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Star Wars and Walking Dead | Stern Pinball's Latest Creations
0 Playsin 7 hours
The Legendary John Borg sits down with us to talk about his two more recent games, Star Wars Fall of the Empire and The Walking Dead Remastered.
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Transcript
00:00:07
Speaker
Thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. I am Josh Roop. With me, my co-captain. Scott Larson. And Scott. Today is an awesome day. I'm excited. Two games have released in the last, like, two months. We got Walking Dead. We got Star Wars Fate of the Empire.
00:00:23
Speaker
Both amazing games. Fall of the Empire. Fall of the Empire. Tomato, tomato, tomato, tomato. If you're going to buy these games, Scott, where are you getting them from?
00:00:34
Speaker
You know, Zach and Nicole at Flippin' Out Pinball, um they've helped us out. We're great. And I i just got a Jaws 70 for my buddy. So if you want to get it, reach out to them. They're always good help.
00:00:46
Speaker
Exactly. And one more thing before we get to our guests. If you see sitting next to me, I've got this beautiful Earthshaker guitar that I had custom made from top to bottom. from a gentleman called Daniel Clark with Sithara guitars.
00:01:01
Speaker
Amazing, amazing quality. I can't wait to get, we're to have Daniel on to talk more about it. Seriously, this guitar is amazing. If you like guitars and you like pinball machines, it's a no brainer.
00:01:13
Speaker
The process takes a little bit. So be comfortable with a little bit of a wait, but I promise you it is worth the wait. So if you want more information, hit us up. We'll send you in the right direction. Scott, will you introduce our guest for us today?
00:01:24
Speaker
We have legendary designer, John Borg, single handedly. He's the one when we ask people who can design a pinball machine and assemble it from bolts to finish product. They always say John knows what he's doing. John's been in the industry literally for years and he, he did double duty this year ah coming out. Like last year he did the remaster of Metallica. And this year he also has two that came out back to back. I have no idea how this guy did it. because we have fall of the empire and we have the walking dead.
00:01:57
Speaker
So John, we appreciate you squeezing us in because I, I think your snorkel is still below water right now. Yep. I am. ah I'm out of game jail now. I'm off the line with the startup for walking dead. And, and I figured I'd get in touch with you guys and come on the show.
00:02:14
Speaker
I appreciate that, man, because we we've been working back and forth. It seems like September. I know that we'd originally talked about doing an interview before anything was revealed. It's just, it's been chaos. And and like we'd said, you'd listen to our episodes and stuff like that. you're like, it's true. i've been I've been neck deep in work for months now. And I guess really the question is, how much time did you have from after finishing up Metallica to starting Star Wars? and Well, Metallica came out in October.
00:02:41
Speaker
We showed it at Expo. And then November passed, I was out on the line a little bit in November with Metallica. And then in December, I found out that I was going to be working on a Star Wars license, but I wasn't sure how much of how much of the story I was going to get.
00:02:58
Speaker
um So I started out with just with a piece of one of the movies and we were going to try to make a game out of that. Turned out that ah they negotiated the whole trilogy. So I was able to you know use anything i I wanted from all you know all three movies.
00:03:17
Speaker
um I was very happy about that. And then sometime in December, early January, I found out that they were going to remaster The Walking Dead. So, so I took both projects on at the same time. So everything I did, I did twice.
00:03:31
Speaker
um You know, I built two sets of prototypes, ah you know, two sets of licensing issues, you know, all the way through from the beginning to the end. um It was, it was a lot of work and, and it was a lot of, you know, days and nights.
00:03:48
Speaker
I didn't even vacation last summer. So, you know, and then when we got to Expo, I thought, oh I'll get a little break right after Expo. And then, you know, so after Expo, you know, we we launched Star Wars. so I was on the floor for that. And then I was also finishing up Walking Dead.
00:04:02
Speaker
so ah So I'm just now out of game jail. Everybody last summer told me that they were, that by the time I got on vacation, I was going to be sitting in my backyard with my shorts and a t-shirt and sitting in a lawn chair with a drink, with an umbrella, with four inches of snow on top of it.
00:04:16
Speaker
and we got our We got our snow. We got 10 inches of snow. Oh, wow. We just, it was crazy. We just got dusted here, but yeah, it was a lot of work to, to, to get them both done. Um, and, uh, and they're both beautiful games. Um, I'm, uh, I'm waiting for my, uh, waiting for my star Wars.
00:04:36
Speaker
Um, it took me a while before I could even get some time to just go upstairs and order one. So I'm looking forward to getting that. Um, I'm going to set that up. i'm so I'm setting up another little area in my basement for some more games because like a lot of you guys, I'm running out of room.
00:04:51
Speaker
so So I've got a ah utility room in my basement that I've cleaned out and painted it sat in black and put some really beautiful cracked ice looking tile on the floor. So I made a little mini game room. I'm going just put a few games, couple my older games in there.
00:05:07
Speaker
So here's the question. When you have something like Star Wars, right okay, this is a couple of things. This is an iconic title. You know, the Star Wars, this is the one thing that people, when they start getting into pinball, they're like, oh, there's a Star Wars game. Well, okay, it's been done many ways.
