Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Ep 154: Evil Dead Pinball with Bug
19 Plays3 months ago
Corwin "Bug" Emery is talking all things Evil Dead. Including writing a Bruce Campbell approved script, looking out for their customers, and the future of Spooky
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Episode Numbering Humor
00:00:07
Speaker
I am.
00:00:08
Speaker
Whoa.
00:00:08
Speaker
Hold on.
00:00:09
Speaker
Whoa.
00:00:09
Speaker
Wow.
00:00:11
Speaker
That was half cocked.
00:00:12
Speaker
That was half cocked.
00:00:14
Speaker
Thanks for tuning in to the loser kid pinball podcast.
00:00:16
Speaker
I'm just dragon.
00:00:20
Speaker
Oh, what time is it?
00:00:22
Speaker
Joe?
00:00:23
Speaker
Huh?
00:00:24
Speaker
You said you're Joe.
00:00:26
Speaker
I said it's, it's too late or whatever.
00:00:28
Speaker
I don't know.
00:00:30
Speaker
Thanks for tuning into the loser kid pinball podcast.
00:00:32
Speaker
I am your captain, Josh Rupp here with my co-captain.
00:00:35
Speaker
Scott Larson.
00:00:36
Speaker
Where are you off the rails?
00:00:38
Speaker
This is episode one 54 for some odd reason.
00:00:42
Speaker
Last episode, we didn't catch it, but I said one 58 again, and we just kept going with it.
00:00:46
Speaker
Blew right through it.
00:00:47
Speaker
Yeah.
00:00:47
Speaker
So apparently I'm ready to be on one 58.
00:00:49
Speaker
We have, I've got two, three times now.
00:00:51
Speaker
Okay.
00:00:51
Speaker
All right.
00:00:52
Speaker
We're good.
00:00:52
Speaker
We're on one 54 though.
00:00:54
Speaker
And a new game has come out.
00:00:56
Speaker
A freaking amazing game.
00:00:57
Speaker
If you've not seen the trailer.
00:00:59
Speaker
Okay, first off the trailer.
00:01:00
Speaker
Zackmini.
00:01:01
Speaker
Hats off to you.
00:01:02
Speaker
Holy crap.
00:01:03
Speaker
Evil Dead.
00:01:04
Speaker
I don't think this could have been presented a better way.
Evil Dead Pinball Game Trailer and Community Support
00:01:07
Speaker
He sold the game just off of this trailer.
00:01:10
Speaker
I wanted an Evil Dead after this.
00:01:13
Speaker
And I don't know how I'd have this in my house with my kids.
00:01:16
Speaker
You could.
00:01:17
Speaker
It's fine.
00:01:17
Speaker
It's all good.
00:01:18
Speaker
True.
00:01:18
Speaker
True.
00:01:19
Speaker
Scott, if you're getting an Evil Dead...
00:01:22
Speaker
where are you getting yours from?
00:01:23
Speaker
You know, I'll contact Zach and Nicole minute flipping out pinball.
00:01:26
Speaker
Um, you know, they've always been great.
00:01:27
Speaker
And really I just ordered a, if you want machines, they can, they can find them for you.
00:01:33
Speaker
I actually just put in a big order for a lot of accessories.
00:01:37
Speaker
So as you guys know, I haven't set it up.
00:01:39
Speaker
Uh, my, my Metallica Ellie is actually in my garage right now and I will be unboxing it this week, but I wanted to get the topper.
00:01:49
Speaker
So if you're a topper guy, if you're a,
00:01:51
Speaker
if you're a speaker light guy or girl, uh, and you want to, uh, just bling out your machines, or if you want to get the, something either new used, et cetera, uh, go ahead and reach out to Zach and Nicole.
00:02:02
Speaker
They're always a really good, um, message them.
00:02:05
Speaker
They get back to you really quickly.
00:02:06
Speaker
Yes.
00:02:07
Speaker
Before we get to our amazing guest, I wanted to give my first, my heartfelt condolences.
00:02:13
Speaker
We just received the message a couple hours ago.
00:02:16
Speaker
Todd Tucky's wife passed away and our heart goes out to them, their family, uh,
00:02:22
Speaker
I personally have never lost the love of a spouse.
00:02:25
Speaker
And so it's hard for me to comprehend at this point.
00:02:28
Speaker
But even with my 20 years of marriage, I couldn't fathom losing my wife.
00:02:33
Speaker
And so Todd, we're thinking of you this time.
00:02:36
Speaker
And if you're listening and you haven't went, you can give your condolences on Todd's Facebook or whatnot.
00:02:42
Speaker
He posted about it today that she passed away last night.
00:02:45
Speaker
So what's your favorite moment from TNT Amusement, Scott?
00:02:49
Speaker
You know, so actually we ended up on, on one of his little episode things where he slapped us all like three stooges style.
00:03:00
Speaker
But my favorite episode, cause when you get into pinball, you start, you start consuming a lot of content and you start Googling stuff and everybody finds the TNT.
00:03:11
Speaker
I know the Todd Hucky videos.
00:03:13
Speaker
And I do remember one where Todd was being his typical Todd self and his wife shrunk him down in her hand and then blew on him and he disappeared.
00:03:24
Speaker
So I legitimately, I don't know of anybody who doesn't have fond feelings for Todd.
00:03:29
Speaker
And he's always been a very positive influence on arcade pinball, anything.
00:03:35
Speaker
And so certainly we want to make sure that he is feeling, uh, feeling the support of the community.
00:03:42
Speaker
And the one thing that I hear over and over again is the community is quite supportive of everybody.
00:03:50
Speaker
And I think that's super nice.
00:03:52
Speaker
Um, just our thoughts and prayers are with the Ducky family.
00:03:57
Speaker
Yep.
Spooky Pinball's Philosophy and Design Insights
00:03:59
Speaker
Well, it's hard.
00:03:59
Speaker
It's hard to transition from that, but, uh, we are going to transition now to,
00:04:04
Speaker
our guest and, uh, sorry to bring you down.
00:04:07
Speaker
Okay.
00:04:08
Speaker
We're, I will say we all need to laugh in life.
00:04:11
Speaker
Okay.
00:04:12
Speaker
We all need to laugh in life.
00:04:13
Speaker
We all need a pressure release valve and
00:04:18
Speaker
The one thing that we can all appreciate is what the spooky pinball company does, because they actually don't take their games too seriously.
00:04:29
Speaker
They found their market.
00:04:30
Speaker
They are all about fun.
00:04:33
Speaker
They're all, they, they have lanes for anyone you need.
00:04:36
Speaker
If you want, if you like the, the horror stuff, they've got it.
00:04:39
Speaker
If you like the horror, funny stuff, they've got it.
00:04:41
Speaker
If you like,
00:04:42
Speaker
The kids stuff.
00:04:43
Speaker
They got spooky.
00:04:45
Speaker
Sorry, they got Scooby-Doo.
00:04:47
Speaker
They have Looney Tunes, which they all look fantastic.
00:04:51
Speaker
But we are here to talk about their latest release, which is the Evil Dip.
00:04:58
Speaker
So with us right now, I'm going to make him sound very, because he goes by Bug, but he has to have more like a regal name, right?
00:05:04
Speaker
He only goes by Bug because it's fun.
00:05:07
Speaker
Sir Corwin Elton.
00:05:10
Speaker
He's like the biggest Bug I've ever seen, though.
00:05:12
Speaker
He's like a six foot six Bug.
00:05:14
Speaker
Corwin Emery joins us.
00:05:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:05:16
Speaker
I slaughtered that.
00:05:17
Speaker
Whatever.
00:05:19
Speaker
It's that day, man.
00:05:20
Speaker
It's the most appropriate intro that I could have.
00:05:24
Speaker
Tripping over myself sounds great.
00:05:26
Speaker
Gracefully falling down the stairs is how I would describe it.
00:05:31
Speaker
Thank you guys for having me.
00:05:33
Speaker
Definitely.
00:05:34
Speaker
Okay.
00:05:35
Speaker
This game, I've got to tell you, man, I saw this.
00:05:38
Speaker
It's insane.
00:05:40
Speaker
Holy crap.
00:05:41
Speaker
I wish I should have convinced you while we were up there at Expo.
00:05:44
Speaker
Just let me sneak in and play this.
00:05:45
Speaker
Right.
00:05:46
Speaker
This is insane.
00:05:47
Speaker
I'm jealous that I like Don's got to play it and Zach's got to play it.
00:05:50
Speaker
I'm like, what the heck?
00:05:52
Speaker
Like this, man, we need to get up there.
00:05:54
Speaker
I have family in Wisconsin, like in Appleton.
00:05:56
Speaker
We need, I need to get up there.
00:05:58
Speaker
I can make it to Benton.
00:06:01
Speaker
If you can get over to Benton, Wisconsin, your chances are higher because we understand that it's not exactly the easiest town to just wind up in.
00:06:10
Speaker
So, yes.
00:06:12
Speaker
Okay.
00:06:13
Speaker
So, okay.
00:06:14
Speaker
Where in Wisconsin is Benton?
00:06:16
Speaker
We're right in the tri-state area of Wisconsin, Illinois, and Iowa.
00:06:22
Speaker
The more well-known areas around us are like Dubuque, Iowa is a pretty big town.
00:06:27
Speaker
Galena, Illinois is a really popular town with a lot of people who live in Chicago.
00:06:32
Speaker
A lot of people like to visit Galena.
00:06:34
Speaker
And then...
00:06:35
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's really about it.
00:06:37
Speaker
Platteville, Wisconsin is like a big college town.
00:06:39
Speaker
But I mean, Benton, less than a thousand people.
00:06:41
Speaker
You pretty much have to be lost to find it.
00:06:43
Speaker
But it turns out you can make some kick-ass pinball machines in a really small town.
00:06:47
Speaker
That's right.
00:06:48
Speaker
Yes.
00:06:50
Speaker
No, go ahead, Josh.
00:06:51
Speaker
I was just going to say, speaking of which, I mean, Evil Dead, I mean, obviously a spooky title.
00:06:56
Speaker
You guys are famous for horror and stuff like that.
00:06:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:59
Speaker
But how long has this been in the making?
00:07:01
Speaker
Because really, this is perfectly up your alley.
00:07:05
Speaker
Yeah, and I'm going to tether onto that.
00:07:08
Speaker
Why the Evil Dead?
00:07:10
Speaker
This is up your alley, but what makes this one stand out?
00:07:15
Speaker
Right.
00:07:16
Speaker
So to answer
Design Process and Theme Integration
00:07:17
Speaker
the first part of the question, when I signed it late into the Halloween production, I want to say.
00:07:23
Speaker
The thing with pinball is it's been like four years now and everything becomes such a blur.
00:07:29
Speaker
It's getting harder every single day to remember when things happened.
00:07:32
Speaker
Like time is so messed up.
00:07:34
Speaker
But I know I signed this late into the Halloween production, kind of like during the summertime.
00:07:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:40
Speaker
And it made all the sense in the world, especially back then, because we just had the hit of Halloween Pinball, which sold over 1200 units in less than a day.
00:07:49
Speaker
And Evil Dead Pinball specifically spoke to us and our company even more because, I mean, especially if you're familiar with the second film,
00:07:59
Speaker
that encompasses a lot of what our brand is about, where there's creepy things in there, there's horror, but there's so much comedy and slapstick humor and interesting camera work and memorable sound design and one-liners and all the things that specifically make for a good pinball machine are in the Evil Dead franchise.
00:08:23
Speaker
And that's why...
00:08:24
Speaker
I think a lot of people out there who aren't even necessarily fans of Evil Dead will really enjoy this game because it has all the things from a 90s classic Bally Williams game in the it brought to the modern era that I think people will love who are fans of Evil Dead or not fans of Evil Dead.
00:08:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:43
Speaker
Okay.
00:08:44
Speaker
So which classic Bally Williams game has a severed head and a severed hand?
00:08:50
Speaker
Okay.
00:08:51
Speaker
Well, maybe you got me there.
00:08:53
Speaker
I can point to the one with the troll mechs though.
00:08:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:56
Speaker
Well, that's true.
00:08:57
Speaker
You know, and Adam's family does have the hand with it, right?
