Transcript
Speaker: Thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
Speaker: We are on episode 45.
Speaker: And with me, my co-captain, as always.
Speaker: Scott Larson.
Speaker: And Scott, let's talk about our friends of the podcast before we get into our awesome guests this evening.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So let's run through it quickly.
Speaker: First off, we have Mike Lund at Beehive Pinball.
Speaker: If you're looking for repro play fields, right now he's doing stars.
Speaker: And so check it out at Beehive Pinball.
Speaker: Next, we have Brad at LitFrame.
Speaker: So if you want to illuminate that awesome trans light, go ahead and check out LitFrames.
Speaker: I have a few of them myself and they make your frame much better when you have the
Speaker: You want to decorate your pinball room, basically.
Speaker: Also, Flyland Designs.
Speaker: I have the alternative, the licensed alternative Medieval Madness in my game, and it provides a fun alternative to the excellent original.
Speaker: He also has Monster Bash and he has Attack from Mars.
Speaker: So go ahead and check those out.
Speaker: And if you want to buy a frame and put them in there, it's a great way of displaying that.
Speaker: Also, this week in pinball, all your pinball needs, please check out this week in pinball and get the rundown on the latest in pinball.
Speaker: Also, last and certainly not least, please check out Flippin' Out Pinball.
Speaker: If you're looking for a new machine, please contact Zach and Nicole and they will help you out.
Speaker: And Josh, who do we have on the podcast today?
Speaker: Okay, before we get into our guest, I'm going to hurry and say this up front before I forget.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Drew and Ian gave us a challenge on their show.
Speaker: If you did not watch Poor Man's Pinball Podcast on Facebook Live on Monday, you can listen to their podcast because they usually release it later.
Speaker: But Drew, thank you for the challenge, but we're going to pass.
Speaker: If you want to hear the stories, we'll message you, but we're not talking about the stories online or on our podcast.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: There's no chance we're going to tell you the weirdest things that happen in Utah.
Speaker: You can just Google them.
Speaker: And by the way, they usually happen every three years that we get national news for some sort of weird thing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, like my town specifically, there's a gentleman that tried to pay his whole entire bill in pennies because he was mad at the hospital.
Speaker: And so he showed up with a wheelbarrow full of pennies.
Speaker: There's that.
Speaker: So, but that's not the weird you were looking for.
Speaker: So we're not going to discuss that.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: But also my, one of my professors in college was actually, he was murdered for his guns and those guys happen to be from Vernal.
Speaker: So, you know.
Speaker: Oh my goodness.
Speaker: You've got to remind me.
Speaker: I've got a story to tell you about that.
Speaker: Oh my goodness.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: We don't have time for that story, but I, you need to remind me.
Speaker: Is it your third cousin on your mother's side?
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: But it's a little bit of a story, but it is – you'll find it hilarious.
Speaker: Not in the context of what happened.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Just weird.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Sounds good.
Speaker: So, all right.
Speaker: I'm going to introduce our awesome guest this evening.
Speaker: This man –
Speaker: his artwork has redefined what artwork should be in pinball from the last five years.
Speaker: He has set a standard so high, it's hard for others to accomplish.
Speaker: And, and he's one of the most, uh, reserved and nicest gentlemen we've met.
Speaker: We have with us Jeremy Packard, AKA zombie Yeti.
Speaker: Oh, well now, come on guys.
Speaker: That, uh, that's a little bit much.
Speaker: Um, uh, hello.
Speaker: We just called as we see it.
Speaker: No, no, that's very kind, but I don't know how honest it is.
Speaker: I thought you guys were a bunch of honest gentlemen, and now you start lying.
Speaker: Hey, no, real quick.
Speaker: So, you know, your little plugs there.
Speaker: Two things.
Speaker: One, did you know that this week in pinball that the Jeff Patterson guy, do you know we went to the same high school?
Speaker: And his dad, his dad taught some classes.
Speaker: I think it was.
Speaker: I can't remember what.
Speaker: I know he also coached, I think, basketball.
Speaker: But I never I never knew.
Speaker: I never knew him.
Speaker: But like in in school, like I didn't know Jeff.
Speaker: But it was funny because we talked one time.
Speaker: It's been a couple of years ago and put it together as we were both talking about like our high schools.
Speaker: And it was kind of ironic and strange, to say the least.
Speaker: Sorry, I just had to throw that out there.
Speaker: Right now, the only thing I'm imagining is the coach from the Goldbergs with those, you know, those like weird spandex shorts that all the gym teachers wore in like 1988.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: No, it's probably not that far off.
Speaker: I remember he had a mustache.
Speaker: That much I remember.
Speaker: His dad.
Speaker: His dad did.
Speaker: He didn't.
Speaker: He didn't.
Speaker: Maybe he did.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: But it's dead.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And there was one other plug you had that I had a story about, too.
Speaker: But I forgot about it because I got sidetracked Googling strange things in Utah.
Speaker: So I'm sorry.
Speaker: Oh, man.
Speaker: Well, we had the stars play field.
Speaker: We had the, the lit frames.
Speaker: We had the fly land designs.
Speaker: I mean, come on, flipping out pinball.
Speaker: We have all.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Flipping out, flipping out.
Speaker: I just wanted to say, thank you guys.
Speaker: I think Zach and his business need, need a little bit more radio time, podcast time.
Speaker: He doesn't get enough.
Speaker: He doesn't.
Speaker: Hi Zach.
Speaker: How's it going?
Speaker: That man is everywhere.
Speaker: I don't know what he's doing to, to promote himself, but he is doing great.
Speaker: Hardest working man in pinball for promotions, for sure.
Speaker: And the smiliest, too.
Speaker: That guy, he smiles and he makes you smile when he smiles.
Speaker: I agree.
Speaker: Remind me to tell you a story about Zach.
Speaker: No, I'm just kidding.
Speaker: Oh, bring it on.
Speaker: We want to hear it all.
Speaker: No, actually, I do have one, ironically, but we'll save that for later.
Speaker: But no, it's a positive one.
Speaker: It's just one that I don't, you know.
Speaker: Zach doesn't want his bad name tarmonished with good material.
Speaker: Well, no, no, actually, it's he just happened to be there.
Speaker: The story is not really about him.
Speaker: It's because he has a third nipple, isn't it?
Speaker: You know about that?
Speaker: Is yours is yours on your inner elbow like mine is?
Speaker: Yeah, actually.
Speaker: Well, OK, so legitimately what they do is they follow the same line where your actual nipples are.
Speaker: And it's weird.