00:05:26
Speaker
by multiple things. This is, I think like the seventh version of a star Wars game. And so yes when you approach the design on this, how do you say, okay, this is something that everybody knows, but I want to bring this sort of approach to it. So how do you approach designing something?
00:05:46
Speaker
Um, well, actually, uh, some of the things that I brought to the game were things that I, that I did before. I definitely wanted to, uh, shoot and open up a death star. and lock balls inside for a multi ball.
00:05:58
Speaker
And then if you look at the game, the way the inserts, the large rectangle inserts for all the modes are deal with all the characters on them. um I used large rectangles and I set the characters upright with a with a translucent area around them.
00:06:13
Speaker
um that was you know So the character that that is screened over the insert has got a blocker behind it so light doesn't shine through it. but there's like a big halo around the character or, you know, parts of the insert light around the character. And that kind of came from the, from the 92 Star Wars game.
00:06:31
Speaker
um If you look at the two, you can definitely tell that, you know, that we, that we borrowed that again. Wanted to blow off the Death Star, wanted to do something with the ADAT.
00:06:42
Speaker
um I think if I didn't put the Sarlacc pit in the game, it probably would have been R2-D2 back there doing something, locking balls or, you know, moving kind of like the original game had.
00:06:53
Speaker
But I wanted to make the game mainly, I wanted to make the game very approachable. um You know, a lot of newbies will play it and, you know, they'll hit, they'll, that's the, this is the first game I think I've ever made where I could plunge the ball and I could probably hit every shot within the first 30 seconds.
00:07:10
Speaker
And if I can do that, you know, people are going to, when you're aiming at something, sometimes you miss and you hit the shot right next to it and, and you feel rewarded. Um, You're not bricking off targets too much in the game. you're You're pretty much making shots. And that center shot up the middle, um the hyperspace ramp, um it's really fast, gets the ball right back to your flipper, and it's really easy to repeat over and over again. And people love that.
00:07:33
Speaker
I think that's what people liked about the first Star Wars game is you could shoot that center ramp really easily. And you got to see it go around the loop and come back to your right flipper. um And I think people really liked that. it was It was easy and it was rewarding. And somebody that doesn't play pinball, they're generally shooting up the middle and they would hit that ramp and they're and did they're feeling rewarded. Like, wow, I did something. Wow, I got to do that again.
00:07:55
Speaker
You know, and wow, I can do it several times in a row. This is really cool. And the combos were great on the game, too. You know, like when I plunge the ball, ball comes to the left flipper, I shoot it up the right ramp and it comes back and then I shoot the Death Star to get the thing open, like right right from the get go.
00:08:13
Speaker
um And but I just wanted to make the game really approachable for people. um And, you know, and and also the the rules on the game are really deep, you know, for your your hardcore players.
00:08:25
Speaker
There's a there's there's a lot there. Ray and Andrew crushed it. They really did a great job. Do you feel like you kind of came full circle with your first game for Data East being Star Wars? And then 30 years later, it's Star Wars. 30 years later, I get to do it again. Yeah. Yeah, it was, that was, that was, it was a lot of fun.
00:08:45
Speaker
Do you, is there anything that you wish that you'd done on the first one that you're like, I've got to do this in this one? ah Yeah, a real ad-at. I would have liked to put a real ad-at in the first one. I ran out of real estate. If we would have made it a wide body, I could have put a had an ad-at in the first one.
00:08:58
Speaker
The LE should have had foldable legs so the whole thing if you destroyed it. the whole Oh, ad-at legs on the game. That would have been Maybe maybe maybe that's ah the accessories package. You can buy ad-at legs for the the machine.
00:09:15
Speaker
There's a modder out there that's now going to take that idea and run with it. You know it. Face shirt. So you kind of talked about a little bit of the designer process. I know when people think of designer, they just kind of think of the play field.
00:09:27
Speaker
And you talked about like dealing with licenses. What is kind of the typical process? Can you, can you just kind of walk us through what a designer does when making a game? Everybody everybody does it different. Um, uh, I have seen some guys that just sketch, you know, and just, you know, put a, you know, picture out there and hand it to a mechanical engineer and let them, let them run with it.
00:09:48
Speaker
Um, ah You know, like a Dennis makes a quarter scale model of a game out of foam core and lays out shots. And he does beautiful.
00:09:59
Speaker
He does a beautiful scale version, you know, downscaled version of the game. um I start out right at CAD and I just start laying out line work. um And then, you know, when I get done with it, it's all real. You know, I turn it over to a guy that that does solid works.
00:10:15
Speaker
And they he just, you know, he does all the Z and extrudes all the parts and and makes the model. You know, so it's all real. And I, you know, and I go after everything. I mean, all the access holes for all the drop wires, for all the switches and everything. I just, ah when i when I cut the thing loose to a mechanical engineer, i I want him to have very few, find very few problems and and just be able to just just just go after it.
00:10:43
Speaker
You know, get a prototype up real quick. So is it you that has to deal with the licensor or is it more of like a Gomez thing? No. nomination Yeah, no. Uh, generally, um, uh, Jody, uh, George, Seth, um, they'll deal with licensors mostly. Um, uh, you know, usually when we start a project, we'll get together. Like when we started star Wars, you know, we got together and and we had a meeting, uh, you know, with, with, uh, with them.
