
Okay.
00:43:28
Speaker
Simpsons again.
00:43:29
Speaker
That would be kind of fun.
00:43:30
Speaker
Simpsons would be cool.
00:43:31
Speaker
Yeah.
00:43:32
Speaker
Tron doesn't have a lot of options, but you could do things again.
00:43:36
Speaker
I know you're dealing with Disney.
00:43:37
Speaker
You're dealing with that kind of stuff, but that is a game that if it's, I actually had one of the prettiest Trons out there that was custom modded.
00:43:48
Speaker
And it was amazing.
00:43:49
Speaker
And so, like, someone who's really into Tron, they would definitely do that.
00:43:54
Speaker
Well, in that game, I swore that game's probably the top modded game of all time.
00:43:59
Speaker
Could be, yeah.
00:44:00
Speaker
There's so many different mods for it, and everyone has to have that.
00:44:03
Speaker
I didn't realize.
00:44:04
Speaker
That's interesting because, like, obviously Twilight and Godzilla would be thrown into that comment.
00:44:08
Speaker
But we would put Tron there, too.
00:44:10
Speaker
That's good to know.
00:44:12
Speaker
I mean, if we did, like, the light cycle races where it's just literally the topper is just, like, doing almost like that centipede game where the lights are following each other.
00:44:21
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:22
Speaker
And if we did Tron, it would have to be, like, over the top.
00:44:26
Speaker
Awesome.
00:44:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:27
Speaker
I like the challenge.
00:44:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:30
Speaker
Yeah, let's see.
00:44:31
Speaker
Okay, now we're kind of getting into some other stuff.
00:44:37
Speaker
Funhaus, again, they're doing stuff.
00:44:38
Speaker
Whirlwind.
00:44:39
Speaker
Everyone always... Whirlwind's like gargling, right?
00:44:42
Speaker
Whirlwind put a leaf blower up there and just blow their hair back.
00:44:47
Speaker
They're going to put one of those fans you put on your floor when you've got to dry it out.
00:44:50
Speaker
That's what they're going to put as their topper, right?
00:44:52
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:44:53
Speaker
We're going to do three fans.
00:44:55
Speaker
Or underneath, so it blows your legs.
Creative and Aesthetic Enhancements
00:44:58
Speaker
Like, whoa!
00:44:58
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:45:01
Speaker
I get away.
00:45:02
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:02
Speaker
I guess you're kind of getting down into the weeds here.
00:45:06
Speaker
And a flash.
00:45:07
Speaker
Get away.
00:45:07
Speaker
Could be a good one too.
00:45:09
Speaker
Get away.
00:45:09
Speaker
Could be a fun one.
00:45:10
Speaker
The siren was a thing.
00:45:12
Speaker
Right.
00:45:12
Speaker
But it's like, if you could take that to the next level, I think people.
00:45:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:18
Speaker
Is there a deeper title that we've considered that would surprise these guys?
00:45:22
Speaker
I'm trying to think.
00:45:23
Speaker
A deep root title?
00:45:25
Speaker
No, no, a deeper title.
00:45:27
Speaker
I was like, a deep root title?
00:45:28
Speaker
Did they make any?
00:45:30
Speaker
No, no.
00:45:32
Speaker
They were on the Raw zone originally.
00:45:35
Speaker
How about the Evaporating Money topper where you just pay for it?
00:45:39
Speaker
Dracula would be a great example of a deeper title that we would love.
00:45:43
Speaker
I mean, that was definitely modded a lot too.
00:45:47
Speaker
When you put a game in an actual casket.
00:45:49
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:45:51
Speaker
That was good.
00:45:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:52
Speaker
We had some good ideas for TNA.
00:45:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:57
Speaker
I can see that.
00:46:00
Speaker
That would be cool.
00:46:01
Speaker
We did a panel at Expo and bounced around a bunch of ideas.
00:46:05
Speaker
I think that indie comes up a ton.
00:46:08
Speaker
Ghostbusters.
00:46:11
Speaker
You look at the toppers that I would say significantly underperformed.