Speaker: Yeah, we had someone who we had we had to remove them because she didn't know she had a third nipple until she had a baby and it started lactating.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: So it was functional.
Speaker: Well, what they do is they usually look like bumps, like like a mole or something.
Speaker: And so that's that's just why it's funny.
Speaker: Anyway, that's so, you know, all the fun things that you know about extra nipples, you can find them on Loser Kid Bimball podcast.
Speaker: I'm sorry I let us down this direction.
Speaker: I apologize.
Speaker: I got us off track.
Speaker: That's totally fine.
Speaker: So people are calling it Year of the Yeti.
Speaker: I think that's quite flattering because your artwork's been nothing but Stern's project this year, it seems like.
Speaker: And Turtles is fantastic.
Speaker: Avengers is amazing.
Speaker: How are you pulling this off?
Speaker: Is there two of you?
Speaker: No, there's not.
Speaker: I wish there was.
Speaker: So here's the thing.
Speaker: And by the way, since I'm setting it up and I'm using so many words and just sort of protracting what I'm going to say next, you know that I'm lying.
Speaker: There's I've got three more games coming out this year yet.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: We can't wait to see all three of them.
Speaker: No, so just for the record, I don't want to have games come out back-to-back ever.
Speaker: Like, that's not something I want to do.
Speaker: I don't want people to get tired of me.
Speaker: And I also don't want to miss out on so much sleep, because I kind of like it.
Speaker: It helps me.
Speaker: But yeah, no, so...
Speaker: So basically what happened was I was working on Turtles and about halfway into Turtles, into the schedule, I think it might have been July last year or something like that.
Speaker: I was approached about doing Avengers because I had a good relationship with Marvel and, you know, Deadpool has been pretty good and they like that.
Speaker: And I'm like, yeah, I definitely want to do it.
Speaker: Can you push it back a little bit so that I can, you know, get it done?
Speaker: And obviously they're like, no.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: We can't do that.
Speaker: And I'm like, well, you know, it was worth a shot.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And and so anyway, so we tried to work out like sort of a compromise on the schedule, which which would have put it, I think, I would have started in November or something like that.
Speaker: And they're like, no, we can't do it.
Speaker: I'm like, OK, that's fine.
Speaker: You know, I'd love to, but I understand, you know, whatever.
Speaker: And so I kept going on Turtles.
Speaker: And what happened was over the holidays, I got a call from George Gomez and he was like, listen, you know, like Marvel really wants you to do this.
Speaker: You know, you're winding down on Turtles.
Speaker: I was set to be done by January.
Speaker: on Turtles and and and he's like, you know, they won't they they said no to everyone else that we've tried to get, you know, can you do it?
Speaker: And I'm like, OK, well, that's great.
Speaker: So does that mean we have a longer schedule?
Speaker: And he's like, well, no.
Speaker: We're at the halfway point.
Speaker: So you're going to have a short schedule.
Speaker: And I'm like, oh, OK.
Speaker: And I'm like, well, yeah, no, I could.
Speaker: I mean, obviously, I want to do it.
Speaker: It's not going to be an ideal schedule.
Speaker: But yeah, whatever.
Speaker: And so I literally, I think...
Speaker: January 1st started, and I think the first week there, I did the first pro translate sketch, sort of trying to come up with an idea on how to approach this and sort of what direction I was going to go stylistically and everything.
Speaker: I knew I wanted to keep it close to Deadpool, but between you and me, I was still in turtle mode.
Speaker: So I do, I do see that I shouldn't say that out loud, because now people start looking but I see that I like I'm a little softer look than Deadpool.
Speaker: And I think that's sort of from coming off of turtles.
Speaker: And I was still sort of in that whatever it doesn't matter.
Speaker: Bottom line is, the first sketch went to Marvel within that, I think the first week or whatever, and they're like, yes, that's great.
Speaker: Do it.
Speaker: And so then I went straight to inks and color the next week, and it just sort of was like a snowball roll from there.
Speaker: It's like I was just constantly just boom, boom, boom.
Speaker: I didn't have any changes throughout the process.
Speaker: They loved everything, which is great.
Speaker: Between you and me, I wish I would have had a little more time to flesh some things out.
Speaker: In particular, that's why we only have...
Speaker: you know, two different back glass designs, translate designs.
Speaker: And, and that's why there are a few similarities, uh, in two of the cabinet packages.
Speaker: Um, uh, but, uh, I'm sorry, I was clearing my throat there.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Uh, but, uh, but, but, you know, I mean, I did the best I could with the time and, and, um,
Speaker: i'm proud of it uh you know obviously i i think uh you know obviously uh keith and and the team's uh game is incredible so being able to be a part of it uh was you know just you know it's i i get lucky um you know i try to i try to pick projects i'm excited for but i think i get lucky uh in regards to um the projects i i do get on so um
Speaker: Yeah, but you asked me about time.
Speaker: It was, yeah, it was short.
Speaker: I didn't have a lot of time.
Speaker: I think I had, I was done in, I started January 1, finished June, maybe towards the end of June, something like that.
Speaker: And during that time, actually, I had, um...
Speaker: My daughter, my oldest daughter, who is also an illustrator.
Speaker: And by the way, I had her when I was 10 years old.
Speaker: I'm very young.
Speaker: And don't ask.
Speaker: No, no, I'm not that young.
Speaker: I just turned, for the record, I just turned 44.
Speaker: So everyone out there who thinks that I'm young and hip, I'm not.
Speaker: And so I actually had her ink and color, the TMNT topper that I swear we're going to see one of these days during that process.
Speaker: But yeah, I didn't get to have her help me on Avengers, though, unfortunately, because it was just sort of one thing after the other.
Speaker: I didn't really have time to take a break.
Speaker: Well, I think it's a testament to what you do, though, because we've talked to multiple people about Avengers already, and everyone's saying it's the best artwork you've done so far.
Speaker: And I'm biased.
Speaker: That hurts me, but go on.
Speaker: But I'm biased because I love Ninja Turtles.
Speaker: And the artwork was fantastic on this.
Speaker: Like, I was listening to Insider and you said that you had to like rethink how you did artwork for Turtles because the 87 artwork is so different from what's done nowadays.
Speaker: Can you explain a little bit of that process to us so people can maybe understand what you did differently with Turtles than the rest of your projects you've done?
Speaker: For me, I know that I have sort of some proclivities, some things that I will tend to do that, you know, I guess it makes things look like I did them.
Speaker: But at the same time, there's certain things that...
Speaker: I try to accommodate for the license.
Speaker: Like I want, I want to actually serve the project and the license because that's sort of how I was always, you know, trained was to, you know, you, you, you kind of, you interject yourself only when necessary.