00:11:11
Speaker
Um, and it was the whole team. Um, you know, mechanical engineer, myself, you know, the whole the whole design team. But as we're going through like you know, approval process and whatnot, you know, I'll usually hear from, you know, Jody will call up and say, you know, this has got a change or the likeness of this person has to be altered.
00:11:30
Speaker
And and he works he works all that out. how how ah How did that process kind of change since you had to juggle two games at once? How did you survive that process? Two team meetings a week, you know one on Thursday, one on Friday.
00:11:44
Speaker
um i just just kept pounding away. I would work on one and then I'd you know get tired and then I would go and switch over to the other one. you know and then you know To make a ah spot a SAM game, you know a spike game, there there was a lot of work in that. Just some of the standards that we have adopted and like the back panel moves in a half an inch because the back panel is now a stiffener support for the playfield. We used to put a wood rail there and put the back panel on the back of the playfield.
00:12:13
Speaker
um You know, so all the ramp trimming had to be redone. The wood rails that used to run up and down the sides of the playfields, those vinyl coated wood rails, we don't use those anymore. It's a steel rail. So I couldn't have any cutouts where there'd be like, you know, GI lights or or a rail maybe going right to the edge of the play field. And I had that on a walking dead in the upper right-hand corner.
00:12:36
Speaker
So I was able to massage that a little bit, put a bigger radius on it, uh, open it up a little bit. Cause that was kind of a hard shot. Um, uh, you know, so I, you know, I worked on a lot of the geometry, you know, to pull all that stuff in and change all the ramps.
00:12:52
Speaker
And then we did a lot of work on the, uh, on the game mechanically, we simplified the prison door mechanism, the linkage. We simplified that and beefed it up a little bit.
00:13:07
Speaker
the The crossbow mechanism is driven with a cylindrical motor now instead of the little pear-shaped motor. The pair shaped motors don't usually last as long as the cylindrical ones. um They're a little more expensive, but you know, the thing is going to work forever um and it has an encoder on it.
00:13:24
Speaker
So I can actually know exactly where the cannon is pointing. So that'll, that'll come into play later, but we're not going to talk about that today. Oh, dang, a little a little taste. I like that, though. Yeah. I'm just hoping what you can do is ah steal someone's a crossbow and you can control it from somewhere else. That would be awesome. You can mess mess with their crossbow. Bluetooth to the game. Oh, yeah. hey but But you are bringing this up. And so i want to I want to bring this in. One of the big things, this is the first game that is really pushing all the things that Spike 3 does.
00:14:02
Speaker
And I know it still doesn't have everything, but what are some of the things that you were able to do with the Spike 3 that you hadn't had in your toolbox before? ah Well, it's it's faster and it's it's more ah robust.
00:14:17
Speaker
um It's a lot faster. That's probably a better question for you know for Guido or Rayday. But the sound, ah the sound is just amazing.
00:14:27
Speaker
The sound system, I just love it um You know, when you buy the LE, you've got you got the the four speakers in the speaker panel instead of two. um And it just sounds great. Well, when I was showing people Star Wars at Expo, I was telling them, I go, if you buy one of these, I go, you you know, you set the the volume level at 32 and it sounds great.
00:14:46
Speaker
And I go, if you put it up to 55, all your neighbors are going to know you have one. They're all going to come over. So oh the biggest thing for me in the with the new system is is is this is the sound system. It's just beautiful.
00:14:59
Speaker
Well, and that bigger display too. I mean, that looks great. Yeah. And the Walking Dead music, the soundtrack, is it's always you know it's always been good. A lot of really good levels of music.
00:15:12
Speaker
So one thing, looking at your play field, So help me help me distinguish when you're designing and you have to say, okay, I need to have an LE premium play field and I have to have a pro version of this play field.
00:15:25
Speaker
How do you decide what elements to put in um to upscale and which ones you're like, you know what, we can we can really try to streamline it for the location, which is you know what the pro is typically designed for.
00:15:38
Speaker
Yeah. Sometimes I, you know, sometimes I start out laying out the, you know, I start out with the pro. Um, usually I, I start and, and put all the bells and whistles in and I look at the, at, you know, uh, the premium LE price. And I, you know, i look at the, I look at the numbers and figure out what I'm going to have to do to make it a pro, you know, like in star Wars, I took the motor, the motor out of the ad at, um,
00:16:03
Speaker
ah So the pro Star Wars game is just, it's upright and it stays that way. It doesn't move. You got to just look at what you've got and you've got to look to, you know, to see where you have to get to, you know, to a pro budget.
00:16:17
Speaker
So one question I had, I know that a couple of people have asked recently, um sometimes the, the Death Star rejects and whatnot, are you guys working on ah a fix to remedy that or what's going on there? Yeah, we have a kit. It's ah it's a simple bracket that mounts on the front of the Death Star ball lock trough, and it has a bigger opening in it, and it allows the ball to go any easier.
00:16:41
Speaker
And we just, um while we were waiting for Walking Dead to come up, um we may do we made a bunch of Star Wars games the last week or the week before, and we used this new bracket. And I went out and checked the games when they came up, and they shot like butter.
00:16:59
Speaker
Um, it's, uh, it's just a bracket that mounts to the front of the the trough and it has a bigger opening in it. Uh, the only thing is you have to take off the plastics around it to get to the mounting screws to mount it.