00:46:16
Speaker
You can put Ghostbusters up there.
00:46:19
Speaker
You can definitely put Star Wars.
00:46:24
Speaker
There's like a billion better mods than having R2D2 up there.
00:46:29
Speaker
I will say, hands down, our number one request is Monster Bash.
00:46:32
Speaker
And I think that kind of played into our decision to do Attack because it's like that many people want that topper and they had it available to them.
00:46:39
Speaker
Like, clearly they didn't hit enough with their toppers for their games.
00:46:45
Speaker
No, and they didn't.
00:46:46
Speaker
And the difference between that one and Attack from Mars, like the.
00:46:52
Speaker
There's some articulation.
00:46:53
Speaker
So you got into it with articulation, something that connects with it.
00:46:57
Speaker
With the Monster Bash one, it's okay.
00:47:00
Speaker
I could probably make a similar one by buying some dolls and gluing them up there.
00:47:06
Speaker
So there's not enough connection with the game to make it worth a lot of money.
00:47:11
Speaker
That's why I'm saying medieval madness would still be fine because it's a great topper, but it's just, it's just like monster bash.
00:47:18
Speaker
It's some sculpts that set there, which is fine.
00:47:20
Speaker
I think it does great, but it's, I think if you took it to the next level, people.
00:47:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:47:24
Speaker
I mean, definitely like replicating the castle up top and making that articulate.
00:47:29
Speaker
I think it would, it would be, it'd be a hit for sure.
00:47:33
Speaker
I think, you know, we look at the sculpts and every, you know, from the CGCs and, you know, of course we love the molded pieces as much as anybody else.
00:47:42
Speaker
But I think we look at the toppers more as a light show as much as it is, you know, the molds and sculpts themselves, right?
00:47:51
Speaker
So, you know, what's it going to look like in your arcade room?
00:47:54
Speaker
And I think a lot of our...
00:47:57
Speaker
Business is really built around like how can we make people's game rooms more, you know, and, you know, more personable than themselves.
00:48:03
Speaker
Like, like, how can you mod your game room just like you can mod your game?
00:48:07
Speaker
Right.
00:48:07
Speaker
So the light show that comes off Attack from Mars, if you play in a dark setting, which I do, but if you play in a dark setting, that thing just takes things to another level.
00:48:16
Speaker
Like we're talking about with the strobe multiball and when the topper is going off with it.
00:48:21
Speaker
yeah, it, it, it takes it up just a whole nother notch and yeah, you might have an epileptic seizure, but it's worth it.
00:48:28
Speaker
You know, the other game that really gets modded a lot is a creature from the black lagoon.
00:48:33
Speaker
Yeah, sure.
00:48:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:48:34
Speaker
We've, we've definitely spent some time talking about that one, not idea wise, but just like getting that on the radar.
00:48:39
Speaker
I mean, it's so loved.
00:48:40
Speaker
We're, we're big mod guys.
00:48:41
Speaker
I mean, we,
00:48:42
Speaker
we do pin sound on a bunch of our games and we, we, we take it various degrees when we have the time.
00:48:48
Speaker
Alec has a T2 that is hands down like the baddest ass T2 I've ever seen.
00:48:53
Speaker
And it's, it's like the amount he's put into that.
00:48:58
Speaker
So yeah, creature is, is right there, right?
00:49:01
Speaker
It's like people put a lot of time into that one.
00:49:03
Speaker
So that would be a good fit.
00:49:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:06
Speaker
We've owned that game in our, in my family's history, I should say, I'd have known to my brother, it did, but yeah,
00:49:12
Speaker
Spent a lot of time on it.
00:49:13
Speaker
I was happy when he got rid of it.
00:49:18
Speaker
Eventually, you're like, okay, I'm done.
00:49:20
Speaker
How long have you guys been doing this?
Journey from Enthusiasts to Creators
00:49:24
Speaker
Everybody tells their pinball origin story.
00:49:28
Speaker
How long have you guys been really interested in pinball?