Speaker: And I guess over time that just sort of comes out.
Speaker: But, but my point is what happened on, on turtles is when I was trying to sort of get my angle on it and dissect it all,
Speaker: What I found was that one of the most identifiable characteristics or traits of that era of the Turtles, which I grew up on and I love, by the way, was the fact that they were almost primarily curvilinear forms.
Speaker: There were no real hard edges.
Speaker: There weren't angles.
Speaker: And one of the things that's come since is every version of the Turtles becomes more angular to the point where
Speaker: The current version is almost comically so in many ways.
Speaker: It's beautiful, but at the same time, it just, you know,
Speaker: to take the essence of what the 87 Turtles was, that was one of the most identifiable things.
Speaker: And for me, I do use a lot of angles.
Speaker: I try to use a lot of, you know, curves and angles to sort of contrast.
Speaker: But in this case, I had to kind of, I guess, soften my hand a bit.
Speaker: And that was...
Speaker: kind of difficult, believe it or not.
Speaker: It was kind of challenging.
Speaker: And so when you say that, you know, people are saying Avengers is, you know, the best work, you know, I'm sort of joking there.
Speaker: But at the same time, what probably people are seeing is maybe a little bit of comfort having worked for over a year straight back to back on those two projects.
Speaker: um that I I kind of I guess was uh the wheels were quite greased by the time I got there because I had been working you know on on turtles and and I actually I put a lot of a lot of extra time into um turtles early on before it even kicked into high gear um just so that I could kind of find my way um and and probably to to uh to to the detriment of it actually no I'm just kidding but
Speaker: Okay, so I want to know, I actually grew up, I am just slightly older than you at two years, and I grew up on the iconic images of Iron Maiden, and I was actually a big fan of the band in the 80s.
Speaker: And in your mind, you have that Derek Riggs type.
Speaker: Now, Derek Riggs, he really wasn't a trained artist, but he had an image that really worked with the band.
Speaker: So my question was, how did you actually take that and to...
Speaker: reimagine it while keeping it true to the original art style?
Speaker: Because it's always hard as an artist when you are trying to, I guess, pay homage to a to a certain style without just being a cut and paste.
Speaker: Oh, that's an easy answer.
Speaker: I'm joking.
Speaker: That's a lot.
Speaker: No, I. Well, so first off, it involves a lot of of.
Speaker: making myself miserable, second guessing every decision I make.
Speaker: That's really the secret to all of my success is I am very neurotic and I have a tremendously difficult time liking anything I do until I've gotten very far away from it.
Speaker: Iron Maiden is a great example of that.
Speaker: I knew everyone wanted Derek Riggs on there.
Speaker: I wanted Derek Riggs on there.
Speaker: But I'm not Derek Riggs.
Speaker: I don't do things like Derek Riggs.
Speaker: And I knew that I couldn't imitate him.
Speaker: I really couldn't.
Speaker: So I tried to distill as much of that inspiration as I could.
Speaker: Obviously, whenever...
Speaker: It was called upon to to actually reference directly something he had done.
Speaker: It made my life a little bit easier, but I still stressed and, you know, would fret over, you know, if I was even coming close to approaching it correctly.
Speaker: And so what sort of happened was, I just kept moving and obsessing as I went.
Speaker: And if they approved it, I thought, okay, maybe I'm not failing.
Speaker: How's that?
Speaker: Is that a terrible answer?
Speaker: No, that's awesome.
Speaker: I tried, I try really hard.
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: I mean, I don't know if I, if I succeed often enough, but I try really hard and, and I hope I, you know, the key is working with Keith is Keith is a very low key, quiet guy.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And, and so he doesn't give me a lot of feedback.
Speaker: And so I assume he hates everything until it's done and, and it's in production.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm joking, of course, Keith.
Speaker: I'm not joking entirely.
Speaker: It's sort of true.
Speaker: Well, I do love the pro back glass and that that had to have been amazingly difficult that you were able to get so many versions of Eddie and just be able to get them all together.
Speaker: You know what the hardest part of that was actually was deciding where to take it in color because actually getting them composed into a space isn't as difficult, but actually being able to take in color and, and push and pull those spaces out.
Speaker: uh, is, is a little bit more difficult, um, at least to do it, I guess, in a dynamic way.
Speaker: And that's, that's, so I sort of, uh, between, between just between us, no one's listening, right?
Speaker: Um, I, I, I sort of exist in three spaces at any given time.
Speaker: Either I'm in concept phase where I'm sketching.
Speaker: Um, I'm in, uh, ink phase where I'm sort of, you know, kind of solidifying forms, uh, or I'm in color phase.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: And I do all of those sort of in order.
Speaker: And when I say that, I'm not talking per piece.
Speaker: I'm talking about the entire project.
Speaker: I'll do every pencil, every sketch up front, get it approved.
Speaker: I'll then move to ink, and then I'll then move to color at the end, obviously.
Speaker: So there's a little bit of a...
Speaker: The stress, it comes back in every phase.
Speaker: So coming up with ideas, and I'm in that phase now on a project, you know, coming up with ideas in the sketch phase is just it's, you know, I'm paralyzed by fear.
Speaker: Coming up with good ideas makes me want to vomit.
Speaker: I'm coming up with great ideas.
Speaker: I don't think it's possible, but I'm hoping to fake it.
Speaker: And then people will go, I guess that's good.
Speaker: Let's move with that.
Speaker: But then I'm going to revisit all that all that fear again once I get to the next phase and the phase after.
Speaker: So, again, I make myself miserable until the end.
Speaker: And then hopefully people don't hate it.
Speaker: Iron Maiden, I said throughout was going to be the last pinball machine I ever worked on.
Speaker: I said, people are going to hate this.
Speaker: They're going to say, this is not Derek Riggs.
Speaker: And that was going to be it.
Speaker: And I remember telling Greg that almost every day and Keith every time I saw him.
Speaker: I'm like, yeah, this is it for me.
Speaker: So so thankfully, no, thanks to everyone who bought, played and supports that project because I'm still here.
Speaker: No, so I love the premium because that is kind of the zenith of their popularity with that.
Speaker: But I would also like to have the pro translate to go in and out just because I think it was such a good job.
Speaker: Now, another question, too, is it seems like you have...
Speaker: in the 90s, late 80s, early 90s, there was a big resurgence of comic book artists and there were some really well-known ones.
Speaker: You know, there's Jim Lee, Wilts Potasio, Rob Liefeld, who did Deadpool.
Speaker: There were all these and Todd McFarland.
Speaker: There are all these known artists.