00:17:12
Speaker
But once you put that thing in, um, it shoots like butter. Awesome. I don't, I don't know. i don't know if that kit is available yet, but I know it's going to be, if it's not already, it's going to be in the next few days.
00:17:26
Speaker
It's, it's coming. Awesome. i know i know a lot of people, I've got one from that loves, he loves your new Star Wars. He loves all your games. I don't know if you know Tim Lee, but he's a Borg fan, man. Yeah, yeah tim Tim is an awesome dude. And he's always bragging to me about his favorite game of all time is The Walking Dead. And he just absolutely star loves Star Wars. And he he owns both games now. And it's just, he's like, you gotta ask. He's like, I turned to him when I was like, dude, I need i need all the questions. Because i know I know you know these games inside and out.
00:17:57
Speaker
But yeah, I guess that was just, he wanted to know too, if you have a tip to best utilize the Jedi magnet too, at the bottom. Uh, when the ball drains, let's say the ball drains out.
00:18:10
Speaker
Yeah. lot of people have asked me about this. So when the ball drains out the left side and you got the Jedi safe, what, um, or the, you know, the, the force of, um, right before the ball hits that little bracket that you see sticking out by the out hole.
00:18:27
Speaker
right as it Right about as it goes gets to that bracket, you hit that button and it'll fling it right up the out lane on the right side into the shooter lane. Now, if the ball drains out the right side and it comes by, if you hit the button, it'll actually force the ball into the out hole.
00:18:44
Speaker
You got to let it go past the magnet and it hits that rail, that metal rail, the flat rail that guides it in from from the left side. Let it bounce off that and it'll bounce up toward the magnet. When it's on its way up toward the magnet,
00:18:57
Speaker
you hit the button and it'll throw back up in between the flippers. So it's pretty interesting. If you spell Jedi all the way, when you keep shooting the spinners and you spell Jedi all the way, it'll actually stop the ball and and bring it to a halt and then it'll throw it up between the flippers. But it's actually more fun when you've got the J, the E and the D lit and use just the force save, not the Jedi ball save.
00:19:19
Speaker
Um, so there's a, there's a difference between the two, you know, some people, uh, you know, they get, you have to get the J, you have to get the J and the E to light it. And then when you get the D, it gives you another try.
00:19:32
Speaker
Um, cause sometimes if you hit the button and your, your timing is off and say the ball, uh, rolls up the right out lane a little bit and it comes back, let it bounce off that rail and gives you a second try.
00:19:45
Speaker
So you hit the button again, and as the ball's going back up toward that magnet again, it'll it'll fling it right between the flippers. It's it's definite definitely a lot of fun when you learn how to use it, especially when you're on ball three and you're getting ready to start multi-ball or something like that, and and you save your ball, and you're just like, yes.
00:20:05
Speaker
um It's a lot of fun. I know. That's one of the cool parts in the trailer. I'm always watching that. was dang, that's so cool to watch just go past right up into the... the shooter lane. Oh yeah. Mike Vinicor and I were talking about that. He, he said, uh, he reminded me of, uh, uh, golden eye James Bond, golden eye back in the day. Yeah.
00:20:25
Speaker
And, and it had a standard bottom standard four lane bottom. And the flippers are right in the middle of the game where this game, you know, you got a five lane bottom. So the flippers are offset. So, you know, looking at it, I was like, well, I'm, I'm going to be able to save it going this way, but the other way isn't going to work. And, uh,
00:20:43
Speaker
And then so when i was when I was exercising it and playing with it, there were few times where the ball, I'd hit the button and i you know the timing would be you know just right on and and the ball would go flinging up the right out lane and it would go up up the out lane and almost get out in between the rubbers that are there.
00:21:02
Speaker
And I thought, wow, that's cool. So I just took and I cut a piece of the the the ball guide wire off and allowed it to just go up the right out lane and go right into the into the shooter lane.
00:21:13
Speaker
And, and it you know, it worked great. and And I was like, you know, so I started showing the guys. I'm like, look at this. This is really cool, you know. and And, you know, I'm like, force save. So it worked out really great. So we took something from an old game and we made it even better.
00:21:29
Speaker
You know, it's it's very skillful and and it's a lot of fun. Very rewarding when you when you save your ball. Yeah, when I started working on Star Wars, I had the the ad at I had him. so He was set back a little farther than he is in the production game.
00:21:43
Speaker
And he, when you you hit him, I had a target right up where his legs were and you shot the target. And then he would lean over and expose his head to the play field. And there was an opto out in front of him and he actually shot it in the head.
00:21:57
Speaker
And so I made the model without the the guns on the front. and And Disney said, you got it you got to put the guns on. So I thought those things are going to break off and they're going to be, you know, they're going to be on the playfield and people are going to be screaming. ah So, so we, we just had the thing. I, I just, I moved it, I moved it forward and I just had the thing lean down and lean over a target. And George was looking at, he was kind of worried that the ball may still hit the thing in the head, you know, like if it deflects and, you know, bounces and it hits the target it goes up a little bit or something, it may, it may catch the head.
00:22:33
Speaker
So, He took the model and he took the front plate where the neck was mounted and he made it pivot. So when the thing comes down, it its chin kind of hits a bracket and it lifts up to kind of get the ball or the head a little further out of but ah harm's way.