00:49:30
Speaker
When did you start getting the bug for modding?
00:49:33
Speaker
And when did you say, you know what, we can take it to the next level and actually start making things to sell?
00:49:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:39
Speaker
You want me to take this one?
00:49:40
Speaker
You want to start it off with a comment?
00:49:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:42
Speaker
It's kind of, it's kind of interesting one.
00:49:44
Speaker
I mean, well, I, I've been in the hobby off and on for a while.
00:49:49
Speaker
Alex been really into it for, for longer than I am of recent.
00:49:53
Speaker
I used to go over to his house and kind of joke about how he would have these amazing machines.
00:49:57
Speaker
I think you had like X-Men, which was like five or 6k.
00:50:00
Speaker
And then you had Lord of the Rings and he would put like
00:50:02
Speaker
a couple thousand dollars worth of stuff into it.
00:50:04
Speaker
And I'd be like, it doesn't make any sense to me why this needs more stuff.
00:50:07
Speaker
It's already freaking amazing.
00:50:09
Speaker
And then I got a medieval madness standard CGC and like turned it into a Royal.
00:50:15
Speaker
And I was hooked, you know, I was like, Oh my God, it's so much better.
00:50:18
Speaker
And I had so much fun doing it.
00:50:20
Speaker
Right.
00:50:20
Speaker
Like,
00:50:21
Speaker
And you did the lights underneath because, man, that was a pain.
00:50:24
Speaker
That was like a six hour.
00:50:26
Speaker
Oh, my gosh.
00:50:27
Speaker
That was painful.
00:50:28
Speaker
I still have that harness because it's like it's just like it was so difficult to get out of there.
00:50:33
Speaker
Well, basically, the standard version didn't come with RGB lights.
00:50:36
Speaker
You had to take out all the.
00:50:37
Speaker
Is that what you're talking about, Scott?
00:50:40
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:40
Speaker
So I did exactly the same thing about the standard.
00:50:42
Speaker
And so I got the, you know, the.
00:50:43
Speaker
It didn't have RGB lighting.
00:50:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:46
Speaker
So you had to take out this crazy ass GI line that goes throughout their entire thing and replace it with a replacement GI.
00:50:54
Speaker
So big screen.
00:50:55
Speaker
So anyway, so we got our both got our Godzilla on the same day.
00:51:00
Speaker
Premiums is about 12 months into the run.
00:51:04
Speaker
Okay.
00:51:05
Speaker
Here's a quick question, though.
00:51:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:06
Speaker
On your back on your speaker light panel, yours change color or do they just have one color?
00:51:13
Speaker
Just one color.
00:51:13
Speaker
That was, that is the non-royalness of my royal.
00:51:17
Speaker
Okay.
00:51:19
Speaker
You can actually do it so it can change color.
00:51:21
Speaker
And I did it.
00:51:22
Speaker
Well, I don't have it anymore.
00:51:24
Speaker
I saw it to make another topper.
00:51:26
Speaker
You could have done it.
00:51:27
Speaker
It was kind of fun.
00:51:29
Speaker
I was able to figure out how to do that.
00:51:32
Speaker
There's a very unique story about my medieval madness.
00:51:36
Speaker
It's not appropriate for this conversation, but I'll have to tell you about it at some point.
00:51:41
Speaker
Well, that's coming up.
00:51:43
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:51:44
Speaker
So some people out there... Sign up to the Patreon and you can get exclusive access.
00:51:49
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:51:51
Speaker
But anyway, we got our Godzilla on the same day.
00:51:53
Speaker
We joked about who was taking which one.
00:51:55
Speaker
Alec ended up having a major playfield issue with his Godzilla.
00:52:00
Speaker
They got the turd out of the tube.
00:52:01
Speaker
It shipped right below the Magna save.
00:52:03
Speaker
So it literally started coming apart.
00:52:06
Speaker
Oh, wow.
00:52:07
Speaker
So now he's got...
00:52:09
Speaker
Now he's got a play field that'll never get installed, right?