Speaker: Were you a big comic book fan back in the day?
Speaker: And did you ever think about doing comics yourself?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: No, I was a huge comic book guy.
Speaker: Like, I grew up, like, my dad had Fantastic Four and Avengers comics from, like, the 60s and stuff.
Speaker: And I remember my grandparents, they were always at my grandparents' house.
Speaker: So every time I'd go, I'd, you know, I'd read those and
Speaker: And and then I started actually using my allowance, which I started earning when I was old enough to apparently be useful.
Speaker: And and every week I would go and pick up comics.
Speaker: And I started with like they were doing a classic Spider-Man, classic X-Men, you know, stuff.
Speaker: And then I started getting into the new books.
Speaker: And this was probably I mean, I was in elementary school at that point.
Speaker: By the time I was in like, what, maybe eighth grade, seventh grade and something like that.
Speaker: I think it was about the time Todd McFarlane started his run on Amazing Spider-Man.
Speaker: And that was sort of revelatory to me because of the fact that, you know, I had been, you know, reading.
Speaker: I should also say at the same time I was a DC guy as well.
Speaker: I read.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Batman and all of the sort of classical tones and style of drawing and ink work was sort of thrown out the window when Todd McFarlane came in.
Speaker: And so that was sort of a huge thing.
Speaker: He was a little more cartoony, but the one thing he did that obviously I've always appreciated was he was very good at solid...
Speaker: dimensional forms in space.
Speaker: Like, like he, he could draw things, whether or not, you know, they, you could, you can make some arguments and now looking back on it it's not nearly as clean as what I remember, but, but it was, he just, yeah, he blew me away.
Speaker: He was one of the first ones to make a mark, you know, in a big way followed by Norm Bray Fogle.
Speaker: who is not as well known.
Speaker: And actually he, he passed away.
Speaker: Oh boy.
Speaker: It's probably within the last 10 years now.
Speaker: But he had, he had been doing detective comics during, you know, probably, I don't know.
Speaker: I was maybe again, eighth grade, freshman year or something like that.
Speaker: And his, uh,
Speaker: Again, very similar styles, tones that he would hit, like McFarlane, but different.
Speaker: And actually, I would say I probably have more influence from Bray Fogle's short run...
Speaker: than anything else.
Speaker: And I just kind of discovered that recently as I was looking through some stuff of his.
Speaker: I didn't really know he had that big of an influence on me.
Speaker: But yes, obviously, and, you know, Jim Lee, Liefeld, obviously I was around the early days of Deadpool, stuff like that.
Speaker: I fell off for a little while, about the time that
Speaker: I got my license and could actually go on dates.
Speaker: I also stopped playing video games there for a while about the same time until I learned to juggle and then it all came back shortly thereafter.
Speaker: But yeah, no, I was very influenced by comics and still am.
Speaker: I mean, there's a lot of amazing guys out there that make me feel very untalented.
Speaker: Well, I want to issue just a quick apology, not only to you, but to Keith.
Speaker: On our episode two episodes or three episodes ago, we had Martin and Jeff, or Martin Robbins and Jeff Teolos to file around on.
Speaker: And one of my criticisms were I didn't fully understand where the artwork was coming from because the Infinity War that we know from 1993, Thanos is the one collecting the gems.
Speaker: And I said, there's no Adam Warlock or Silver Surfer on here.
Speaker: And Joe Lemire actually messaged me from Pinball Players Podcast, and he sent me a picture of the lower play field.
Speaker: And right there above all the Avengers, smack dab in the middle, is Adam Warlock's head.
Speaker: Yes, but not the version.
Speaker: So that's a weird thing, too.
Speaker: And you can blame me for this.
Speaker: But talking with Marvel, one of the things they said was, listen, you can pull from any era as long as they're all from the same era, right?
Speaker: But I kind of broke that a little bit.
Speaker: And I probably shouldn't even say this now, but I kind of broke that a little bit.
Speaker: And the biggest throwback where I broke that, because I kind of tried to stay with the more modern interpretations, but sort of with a more, I guess, a little bit throwback style to it.
Speaker: But but Thanos, actually, I tried to stay as close as I could to the Starlin era stuff, you know, but but whatever.
Speaker: I mean, I don't I don't know as long as people don't hate it.
Speaker: That's all that.
Speaker: Dude, everyone loves us.
Speaker: I tried really hard.
Speaker: I have, there is no complaints with any of this, at least from what I've heard.
Speaker: And we hear a lot, like for some odd reason, we get a lot of messages, but it's wonderful artwork.
Speaker: I was just confused of where the storyline was coming from because I know that the 93 doesn't have the black order in it, but like more of the 2012 stuff does.
Speaker: And so I was confused where the storyline was coming from, or if it was more like Jurassic park where it's kind of like the, the own adventure kind of thing.
Speaker: Well, I think that's sort of the way it went.
Speaker: Keep in mind, because I came in so late, and it had been kind of delayed because of the lack of having an artist on, that they were building the game, they were coming up with all this stuff, but some of the more solidified story notes were still not there.
Speaker: when I came in, like they were, but they weren't like, they were still trying to figure out some things.
Speaker: And maybe I'm wrong, by the way, Keith, Keith can correct me on this one.
Speaker: But, but so I sort of, uh, was putting things together in the space that I could based on what I knew, uh, and what I didn't know.
Speaker: And, and it all sort of, you know, so, so for instance, Adam Warlock, um,
Speaker: you know, does he have a big role in the game itself?
Speaker: I, you know, I guess I should say by comparison to the original comic run that, you know, was sort of, I was pulling from.
Speaker: It's not quite the same.
Speaker: So I would say it's probably more of an original take based off of lots of different pieces and era.
Speaker: I just wanted to pay tribute
Speaker: Every place that I could.
Speaker: I mean, and by the way, if I could have drawn the silver surfer, if we could have used him, I better believe I would have done that.
Speaker: But I don't think he was he was in our wheelhouse for this one.
Speaker: Gotcha.
Speaker: Were there limitations?
Speaker: Because I noticed there's no X-Men or X-Men.
Speaker: Yes, is either.
Speaker: Yeah, well, so the way it works is, and again, I'm not the licensing guy.
Speaker: I don't know this stuff, but I can tell you this much.
Speaker: I do know after working on Deadpool and working on this, there are distinctions.
Speaker: There's lines drawn in the sand.
Speaker: Like the X-Men are a different license, right?
Speaker: Spider-Man is his own license.
Speaker: So like there's some areas that don't cross over, I guess, is maybe the way to look at it.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: But anyway, again, I could be wrong on that too, but that's...