00:22:51
Speaker
And that worked out great. um uh, it would have been fun to bash the thing in the head, but, uh, I didn't want to fall apart either. Yeah. So I don't blame you. I can imagine a lot of a headless ad outs out on location with, uh, with that sort of trauma.
00:23:06
Speaker
Yeah. You know, and when I made Metallica, you know, my, my snake lost teeth. Yeah. So I didn't want to lose my head in this one. yeah So, but, um, yeah. So, and then, and then even like, you know, if, but you know, hitting the, the, the ad at, um,
00:23:23
Speaker
in the head also, you know, puts a little bit of a jolt on the linkage, you know, and it was a, and it's a pear shaped motor that, that drives that thing. So I was a little bit worried about that too.
00:23:34
Speaker
So I was told once a long time ago, it's better to make a good game that works great than a great game that works good. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. So I noticed a lot of wire forms in here. So tell me about your philosophy on wire forms, because and Yes, it's cool to look at the ball, travel around a wire form, but there is a purpose to to designing the speed at which it's coming off the the wire form or or the you know the kinesthetics of it. So can you tell me why you chose the way you did on these wire forms? um i yeah you know Plastic ramps get scratched and and they look dull after a while. um I like the wire ramp look and you can see through and you can see all the artwork behind it
00:24:22
Speaker
um You can see through a plastic ramp too, but I definitely wouldn't have made all the ramps steel. But I do like wire ramps. Remember Tales from the Crypt?
00:24:33
Speaker
Yep. That thing was had wire ramps all over it. so But yeah, I like wire ramps. So I noticed that on Star Wars and also on Walking Dead that you guys are using two new artists. Are these specific to the licensors or is this guys that you found in Poland? No.
00:24:53
Speaker
Yeah. um Vince, Vince Prost worked on the Star Wars game. And he also did Dungeons and Dragons for us. Okay. So we had used Vince before um and I'd met him a couple of times. ah The new artist, Robert Lasky, he is a fabulous illustrator and he, ah I never did get to meet him.
00:25:16
Speaker
um But his work is amazing. I mean, he just, he nailed those images. of Rick couldn't look more like Rick. And Michonne looks fabulous on the cabinet, you know, slicing the zombies head off.
00:25:31
Speaker
I was actually kind of a little worried that it was a little too scary. little too, you know, the opposite side of the cabinet on the l LE has got the the arrow in the zombies head. Yeah. And Daryl's chasing it down.
00:25:44
Speaker
It's beautiful though. um he's he He really did a really nice job. So this is a classic game that is, now it's it's known for a couple of things.
00:25:55
Speaker
It's known for having a brutal layout. It's known for having epic rules and for being a game that typically favors the high-end tournament level player.
00:26:07
Speaker
So, so when you approach a game like this, I'm a little curious, what was the, what was the thought processes? How can we make this the remastered version of walking dead like you did with Metallica?
00:26:21
Speaker
Well, uh, if you play at old Metallica and then you play a new Metallica, you can definitely tell that the new Metallica is a lot friendlier. You get a lot more ball saves. You know, there aren't specials in the outlines anymore. They're, they're, they're saves.
00:26:36
Speaker
Um, the bit feature in the outlanes on Walking Dead is gonna save your ball for you. And the bit bonus that you achieve when you drain is just gonna be just kind of an underlying thing that you just collect.
00:26:50
Speaker
um So I'm just gonna give you the ball back more. um We're gonna, you know, ball saves going into multi-ball will last a little longer. um We're gonna make it play longer.
00:27:04
Speaker
It doesn't seem on the new version, it doesn't seem to be like when it comes out of the pops, um you know, it doesn't, it's not going down the the drain as much. You know, I got the, it's, it's kicking off the post a little bit more.
00:27:19
Speaker
um It's, so it's going to be a little friendlier than the the main, the old version. Nice. And I do like the coil that you put in with the wall Walker. So it actually looks like it's like he's, yeah, he's moving. Yeah. Cause when you, when you, when you spell well, the lights just, you know, so they they just streamed back and forth and, I wanted to make him move and, you know, provide some feedback.
00:27:46
Speaker
ah Metallica was amazing already. And you guys enhance that, um, Radiated a fantastic job. Do you plan on doing any ah any enhancements to the walking dead ah rules and whatnot as well?
00:27:59
Speaker
um You know, ah the one thing that I thought was just impossibly hard, except for maybe Keith and Ray in the game was getting the last man standing and having to collect 115 zombie kills.
00:28:10
Speaker
We're going to add a couple of things that you'll collect along the way. So after you get 30 or, you know, some number left to determine what that is exactly. But you we're going give you some like almost like I want to say many wizard modes along the way. So when you get to 30, you'll get something cool and you get to 60, you'll get something cool and you can still work your way, you know, go all the way up to 100 and something and get to last man standing.
00:28:37
Speaker
I want to make it easier to ah to collect kills so you can boost those numbers up faster, too. So we're going to do a lot of code enhancements and we'll probably be working on it.
00:28:48
Speaker
We'll probably be working on the code you know for another few months yet. So You also took the, you know, you're upgrading the DMD to the LCD and yeah I will, I will say. that was That was a lot of work in itself. Just getting ah ah the the look and feel correct and yeah getting licensing to approve it.