00:52:12
Speaker
No, I got a play field mounted on my wall.
00:52:15
Speaker
We fixed the play field.
00:52:17
Speaker
Rob and I were able to actually fix the play field.
00:52:20
Speaker
Yes, it was fixed and then he got a play field out of it.
00:52:24
Speaker
But anyway, yeah.
00:52:25
Speaker
So like I come from the toy space.
00:52:27
Speaker
So I've done a ton of prototyping with like toys as part of another business.
00:52:32
Speaker
Alec and I used to work together.
00:52:34
Speaker
We're good friends now and we're both into the hobby.
00:52:37
Speaker
Got these machines.
00:52:40
Speaker
and there was no timetable for the Godzilla topper.
00:52:43
Speaker
So I was like, I'm going to make something.
00:52:45
Speaker
He made one too.
00:52:46
Speaker
It wasn't nearly as cool what I ended up making, which was layered plastic that originally was based on a photograph of the side of the premium cabinet.
00:52:55
Speaker
And ultimately I wasn't happy with like the color density of the photograph.
00:52:59
Speaker
So I ended up hiring an artist to like recreate the,
00:53:02
Speaker
the side cabinet artwork for Godzilla and I made it and it looked fantastic.
00:53:08
Speaker
I mean, it's basically the layout of the premium cabinet.
00:53:14
Speaker
And Alec was like, I want one because my like has toys on top of my not so great toys on top of my Godzilla.
00:53:25
Speaker
So we ended up like getting that information out there and we ended up selling a handful of these things because it was like it was pretty expensive to make.
00:53:34
Speaker
And that was prior to like officially forming the company.
00:53:36
Speaker
So that was not compliant with licensing.
00:53:39
Speaker
And so this was basically a homebrew.
00:53:42
Speaker
This is like a family.
00:53:43
Speaker
Yeah, it was you just doing stuff.
00:53:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:53:45
Speaker
Yeah.
00:53:46
Speaker
The people I mean, we made less than I think we made like 25 of them.
00:53:51
Speaker
You can see them pop up on Pinside every once in a while.
00:53:55
Speaker
And we decided to do this, you know, in that capacity.
00:53:58
Speaker
And then eventually we, Alec challenged me to make the most packed pinball machine in pinball, Twilight Zone, a topper that would do that
Twilight Zone Topper Development and Market Reception
00:54:11
Speaker
justice.
00:54:11
Speaker
And that's kind of how we went off to the races was making that topper.
00:54:16
Speaker
I'd never seen anything in the market that I felt like really was worthy of, you know, Twilight Zone.
00:54:22
Speaker
People were taking that thing off the slot machines, you know, and that was kind of like the biggest, like the coolest topper that became the unobtainium thing.
00:54:30
Speaker
But these things are selling for like $2,000, $3,000.
00:54:32
Speaker
And even then, I didn't understand it.
00:54:35
Speaker
It just didn't make sense to me for the price point.
00:54:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:39
Speaker
when we were in that basement, just staring at the game, like what's the best moments of these, this game, you know, like, like we kind of just mapped out what our favorite parts of that game were.
00:54:49
Speaker
And then of course, like, wouldn't it be, wouldn't it be cool if like, what if, what if the gumball actually had a gumball come out?
00:54:55
Speaker
Like what if we were actually able to make this thing go around?
00:54:58
Speaker
And then that just kind of like push things to another level.
00:55:02
Speaker
So, yeah, so we launched that at TPF 2022.
00:55:04
Speaker
We kind of got things ready.
00:55:09
Speaker
We took it to the show.
00:55:11
Speaker
We started to reach out to media.
00:55:14
Speaker
Kerry Hardy ended up doing our install video for us.
00:55:18
Speaker
I used to think Kerry was the creator of Penn Stadiums because I would watch this video of him installing Penn Stadiums.
00:55:22
Speaker
Like, oh, that's the guy that made Penn Stadium.
00:55:24
Speaker
So I learned that he did install videos as part of his content.