Speaker: Based on looking at style guides and things like that, I'm pretty sure I'm not.
Speaker: Well, you're right, actually.
Speaker: In the late 90s, Marvel was really hurting for money, and so they sold off all these movie licenses and other things that are going on to it.
Speaker: And that's the reason why Fantastic Four went one way, X-Men went one way, Spider-Man went one way.
Speaker: And really, the reason why we have the whole Avengers series in the movies is because they sold off all their A-list licenses
Speaker: superheroes.
Speaker: And so really the Avengers was kind of a B list.
Speaker: It was like the and also list.
Speaker: And so they were able to create this great storyline using Iron Man, which was really the
Speaker: You know, it's Marvel's equivalent of Batman, really.
Speaker: Well, I agree with you, by the way, wholeheartedly, because between you and me and keep in mind, I'm somebody who loved comics.
Speaker: Iron Man was the least interesting character in the comics when I was reading.
Speaker: I did not enjoy him.
Speaker: What Robert Downey Jr. and the writers did with that role to make him like the coolest guy in the room.
Speaker: You know, you got to eat those guys deserve all the money they get.
Speaker: He was not he was not a favorite of mine.
Speaker: And now now he absolutely is.
Speaker: Well, it's funny too, is Happy, so you know Happy from the movies, he directed the very first Iron Man and he fought and fought to get Robert Downey Jr. in that role because he said, this is your Iron Man, this is the man.
Speaker: And it's funny that he fought so hard to get him and he finally got him and look where they are now.
Speaker: I mean, I guarantee if it wasn't for Robert Downey Jr., they would not be where they are in the Marvel Cinematic Universe because look at how incredible Hulk did not even six months later.
Speaker: Agreed.
Speaker: Yeah, totally.
Speaker: I totally agree.
Speaker: All the casting is fantastic, except for that Hawkeye guy.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: I'm calling you out.
Speaker: I'm calling you out.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: I'm joking.
Speaker: But let's be honest.
Speaker: No, I'm joking.
Speaker: He's great.
Speaker: He's great.
Speaker: He's an avid listener to the podcast.
Speaker: So you might get some heat after this.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: And we're good friends, you know, being Jeremy's.
Speaker: And so I give I just rib him a little bit.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Do you know he bit his kid?
Speaker: Anyway, I don't know.
Speaker: I read things online.
Speaker: You know, if it's on the internet, it's true, right?
Speaker: Look up Jeremy Renner bit his kid.
Speaker: And maybe I'm wrong, but I think I read that somewhere.
Speaker: I'll have to check that out.
Speaker: That is hilarious.
Speaker: Oh, my goodness.
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: I know a lot of things that are not important to life, but go on.
Speaker: I know exactly where you're coming from.
Speaker: I'm the exact same way.
Speaker: Well, I want to talk about one thing, and this is when I knew you were legit.
Speaker: And I'm not a huge... Okay, let me put it this way.
Speaker: I enjoy Primus music.
Speaker: I'm not an in-depth fan, but I know some of their history.
Speaker: And so when I saw the Primus play field and everything that went into that, I mean, that is passion on artwork.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You can fake it till the cows come home with artwork.
Speaker: You can draw just whatever the person wants you to draw, but there's a difference between that and oozing passion.
Speaker: I think that's what people appreciate about each project you do.
Speaker: It oozes passion.
Speaker: Like with turtles,
Speaker: I can tell that you're a fan of turtles because of the stuff that is in there.
Speaker: And it's just, I think that's where the appreciation comes from your artwork.
Speaker: Is that, is that one of the other reasons you try to pick projects that you're more familiar with than others?
Speaker: Oh, well, yeah.
Speaker: I mean, and I appreciate that, by the way, and I'm glad that it shows.
Speaker: Yeah, no, I won't do a project.
Speaker: Listen, I've turned down a lot of projects.
Speaker: As a matter of fact, I don't know if I've said this one before out loud, but I turned down doing the Star Wars comic version.
Speaker: And it's not because I don't love Star Wars.
Speaker: But it's because I knew I couldn't add anything to it.
Speaker: It also intimidated me greatly.
Speaker: But but I go, you know, I don't know that I can do anything in that space.
Speaker: Those people have to look exactly like they look and there's not anything that can really deviate.
Speaker: And maybe I'm a chicken, but whatever.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But, but, but my point is, you know, I look at a project when I, you know, when it comes to me and I go, okay, is there, is there a challenge here?
Speaker: Is it something that I love and can completely understand and try to, I guess, boil down into some sort of, you know, pure form and figure out what to go, whatever the hell.
Speaker: Yeah, I, I, I will not work on anything unless I think I can bring something to it.
Speaker: And so that does mean that, yeah, I, I, I look for things that excite me and challenge me because at the end of the day, uh,
Speaker: whatever the last thing was that I did is pretty much going to determine if I get to do another thing.
Speaker: So I kind of look at every project like it's the last project I'm doing.
Speaker: Now, that's mentally not healthy.
Speaker: It's a bit draining even.
Speaker: But for whatever reason, it keeps me honest and keeps me trying.
Speaker: I don't ever want to phone anything in.
Speaker: And so like, you know, you bring up Primus and, you know, talk about a short schedule.
Speaker: I had, I think, five weeks, maybe maybe six total, but with sketching, but to do that entire cabinets, back glass and, you know, play field.
Speaker: And this goes with Avengers 2, not in that time frame.
Speaker: I always say, okay, I can make concessions on the cabinets.
Speaker: I really can't make too many concessions on the back glass because that's the thing that's going to draw someone over from the other side of the room.
Speaker: But I absolutely refuse and will not make concessions on the play field.
Speaker: Um, that's the place that people are going to be staring at, uh, hopefully for years and years.
Speaker: And so that's the place where you got to put focus.
Speaker: And by the way, I shouldn't take credit for that.
Speaker: Um, uh, I, I, I, I got to give that credit to, to Greg Ferris, um, for instilling that in me, uh, from, from the, the early, early days, uh, Ghostbusters.
Speaker: Um, you know, so, so yeah, uh, I,
Speaker: It's something that it's never easy.
Speaker: No project is easy.
Speaker: But if you are excited about it, it mitigates that unease, if that means anything.
Speaker: You're telling me pinball's not easy?
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: And we'll move on.
Speaker: I will say, though, that I bought the limited edition because it had everything that you did, including the mirror back glass.
Speaker: I wanted the the inside art blades.
Speaker: that were done by you.
Speaker: And so that really helped out.
Speaker: And also the same thing with turtles.