00:09:00
Speaker
You know, so yes.
00:09:01
Speaker
Very good point.
00:09:02
Speaker
You just added a severed head because you know, they were, they were severely lacking in severed heads.
00:09:06
Speaker
Well, the thing hand is like one of my favorite mechs that I really, really want to rip off someday.
00:09:12
Speaker
And this game was I got close.
00:09:14
Speaker
I got close to being able to rip it off.
00:09:16
Speaker
But instead, we had it running back and forth so you could hit it because, I mean, that was cooler.
00:09:20
Speaker
Yeah, because you're shooting with the shotgun and that's perfect.
00:09:23
Speaker
OK, this that right there is why you guys do theme integration very, very well with your games.
00:09:29
Speaker
You've taken the perfect scene where, you know, Ash, if you guys haven't seen this movie, what have you done with your life?
00:09:35
Speaker
First off, second off, there's a scene in the second one where Ash is forced to cut off his hand and it's scurrying away and it flips him off and he shoots it with the shotgun.
00:09:46
Speaker
You've got the double barrel shotgun as you're in lane.
00:09:49
Speaker
going across like, like ash across the side of the cabin and you're shooting this ball at that hand.
00:09:54
Speaker
It's just, it's perfect.
00:09:56
Speaker
And that's just one of the things you guys have integrated in this.
00:09:59
Speaker
I mean, why, how I just, I have so many questions.
00:10:06
Speaker
I mean, we've always been known for good theme integration and a very large part of that.
00:10:13
Speaker
And this is actually something we sometimes take a little bit of criticism for even is we pretty much always just choose themes.
00:10:20
Speaker
We love, we almost exclusively choose themes that we're very into because we know that if our heart lies with those things, we're going to be able to bring out the things and those that we love to, to the customers.
00:10:32
Speaker
I mean, growing up,
00:10:33
Speaker
I'm very fortunate I ended up with this career because growing up, I was so obsessed and passionate about everything horror and music and comedy.
00:10:43
Speaker
And fortunately for me, I needed all of those traits to get good at this job.
00:10:47
Speaker
And but I knew how strongly I felt for all of those things.
00:10:51
Speaker
And I always just wanted other people to feel the love that I was feeling for those things.
00:10:57
Speaker
And a lot of times growing up, I didn't know how to do that.
00:11:00
Speaker
A lot of people just thought the stuff I liked was kind of weird or they didn't quite get it.
00:11:04
Speaker
They didn't quite get why it was so cool.
00:11:05
Speaker
Like this is just the old cheesy cheap movie from the eighties.
00:11:09
Speaker
Why are you so into it?
00:11:10
Speaker
And when we get to make a game like evil dead pinball, where we get to shoot at a roaming hand with a shotgun and we have call outs where he's like, Oh, you little sucker.
00:11:20
Speaker
And he's like cursing at the hand and whatnot.
00:11:22
Speaker
It's like, it's, it's showing people that,
00:11:25
Speaker
what I love and what I'm so passionate about in a way that I could never express with words.
00:11:30
Speaker
It puts it in a physical way for people to enjoy and experience.
00:11:33
Speaker
And I hope that's what people get when they play that.
00:11:35
Speaker
They get the same excitement that I did.
00:11:38
Speaker
I had growing up with these, these licenses that we get to work on.
00:11:44
Speaker
100%.
00:11:44
Speaker
This is the first time in a while that you've done something strictly like horror.
00:11:50
Speaker
And so you've tried to split that balance because there are some people who are like Texas chainsaw massacre.
00:11:56
Speaker
Maybe not so much.
00:11:57
Speaker
Maybe I'll go for the Looney tunes option.
00:11:59
Speaker
So you didn't do the, the double barreled approach for this one.
00:12:03
Speaker
So what was the thought process into that?
00:12:06
Speaker
Uh, dual themes are hard and I didn't want to do them anymore.
00:12:09
Speaker
Okay.
00:12:11
Speaker
No, I mean, that is actually a big reason.
00:12:13
Speaker
We are stepping away from the dual themes.
00:12:16
Speaker
I love the dual themes.
00:12:17
Speaker
I think it works.
00:12:18
Speaker
I think it has a great place, but it is very difficult.
00:12:22
Speaker
And this one, in a sense, still was a dual theme for me because it's two completely separate licenses that I had to work through and navigate and get to merge together for the project.
00:12:32
Speaker
But yeah.
00:12:35
Speaker
We felt very, very confident in this property to stand on its own two legs because this is a license that people have been asking for for so long.
00:12:44
Speaker
As long as there has been spooky pinball, especially spooky pinball with Ben Heck around it, people have been begging for us to do Evil Dead.
00:12:52
Speaker
I mean, you can literally go back 10 years ago in Pinside Threads and find people asking...
00:12:58
Speaker
Questions like, is Spooky Pinball going to do Evil Dead?
00:13:01
Speaker
And you can even find pin side comments from Ben from like eight years ago being like, if we did Evil Dead, I'd love to do stuff like this in it.
00:13:09
Speaker
So it's just, it feels like it's been a long time coming.
00:13:12
Speaker
And I mean, that's how a lot of, that's how Scooby-Doo felt, especially.
00:13:15
Speaker
It felt like the theme that we were supposed to do for a long time.
00:13:20
Speaker
And Evil Dead also felt like a theme we were really supposed to do for a long time.
00:13:24
Speaker
So it feels great to finally get to it.
00:13:26
Speaker
And we have more themes that,
00:13:28
Speaker
feel like we are supposed to do them that we are getting to.
00:13:30
Speaker
So.
00:13:32
Speaker
Well, and speaking of getting these themes and Ben Heck wanting to do them and you guys being, you know, you guys need to be doing it.
00:13:39
Speaker
My understanding is Frenchie heard that you guys were on this title and called you and was like, so you need an artist.
00:13:46
Speaker
Tell me about that.
00:13:47
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:48
Speaker
It's my blackmail story that started one of my all time favorite friendships I've ever had.
00:13:53
Speaker
So I knew Chris, obviously, through the industry because I absolutely adored his work on the Munsters.
00:13:59
Speaker
It was my favorite pinball art package of all time.
00:14:02
Speaker
And I'd been on his show a couple of times and I talked with him, you know, at shows a couple of times.
00:14:07
Speaker
But I really didn't know Franchi personally
Art Style and Mechanical Design Choices
00:14:10
Speaker
at all.
00:14:11
Speaker
And it was at Expo not long after I signed the license because I signed it in like late summer.
00:14:16
Speaker
And then I was at Expo in the fall.
00:14:19
Speaker
And Franchi comes up to me and he was like, you need me on your next game.
00:14:26
Speaker
And I was like, oh, yeah, why do we need you?
00:14:28
Speaker
And he's like, because I know what your next theme is.
00:14:31
Speaker
And I was like, oh, you know what my next theme is, Chris?
00:14:33
Speaker
Huh?
00:14:33
Speaker
What is it?
00:14:34
Speaker
And he goes, oh, well, it rhymes with evil dead.
00:14:40
Speaker
And I kind of turned white as a ghost.
00:14:42
Speaker
Big gulp moment because I was at Expo looking around like, oh, man.
00:14:46
Speaker
And I was just really flabbergasted that he just somehow knew it.
00:14:50
Speaker
And what's funny about that is he doesn't remember how he knew.
00:14:54
Speaker
Like I asked, how did you know that we had it?
00:14:55
Speaker
And he's like, I'm old.
00:14:56
Speaker
My memory's crap.
00:14:57
Speaker
I don't remember.
00:14:58
Speaker
So I don't know how he knew.
00:14:59
Speaker
I mean, he's friends with like a couple of the actors from the movie.
00:15:02
Speaker
It could have been from that or something.
00:15:04
Speaker
But yeah, he essentially was like,
00:15:07
Speaker
If you don't hire me, and he was like laughing while he said it.
00:15:11
Speaker
He was clearly joking.
00:15:11
Speaker
He was like, if you don't hire me, I'll leak it to everybody.
00:15:15
Speaker
And I was like, geez, first impressions, huh?
00:15:20
Speaker
And so we traded phone numbers and I got back from the show and it was Monday and I was like recovering.
00:15:26
Speaker
trying to get my thoughts in order and get ready to get back to work.
00:15:30
Speaker
And I got a text from him and it was some artwork of the Cheryl popping up from beneath the trap door.
00:15:37
Speaker
Yes.
00:15:38
Speaker
And he was like, I'm already getting started.
00:15:40
Speaker
And I was like, well, I think he has the job then.
00:15:43
Speaker
I can't tell him no at this point, like he's already started and what he sent was so good.
00:15:48
Speaker
I remember like opening, I was on my way out to work and I was on my, my, in my laundry room, like putting my boots on and was like, Oh,
00:15:56
Speaker
man, that looks really good.
00:15:59
Speaker
Yeah, we're going to have to hire him.
00:16:01
Speaker
And I couldn't be happier that we did because it ended up spawning this really amazing friendship that we have and what ultimately led to a few years later having him become exclusive to Spooky Pinball as our exclusive artist.
00:16:15
Speaker
And I couldn't be happier about it.
00:16:18
Speaker
I love Chris to death.
00:16:19
Speaker
And we talked just about every single day.
00:16:21
Speaker
He called me today.
00:16:22
Speaker
He was upset because we hadn't talked since Saturday.
00:16:24
Speaker
And I felt so guilty.
00:16:26
Speaker
Because we were busy on the production line training people and building new games.
00:16:30
Speaker
I felt so bad.
00:16:30
Speaker
It feels weird not talking to them right now.
00:16:33
Speaker
So can you expand on that with signing an exclusivity contract and what all that?
00:16:41
Speaker
I know you can't go super in depth, but what's the thought process behind doing that and how many games and whatnot?
00:16:48
Speaker
Right.
00:16:49
Speaker
So what it came down to was we started working together on Evil Dead, and I really liked it.
00:16:55
Speaker
And then we started working together on one of the next games, and I liked it even more.
00:17:00
Speaker
But more importantly, I liked working with Chris because he, not just because of our friendship, which is a big part of it, but because he also is an amazing artist.
00:17:11
Speaker
He's an amazing, I don't want to say employee, but he is
00:17:17
Speaker
He understands what needs to be done to get it approved through licensors too.
00:17:23
Speaker
He just, he understands pinball through and through when it comes to art.
00:17:28
Speaker
And I didn't want to lose that.
00:17:31
Speaker
I really loved working with him and you know, through talking with him, I knew he was going to be working on quite a number of projects with other companies and
00:17:42
Speaker
I was getting worried because I was like, well, I can't have my games look exactly the same as everybody else's games.
00:17:49
Speaker
Our artwork has always been good.
00:17:51
Speaker
We've always had great artwork.
00:17:52
Speaker
It's one of the defining features of our games.
00:17:55
Speaker
And to keep...
00:17:57
Speaker
our artwork being one of the defining features of our games so that it stands out in your lineup.
00:18:01
Speaker
I need our artwork to look different than other companies.
00:18:04
Speaker
And if Chris's artwork is on every company's game, then I'm kind of SOL.
00:18:09
Speaker
We'll take that away.
00:18:12
Speaker
And it made me, I was like pretty bummed out for a while.
00:18:15
Speaker
Like, oh crap, like, am I not going to be able to work with Chris in the future here?
00:18:19
Speaker
that would really suck because we have more things I want him to do.
00:18:23
Speaker
But yeah, if four games come out in a year and they're all Frenchie, like that's kind of a problem for me.
00:18:29
Speaker
So I started proposing the idea to him and he was kind of back and forth on it.
00:18:34
Speaker
I invited him to come stay with us for a few days in Benton.
00:18:38
Speaker
And it wasn't too long after that, that we kind of got it worked out for him to be exclusive to us in pinball.
00:18:43
Speaker
He still has, he still does more artwork outside of pinball.
00:18:46
Speaker
I don't know if most people know this, that he has a day job.
00:18:49
Speaker
outside of pinball that he does artwork for as well.
00:18:53
Speaker
But yeah, it just kind of, that's kind of how all that shook out.
00:18:57
Speaker
And like I said, I couldn't be more thankful for it.