00:29:08
Speaker
um We tried to mock the old, a lot of the old display effects and they came out really nice. It it looks, it looks really good. I mean, I have, I bought a walking dead last summer.
00:29:20
Speaker
I bought a walking dead premium. with very low plays on it with a color DMD and the new display work. When I look, even the color DMD looks really nice. But when I look at the new display work, I'm just like, well, there's hands down.
00:29:33
Speaker
Um, it's, it's gorgeous. Speaking of the new display work and whatnot, is there going to be any show clips in there? And also the other question I, Oh, go ahead. No, no show clips.
00:29:45
Speaker
Okay. And then the other question I had too is it looks like, because I know that ah you guys have upgraded a lot of the scenes from the original Walking Dead, ah the DMD stuff, and put them into the new game. Is it still the same...
00:29:58
Speaker
um display size that you've stuck on the new screen and kind of filled around uh are you talking about dmd effects that you're still seeing you were still seeing in a game or correct yeah so like you know from from walking dead the dmd it it looks like in the new trailer you guys have kind of refreshed those and made them look better for the new game is it still the dis is it still the dmd size on the new screen or or did you fill out the whole screen with the whole no we filled the whole screen Oh yeah.
00:30:28
Speaker
Yeah. Nice. um Yeah. I know when, when, ah when we first went out, I think there were still a couple of ah DMD effects still in the game. ah But that, that's all, that's all gone now.
00:30:40
Speaker
Yeah. They're full screen, full screen renderings. Nice. Did you have to rework any of the modes? So, for example, on Star Wars, or sorry, not Star Wars, Spider-Man, you guys had when you did the ultimate version, they actually they like some of the modes were renamed, even though the the gameplay was pretty much the same. Are any modes renamed or they all going to be? If you know the Walking Dead rules, you're going to walk up. Yeah, and the modes are all the the modes are all named the same.
00:31:11
Speaker
We just changed the, ah you know, the icons for on the, on the mode inserts. But, but the modes are all still going to play the the way they did and they'll be enhanced too. And the voice work, any more call outs, any new things going on? Yeah. um Yeah. We have ah right now, I, the, the voice work that's in the game is just what we recorded from Merle 10, 12 years Yeah.
00:31:37
Speaker
um But we've got, I wrote scripts for Michonne, Daryl, Maggie, Carol, T-Dog. um Some of the characters I only pulled like maybe five to ten lines from.
00:31:53
Speaker
But, you know, like the main characters like Rick and Carl and Daryl and, you know, I pulled a lot of lines and. and you know, dug up all the timestamps and gave all that stuff to Jerry and he, uh, and he, he, he captured it all. So that's going to be, will be populated and start to appear in the game too.
00:32:11
Speaker
So when we start getting updates, it's, it's going to get, it's going to get really full. You know, it's, it's going to be, it's going to be great when it's, by the time it's all completely finished. What has been kind of, I know you've had a lot of chaos going on on with all this, but What's been your favorite process of of making these two games?
00:32:31
Speaker
My favorite process? Sorry, favorite favorite part of the process, I guess. Oh, I was going to say I going to favorite part. it a Finishing. ah um Favorite part of the process.
00:32:44
Speaker
um I love sitting down and doing the layout work in the beginning. um You know, it's just yeah it's a lot of work. It's a lot of time. And I love to just sit and, you know, dig. And sometimes I'll go to work and I'll come home and I'll eat dinner and I'll be, you know, sitting around, do something for a couple hours and then I'm right back at it again. You know, and I'll draw it at two or three o'clock in the morning sometimes. So I'm really getting into it.
00:33:09
Speaker
um But yeah, the drawing and then building the first one. you know, building the first, the first white load up and, and, so and shooting the ball around. And usually I don't even have flippers at that time. And I'm, I'm very good at holding the flipper with my thumb and flicking the ball and making, making shots, you know, so I'm playing the ball with no power as soon as I get the thing built.
00:33:31
Speaker
Nice. um One thing that people have pointed out, you opted to go with regular rollovers instead of star rollovers on, on your new walking dead. What made you decide to do that?
00:33:42
Speaker
um ah ah Historically, the star rollovers have always had problems with the tooling and flash on the inserted part that's in the play field. i'm And sometimes they would get stuck.
00:33:57
Speaker
um The button is ah a little nicer. It's got a nice ring around it with ah RGB in it. And then the the nice thing about the new one is if you want to replace the ones in your old game, they're you all you do is swap. You don't even have to change a connector.
00:34:14
Speaker
Oh, wow. It's three it's ah reverse compatible or? Yes. Backward compatible. Yeah, that's what I meant. Okay. Yeah, and they're very they're very sensitive. I mean, you are you know they're you you touch them and you push them with your finger and they're they're really super light actuating.
00:34:33
Speaker
And they work, they work well. Did you have to do anything for the play field? Or I guess the real question is what did you have to do for the play field? to retool it for you know, yeah. For, for spike and this version of the cabinet. And cause I know with Metallica, you did some, some minor tweaks to get that thing going, but was there anything that you had to do to retweak this? All the, all the light boards and everything, just converting an, uh, you know, an old game to to spike spike three, um, all the light boards have to be redone.