Speaker: I did like the limited edition art blades in there, but because that goes to limited edition, I got a premium.
Speaker: I got the premium ones, which I think are perfect because they do blend with the theme perfectly.
Speaker: And so art really does elevate what I'm buying to an extra level.
Speaker: And so I appreciate what you're doing because it does show.
Speaker: Well, listen, that was my, and I won't get into the past past, but that was my goal early on was I go, how much did these things cost?
Speaker: And I go, geez, man, if I was paying that much money for something, it better look like it.
Speaker: And so, you know, as an artist, because keep in mind, when I first started working
Speaker: legitimately doing pinball work or maybe illegitimately.
Speaker: I joke, but it's a joke.
Speaker: You know, it was like 2011 and I literally had just been doing illustration for a year at that point.
Speaker: I had not done anything for like 10 years.
Speaker: I hadn't picked up a pencil.
Speaker: I had been working in the realm of design and creating web-based products, things like that.
Speaker: And so I sort of had this new ignorance in, I guess, how to value my work and how to value my time.
Speaker: And so when I was approached way back when by he who shall not be named,
Speaker: Um, I, I'm joking.
Speaker: Uh, uh, by the way, hi, John.
Speaker: Um, uh, I, uh, I, uh, uh, I, I put everything into it.
Speaker: Like, I, I'm like, you know what, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this.
Speaker: I want this to succeed.
Speaker: I want this, you know, this is perhaps my opportunity.
Speaker: And so I, you know, I made my life terrible and I continue to do it to this day with a smile and only occasionally a tired, weepy frown.
Speaker: I'm sorry, that's a joke.
Speaker: I'm always happy.
Speaker: Sure, absolutely.
Speaker: And again, I have no idea.
Speaker: I don't even know what the question was anymore.
Speaker: No, I'm sorry.
Speaker: No, I mean, yeah.
Speaker: Okay, so if you had your ideal, you know, in zombie Yeti land, when you're like, you know what, this would be my ideal timeline from start to finish, what I would have for a project, a pinball machine, what would you say is your comfort level?
Speaker: Okay, so I am going to be absolutely honest here.
Speaker: I don't think I should ever dictate that.
Speaker: And I'll tell you why.
Speaker: Twofold.
Speaker: One, part of what makes the project what it is in the end is a little bit of the chaos.
Speaker: And a little bit of that unknown throughout keeps you on your toes.
Speaker: And so for me, as much as I could say, you know, so I'll give you an example.
Speaker: So I figured, I actually, I figured this out the other day and I'm not gonna, I won't give exact numbers, but roughly, roughly, you know, per piece, you know, I think, you know,
Speaker: in my you know what i'm not gonna say it i'm not gonna say it because i i don't want to i don't want to give too much of it but um in a perfect world i would have weekends off how's that um but i don't because i want to take that time when i know everyone else is off to refine and refine so um the schedule's fine i'm the problem
Speaker: Well, it's hard to walk away when it's it's the same thing as taking a class in college.
Speaker: If you take if you take one class, you're going to spend a certain amount of time in a week on that one class.
Speaker: Or if you take five classes, you're going to spend the same amount of time, but you're going to diversify it just because however you personally are wired, that's the amount of effort you're going to put into it.
Speaker: So if you have three projects going simultaneously, you're going to spend the same amount of time just divided between the projects.
Speaker: Yeah, you know, and it's interesting because I went to, first off, what's interesting is I was a very lazy kid, super lazy.
Speaker: I was encouraged to be lazy.
Speaker: My dad started working a full time.
Speaker: He was a family of six.
Speaker: So he started working a full time job literally while he was in high school.
Speaker: He would work till midnight, one o'clock on school nights.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And that's because there were so many kids.
Speaker: If he wanted anything, he had to make his own money anyway.
Speaker: So he always told me, he's like, listen, enjoy being a kid as long as you want.
Speaker: He's like, don't don't push it.
Speaker: And so he would actually, you know, give me in the summers, he would give me an allowance to be able to go do things with friends and stuff like that.
Speaker: And so he basically trained me to be lazy.
Speaker: But I also watched him and how he worked.
Speaker: And he's a very hard worker.
Speaker: And so I got a work ethic.
Speaker: I just didn't have anything to apply it to.
Speaker: And so then I get to college and I went to the Columbus College of Art and Design, which is in Columbus, Ohio.
Speaker: Can you believe that?
Speaker: It's so cool that those names line up.
Speaker: It's it's not too far from Ohio State.
Speaker: They named the city after the college, right?
Speaker: Yeah, they did.
Speaker: They did.
Speaker: After the fact.
Speaker: And it was known at that time that I went as being the second most rigorous curriculum to Princeton.
Speaker: Now, that's what they said.
Speaker: I'm like, how would they possibly even put you?
Speaker: Like, no one's going to whatever.
Speaker: That was part of their marketing.
Speaker: And I'm like, who would want to go here?
Speaker: But whatever.
Speaker: I went anyway.
Speaker: They gave me a lot of money.
Speaker: I went.
Speaker: And so they actually had it structured where to be a full time student, you had to have at least 18 credit hours.
Speaker: And and there that was a lot of classes.
Speaker: I mean, I literally was in class at least eight hours a day and every class expected you to.
Speaker: to be only paying attention to their class and putting all of your time for whatever the next days, weeks, whatever, into that class, right?
Speaker: And so if it was a painting class or a sculpture class, whatever, they expected you to always be only working on their work, even though they know that's not possible, right?
Speaker: And so that trained me and really made me ready for pinball in the fact that you have to figure out how to maximize your time in every possible, you know, whether it be, I guess, anatomy, whether it be, you know, structural drawing, perspective, things like that.
Speaker: Like you sort of had to...
Speaker: figure out how to do the impossible and not go crazy.
Speaker: And so I managed to graduate, by the way, which every year I was like, I'm done.
Speaker: This is it.
Speaker: I'm done.
Speaker: I can't do this anymore.
Speaker: This is driving me crazy.
Speaker: And I think that helped tremendously.
Speaker: As a matter of fact, there's actually a
Speaker: an artist who is, I think, working on a project right now.
Speaker: And Greg Ferreris had run him by me.
Speaker: And I was looking through his credentials and it said he graduated from, you know, Columbus College of Art and Design.
Speaker: And I said, I think he can do it.
Speaker: I'm like, I'm positive this guy can at least get the work done.
Speaker: And his portfolio was great too.
Speaker: So maybe someday when you see that, I can go, hey, look, he was also from CCAD.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But but whatever.
Speaker: I mean, I at the time I cursed it.
Speaker: Now I understand.