00:18:59
Speaker
It's been a heck of a ride.
00:19:00
Speaker
And he's so great with also a lot of like the marketing collaborations.
00:19:04
Speaker
He has
Innovative Game Mechanics
00:19:05
Speaker
so many ideas.
00:19:06
Speaker
And yeah, it just overall great collaboration.
00:19:10
Speaker
I got more than an artist when we brought him on.
00:19:13
Speaker
And yeah.
00:19:15
Speaker
The thing about his artwork, and this is, I'm looking at Evil Dead as we speak right now.
00:19:21
Speaker
first off this gives me greg ferreras evil or elvira horse a house of horror vibes it's very much like that old school 90s like you're saying that bally williams where it's you're not just looking at art but it's telling a story and it's very descriptive as well you're not solely uh basing your rules off of rgb leds right like
00:19:44
Speaker
just like cellar open and boomstick.
00:19:48
Speaker
There is text in places that should be text.
00:19:52
Speaker
So that way you can kind of understand the play field as you're playing instead of half.
00:19:58
Speaker
Don't get me wrong.
00:19:58
Speaker
I enjoy the LCD.
00:20:00
Speaker
Okay.
00:20:01
Speaker
Under Sanity, is that the Red Skull?
00:20:04
Speaker
Or not Red Skull.
00:20:05
Speaker
What is it?
00:20:05
Speaker
The Misfits logo.
00:20:07
Speaker
I know it's not original.
00:20:08
Speaker
Like Red Skeleton.
00:20:09
Speaker
What is that above...
00:20:11
Speaker
Underwear.
00:20:12
Speaker
I'm sorry.
00:20:12
Speaker
I don't have the artwork pulled up in front of me.
00:20:14
Speaker
Under what part?
00:20:14
Speaker
Under what?
00:20:15
Speaker
So the, on the ball saves on the, on the left and the right side, it almost looks like the red skeleton, you know, the misfits logo that they sold from.
00:20:21
Speaker
Oh no, that's the movie to poster.
00:20:23
Speaker
Oh, okay.
00:20:24
Speaker
Okay.
00:20:25
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:25
Speaker
If you look at the evil dead two poster, it has that skeleton that's kind of looking off to the side a little bit.
00:20:31
Speaker
And yeah, we just thought that that would look really cool in the inserts.
00:20:35
Speaker
We wanted to, I just realized like that's a super iconic poster that we weren't incorporating in the artwork.
00:20:39
Speaker
And I think that's something I asked for to be in there.
00:20:43
Speaker
Gotcha.
00:20:44
Speaker
But to, to my point earlier about theme integration, where I was kind of gushing over like what I love and what I'm passionate about and how I want to show that to people and put it in the game.
00:20:54
Speaker
Chris has that times 10 in his artwork.
00:20:57
Speaker
And you can tell clear as day that this is a project that he loves and that evil debt is something that he absolutely adores.
00:21:04
Speaker
And he understands how to get that to come out of his, his brain and his heart and, and,
00:21:10
Speaker
onto a cabinet and a play field and everywhere else that his art is in the game.
00:21:15
Speaker
Yep.
00:21:17
Speaker
When you're approaching these games, what makes you choose to do like a standard body, wide body?
00:21:23
Speaker
Like what goes into your mind on that design?
00:21:26
Speaker
This is, I have such a horrible answer for this.
00:21:29
Speaker
When people ask like, how do you decide standard body and wide body?
00:21:32
Speaker
Honestly, I don't know what it is.
00:21:34
Speaker
Some games out there just say standard and some games just say wide body.
00:21:40
Speaker
I don't know.
00:21:41
Speaker
We'll do it right now.
00:21:43
Speaker
We'll try it right now.
00:21:44
Speaker
Name three licenses you would like to see.
00:21:47
Speaker
And I'll say if I feel like they would be standard body or wide body.
00:21:50
Speaker
Okay.
00:21:52
Speaker
Rocky Horror Picture Show.
00:21:54
Speaker
Standard body.
00:21:56
Speaker
Back to the Future.
00:21:59
Speaker
Standard body.
00:22:02
Speaker
You know what?
00:22:03
Speaker
I want a Nightmare on Elm Street.
00:22:05
Speaker
Wide body.
00:22:08
Speaker
Nice.
00:22:08
Speaker
And that's... When you thought Evil Dead, you're just like wide body?
00:22:11
Speaker
It was wide body immediately.
00:22:13
Speaker
It just was immediately.
00:22:14
Speaker
I think some of that is just because certain games call for larger spectacle mechs, like in this one, a large cabin.
00:22:22
Speaker
We know once we put a large cabin in there, well, if it's going to be a standard body game, that's going to eat up too much real estate.
00:22:28
Speaker
So let's try and get some more things on the side.
00:22:33
Speaker
Okay.
00:22:34
Speaker
Now I can try it with you guys.
00:22:35
Speaker
Hang on.
00:22:35
Speaker
All right.
00:22:36
Speaker
So, okay.
00:22:36
Speaker
All right.
00:22:37
Speaker
All right.
00:22:37
Speaker
All right.
00:22:37
Speaker
Go ahead.
00:22:37
Speaker
Let me, let me think of some random titles.
00:22:39
Speaker
Okay.
00:22:42
Speaker
Jimmy Buffett pinball.
00:22:46
Speaker
You know, I would say wide body and mainly because Jimmy Buffett's such a chill guy.
00:22:51
Speaker
Wide bodies tend to be more like kind of, kind of just experience.
00:22:55
Speaker
They can be a little floaty.
00:22:57
Speaker
You lower them down.
00:22:58
Speaker
There you go.
00:22:59
Speaker
Okay.
00:22:59
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:01
Speaker
Fall out.
00:23:03
Speaker
Ooh, I would have to say wide body because it's an expansive universe that you're really trying to portray.
00:23:09
Speaker
It could be a lot of mechs like evil dead.
00:23:11
Speaker
There's a lot that entails in fallout that you could just, yeah.
00:23:16
Speaker
I don't know, but the problem is to fall out can be very brutal too.
00:23:18
Speaker
So it's like when you want, I would have said narrow body.
00:23:22
Speaker
I would have said standard body on that one.
00:23:23
Speaker
All right.
00:23:24
Speaker
One more, one more doom.
00:23:27
Speaker
Oh, that's going to be standard body.
00:23:28
Speaker
That's standard body.
00:23:29
Speaker
Cause that's gotta be, that's gotta be brutal.
00:23:31
Speaker
It's gotta be mean.
00:23:33
Speaker
It's I mean, how many, you know, when you drain the ball, you have to hear like a call out that says headshot.
00:23:38
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:39
Speaker
But you see what I mean?
00:23:40
Speaker
Like I, I throw the, you throw it out there and you have that gut feeling and it just feels right.
00:23:45
Speaker
And that's honestly the answer.
00:23:47
Speaker
Most of the time when we decide if it's going to be standard or wide body, it's just this gut feeling that does or doesn't make sense.
00:23:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:54
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:55
Speaker
So lead me through.
00:23:56
Speaker
You have now I'm, I'm looking at this.
00:23:59
Speaker
I see three flippers.
00:24:02
Speaker
Is there, wait, is there one hidden?
00:24:05
Speaker
There's one flipper.
00:24:06
Speaker
The sling.
00:24:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:24:07
Speaker
That's the one I can't see very well.
00:24:08
Speaker
Yeah.
00:24:09
Speaker
Sling flipper, baby.
00:24:10
Speaker
You'll get used to it.
00:24:12
Speaker
Just wait.
00:24:13
Speaker
Just wait till you play with that thing.
00:24:14
Speaker
Now I hear that that one, now that one's, you're not stage flipping, right?
00:24:19
Speaker
Is, are you, is this, is a secondary button on that?
00:24:23
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:24:24
Speaker
The sling flipper is a secondary button.
00:24:27
Speaker
We are going to get a setting in the menu where it can be staged because we know some people just really don't like a second button for stuff like that.
00:24:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:24:37
Speaker
it's better to have the second button.
00:24:39
Speaker
It plays better.
00:24:39
Speaker
You'll use it smarter if you have the second button.
00:24:42
Speaker
Yes.
00:24:42
Speaker
But we like to leave options like that for people because it's your game.
00:24:47
Speaker
You're spending a lot of money buying these games.
00:24:48
Speaker
You should be able to change settings to make it more your style so you can just enjoy it the way you want to enjoy it in your own home, you know?
00:24:56
Speaker
How did you choose to do a... Sorry, go ahead, Josh.
00:24:59
Speaker
Oh, I was just going to say, can it go behind the groovy flipper?
00:25:02
Speaker
Yeah, it actually can.
00:25:04
Speaker
We were at one point considering making that a shot because you can shoot behind the groovy flipper and it'll kick it over into that right in lane.
00:25:12
Speaker
But we didn't really want to encourage people to shoot the backside of that flipper.
00:25:16
Speaker
Hence why in the first place we didn't stage it because if it was staged and you backhand, you're going to hit the backside of that flipper.
00:25:23
Speaker
And we don't really want to encourage people to hit that because it could wear on it over time.
00:25:27
Speaker
So we ended up not doing it.
00:25:28
Speaker
But yes, it can and does happen quickly.
00:25:31
Speaker
sometimes during gameplay and it'll kick it over there and it's kind of a funny little moment, but no, it is not technically a shot.
00:25:39
Speaker
What, unless you want it to be anything can be a shot if you're motivated, right?
00:25:44
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:45
Speaker
Um, what, uh, what made you think, Hey, I want to use a flipper for, you know, where the, the typical kickers are.
00:25:54
Speaker
Uh, it was kind of, um,
00:25:56
Speaker
a bit of a joke at first, almost an accident.
00:25:59
Speaker
We had the hand over on the left side running back and forth and we liked it, but it was, it just felt a little too awkward to hit off the lower part of that flipper.
00:26:11
Speaker
You don't usually put major mechs off a very end of the flipper shot in a game.
00:26:17
Speaker
And we were like, this is really great, but it's just not quite where we want it to be.
00:26:22
Speaker
And we weren't sure how we were going to move it elsewhere.
00:26:24
Speaker
Cause we already had all this other stuff in the game.
00:26:26
Speaker
And I literally stepped out of the office for a minute just to like hit the bathroom.
00:26:30
Speaker
And when I came back in, Luke had the right sling plastic off and he drilled the hole and he'd put a flipper there.
00:26:38
Speaker
And he looked at me and he was like, sling flipper.
00:26:41
Speaker
And I was like,
00:26:44
Speaker
All right, sure, why not?
00:26:46
Speaker
It was just a joke at first, but we popped a coil in there, we wired it up, and we started flipping with it.
00:26:52
Speaker
We were like, holy crap, this is actually – it's really easy to get control over the ball and hit the hand over there with it.
00:26:58
Speaker
And we also found you could hit other shots off the play field with it as well.
00:27:03
Speaker
So we were like, this actually –
00:27:05
Speaker
Like people are going to think this is really dumb, but it's actually really cool and it's pretty fun.
00:27:09
Speaker
And then later, like as I was testing code and things like that, I started finding myself using it defensively and to trap up and to change where the ball was going to feed to.
00:27:19
Speaker
And I was like, this thing's actually super dynamic.
00:27:21
Speaker
And I think people are going to really enjoy using it.
00:27:24
Speaker
There's going to be some fun tournament strategies too that we were finding recently that some of the tryhards will definitely be able to use and have fun with.
00:27:31
Speaker
So.
00:27:33
Speaker
So I'm looking at this picture and I know it's a wide body, but you almost have it set up because of the groovy drops and the double shotgun ball guide and whatnot.
00:27:47
Speaker
It almost looks like a narrow body inside of a wide body.
00:27:50
Speaker
Does it play like a narrow body because of this?
00:27:52
Speaker
Exactly.
00:27:53
Speaker
Yes, and this is something I was hoping people would notice and pick up on because people get worried when they hear wide body because I think it's going to be like floaty, slow, kind of like older wide bodies are.
00:28:03
Speaker
But we do not design our wide bodies that way.
00:28:06
Speaker
We still design it with a standard set of shots.