00:55:28
Speaker
And it was universally praised from the beginning.
00:55:31
Speaker
I mean, despite being $1,600, which is crazy amount of money to spend on a topper, like people were like, I'm rebuying Twilight Zone because I want this topper.
00:55:42
Speaker
And that was, of course, for entering the hobby brand new and fresh.
00:55:46
Speaker
That was the ultimate compliment for sure.
00:55:48
Speaker
That is.
00:55:49
Speaker
That's awesome.
00:55:50
Speaker
That's actually my origin story is I've re-bought Twilight Zone because I saw American Pinball's black and white version that they made.
00:55:58
Speaker
Yeah, that was cool.
00:55:59
Speaker
I didn't realize you could do something like that.
00:56:02
Speaker
I'm like, well, now I need to go buy that again.
00:56:06
Speaker
It was right when COVID started.
00:56:08
Speaker
We just had time on our hands and I was able to source a game right before the prices all went up and had an awesome project.
00:56:17
Speaker
Awesome.
00:56:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:19
Speaker
I'm excited for this topper.
00:56:20
Speaker
This, this attack from Mars topper is insanely cool.
00:56:23
Speaker
If you're going to pinball expo, you need to check it out.
00:56:25
Speaker
So Joel reminded me when you guys did TPF this year, you had a peephole at your booth.
00:56:32
Speaker
So you can kind of see what the next little secret was coming.
00:56:35
Speaker
Are you going to have something like that at the booth this year for expo?
00:56:38
Speaker
I do remember Joel coming by.
00:56:40
Speaker
We did a little highlight reel and I think I, uh, mistyped his last name.
00:56:44
Speaker
So Joel, I apologize for writing your last name wrong, but he was super excited about it.
00:56:49
Speaker
Um, we had a people, so people could get a little glimpse at it.
00:56:52
Speaker
We do not have that at this show, but we are going to be revealing another topper.
00:56:56
Speaker
As I mentioned, we're going to have a homebrew section within our booth.
00:56:59
Speaker
So we're going to have, uh,
00:57:02
Speaker
Brad, I forget his last name, but we're gonna have Friday the 13th in our booth, which is a huge title at one best of show at TPF.
00:57:10
Speaker
And then we're going to have another title from a St.
00:57:12
Speaker
Louis homebrew guy who's brand new to the scene.
00:57:15
Speaker
And this thing is crazy.
00:57:17
Speaker
Yeah, you're going to love it.
00:57:18
Speaker
So we got a 10 by 30 booth.
00:57:20
Speaker
Thank you, Rob Burke, for hooking us up.
00:57:22
Speaker
We got a homebrew section.
00:57:23
Speaker
Then we're going to have attack and this new topper.
00:57:26
Speaker
And then we're going to have our color Godzilla.
00:57:29
Speaker
topper and our black and white Godzilla topper.
00:57:31
Speaker
So we're going to have both those on display with the screens at Expo.
00:57:35
Speaker
Nice.
00:57:36
Speaker
I will say that people thing, that was my favorite part of TPA.
00:57:41
Speaker
Just watching the people have to bend over.
00:57:43
Speaker
And some people that literally probably haven't been over and like got down on one knee in like maybe 30 years, try to get down to watch, you know, see what the heck they were looking at.
00:57:51
Speaker
Everyone thought they were going to be getting an eyeful of something else.
00:57:54
Speaker
And then when they actually saw there was like an actual topper, we weren't trying to just like, you know, joke, pull joke on them.
00:58:00
Speaker
That was my favorite.
00:58:01
Speaker
That was my favorite part of the show.
00:58:02
Speaker
And that was his brain shot.
00:58:04
Speaker
Yeah, it's on Instagram.
00:58:05
Speaker
Go back to March for the electric playground.
00:58:07
Speaker
You'll probably see Kerry Hardy with a big cheese on his face when he sees what's inside that hole.
00:58:11
Speaker
When you're chained to a booth and you got to sit there for hours, you need entertainment.