00:35:06
Speaker
Um, uh, you know, and then, you know, when you're remaking a game, you're starting with some of the things that you're keeping from your original model and then you're changing a ton of stuff. And it's, it's, it's, it's all, it's, it's 90% as hard as doing a ah full game from scratch.
00:35:26
Speaker
There's just, just a ton of work. um I don't know if you said, but who's doing code on this one? a Guido. You guys know Mark? Yeah. No, he's great.
00:35:38
Speaker
He's one of the funnest guys to talk to at a ah at a convention. Yeah. He has stories. He has a lot of stories. Yeah, he's great. So a lot of times um we know that as the designer, you're also dealing with all the accessories and everything like that. And so I'm assuming this is even more challenging. yeah You have parallel things. And I would say notoriously something like Lucas films has been very guarded about how they want their product presented. And we, we know how long it took for the original product. um, R2D2 topper to get approved. And so how are you working through that for this, these two projects simultaneously? Mine mine is, is just about finished.
00:36:24
Speaker
Yeah. You're not going to wait a year for the topper. It's coming. I mean, we go, we, we've got to get to a point where we're toppers have to release with games. Yeah. You know, um, I think some people buy a game if they have the game sitting for a year,
00:36:36
Speaker
you know And then they're goingnna they're like, oh, wow, that topper's available now, but I want to buy that next game yeah instead you know of the topper. It's easier to sell a product in your hand. And we're trying to get getting closer. I mean, Metallica's topper came out right away after the game released.
00:36:54
Speaker
So ah both these toppers, the one for Walking Dead and the one for Star Wars, they are stunning. Just like, wow. Really, really happy with both of them. Can you upgrade the walking dead to the, the light bars also for the premium?
00:37:09
Speaker
Not, not the, I'm sorry, not the light bars, that the you talking about the fresh expression lights. Yeah. I'm talking to the expression lighting. Oh yeah. and it's really easy to do. the The trim comes with the lights and everything. And all you do is just pop it on the cabinet and bolt it down. It's, it's, it's much easier to, to, to add to a premium than it is on the spike to system.
00:37:28
Speaker
Oh, nice. I guess one question I have is On Star Wars and on Walking Dead, you have like helmets and heads. Where did that concept come from and what made you decide to put like?
00:37:42
Speaker
Well, the heads came from Walking Dead. Yeah, Star Wars, I knew I wanted to do Darth Vader and i and i you know and it ended up being a scoop and Darth Vader was going to give you things and start modes.
00:37:56
Speaker
And and I wanted to dress it up. And, you know, being that that scoop is so low in the playfield, close to the flippers, you know, I couldn't put a figurine. So I just molded I just molded his head.
00:38:07
Speaker
And then the stormtrooper head, we already had tooling for that one. And I had a target over on the other side that was for the stormtrooper. I'm like, well, I'm just going to take this old shooter and I'm going to, you know, I'll just instead of filling it because that was the shooter, not for the old Star Wars game. um I didn't put the insert in it and I just put holes in the bottom of it and attach it to the plastic and put a light bulb up in it to so it would light up.
00:38:34
Speaker
So that's how the heads got there on Star Wars. Okay, but I'm noticing a theme. Covered heads seem to be in your last, you know, three games. So you have Metallica with Skulls. Let's see.
00:38:47
Speaker
My next game might have a head in it too. One.
00:38:52
Speaker
Yeah, i think I think I have a head in my next model that's coming. Okay. Yeah. You're already working on your next game. are Shouldn't you be taking a vacation? i should. And I'm going to take some time off here over Christmas in between like Christmas, New Year's.
00:39:09
Speaker
um But i just I just started pounding away right away because I definitely want to make sure that I have some time for a vacation this summer. Don't you have to work on two games simultaneously? Isn't that in your contract? Like you have to you have to release two games a year.
00:39:25
Speaker
Oh, no. You know, it's been that way for a lot of years, but it's not in the contract. So, but yeah, I'll probably pick up to I think I'm picking up to this year.
00:39:39
Speaker
Nice. What is the take home message that you want people to know about this game is like, you know what, this is why this game is awesome. um I think the thing that ah raises the hair on the back of my neck the most when I play that game is when I go into multi Death Star multiball and I shoot those jackpot shots um and I get through the 14 shots.
00:40:04
Speaker
And sometimes you'll hit a shot and you'll and you'll have ah like a multiplier li you'll get rewarded two shots for the one shot. um But when you get to 14 and then you blast the Death Star and it opens up and you make that shot and then the game just goes dead and everything turns, you know, all the all the balls drain flippers flippers quit.
00:40:24
Speaker
And you're like, well, what happened? You know, and then all of a sudden you see the explosion in the screen. I just that I just love that, you know, when you get there, um you know, and it's pretty hard to start the multiball.
00:40:35
Speaker
And when you but when you get there and you get to that, that that's a lot of fun. Awesome. Same question on Walking Dead. The only thing want to say, the only thing that I regret is, remember when the the the prison doors open and you see the zombie walking along the fence and he exposes himself and he gets clubbed with the crowbar?
00:40:54
Speaker
Yeah. That was that was me. back in, you know, 12, 13 years ago. yeah um The new artwork for that doesn't look exact. It doesn't look like me.