Speaker: You know, they were basically telling you, like, if you really want to do this job, if you want to be an artist and actually work and make money, you don't get to rest.
Speaker: And it's true.
Speaker: I mean, it's probably true of many jobs, by the way, but it's the only one I know right now.
Speaker: Yeah, I wasn't that motivated of a kid either.
Speaker: And there's a lot of jobs where I think, well, I did a really crappy job.
Speaker: But yeah, at some point in your career, you have to decide, I'm going to put my effort into this to make it worth it.
Speaker: But yeah, you're absolutely right.
Speaker: There really aren't 40-hour-a-week jobs for a lot of people because if you're doing your own stuff, then there's never end.
Speaker: The clock doesn't end.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: But yeah, I mean, and there comes a point in time where you go, OK, I've got to be an adult now.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: The one thing that people have pointed out, and I don't know if you can speak to this or not.
Speaker: Why is there so much yellow?
Speaker: Well, first off, it's well, first off, it's not just yellow.
Speaker: At least if you're talking about the trim on Avengers.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: It's actually, it's a spark.
Speaker: There's a sparkle in there that this does not pick up on.
Speaker: It's because Thanos.
Speaker: So Thanos, especially back in the Starlin original sort of Infinity storyline.
Speaker: Uh, it basically, and this was kind of a joke all throughout to me.
Speaker: Um, I laughed at it and kept making it and no one responded.
Speaker: No, I'm joking.
Speaker: I think they, I think a few people left, but, but he essentially, he always looked like he was wearing a big dish glove to me.
Speaker: Um, I embrace that personally.
Speaker: Uh, I like that he didn't, he wasn't wearing gold back then.
Speaker: Now he might've been, but you got to keep in mind the way they colored things back then, they didn't have digital color and they, they, it was more, uh, that the offset was more, it was closer to a, uh, a palette for say a silkscreen poster where like, maybe they're going to have, you know, like maybe five different colors and they can make some blends and, and, you know,
Speaker: value from sort of bringing opacity into it a bit.
Speaker: But, you know, they really didn't have it.
Speaker: So yellow, they never had gold.
Speaker: It was always yellow.
Speaker: And so that was, you can blame me for that.
Speaker: I thought it was absolutely stunning and striking.
Speaker: And I just came off Turtles and I go, I don't want anything...
Speaker: to look like any game I've done before.
Speaker: Like every, every time I do a game, I want to make sure they can sit by each other and people don't see them blend together.
Speaker: I want to see them, you know, and by the way, that's selfish because I know that I'm going to have my games.
Speaker: But so, so that's, yeah, that's my fault.
Speaker: Blame me.
Speaker: We'll blame you a hundred percent.
Speaker: It looks good though.
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: Like Scott convinced me because at first I think all of us were like, what's with the yellow?
Speaker: The gold is awesome.
Speaker: What's wrong with you?
Speaker: It's like sparkly.
Speaker: It's amazing.
Speaker: When you get close to it, yeah, it's much better than what – and I think this is true of all Stern machines but especially selfishly my machines.
Speaker: They look –
Speaker: completely different in the real world space than in photographs.
Speaker: Like it's very hard.
Speaker: Even just dimensionally, like you never see a pinball machine sort of at this orthographic three quarter view or what, you know what I mean?
Speaker: Like it's, it's, it's just a different experience.
Speaker: So, and I try to build things and approach it knowing how they're actually going to be seen.
Speaker: Like I don't, I don't make arbitrary choices.
Speaker: Put it that way.
Speaker: But I'm also not saying I make all the right choices either.
Speaker: Like I said, I question everything I do.
Speaker: And if somebody hasn't told me to change something, well, by God, it's going to be there.
Speaker: Well, I know with Iron Maiden came out that a lot of people were wondering about the, I guess, the green and red combination.
Speaker: And the funny thing is everybody who owned the game or saw it up close, they said, it's absolutely the right combination.
Speaker: It just doesn't get picked up very well in the pictures.
Speaker: Yeah, no, absolutely.
Speaker: And you know, what's funny about that too is I've heard, and I don't know the validity of this, but I've actually heard that some of the...
Speaker: Some of the colors for trim have been diminished based on the type of materials that have been being used.
Speaker: And I don't know the whole story there, but I believe there was like maybe it's like the equivalent of, you know, like cadmiums, maybe like there's there's metals and I don't know, whatever.
Speaker: But but there's like wherever it is.
Speaker: I know that we had limitations on Avengers where there were certain things.
Speaker: colors that were knocked out of the running.
Speaker: We couldn't have them.
Speaker: And maybe it had to do with COVID.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Because I really wanted a COVID green.
Speaker: Anyway, that's a terrible joke.
Speaker: I feel instantly regrettable for saying that.
Speaker: But so that limited things a bit.
Speaker: And so, you know, whatever.
Speaker: I'm not making an excuse.
Speaker: I'm just saying that, you know, that does exist.
Speaker: That's reality.
Speaker: Well, and I think it gives a perspective because I think us as...
Speaker: So enthusiasts in the hobby, we demand maybe too much of everyone because we get this idea drummed up in our head.
Speaker: And then when the final product comes out and we look at it, we go, that's not what I had pictured.
Speaker: A lot of people then attack whatever the project is because it's not what they – the perception that they brought up.
Speaker: And I think you didn't get as much of that with this because no one knew Avengers was coming until like two weeks before when someone's like, by the way, the next pinball machine is a Marvel machine.
Speaker: And so even we speculated, we're like, well, it's got to be Black Panther because that only makes sense.
Speaker: It's Black Panther.
Speaker: Captain Marvel.
Speaker: Then when they announced Avengers, I don't think anyone was thinking Avengers.
Speaker: And so there was no expectation.
Speaker: And so it's been blown out of the water because the release, the reception to this has been because this game looks phenomenal between Keith Elwin's design and your artwork.
Speaker: And just everything, it's like a perfect storm.
Speaker: I don't know what Stern's paying you guys.
Speaker: They need to pay you guys more.
Speaker: And you can take that to the bank for me.
Speaker: You know, you can go ask for a raise and say, hey, by the way, loser kids say that.
Speaker: Because these machines are pushing the standard of what pinball should be.
Speaker: Could I have a copy of this one?
Speaker: There's a few people.
Speaker: No, I'm joking.
Speaker: Do you want to be my manager?
Speaker: No, I really appreciate that.
Speaker: I think what you're trying to say is had people had expectations, I would have failed miserably.
Speaker: And I agree with you.
Speaker: No, no, I'm joking.
Speaker: But yeah, I was shocked.