00:58:16
Speaker
I can only play so many games of Twilight Zone and Godzilla.
00:58:19
Speaker
So that peephole gave me so much just relief.
00:58:23
Speaker
I just watch this.
00:58:25
Speaker
I encourage everybody that was like, hey, you need to come look at our peephole.
00:58:29
Speaker
It was called the glory hole by the end of it.
00:58:31
Speaker
Wow.
00:58:32
Speaker
Wow.
00:58:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:58:34
Speaker
that's a that's a that's a little different context the uh okay so legit i have a twilight zone and i do have like a pyramid on top but dang your your one looks so good it's like uh yeah that that looks like something i would do it yeah we're on a bit of a hiatus on that one right now we're building other things okay but there's a wait list it says join wait list so i we'll build it again we'll build it again
00:58:58
Speaker
Did you see the silver screen edition on there?
00:59:01
Speaker
I did.
00:59:01
Speaker
I was actually, I was there.
00:59:02
Speaker
We haven't, we haven't really promoted it.
00:59:04
Speaker
So we did end up making, I guess I'll give a shout out to great American gaming.
00:59:09
Speaker
They made five,
00:59:11
Speaker
Well, they're making some black and white toppers for sale and they acquired five toppers from us.
00:59:16
Speaker
They're black and white additions.
00:59:17
Speaker
They're going to be coming with that game when you buy it.
00:59:20
Speaker
It'll be expensive, I'm sure, but we've got some available.
00:59:24
Speaker
We actually have a wall version that has actually a working clock and you can flip a little switch and make the ball go.
00:59:29
Speaker
So we sell quite a few of them to just collectors who used to own the game.
00:59:33
Speaker
Oh, the wall art thing.
00:59:34
Speaker
Oh, wow.
00:59:34
Speaker
Yeah.
Expanding Product Appeal Beyond Pinball Machines
00:59:35
Speaker
So.
00:59:35
Speaker
Okay.
00:59:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:59:37
Speaker
if you don't have twilight zone and you want to pay homage to the amazingness of that game, you can get a wall version of our topper.
00:59:46
Speaker
It's really, and you actually, the big Lebowski too.
00:59:48
Speaker
I saw there's a wall art version of the big Lebowski.
00:59:51
Speaker
So, so you can, you can definitely experience your stuff if you don't have the games.
00:59:57
Speaker
For sure.
00:59:58
Speaker
For sure.
00:59:58
Speaker
All right.
00:59:59
Speaker
Is there anything we didn't cover that you guys are just like this?
01:00:02
Speaker
You got to know about this before we shut this down.
01:00:05
Speaker
No, I mean, I think we got most of it.
01:00:08
Speaker
I would say, you know, the EM topper that we're going to be doing, I think it's fun to throw a shout out to Rob Burke.
01:00:15
Speaker
This is – he's been pushing for two years for us to do an EM topper.
01:00:19
Speaker
And if you know Rob, you can imagine how those conversations went.
01:00:24
Speaker
Yep, yep.
01:00:25
Speaker
He is like the epitome of why I love this hobby so much.
01:00:30
Speaker
He's just such a crazy eccentric guy.
01:00:33
Speaker
Just never afraid to share an opinion, especially when you don't ask for one.
01:00:38
Speaker
And he really pushed us to do this EM topper.
01:00:41
Speaker
And I think it came out amazing.
01:00:44
Speaker
I just can't wait for him to see it and to be there when he gets to see it and actually show that we did this for him.
01:00:51
Speaker
And, you know, we'll see if it actually sells, but we'll, you know.
01:00:54
Speaker
it'll be, it's going to be a fun reveal at the very least.
01:00:57
Speaker
So make sure people come by the booth to check that out for sure.
01:01:00
Speaker
Yeah, definitely.
01:01:02
Speaker
Well, some of the old school things are great.
01:01:04
Speaker
Like I, and I totally forgot about this, but I remembered it when I, when I saw the clip at the end of Superman too,
01:01:11
Speaker
when he goes in and attacks the bully.