00:28:09
Speaker
We just use that extra space on the sides to fit those extra features or to expand the shots out.
00:28:15
Speaker
But you're still hitting them from narrow body entry points.
00:28:19
Speaker
So it keeps the game moving very fast.
00:28:22
Speaker
It keeps it shooting like a standard, but just allows you to fit more content in the game.
00:28:27
Speaker
Like if it was a standard body, your the fan type layout shots up that center would remain pretty much the same, but you would lose the slant.
00:28:35
Speaker
You would lose the hand on the far left side.
00:28:38
Speaker
So it's it's still shoots and plays like a standard body game.
00:28:41
Speaker
There's just a little bit more space out on the sides.
00:28:44
Speaker
And I think it balances out very well.
00:28:46
Speaker
And a lot of people who played Scooby do.
00:28:48
Speaker
I mean, there's a lot of people out there who play a Scooby and they don't even realize it's a wide body until later, until they notice it next to another game.
00:28:55
Speaker
And they're like, that's a little bit bigger.
00:28:57
Speaker
And I think that's going to happen here, too.
00:29:00
Speaker
I mean, mechanically, this game has a lot going on.
00:29:04
Speaker
Was this just something you were inspired from the beginning or is it you guys started designing and it was just like, and we're putting this in and we're putting this in.
00:29:12
Speaker
Yeah, we just kind of decided at some point we have a saying going of F the BOM where we just couldn't stomach taking anything out.
00:29:25
Speaker
Every idea we had, we felt like the game needed it.
00:29:29
Speaker
And we just wanted to serve the theme well.
00:29:32
Speaker
And this theme in particular was just really pulling a lot from us that we just really wanted to give everything we had on this game.
00:29:40
Speaker
We really wanted to show like this is the cultivation of all of our experience from the
00:29:46
Speaker
Halloween and Ultraman from Scooby-Doo and from Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Looney Tunes.
00:29:51
Speaker
And then from all the games before that, that we, our team didn't design, but had built because we'd all been a part of those processes.
00:29:58
Speaker
It was just this culmination of all that experience.
00:30:02
Speaker
And the theme was right
Production Quality and Durability
00:30:04
Speaker
for us.
00:30:04
Speaker
It felt like something.
00:30:06
Speaker
It felt like a game, a layout, and a theme that we could put our truest.
00:30:10
Speaker
This is getting so snobby.
00:30:13
Speaker
Our truest essence of our company and who we are into it.
00:30:18
Speaker
Really put in there absolutely everything we have.
00:30:21
Speaker
I've said it a lot in...
00:30:23
Speaker
the featurette and other marketing forms and everything like this game is spooky pinball.
00:30:28
Speaker
This is us in this game.
00:30:30
Speaker
This is what we have.
00:30:31
Speaker
And it was making the whole process of building it and releasing it, uh,
00:30:36
Speaker
really intense for us.
00:30:38
Speaker
We were very nervous going into this one because we really did pour our all into this and knew that this is us.
00:30:45
Speaker
This is us in pinball form.
00:30:47
Speaker
If people don't like this one, they don't like us.
00:30:51
Speaker
They don't like our best and we don't know what to do.
00:30:54
Speaker
So to see everybody react, not just like happy, but overwhelmingly positive.
00:31:02
Speaker
I mean, the most positive we have ever, ever, ever seen.
00:31:07
Speaker
really, really took a huge weight off of our shoulders because we felt just so relieved knowing that people were accepting of us and into what we have to offer in this industry.
00:31:19
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:20
Speaker
Lead me through, you have a double barrel shotgun on the right that basically has two shooter lanes.
00:31:27
Speaker
So, so lead me through that.
00:31:29
Speaker
What was the thought process on that?
00:31:31
Speaker
I'm, I'm certain it's going to be like,
00:31:34
Speaker
theme integration on some level, but there is a, there's an interesting design element that you actually have, you know, part of the, the entry into the game is the, the shot path.
00:31:46
Speaker
And so you have two of those to, to take into account.
00:31:49
Speaker
So tell me about that.
00:31:52
Speaker
Yeah, we just always knew we wanted to shoot a double barrel shotgun in the game.
00:31:59
Speaker
And a dual shooter lane is something that hasn't been done in a really long time.
00:32:04
Speaker
I'm pretty sure Twilight Zone is the last time it's been done.
00:32:07
Speaker
And even that isn't really the same as what we're doing here with this one.
00:32:11
Speaker
We just always knew we wanted to load a double barrel shotgun and shoot it.
00:32:17
Speaker
And we were able to do that in two ways, excuse me, in the game with bashing those shotgun shell targets in up above.
00:32:25
Speaker
And then that leads to the sequence of vents that, you know, loads the two balls into the shooter lane so you can actually shoot it.
00:32:31
Speaker
And then we went a step further with it and added the muzzle flash.
00:32:36
Speaker
When we did our flasher pass in the game, we added a flasher underneath that apron spot.
00:32:40
Speaker
So whenever you fire the ball, it goes off and it actually has the gun muzzle flash of when you when you fire it as well.
00:32:47
Speaker
Wow.
00:32:47
Speaker
And I mean, yeah, I hope it's a decent enough answer to your question, but just general knowing from the beginning we wanted to shoot.
00:32:55
Speaker
a double barrel shotgun and the shooter lane being a very good opportunity, especially because it is wide body.
00:33:01
Speaker
And we expanded out on those sides where, like I said before, it's not the shots that are getting expanded out there.
00:33:07
Speaker
It's the features.
00:33:08
Speaker
And this is one of those features where we were able to take it out there.
00:33:10
Speaker
We're on like Scooby-Doo.
00:33:12
Speaker
That space was used for the bravery meter.
00:33:14
Speaker
Well, we didn't have a bravery meter in Evil Dead.
00:33:16
Speaker
We have a sanity meter, but not a bravery meter.
00:33:19
Speaker
And it just kind of all put itself right in place for us.
00:33:23
Speaker
It seemed to make a lot of sense.
00:33:26
Speaker
And you speak of these shotgun shells.
00:33:28
Speaker
Holy crap.
00:33:28
Speaker
This is like one of the coolest features on this game.
00:33:32
Speaker
Like it's the, it's the thing that caught my eye when I first saw the trailer, you've got to tell me how you came up with this idea.
00:33:38
Speaker
And I don't know if anything's been done like this before.
00:33:41
Speaker
I know Zach Manning with flipping out had mentioned on the rate on the pinball show with Dennis Creasel that they were, they're attributing this almost to like a drop target, but sidewards instead of like going up and down on the play field, it's, it's in and out.
00:33:54
Speaker
So yeah,
00:33:55
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:33:55
Speaker
That's kind of like what the inner workings of the mech are like.
00:33:58
Speaker
This one's all spooky Luke, for sure.
00:34:01
Speaker
When we, back in the day, we really wanted to do, this is kind of funny, we really wanted to do a John Wick game, because we all love John Wick.
00:34:08
Speaker
We're huge John Wick fans.
00:34:10
Speaker
And we're doing our first layout, we kind of had that in mind.
00:34:14
Speaker
And we really wanted to load a shotgun in John Wick, thinking that that would be like a cool way to go through different levels in the game and whatnot.
00:34:21
Speaker
So putting a gun in Wick makes sense, right?
00:34:26
Speaker
No comment, but pinball is hard, man.
00:34:32
Speaker
That's all I'll say.
00:34:34
Speaker
Yeah, we wanted to do that in Wick.
00:34:36
Speaker
Obviously, we ended up not doing John Wick and, you know, did.
00:34:39
Speaker
went a different route with everything but when we got to this game double barrel shotgun is a pretty big old feature in the evil dead franchise and luke had been sitting on this idea for years and years and finally a game presented itself that it made sense to start to put that in because uh yeah no uh scooby-doo or looney tunes well technically looney tunes would have
00:35:01
Speaker
But Scooby-Doo didn't make a whole lot of sense to do a feature like this.
00:35:04
Speaker
So, yeah, Spooky Luke had that design for a long time.
00:35:07
Speaker
He kind of knew how he wanted to do it.
00:35:09
Speaker
We got this license.
00:35:10
Speaker
We started doing this layout.
00:35:11
Speaker
He knew pretty early on that he wanted to get this mech worked into there.
00:35:15
Speaker
And, yeah, it is very similar.
00:35:17
Speaker
It's kind of like a drop target mech, but on its side.
00:35:21
Speaker
But all that stuff's internal.
00:35:23
Speaker
You're never going to see it, I hope.
00:35:25
Speaker
So, yeah.
00:35:26
Speaker
From the top side, it's just actually some double barrels on the play field with shotgun shells that you're hitting in with spooky pinball 12 gauge shells.
00:35:34
Speaker
I love that we got that detail onto those and I'm happy the licensure was cool with it.
00:35:39
Speaker
That is amazing.
00:35:40
Speaker
And that's one thing I love about Franchi is he sneaks in little details like this.
00:35:46
Speaker
And I, for those that don't know, Zach, many was actually supposed to be in Munsters.
00:35:50
Speaker
We talked about Munsters earlier.
00:35:51
Speaker
He was in the outlet on the left side, but he got caught and Frenchy had to take him out.
00:35:56
Speaker
But just, it's funny.
00:35:58
Speaker
Cause like Beatles, I know that he put his daughter Presley in there.
00:36:03
Speaker
She's, she's one of the girls that are fangirling over the Beatles.
00:36:06
Speaker
So I just, I always loved the little, the little Easter eggs that he puts in here.
00:36:09
Speaker
And that's, that's perfect to have spooky on the,
00:36:12
Speaker
The 12K shotgun challenge for Frenchy.
00:36:14
Speaker
He needs to put a loser kid logo in a spooky game.
00:36:17
Speaker
Now figure out how to, how to hide it in.
00:36:21
Speaker
Maybe we could find a, like a, a napkin.
00:36:23
Speaker
We can draw it on in the work shed or something like that.
00:36:28
Speaker
That's it's a busy table.
00:36:29
Speaker
We can fit a lot of more details in there.
00:36:31
Speaker
You can put a lot in there.
00:36:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:33
Speaker
Put it on the toilet paper in the bathroom in the cabin.
00:36:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:39
Speaker
uh france you make it happen yeah i know you're listening i have faith in you chris you're good all right so there you know one thing i do want to bring up is um you guys your quality is getting better and better and better um there is a lot mechanically going on with this game what are you guys doing to ensure that the the quality gets better with this game and also um
00:37:05
Speaker
One other question I had too that goes with the quality and whatnot.
00:37:08
Speaker
I know that other companies have a machine that essentially tests the mech so many times.
00:37:13
Speaker
It's like 24-7, 365.
00:37:15
Speaker
Do you guys do that as well with your mechs to ensure that these are going to last over the life of the unit?
00:37:22
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:37:22
Speaker
I mean, for the most part, a lot of the mechanism features we are using are, you know, quite a few of them are from...
00:37:32
Speaker
decades of pinball use and experience.
00:37:34
Speaker
I mean, like drop targets, auto launchers, pop bumpers, things like that.
00:37:38
Speaker
I mean, those have been used for so long and they've gone through so much stress testing that you can very confidently rely on those.
00:37:44
Speaker
But yeah, once you get a feature like a double barrel shotgun mech, yeah, you need to fire that thing about...
00:37:52
Speaker
10 to 20 to 2 billion times to make sure it's not going to fall apart out in the field.
00:37:58
Speaker
And then somehow, some way it will still find a way to do it, but it will fire that 20 billion times in your office first before it gets out into the field.
00:38:07
Speaker
Yeah, we do stress testing like that all the time.
00:38:09
Speaker
We used to have this compressor room that was always super loud that we would put things like that in to do the testing on because then you wouldn't at least have to listen to it all day and you just check on it throughout the day to make sure it's still firing and working.
00:38:22
Speaker
But quality.
00:38:23
Speaker
Dude, we've got so many new things we're doing that has already been seeing such drastic improvements.
00:38:29
Speaker
And as we've been entering this Evil Dead build, I'm feeling very I'm feeling so confident in it.
00:38:34
Speaker
So we moved into the new factory, which I've talked about this quite a bit.
00:38:37
Speaker
We've moved into the new factory, which was completely designed around workflow and quality improvement.