00:41:05
Speaker
So, so that was the the bummer about it. But prison multiball, um I love doing that. i love shooting the crossbow and I love shooting Bicycle Girl. that those Those growls and moans that she makes, you know, you hear, ah you know, she's, ah that's a lot of fun.
00:41:23
Speaker
So that's those, that's three things. um, that I love about walking dead. And then I love the walking dead top or two. Why did you put, okay, please tell me your head is the severed head on the topper. I mean, it it has to be, it has to be the John Borg zombie that severed head. It's not, it's not, it might. Well, you know what? I mean, maybe after, you know, several years of being a zombie, one of, one of the, one of the three maybe two of the three could possibly be me.
00:41:51
Speaker
Okay. Yeah.
00:41:54
Speaker
Has it been kind of a trip down nostalgia lane going back through making a new Walking dame Dead in San Diego? Oh, yeah. When that show came out, you know, I remember AMC, they put a timer up on the screen. It would say like two days, three hours, and 20 minutes until The Walking Dead. And they were always always had this timer. They were showing this timer on the screen when The Walking Dead was going to air.
00:42:16
Speaker
And was sitting in front of the TV probably 20 or 30 minutes before it the first episode aired. And i just loved it. The first season was just amazing. The first four seasons were were just unbelievable. I loved it.
00:42:29
Speaker
I couldn't get enough of it. Is Negan in this one, in the remastered? No. Yeah, it's still the first four seasons. We didn't add any any of the following seasons.
00:42:41
Speaker
Okay. yeah Ain't nothing wrong with that. Well, you know what? The one part that i I remember when they got to Terminus and they were all had their heads leaned over into that stainless steel trough and they were they were gonna they were going to make food out of them. Yeah. I didn't want anything like that in the game.
00:42:58
Speaker
A little too over the top. ah um But yeah. um Yeah. The scenes that we picked, you know, in the beginning when I first started working on the game, I and i intended a on using some of the the movie footage.
00:43:15
Speaker
and And I actually scripted all of it and got timestamps for all the stuff that was said. And, you know, this is where the scene starts and this is where the scene ends. And I broke it all broke all the modes down.
00:43:27
Speaker
There just wasn't enough there wasn't enough footage there to to do it. And then that's when we decided we're like, we're gonna we're going to make the game with, we're going to recreate and and better the original display effects.
00:43:43
Speaker
um You know, like when you kill a zombie, you see a few zombies and they're wandering out, you know, they're just kind of like waddling out in the in a field. And then you you make one of the kill shots and you see the thing go and it falls.
00:43:54
Speaker
um You know, and back when we were doing dots, there were probably like maybe 10 dots that made those little characters, you know, and yeah they were kind of campy and fun and in Dot Matrix. but they're definitely more realistic and and very cool looking now. Chuck and his team, they all, they did a great job.
00:44:11
Speaker
Well, awesome board. We really appreciate you coming on is do you feel like there's, pleasure do you think there's anything that we just haven't covered that you're you've got to know this about star Wars or walking dead. Wow.
00:44:22
Speaker
That's a tough one. I mean, I'll answer that one when we do the next show. Okay. Sounds good to me. Yeah. If you want people getting ahold of you, what's, what's the best way? If you don't want them, you can just tell them now. Oh, uh, uh, I'm on Facebook and messenger and cool. Yeah. People, people have, I haven't been on Facebook in a while, so I got a lot of friend requests that I haven't had a chance to go through. Um, so, uh, I met some people at the influencer party when we did, uh, start when we did the fall the empire.
00:44:53
Speaker
yeah And, and I had a few people, you know, that I asked I go, are we friends on Facebook? And they'd say, no. And I said, well, send me a friend request. And I haven't, I've got to look and look at them. I've got a whole bunch. I have, I just haven't had time to.
00:45:05
Speaker
Well, now you have time. I guess. Facebook. Now it's time to sit in your backyard with, with four inches snow on top of your snow on my umbrella. and yeah I want a picture of you and your Bermuda shorts and your, and your, in my lawn chair.
00:45:20
Speaker
Yeah. In your lawn chair, my snow shovel sitting right next to me and and your so sunglasses and your, your beach hat. That's what I need. Oh,
00:45:30
Speaker
ah Well, we appreciate you coming on. if you want If you want to get a hold of it. Yeah, for sure. i it what is We've done this two or three times now, and every time you come on, dude, it's just it's awesome. It's just great catching up. Yep. It was nice nice to ah it was i was nice. I met i met you guys' so influencer party last year. I can't remember which one, which game we were showing.
00:45:54
Speaker
isn Yeah, we got I got a picture of ah of us by Metallica. yep I was sporting my Loser Kid t-shirt at work the other day. Oh, nice. nice yeah Did you see this one? This is a Loser Kid in Metallica font. See? Oh, cool. the world know Nice.
00:46:11
Speaker
awesome Well, if you want to get ahold of us, we are loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com. You can get ahold of us on all the socials at loser kid pinball. If you like the shirts that Scott and I are wearing his up on several swag.com slash loser kid.
00:46:26
Speaker
Other than that, uh, I think that does it for us tonight, Scott. You want to give us the last word? for Awesome. Thanks. No, thanks John. Uh, absolutely. Buy a pinball for Christmas. Yes.
00:46:40
Speaker
you