01:01:13
Speaker
Do you guys remember this scene?
01:01:14
Speaker
He puts him on a tray and then throws him down the bar, and the guy crashes into a pinball machine, and the back of the pinball machine is the donkey kicking his head.
01:01:25
Speaker
I'm like, that's the kind of stuff that you want to see.
01:01:29
Speaker
You want to see that kind of stuff.
01:01:33
Speaker
How come they haven't made a classic Superman game?
01:01:36
Speaker
That is just like...
01:01:39
Speaker
criminal it's criminal that is perfect word yeah yeah you know all you need is you need the music and you need christopher reeve that's pretty much it you hit that start button that soundtrack hits like that would i'm in just get i'll slide a blank check across the table yeah a number feels fair
01:02:00
Speaker
All right.
01:02:00
Speaker
So our audience has been listening this whole time.
01:02:02
Speaker
If you want them to get a hold of you for their topper ideas or for questions or even buying, how do they get a hold of you guys?
01:02:10
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:11
Speaker
I mean, we're on all the stuff, right?
01:02:13
Speaker
Pinside, of course, our website, we've got a contact form.
01:02:16
Speaker
A lot of people will get a hold of us there if they've got like a special request.
01:02:19
Speaker
We don't do like one-off toppers.
01:02:21
Speaker
But if you've got an idea, you know, we'd love to hear about that.
01:02:25
Speaker
Instagram.
01:02:26
Speaker
We've got quite a bit going on there and Facebook as well.
01:02:28
Speaker
So anywhere, but mainly you can find all that through the electric playgrounds website, which is T P pinball.com.
01:02:36
Speaker
Awesome.
01:02:38
Speaker
And if you want to get ahold of us, we are loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com.
01:02:41
Speaker
You can get ahold of us on all the socials, Facebook, Instagram, X, Twitter, Twitch, I guess X and Twitter, the same thing.
01:02:49
Speaker
Also, if you haven't been noticing, we've been sporting our Loser Kid gear in support of Attack from Mars.
01:02:54
Speaker
We got the Loser Kid Attacks, right?
01:02:57
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:57
Speaker
And so you want to get that?
01:02:59
Speaker
SilverballSwag.com slash Loser Kid.
01:03:02
Speaker
Shoes, all that jazz.
01:03:03
Speaker
The hat list is now officially closed.
01:03:05
Speaker
We're no longer taking orders for that.
01:03:06
Speaker
We might have some extra expo.
01:03:08
Speaker
So if you missed out, run into us.
01:03:10
Speaker
Say, hey, I want a hat.
01:03:11
Speaker
See if we can get one.
01:03:12
Speaker
You can still get hats.
01:03:13
Speaker
We can send them to you.
01:03:14
Speaker
But we just won't have them ready for expo.
01:03:18
Speaker
Exactly.
01:03:18
Speaker
So Scott, give us our last word.
01:03:21
Speaker
You know, I'd like to thank Rob and Alec for coming on and absolutely go check out this attack from our topper.
01:03:26
Speaker
And if you want to get a better Godzilla topper, check out their Godzilla topper and we'll see you guys at Expo.
01:03:44
Speaker
This just soon reports are coming in from all over the world.
01:03:47
Speaker
Greetings, Earthling!
01:03:49
Speaker
Ah!
01:04:16
Speaker
Germany is victorious!
01:04:25
Speaker
Watch out, men!
01:04:26
Speaker
They've got a big ol' beam!
01:04:35
Speaker
Look out!
01:04:36
Speaker
Martian!
01:04:44
Speaker
Jackpot!
01:04:48
Speaker
Go for the extra ball!
01:04:50
Speaker
Extra ball!
01:04:57
Speaker
Get the troops ready!
01:05:13
Speaker
You cannot defeat our force field!
01:05:17
Speaker
Well done, soldier!
01:05:29
Speaker
Total annihilation!
01:05:34
Speaker
Woohoo!
01:05:51
Speaker
Get every available man!
01:05:55
Speaker
The fate of the world is in your hands!