00:38:44
Speaker
to improve on those things from our previous factory.
00:38:47
Speaker
We spent like 11 or 12 months designing that, making custom rigs, figuring out what the workflow is going to be, kind of restructuring our build process overall to get more of a true assembly line feel to it.
00:39:00
Speaker
And on top of that, a lot of our employees that we have now have been with us for years, years and years.
00:39:06
Speaker
They've built thousands of games.
00:39:08
Speaker
They have such a deeper understanding of pinball now than they did before.
00:39:12
Speaker
We've also hit what I feel is a really great spot in game sale, like unit count in what we produce every year.
Thematic Richness and Production Strategy
00:39:20
Speaker
Because, I mean, when we were in the Halloween days, we were trying to do 40 games a week.
00:39:26
Speaker
which was just so many when we had previously been doing Rick and Morty, which was 750 games in a year.
00:39:33
Speaker
We got to Halloween Ultraman.
00:39:35
Speaker
It was 1700 games in a year.
00:39:37
Speaker
So we had to do that also amidst all the COVID craziness when we'd gotten back.
00:39:44
Speaker
So, I mean, where we're sitting right now, we have so much more experience.
00:39:49
Speaker
We have so much refined and redesigned mechanisms and build quality improvements that we've learned since our first design on Halloween.
00:39:59
Speaker
We have employees with 10 times the amount of experience now that they had before in such a deep, much deeper understanding.
00:40:06
Speaker
And then even still on top of all that, I'm still adding new things all the time to our production process to improve the checks and everything.
00:40:15
Speaker
My joke lately that I want to do, you know, when you go to the hardware store and you're buying paint and they put it in one of those machines that shakes it up really violently.
00:40:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:40:23
Speaker
I want to put my cleared sticker on the game.
00:40:25
Speaker
I want JR boxing guy to wrap it up and I want him to put it in one of those and just shake the hell out of it.
00:40:31
Speaker
And then I'm going to put it back up on a stand and just go through it again.
00:40:35
Speaker
Whatever I can do to keep improving the process I'm going to do.
00:40:38
Speaker
But I think the culmination of all those things is really going to
00:40:43
Speaker
show on evil dead when it gets out there.
00:40:46
Speaker
And a spooky Luke has really done a fantastic job of just going through this, this particular design and refining it over the last year to make sure it's as ready as possible.
00:40:56
Speaker
Cause another thing, I'm sorry if I'm ranting about this for too long, another thing that's helped us improve with quality as well is how much further ahead we're getting built to, because so many times quite transparently,
00:41:09
Speaker
We were scrambling to get up to our game launches for so many years, trying to make sure the game was finished and ready to go hit the production line.
00:41:16
Speaker
But now we're working on four or five games in the future, some of which, like three or four of those, are being coded on right now.
00:41:25
Speaker
that's so much more time to go back through the build and look at it again on how you can go and redesign certain elements of it to make sure it's more robust and easy to build for production.
00:41:34
Speaker
Because when we first started Evil Dead, we were very aware, like, this is so many items.
00:41:39
Speaker
We have to make sure we can build this.
00:41:41
Speaker
And Luke did so many pass-throughs making sure that it is going to be so robust.
00:41:46
Speaker
I mean, just built everything.
00:41:48
Speaker
so strong.
00:41:50
Speaker
And I think that's going to show.
00:41:51
Speaker
I'm feeling really good about it.
00:41:52
Speaker
I mean, at the end of the day, it's always pinball.
00:41:54
Speaker
Pinball is a wear and tear machine.
00:41:55
Speaker
It's going to take a lot of abuse, especially on locations.
00:41:58
Speaker
It's going to take so much abuse and there's maintenance with that.
00:42:01
Speaker
But I think we're really coming into our own here, not just on the quality control fronts at Spooky Pinball, but everything.
00:42:09
Speaker
We've got our layouts tuned into where we want them.
00:42:11
Speaker
We've got the licensing tuned in where we want it, the quality tuned in where we want it, the
00:42:15
Speaker
the code tuned in where we want it, the art tuned in where we want.
00:42:19
Speaker
I can keep going.
00:42:20
Speaker
It's we've really hit our stride and we all are feeling it.
00:42:25
Speaker
We all are feeling so much better and more relieved right now than we did a few years ago where it was just overwhelming everything that was going on all the time.
00:42:33
Speaker
So yeah,
00:42:34
Speaker
Yeah, we're feeling good.
00:42:37
Speaker
Okay.
00:42:37
Speaker
Well, I'll say too, like we went, Scott and I were at expo and it's a testament.
00:42:41
Speaker
Like while we were there, I mean, we went through the spooky booth a handful of times and I swear every time I was in that booth, there were people on the machines and all the machines were working.
00:42:50
Speaker
I never saw a hood go up on one of them.
00:42:52
Speaker
And if it did, it was quick.
00:42:54
Speaker
So I just, I, I I'm seeing an improvement as well.
00:42:59
Speaker
So yeah.
00:42:59
Speaker
What would you have to say, Scott?
00:43:01
Speaker
Well, getting back to what you were talking about.
00:43:05
Speaker
So what is a, this is a question that you may or may not want to share, but I'll ask it anyway.
00:43:12
Speaker
what is a successful, a successful goal for you?
00:43:17
Speaker
Like per week, how many games you want, you want to do, or, or what is a successful run on a, on a title?
00:43:23
Speaker
Because you did contract the number a little bit, which I think is actually beneficial for a game like evil dead, because you're probably going to cater to the hardcore evil dead fans and the pinball fans.
00:43:35
Speaker
I don't know how many,
00:43:38
Speaker
how many new people you're going to get with such a very, very specific theme.
00:43:43
Speaker
And so it makes sense to, to give a very targeted focused number and to be able to get those out to the super fan people.
00:43:53
Speaker
Yeah, there's a handful of answers to that question.
00:43:56
Speaker
Right now we're cruising at about 16 to 20 games per week.
00:44:00
Speaker
I'd like to still be floating around that 16 mark throughout the production of Evil Dead, which I think that's about where we're going to be.
00:44:08
Speaker
The game's still selling very strong.
00:44:11
Speaker
I think we're probably going to sell this game out this year.
00:44:14
Speaker
Hoping so.
00:44:15
Speaker
That would be pretty cool.
00:44:17
Speaker
And what number is that?
00:44:19
Speaker
So everybody knows.
00:44:20
Speaker
888.
00:44:20
Speaker
Evil Dead is limited to 888 collector's edition units.
00:44:26
Speaker
The collector's edition is kind of fun.
00:44:27
Speaker
It's the only edition.
00:44:28
Speaker
We just didn't change the name because we don't like shaking up too many things before a game launch and confusing people.
00:44:33
Speaker
But it's 888 units of the top level model that we have offered for the last four years.
00:44:42
Speaker
But yeah, the 16 to 20 games a week is right about where we want to be.
00:44:47
Speaker
And yeah, we have limited Evil Dead lower than some of our previous titles.
00:44:51
Speaker
I mean, Looney Tunes and TCM were both limited to 888, but they came out at the same time.
00:44:57
Speaker
So it was over 1,500.
00:44:59
Speaker
It's still a ton of units and Scooby-Doo limited to 1900.
00:45:01
Speaker
Yeah, there's a handful of reasons why we lowered it.
00:45:05
Speaker
One of the biggest being protecting the value of the game for the customers.
00:45:09
Speaker
That's a very important thing to people in this industry is the resale value of their game.
00:45:15
Speaker
And I think back when we did Rick and Morty and it was that 750 units and it sold very strong and had a great fan base, it also protected the value of the game for a lot of those people.
00:45:26
Speaker
And that really helps that when people can any extra reason people can feel good when they buy your game.
00:45:35
Speaker
You should take that very seriously.
00:45:37
Speaker
Right.
00:45:38
Speaker
And we do.
00:45:39
Speaker
So protecting the customer's value, not trying to shoot for the stars and produce 3000 games a year because it will kill all of us sooner than later.
00:45:49
Speaker
Yeah.
00:45:50
Speaker
Another very big reason.
00:45:51
Speaker
But that does kill your resale too.
00:45:54
Speaker
Just exactly what you're saying.
00:45:55
Speaker
Exactly.
00:45:56
Speaker
If you have any game that produces like 5,000 to 10,000 games, you know eventually there's going to be a lot on the market.
00:46:06
Speaker
Yeah, 100%.
00:46:08
Speaker
Just throwing it out there, I bet you can get a good deal on an old school Metallica Pro right now.
00:46:15
Speaker
Sure, yeah.
00:46:16
Speaker
Because they made like 10,000 of them.
00:46:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:19
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:20
Speaker
So protecting that resale value is super important.
00:46:23
Speaker
Well, it's funny that you say that because I was going to make, I went through, I was actually going through your guys's, your, your games on, on, on pin side and they're keeping track of sales and whatnot.
00:46:34
Speaker
And to your point, yeah, you look at Rick and Morty, the resale value right now is anywhere from, I mean, there's one at 8,500, but it's typically about 9,500 to 11.
00:46:43
Speaker
And then you look at Halloween where you guys made a ton of them and you're looking around like five, $6,000.
00:46:47
Speaker
Right.
00:46:47
Speaker
The other interesting part too, to your point, because people like, why are they only going one model?
00:46:53
Speaker
It's funny because I went through a lot.
00:46:57
Speaker
Well, that's what's funny.
00:46:58
Speaker
I went through the sales.
00:47:00
Speaker
Yeah.
00:47:00
Speaker
That's there's no sales.
00:47:02
Speaker
Like if you go to Halloween where there's a collectors and a blood suckers and all this stuff, literally the ones are selling or the collectors edition.
00:47:08
Speaker
So it either means people bought the standard and the blood suckers.
00:47:11
Speaker
and aren't selling them, which I highly doubt, or it's literally, they're only buying collector's edition.
00:47:16
Speaker
So why are we making these other games?
00:47:18
Speaker
Why are we going through that headache?
00:47:19
Speaker
You know what I'm saying?
00:47:20
Speaker
Well, it does remind me when we, we did talk, you know, we visited Jersey Jack and they, they threw out there.
00:47:29
Speaker
They basically stopped making the standard guns and roses because it wasn't selling.
00:47:33
Speaker
Like people didn't want that.
00:47:35
Speaker
They wanted the full version.
00:47:37
Speaker
And my attitude is when I see a spooky game, I see the same thing.
00:47:40
Speaker
If you're going to spend the money for this, why would you want anything less than the top level?
00:47:46
Speaker
Well, in our top level, just has so much bang for the buck.
00:47:51
Speaker
I mean, Evil Dead, I'm not going to go into the whole list.
00:47:54
Speaker
We've talked this to death.
00:47:55
Speaker
But I mean, the features that you get in Evil Dead at that $9,999 price tag, it would cost you so many thousands of dollars to get those features into any other game in the market that is priced similar to ours.
00:48:10
Speaker
And yeah, so when you offer the standard and the Bloodsuckers editions that were just a couple grand cheaper,
00:48:16
Speaker
I mean, over 90% of our sales were collector's editions.
Evil Dead Topper's Popularity
00:48:20
Speaker
It just was no longer worth the headache of doing different sculpts, plastics, art packages.
00:48:26
Speaker
That's a whole new set of approvals and this and that you have to do.
00:48:30
Speaker
And I just would rather have one version of the product and it's the best version of the product out there, especially when that's the only one people were buying anyway.
00:48:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:48:42
Speaker
When you look at it, though, other other manufacturers have relied on add ons like they've relied on.
00:48:50
Speaker
Oh, you want extra lights?
00:48:51
Speaker
Oh, you want something?
00:48:52
Speaker
You know, you want the you know, the fancy armor, you want the shooter, all that kind of stuff.
00:48:57
Speaker
And you guys have really gone away from from that.
00:48:59
Speaker
You're just like, that's the game.
00:49:02
Speaker
The one add on that you guys do have, we haven't even talked about this.
00:49:07
Speaker
Oh my goodness.
00:49:08
Speaker
Let's talk about the topper.
00:49:09
Speaker
Holy crap.
00:49:11
Speaker
That is okay.
00:49:12
Speaker
I, I have, I'm a topper guy, as you can see, I, most of my, most of my games get toppers, but I always cringe a little bit because sometimes the toppers don't like, like actually meet expectations on what I think a topper should be.
00:49:26
Speaker
Okay.
00:49:28
Speaker
Anybody who looks at this game and does not want the topper needs to, needs to go to get their head examined because you have to have this topper.
00:49:37
Speaker
If you're going to get this game, well, the game right behind you doesn't have a topper.
00:49:41
Speaker
So I think you need to buy an evil dead topper for that one right behind you.
00:49:44
Speaker
I can't tell which game that is behind you, but it's iron maiden, but that would be hilarious to put an evil dead top on there.
00:49:49
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:50
Speaker
Put evil dead on there.
00:49:51
Speaker
I'll help you out.
00:49:52
Speaker
We'll get it hooked up.
00:49:53
Speaker
You know, it'd be great.
00:49:55
Speaker
It'd be perfect.
00:49:56
Speaker
That would be hilarious, by the way.
00:49:58
Speaker
I would love to do that because I don't like the topper that is available for it.
00:50:02
Speaker
Yeah, well, there's people out there buying the topper who didn't even buy the game.
00:50:05
Speaker
So I guess, you know what's funny?
00:50:07
Speaker
We didn't put a limit on the top.
00:50:11
Speaker
We just never even thought that that was a possibility.
00:50:13
Speaker
We never said topper is limited to 500 units or topper is limited to 888 units or anything like that because we never considered that some people were going to buy it without the game.
00:50:25
Speaker
And then people were buying the topper without the game.
00:50:28
Speaker
And yeah, I mean, that topper has just been a complete smash hit.
00:50:32
Speaker
I'm very, very thankful for it because it was quite the investment and it was a very cool experience getting it together and everything.
00:50:42
Speaker
But it's always scary when you don't know if something's going to work or not.
00:50:44
Speaker
And I'm not joking.
00:50:46
Speaker
I think we're sitting right now at...
00:50:49
Speaker
80 to 85% of our game sales have the topper included right now.
00:50:53
Speaker
It's an insane number.
00:50:56
Speaker
It did better than we ever would have expected a topper to do.
00:51:00
Speaker
So thank you to everybody out there.
00:51:03
Speaker
Toppers, 1400.
00:51:03
Speaker
Okay.
00:51:05
Speaker
Okay.
00:51:06
Speaker
So look at what they're selling other toppers for.
00:51:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:09
Speaker
That's a $3,000 topper.
00:51:10
Speaker
Oh yeah.
00:51:11
Speaker
Oh yeah.
00:51:13
Speaker
You know, there's kind of a moment at expo.
00:51:16
Speaker
I probably shouldn't tell that story because it kind of calls out other people.
00:51:18
Speaker
But there was a moment at Expo where I was looking at other companies' toppers.
00:51:22
Speaker
That's fine.
00:51:22
Speaker
And I walked by.
00:51:24
Speaker
I didn't realize – this sounds kind of crappy.
00:51:26
Speaker
I didn't realize how small they were.
00:51:29
Speaker
Some of them.
00:51:30
Speaker
In a lot of the promo material, it always seemed like they were these really big, cool things.
00:51:34
Speaker
And yes, very expensive.
00:51:36
Speaker
But I always thought like, oh, some of them are pretty darn cool and whatnot.
00:51:39
Speaker
And I was at Expo and I was looking at them and I was thinking back in ours and we were trying to price it at the time.
00:51:45
Speaker
We were thinking $1,400.
00:51:46
Speaker
We weren't sure how people were going to take that or not.
00:51:49
Speaker
And then I saw what the other toppers that were $1,400 or more were.
00:51:52
Speaker
were and I was like, oh, we're going to be okay.
00:51:55
Speaker
Like this is going to do just fine.
00:51:58
Speaker
And then it did.
00:51:59
Speaker
So that was great.
00:51:59
Speaker
Okay.
00:52:01
Speaker
What is the height on this topper too?
00:52:02
Speaker
Like, yeah.
00:52:03
Speaker
Max height is a 13 inches.
00:52:06
Speaker
Okay.
00:52:06
Speaker
If my memory serves me well, other hop, other toppers are at, you know, they're not top in 10.
00:52:12
Speaker
We're talking like seven to nine.
00:52:15
Speaker
Yeah.
00:52:15
Speaker
Yeah.
00:52:15
Speaker
Yeah.
00:52:15
Speaker
Max height.
00:52:16
Speaker
If my memory serves me well, the full like open seller should be about 13 inches.
00:52:22
Speaker
Nice.
00:52:23
Speaker
This is definitely cut a hole in your ceiling worthy.
00:52:25
Speaker
Yeah.
00:52:25
Speaker
You know, a lot of people are talking about putting it beneath the game because they can't fit it in their rooms.
00:52:30
Speaker
That would be funny.
00:52:31
Speaker
We're, we're going to, this is one of those things where people were like, can you make an extension?
00:52:35
Speaker
And spooky Luke commented online.
00:52:37
Speaker
Yeah, we can make an extension.
00:52:39
Speaker
And then about an hour later, he was like, oh crap.
00:52:41
Speaker
Hey, AJ, can we make an extension?
00:52:45
Speaker
And it was like, yeah, I hope so.
00:52:47
Speaker
Like, I think so.
00:52:48
Speaker
And then we got to figure it out.
00:52:50
Speaker
We got to figure it out.
00:52:50
Speaker
We could totally do an extension.
00:52:52
Speaker
But it's one of those times where we're like, we will make sure that that happens because a lot of people want to put it in front of their game at the very bottom.
00:52:59
Speaker
So it's actually a, what do you call it?
00:53:00
Speaker
Not a topper, a bottomer.
00:53:02
Speaker
A bottomer.
00:53:03
Speaker
A bottomer.
00:53:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:53:05
Speaker
That sounds kind of weird, but, but yeah, I just hope nobody is like surprised by it.
00:53:10
Speaker
And they like put their foot through its head when it starts moving and they didn't know it was down there or something.
00:53:15
Speaker
So they might need some signage saying like watch your feet, put chicken wire, chicken wire in front.
00:53:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:53:22
Speaker
Hey, 13 inches.
00:53:23
Speaker
If you can, if you can get 13 inches in anything, you should always pay for it.
00:53:26
Speaker
Just do it.
00:53:28
Speaker
I'm going to move on from that.
00:53:30
Speaker
Okay.
00:53:30
Speaker
The question that a lot of people have asked, and I'm curious as well, and I'm sorry I didn't watch the Carrie Hardy video.
00:53:36
Speaker
We love you, Carrie.
00:53:37
Speaker
You're awesome.
00:53:37
Speaker
We haven't had time.
00:53:38
Speaker
This has come out so fast.
00:53:40
Speaker
I know.
00:53:40
Speaker
There's been so much content.
00:53:41
Speaker
That
Focus on Evil Dead Movies and Design Challenges
00:53:42
Speaker
is one thing you guys have done excellently is the amount of content to consume on this has been impressive.
00:53:49
Speaker
The question I have, we'll call out other people.
00:53:51
Speaker
Like seriously, go and look at the stuff that Zach, that Zach did for you guys.
00:53:54
Speaker
I mean, that stuff is great.
00:53:56
Speaker
Go look at the Carrie Hardy stuff.
00:53:57
Speaker
Like you have been such a, a marketer of this that even you guys do want information.
00:54:03
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:54:04
Speaker
It's great.
00:54:05
Speaker
Go ahead, Josh.
00:54:06
Speaker
So, so the question is this covers only the first two movies.
00:54:10
Speaker
Why not army of darkness?
00:54:12
Speaker
And I can kind of guess maybe why Ash versus evil dead, but tell us that as well.
00:54:17
Speaker
Mm-hmm.
00:54:17
Speaker
So the biggest reason Army of Darkness isn't present in the game is when we were doing movie one and two, we were focusing on the entire cabin in the woods setting.
00:54:29
Speaker
As soon as you throw Army of Darkness in that mix, how are you going to fit all the different features from that movie and the first two movies and make it make sense?
00:54:39
Speaker
Like where on that double wide body?
00:54:41
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:54:42
Speaker
Like where on that layout are you going to put the castle?
00:54:45
Speaker
And also do people want the seventh castle from spooky pinball?
00:54:49
Speaker
I mean, we do a lot of castles, but Al's Cooper's on top.
00:54:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:54
Speaker
Right.
00:54:55
Speaker
No, but it, it just wouldn't make sense to fit all the features.
00:54:59
Speaker
Cause we could do an entire game of army of darkness by itself.
00:55:01
Speaker
Like that movie, you could easily do an entire layout just based around all the features from that.
00:55:06
Speaker
But I mean, there was a conversation that was had where we kind of looked into it and whatnot.
00:55:11
Speaker
And then for,
00:55:12
Speaker
for what we typically require to be available for us to do a license, as far as content goes, it wasn't really there for us.
00:55:21
Speaker
That's really all I can say about that.
00:55:23
Speaker
Quite honestly, is there just wasn't quite what we've wanted there.
00:55:27
Speaker
And it just, it felt like,
00:55:29
Speaker
None of it was adding up in a way to make sense that said, yes, do this.
00:55:34
Speaker
So we didn't.
00:55:36
Speaker
And I think it was the right decision.
00:55:38
Speaker
And anyone who plays the game, I think they will agree after they are done playing the game that this is the exact right experience that you would be looking for from an evil dead pinball.
00:55:49
Speaker
You definitely want to, the first two have such a huge fan base.
00:55:55
Speaker
You don't want to pick five minutes out of one movie and just put it in and move on.
00:56:00
Speaker
You're right.
00:56:01
Speaker
You want the complete experience.
00:56:02
Speaker
And so I totally agree with you.
00:56:05
Speaker
If you're going to go all in, have an immersive experience in a well-defined box.
00:56:12
Speaker
You want to make sure that that stuff is taken care of.
00:56:16
Speaker
So what, you know, and I'm going to steal Josh's question because Josh was brainstorming with us a little earlier.
00:56:24
Speaker
So what was the biggest learning experience or take home that you got from this game?
00:56:30
Speaker
Ooh, no one's asked that yet.
00:56:32
Speaker
What was the biggest learning experience or take home from this game?
00:56:38
Speaker
Or biggest challenge, you know, that's another option.
00:56:40
Speaker
Like what's the biggest challenge that you, that you encountered when you were designing this?
00:56:44
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:46
Speaker
How much editing do you guys do so I can take time to think about the answer?
00:56:50
Speaker
You can think about it.
00:56:51
Speaker
We could ask another.
00:56:52
Speaker
I mean, we can edit the crap out of this.
00:56:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:54
Speaker
Josh does all the editing, so I'm fine with it.
00:56:57
Speaker
Ah, perfect.
00:56:59
Speaker
Man, what's the biggest take on learning experience from this?
00:57:05
Speaker
With how the response to the game has been, it shows that everything we decided to make sure to go the extra mile on is 100% worth it.
00:57:17
Speaker
And we will continue to do that going forward.
00:57:20
Speaker
Because there is a lot of things we could have not put in this if we wanted to save money.
00:57:28
Speaker
or just make the build process a little simpler or anything like that.
00:57:33
Speaker
And we decided to say, screw all that.
00:57:36
Speaker
You know, like I said, F the BOM, let's throw everything we have in us at this.
00:57:42
Speaker
And we're going to continue to do that going forward because the response to it alone has made it worth it.
00:57:49
Speaker
Even if we sold one of these,
00:57:52
Speaker
and everybody reacted that way, it would be worth it to do it again because the love that the community showed for it and that we got to feel from that was just worth it.
00:58:03
Speaker
So we know it is worth always going the extra mile and to not take any shortcuts and to do everything we possibly can in these games.
00:58:12
Speaker
Because there's so many features in the game.
00:58:16
Speaker
And it's like, we could have pulled the tape recorder out of the apron at any time.
00:58:20
Speaker
Anytime.
00:58:20
Speaker
We could have just pulled that out.
00:58:21
Speaker
Nobody would have ever known it was there.
00:58:24
Speaker
And the game would still be great.
00:58:25
Speaker
But we wanted to make sure it was there and to have a character who voices on it and to do that neat little effect because it was just another thing.
Unique Game Modes and Player Experience
00:58:33
Speaker
that brings the game to life, that brings our love for it to life.
00:58:39
Speaker
And it was 100% worth it.
00:58:40
Speaker
And we know it was 100% worth it.
00:58:42
Speaker
So I'd say that was probably the biggest takeaway was always putting in everything you have is you should always do that for sure.
00:58:52
Speaker
When I love that you guys do so much unique stuff with your games, like thinking back to Texas Chainsaw Massacre, like the blood draining mode.
00:59:03
Speaker
On this one, I have to point out, I love the girlfriend messing with you in the game.
00:59:08
Speaker
Oh, dude, it's so much better now.
00:59:10
Speaker
You haven't even seen the best of it.
00:59:12
Speaker
I was just playing it earlier today.
00:59:14
Speaker
We've been adding so much code because that gameplay video I put out, we've been doing a lot of work since that gameplay video.
00:59:21
Speaker
I mean, I recorded that quite a while ago.
00:59:23
Speaker
And...
00:59:24
Speaker
The Linda trickery stuff that I was playing today was so cool where after the set amount of pop hits that I went and got, she rotated all my flippers, including the sling flipper.
00:59:36
Speaker
So it was between those three and they were all inverted and everything for like a period of 10 to 15 seconds.
00:59:43
Speaker
And she's making fun of you while you do it.
00:59:46
Speaker
It's getting so much better every single day.
00:59:49
Speaker
And I can't wait for everybody to see it.
00:59:51
Speaker
Sorry to interrupt you.
00:59:51
Speaker
I just got...
00:59:53
Speaker
Does she ever tell you what to do or she's always telling you the wrong thing?
01:00:00
Speaker
That's a good point.
01:00:02
Speaker
We should make sure she also says some truthful things to make sure it's even trickier.
01:00:07
Speaker
Right.
01:00:07
Speaker
Always bury a truth.
01:00:08
Speaker
I'm going to send a note.
01:00:09
Speaker
That's a really good point.
01:00:10
Speaker
You're right.
01:00:11
Speaker
Yeah.
01:00:11
Speaker
We need to make sure that's like that.
01:00:12
Speaker
All right.
01:00:13
Speaker
Ben's getting a text after this interview.
01:00:15
Speaker
Cause yeah.
01:00:16
Speaker
Okay.
01:00:16
Speaker
If she gives good advice too, that makes it harder.
01:00:19
Speaker
Very good point.
01:00:20
Speaker
We get a flipper code in the game.
01:00:22
Speaker
You have to put a loser kid logo in the game.
01:00:24
Speaker
So I'm like on the flipper code.
01:00:25
Speaker
Yeah.
01:00:26
Speaker
That's a very good point.
01:00:27
Speaker
We got to make sure to do that.
01:00:28
Speaker
Yeah, because if it actually does ball save, then you might actually trust her next time.
01:00:32
Speaker
I know.
01:00:33
Speaker
It totally screws me.
01:00:34
Speaker
Absolutely.
01:00:36
Speaker
Yeah, you're right.
01:00:36
Speaker
I got to say, between that and then the code where you guys have the cabin going nuts because you're trying to take on all the deadites, isn't that like one of the final modes as well?
01:00:47
Speaker
I'm trying to think.
01:00:48
Speaker
I was trying to think.
01:00:50
Speaker
Yeah, because Zach was telling me about this.
01:00:52
Speaker
He was talking about how like,
01:00:54
Speaker
There when Bruce Campbell, Ash is losing it and the cabin's actually attacking him and stuff.
01:01:01
Speaker
Oh, you're talking about sanity mode.
01:01:02
Speaker
Yes, sanity mode.
01:01:03
Speaker
Yes.
01:01:03
Speaker
Tell me about this.
01:01:04
Speaker
And the whole game goes nuts.
01:01:06
Speaker
Yes.
01:01:06
Speaker
So sanity mode.
01:01:08
Speaker
So in the game, the captive ball is the Necronomicon shot.
01:01:12
Speaker
Every time you interact with the Necronomicon, much like the movie as Ash is interacting with everything in the cabin,
01:01:18
Speaker
You're going progressively more insane.
01:01:22
Speaker
And at a certain point, you're going to break.
01:01:24
Speaker
And when you break, that's when we enter you into the sanity mode, which is where in the second movie, that iconic scene where he falls through the chair and then the deer head looks at him and starts laughing.
01:01:34
Speaker
And then everything in the cabin comes alive and starts laughing at him.
01:01:38
Speaker
And he kind of joins in on it and then it all gets stopped.
01:01:42
Speaker
From the very beginning of this game, I knew I wanted the game to come alive and laugh at you.
01:01:48
Speaker
I wanted to use every single mech we possibly could to laugh at you in the game.
01:01:53
Speaker
And that's exactly what we do.
01:01:54
Speaker
And we've been testing and playing the daylights out of it lately, just trying to add as much to it as we can.
01:02:00
Speaker
And I want to keep adding more to it.
01:02:02
Speaker
And, but that's what happens.
01:02:04
Speaker
You enter it.
01:02:05
Speaker
The game starts popping things up, laughs at you, pops another thing up, laughs at you until eventually the whole game has come alive.
01:02:12
Speaker
The trap door is flat for the people who are watching, can't see or are listening.
01:02:17
Speaker
I'm waving my hand up and down, but the trap door is literally like doing laughing motions at you while you're shooting the targets beneath it.
01:02:24
Speaker
And the deadites are popping up in very infrequent patterns, right?
01:02:28
Speaker
While it's just, it's so great.
01:02:30
Speaker
The lift ramp is going up and down, laughing at you.
01:02:32
Speaker
The pop bumpers are laughing at you.
01:02:34
Speaker
The hands going crazy.
01:02:35
Speaker
Linda's head spinning around the tape recorders playing backwards.
01:02:38
Speaker
The porch swing is going back and forth.
01:02:41
Speaker
The game absolutely loses its mind.
01:02:43
Speaker
And your goal is to silence it by, by hitting all of those different features and getting them to stop laughing so that you can be sane again so that you can get through the rest of the game.
01:02:53
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:55
Speaker
But it's a really great mode.
01:02:57
Speaker
And I think it's going to be one of the defining moments of the game for people when they get to play it.
01:03:03
Speaker
Love it.
01:03:05
Speaker
I'm sorry.
01:03:06
Speaker
I want this game.
01:03:07
Speaker
And yet I don't know how I'm going to bring it home.
01:03:10
Speaker
There's a family mode.
01:03:13
Speaker
Yeah.
01:03:13
Speaker
It's a family of darkness, Josh.
01:03:15
Speaker
Come on.
01:03:15
Speaker
Yeah, I get that.
01:03:16
Speaker
But you, I don't know about your family, but my family, when they see something like this, all of a sudden they're like 110% in like my five-year-old's like, what's jaws.
01:03:26
Speaker
Like I brought home a jaws pinball machine and here I'm trying to commit like, do I really show my five-year-old jaws?
01:03:33
Speaker
It was something we had to do.
01:03:34
Speaker
He was obsessed all of a sudden.
01:03:36
Speaker
Don't show your five-year-old evil dad.
01:03:38
Speaker
Exactly.
01:03:40
Speaker
I was playing Iron Maiden the other day and my daughter came down and I was a little nervous a little bit because she hadn't really looked much at the animations.
01:03:48
Speaker
She's like, why is he doing that?
01:03:50
Speaker
And I said, oh, he's like one of those funny zombies like plants versus zombies.
01:03:54
Speaker
She's like,
01:03:55
Speaker
Oh, okay.
01:03:56
Speaker
Yeah.
01:03:57
Speaker
It's plants versus it's like Ash.
01:03:59
Speaker
Yeah.
01:04:00
Speaker
It's plants versus zombies, Ash versus zombies.
01:04:02
Speaker
And actually the plants are super
Code Development and Bruce Campbell's Contribution
01:04:04
Speaker
evil and evil dead.
01:04:04
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
01:04:06
Speaker
And they swear at you.
01:04:07
Speaker
You're onto zombies versus plants really.
01:04:09
Speaker
Yeah.
01:04:10
Speaker
Yeah.
01:04:11
Speaker
Okay.
01:04:11
Speaker
Okay.
01:04:12
Speaker
You can try that.
01:04:13
Speaker
Where's the code at?
01:04:14
Speaker
Where is it going to, where is it going to be at when it starts shipping?
01:04:16
Speaker
And when do you guys start shipping?
01:04:18
Speaker
We're going to start shipping.
01:04:20
Speaker
Early January is when you'll really start seeing some.
01:04:23
Speaker
I think we're going to get a few of these out before the end of December, actually.
01:04:28
Speaker
Just depending on how production keeps going.
01:04:30
Speaker
You know, we're getting it built right now.
01:04:31
Speaker
We were just hitting the wiring stage tomorrow.
01:04:33
Speaker
We're going to start doing some mechs and things like that.
01:04:36
Speaker
So I think it'll start really moving out early January.
01:04:40
Speaker
Code is currently rock freaking solid.
01:04:42
Speaker
We've been doing hours upon hours of continuous gameplay across multiple multiplayer games and having no resets.
01:04:52
Speaker
Super happy with where Ben has gotten as far as that goes.
01:04:56
Speaker
We did prioritize stability over...
01:05:00
Speaker
a sheer massive amount of content to be there at the very start.
01:05:06
Speaker
But that being said, the content that is there at the very start is great.
01:05:10
Speaker
And I still think more than plentiful to get people rolling.
01:05:13
Speaker
And we're already moving on to the next modes that are going to be coming with the end of the game as well.
01:05:19
Speaker
And we're writing new modes that we actually didn't plan already to like, we've already come up with new modes that we were like, oh, we could work that in in between these features as well, just because we think it needs it.
01:05:29
Speaker
So
01:05:30
Speaker
There's still lots to come, but there's a lot that is already there.
01:05:34
Speaker
And it's going to be, I think, like I said, on everything I've mentioned that we've hit our stride on, Code's one of them too.
01:05:41
Speaker
I'm very happy with where it's going to be.
01:05:43
Speaker
I think when it gets out there, like I said, rock solid.
01:05:46
Speaker
going to be plenty of content.
01:05:47
Speaker
People are going to have a lot to consume and we're going to make sure we keep hitting them with more and more as the year goes on.
01:05:53
Speaker
Because I love doing the code updates throughout the year too.
01:05:56
Speaker
And I think a lot of people enjoy getting code updates throughout the year.
01:06:00
Speaker
I think there's a lot of people out there who don't realize they don't actually want 100% code complete day one because it's really exciting getting a new mode in your game.
01:06:08
Speaker
And also because we actually give a darn and listen to the community.
01:06:13
Speaker
A lot of times what people request to see more of or less of, we listen to that and include that in our future updates as well.
01:06:22
Speaker
So I'm excited for that because every single time you put a game out, there's always something from the movie or the TV show or whatever that people really latch on to that they want to see that your team was like, huh, I didn't expect them to grab onto that so much.
01:06:36
Speaker
Time to start making an animation or mode out of that to make sure it's more prevalent in the game.
01:06:42
Speaker
So it's cool to get the customer feedback finally, because when it's a small group of people and you're all working on it and you can't talk to anybody about it for so long, it's nice when you can let people in and they can give you some more feedback and present ideas to you that you had never thought of and get what they want in the game as well.
01:07:02
Speaker
Well, if you need a play test part of it, yeah, yeah.
01:07:06
Speaker
They're both stumbling over each other.
01:07:07
Speaker
Like we'll do it.
01:07:08
Speaker
Well, go ahead.
01:07:09
Speaker
Just ship one out.
01:07:10
Speaker
I swear we'll take care of it.
01:07:12
Speaker
We'll fly out.
01:07:13
Speaker
You know, we don't have, we're not picky.
01:07:14
Speaker
We're not.
01:07:14
Speaker
I say we do tours.
01:07:15
Speaker
We take visitors.
01:07:18
Speaker
You.
01:07:19
Speaker
Okay.
01:07:19
Speaker
I've got to ask Bruce Campbell did the voice outs or voice, the call outs, the voice call outs.
01:07:25
Speaker
Um,
01:07:26
Speaker
Did he come to Benton?
01:07:27
Speaker
Do you guys fly out to Los Angeles to do this?
01:07:30
Speaker
Were you fangirling?
01:07:32
Speaker
Tell me about the Bruce Campbell stuff.
01:07:34
Speaker
Yeah.
01:07:34
Speaker
So how most of the recording sessions go for script on these games is they will go to a studio that is nearby to them, or sometimes they have their own studio at home.
01:07:45
Speaker
In this case, Bruce went to a nearby studio.
01:07:48
Speaker
And...
01:07:51
Speaker
I zoom in essentially to oversee the recording session and answer any questions they may have provide direction that may be needed on certain things with the game.
01:08:02
Speaker
But no, we had a absolutely gargantuan script that Bruce got.
01:08:07
Speaker
We had a couple sessions that were booked to be many, many, many months apart because we knew as game development went on, we would find more things that we want in the game and would come up with more funny call outs.
01:08:19
Speaker
I mean, while we were shooting the trailer with Zach and Greg,
01:08:22
Speaker
we were coming up with new call-outs that we wanted Bruce to say, which on your family-friendly podcast, I cannot share what those ones were.
01:08:30
Speaker
But it was really great that we got to separate that into the two sessions.
01:08:34
Speaker
But yeah, I zoom in and yeah, Bruce is on the other end.
01:08:38
Speaker
Cameras are typically always off when the other person's recording because you don't,
01:08:43
Speaker
It would be very awkward if you two were watching me right now as I recorded over 100 pages of something and was like making funny faces and act like acting for it.
01:08:53
Speaker
It would be pretty uncomfortable.
01:08:54
Speaker
So usually cameras off for that.
01:08:56
Speaker
But yeah, they go through multiple takes of every line of different styles.
01:09:01
Speaker
They ask questions on certain things, how you want it pronounced, this or that.
01:09:05
Speaker
And but with Bruce.
01:09:07
Speaker
He's pretty darn familiar with how to play the character Ash and his ad libbing is better than anyone's writing could be.
01:09:17
Speaker
So the, the lines we would give him, I mean, we had a lot of lines that I'm very proud of.
01:09:21
Speaker
I think the script was very good.
01:09:23
Speaker
And I mean, the script had to be approved by Sam Raimi.
01:09:26
Speaker
So that's worth something if he thought it was good too.
01:09:29
Speaker
But, um,
01:09:31
Speaker
The ad-libbing that Bruce would do on top of like some of the more generic lines we would give him was just so above and beyond what you could ever ask for out of an act.
01:09:40
Speaker
I mean, usually when you ask somebody to ad-lib, you get like a few little things here and there and they throw some taglines.
01:09:46
Speaker
He would just go on tangents of his own insanity when he was doing those lines.
01:09:52
Speaker
And yeah, super happy with it.
01:09:54
Speaker
And that second session that we did was not that long ago.
01:09:58
Speaker
It was about a month ago now, I want to say.
01:10:01
Speaker
So, you know, all the way up really close to game launch.
01:10:03
Speaker
We made sure we got a lot of good stuff in there that people are going to want to see.
01:10:06
Speaker
And yeah, there's some really great things in there that I'm excited for everybody to get to when we get to the live streaming and people get their hands on it at locations and shows and whatnot.
01:10:16
Speaker
So did you guys send him the video?
01:10:18
Speaker
Like, obviously if you did the recording session about a month ago, has he seen the product?
01:10:22
Speaker
Is he given any feedback on it?
01:10:24
Speaker
Bruce is directly a part of the approvals on the product.
01:10:28
Speaker
He is involved with the licensing aspect of it.
01:10:30
Speaker
So yes, he, he,
01:10:33
Speaker
was always aware of it kind of head to toe.
01:10:35
Speaker
And I mean, anything with him involved in it, he has to have approval on.
01:10:40
Speaker
So head to toe, this thing gets a lot of different people's approval.
01:10:44
Speaker
It goes through a lot of channels of approvals, but yeah, two of those people being Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi, if they approve it, I think it's worth something.
01:10:53
Speaker
Yeah.
01:10:56
Speaker
Got any other questions, Scott?
01:10:57
Speaker
No, I think we're good.
01:11:00
Speaker
So is there one thing that you really wanted to put in the game that you haven't yet?
01:11:05
Speaker
Ooh, one thing I want to put in the game that I haven't yet.
01:11:10
Speaker
I mean, there's a lot of cool modes that are coming.
01:11:13
Speaker
I don't want to spoil what any of them are because it's fun.
01:11:16
Speaker
I mean, you'll see in the inserts like a Henrietta multiball becoming Cheryl multiball becoming some wizard modes, things like that.
01:11:22
Speaker
I'm very excited for those to get into the game.
01:11:26
Speaker
I've been mostly jazzed for the Linda trickery stuff in the sanity mode.
01:11:32
Speaker
And those are the two things that we've been putting all of our efforts into right now, as well as making sure there's more
01:11:38
Speaker
sounds from the actual films.
01:11:40
Speaker
Synced up movie clips, just general call-outs from the film to play at cool moments during the game, making sure we're really using those full assets for everybody so when they first get it, they're being hit with the right amount of new funny lines from Bruce as well as the nostalgia.
01:11:55
Speaker
So the Linda trickery and the sanity stuff right now is by far my favorite aspects of the game.
01:12:01
Speaker
And those are a couple of things that not everybody has gotten to see everything from yet.
01:12:05
Speaker
So I'm excited for everybody to get to see those for the first time.
01:12:09
Speaker
Nice.
Community Engagement and Contact Information
01:12:11
Speaker
Honestly, guys, you've knocked it out of the park.
01:12:14
Speaker
I know it's a cliche, but each release is getting better and better and better.
01:12:18
Speaker
And it's showing in the product that you guys are putting forth.
01:12:22
Speaker
I mean, really congrats to Spooky and what you guys are doing it.
01:12:25
Speaker
Cause you're doing it right.
01:12:26
Speaker
Like seriously, you guys moving forward are just, I'm astounded every time a new release comes out.
01:12:32
Speaker
Cause you are hitting the nail on the head.
01:12:34
Speaker
You're doing great.
01:12:35
Speaker
It seems like spooky is comfortable in the lane that they have chosen.
01:12:39
Speaker
And that's really important because you need to find what works for you and what market you're catering to.
01:12:48
Speaker
It totally makes sense that you guys are making stuff that you care about.
01:12:52
Speaker
That is also marketable.
01:12:53
Speaker
It's not like you're doing something totally random.
01:12:57
Speaker
You have figured out there is a market for this in pinball that is not being captured by, I would say, bigger manufacturers.
01:13:07
Speaker
So that works really well.
01:13:07
Speaker
Fortunately, we have decent taste with what we like.
01:13:11
Speaker
Some of the things we like happen to be marketable.
01:13:13
Speaker
So that's good.
01:13:14
Speaker
That's convenient.
01:13:15
Speaker
Well, that's also being self-gating to make sure that you are able to select something that you're like, this would be great and I can sell it.
01:13:23
Speaker
Yeah.
01:13:25
Speaker
Trust me.
01:13:26
Speaker
There's times where we're careful.
01:13:27
Speaker
We're like, is that one not actually sellable or are we just all really into that?
01:13:33
Speaker
And that's when Golden Pawn was made.
01:13:37
Speaker
Yeah.
01:13:37
Speaker
It's breaking two, electric boogaloo.
01:13:39
Speaker
Exactly.
01:13:40
Speaker
Yeah.
01:13:42
Speaker
Okay, well, we want to send you guys out a bunch of hats so you guys can pass them around the office, make sure people go.
01:13:48
Speaker
And we're making some more beanies because I'm a beanie guy.
01:13:51
Speaker
And I know if you guys recall, would ever get with me on that.
01:13:54
Speaker
He didn't know.
01:13:56
Speaker
What are you talking about?
01:13:56
Speaker
I told you to order them.
01:13:57
Speaker
Yeah, I'll say the loser kid hats are some of the top hats in all of pinball for sure.
01:14:03
Speaker
Without a doubt, one of the best hats in pinball.
01:14:07
Speaker
I wish we could streamline them a little better, but you know what?
01:14:10
Speaker
I oversee the quality on them.
01:14:13
Speaker
It's the love.
01:14:13
Speaker
It's always be one of those once a year things.
01:14:17
Speaker
But no, we want to thank you for coming on, Bug, taking your time.
01:14:21
Speaker
I know it's 11 almost there.
01:14:25
Speaker
I appreciate all you do, man.
01:14:26
Speaker
And honestly, you're one of the most professional people
01:14:29
Speaker
pinball people we deal with i mean it's it's insane at your age to see how well you carry and hold yourself when it comes to stuff like this it helps say he has a podcasting background it's most professional every time we have him on it's like something anyone has called me before so thank you we i'm many things i don't know about most professional if you want people getting a hold of you how do you want them to get a hold of you bug
01:14:55
Speaker
Yeah.
01:14:56
Speaker
Order a topper and I will send you a pigeon with a letter attached to it.
01:15:02
Speaker
No.
01:15:03
Speaker
Spooky Pinball, we're available on everything.
01:15:05
Speaker
I'm on Bug Scream and Stream on Facebook and Instagram.
01:15:08
Speaker
You can shoot me messages there.
01:15:10
Speaker
Otherwise, my email is bug at spookypinball.com.
01:15:14
Speaker
Otherwise, Spooky Pinball, we have the phone number.
01:15:16
Speaker
You can always call our main office.
01:15:17
Speaker
You can email.
01:15:18
Speaker
Morgan is quite honestly much better at answering the general questions.
01:15:22
Speaker
Cause I'm usually wrapped up in a lot of other stuff.
01:15:24
Speaker
Uh, so if you have like some pretty general questions, email Morgan at spooky pinball.com and, uh, yeah, we're, we're pretty available.
01:15:34
Speaker
You can find us pretty much anywhere.
01:15:35
Speaker
Spooky Luke's on all the social medias.
01:15:37
Speaker
I'm live every single week, Thursdays at 7 PM central on Twitch for the bug screaming stream channel there.
01:15:44
Speaker
Um,
01:15:46
Speaker
Yeah, we're around.
01:15:48
Speaker
We're on Pinside.
01:15:49
Speaker
We're on Patreons.
01:15:49
Speaker
We're in the deepest, darkest holes of the internet to make sure that we're talking to the pinball people all day, every day.
01:15:56
Speaker
So you'll be able to find us somewhere.
01:15:58
Speaker
Awesome.
01:16:00
Speaker
Except Reddit.
01:16:01
Speaker
I don't go to Reddit.
01:16:03
Speaker
Yeah, I don't.
01:16:03
Speaker
That's no man's land.
01:16:05
Speaker
Yeah, it's a wasteland.
01:16:06
Speaker
Yeah.
01:16:08
Speaker
If you want to get ahold of us, we are loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com.
01:16:11
Speaker
We are on YouTube.
01:16:13
Speaker
If you haven't liked and subscribe, why haven't you done it?
01:16:15
Speaker
Why aren't you going to YouTube?
01:16:17
Speaker
Because I know, I know it's a whole different audience.
01:16:19
Speaker
So anywho do that.
01:16:21
Speaker
We're on X, Facebook, Instagram, threads, Twitch.
01:16:26
Speaker
I Twitter is X. That's throwing me off.
01:16:28
Speaker
I apologize.
01:16:30
Speaker
But also, if you want some swag, hit us up at silverballswag.com slash loserkid.
01:16:34
Speaker
We just dropped some new high-top shoes because it was a demand for it.
01:16:40
Speaker
This is our first time announcing them.
01:16:41
Speaker
We've already sold like 10, 15 of them or something like that.
01:16:44
Speaker
It's crazy.
01:16:45
Speaker
So if you want that, do that.
01:16:48
Speaker
Scott, give us our final words.
01:16:50
Speaker
And this is my broomstick.
01:16:53
Speaker
What?
01:16:53
Speaker
What?
01:16:57
Speaker
Thank you.