Speaker: that that this was not being, you know, even tangentially talked about Jason Rufa, I'm looking at you.
Speaker: You know, there's no, he seems to always like, say, like, you know, the next five things or something.
Speaker: He's one of those guys.
Speaker: And I was shocked and I kept sort of joking with Keith.
Speaker: I'm like, Keith, when are you going to let people know?
Speaker: Because I just assume that somebody within the walls there has to be giving information out when I see some of these leaks.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I kept holding out.
Speaker: I'm like, I hope that I hope this does not leak.
Speaker: I hope it does not leak.
Speaker: And then when I saw people talking about a Marvel title, I was so glad that nobody was even thinking Avengers.
Speaker: I was like, oh, thank you.
Speaker: Because I knew that would that would sort of cushion the blow when people saw it.
Speaker: And you're right.
Speaker: Some people would, because of lack of expectation, would accept what I had done.
Speaker: Well, it's a hard franchise.
Speaker: It really is.
Speaker: I mean, look at they've built up this universe that's made billions of dollars over the last decade.
Speaker: And so I don't know if you felt it with Deadpool at all, because everyone was always talking, well, Ryan Reynolds, Ryan Reynolds.
Speaker: And even to this day, it's still, well, you know, but Ryan Reynolds.
Speaker: And I don't get it because that is such a beautiful game.
Speaker: It's just...
Speaker: You look at that game and it's, oh yeah, it's fantastic.
Speaker: Well, I, I, we, I, obviously I love that game.
Speaker: I'm very proud of it.
Speaker: I think, uh, uh, Tanya, uh, did an amazing job on, on the, the code and, and, um, you know, it was a rough ride on that one.
Speaker: Uh, when we go into details, uh, but, uh, um, you remember there was another designer on it at one point.
Speaker: See, what, what am I doing?
Speaker: We don't know who you're talking about.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: By the way, that brings me to my joke that I've used way too much.
Speaker: I shouldn't even say it, but, you know, I had had such a bad time working with designers named John that when John Borg wanted to work on Turtles, I was afraid we were going to find out something horrible that he had done in his life.
Speaker: I kept going to him, John, just confess to me now.
Speaker: We can get ahead of this.
Speaker: Anyway, I'm joking.
Speaker: But that's a terrible joke, by the way.
Speaker: I will not.
Speaker: No more pinball machines for me.
Speaker: I apologize.
Speaker: But no, I
Speaker: yeah i i think uh at the end of the day um uh i i deadpool ended up being such a better game uh george gomez uh like he toiled and he worked night and day uh to put that together to get that get to get a new design put together and it was so much better than what we would have had just trust me on that one um
Speaker: I'm very proud of that one.
Speaker: To this day, it's probably my favorite playing game.
Speaker: A lot of that has to do with the rules.
Speaker: Just in general, it's my kind of game.
Speaker: It's easy to jump into.
Speaker: For me, I can go to the end and
Speaker: enjoy myself uh and i it doesn't get old it's like it's you know it's like back in the old days uh playing arcade games uh you know like uh uh you would play a game that literally only lasted maybe a half an hour and then that was it nowadays these games they're too long i can't play a 30 hour game i don't have time for that um i forget where i was when i go i step away and i come back i'm getting old
Speaker: No, but yeah, no, I don't even know what your question was because that's how my brain works.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: No, you're good.
Speaker: You're good.
Speaker: Well, and I want to say one more thing too.
Speaker: I want to congratulate you too because for so many years, everyone was saying that Zombie Yeti was the leak from Stern because you got on Deadpool and that leaked.
Speaker: And then what was the other one?
Speaker: I know Turtles leaked early too.
Speaker: And they're like, well, the only connection here is Yeti.
Speaker: And you'd went on a podcast.
Speaker: You're like, I swear, guys, it's not me.
Speaker: And now Avengers, it didn't release until two weeks before.
Speaker: So obviously you're not the leak.
Speaker: So Stern, stop.
Speaker: Listen, that angers me more than anything because I don't know if you do this.
Speaker: Well, yeah, because my work in the licensing world exists outside of Stern 2.
Speaker: I have no...
Speaker: uh no reason i have no no bonus uh to get out of leaking like if you remember like ghostbusters uh leaked right that was the first one that was really early yeah right right and you know what they leaked they leaked uh unfinished artwork bad pictures of you bad pictures of it and and uh what do i have to gain from that like nothing like
Speaker: And I was confronted about it, too.
Speaker: And they're like, listen, we actually do know who it was now.
Speaker: And I'm not going to go into details.
Speaker: But it's very possible that the same source may have been on others, too.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: But the bottom line is, I can swear to you.
Speaker: that I have no reason and no desire to ever leak.
Speaker: Like the surprise is part of the fun.
Speaker: And I get very upset when I see people guessing games that I'm working.
Speaker: I don't like that at all.
Speaker: So it's fun.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I had never heard that people thought it was me.
Speaker: Ghostbusters was a direct thing.
Speaker: That one, I was part of an investigation, so to speak, where they're like, Hey, did you do this?
Speaker: And here's the funny thing about that one too is,
Speaker: It was actually in production, production template, which I've never even seen.
Speaker: I don't even have.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So it wasn't me, kids.
Speaker: And I can assure you, I have no reason to talk about anything else.
Speaker: I don't want.
Speaker: We want to clear your good name because, you know, I appreciate that.
Speaker: That's that's what we do.
Speaker: And I can get your frustration.
Speaker: I mean, I think we can all relate when you go to cook something.
Speaker: If someone walks into the kitchen, you're halfway through baking a cake.
Speaker: And they look at the bowl and it's still just that pudding portion of the cake.
Speaker: And they're like, what the heck's this?
Speaker: This is not cake.
Speaker: And you're like, well, I'm not done yet.
Speaker: Yeah, and not just that, but when you're going an entire year on a project, for instance, and you're having to keep your mouth shut, you're not allowed to show anything –
Speaker: why do you want it to leak like, you know, even a week before or a day before like that?
Speaker: Like when turtles, those crappy turtle pictures went out to see how I edited myself.
Speaker: Wasn't that those can't be turtle pictures went out like the day before, you know, or a couple of days before.
Speaker: I don't remember now, but, but that, that, that made me upset.
Speaker: I'm like, Oh, you gotta be kidding me.
Speaker: Why, why can't people just wait and be nice?
Speaker: By the way, which allows me to call out,
Speaker: Can I do that on here?
Speaker: Am I allowed to do that?
Speaker: If you want to.
Speaker: We will not.
Speaker: Because he said.
Speaker: Oh, I'm sorry.
Speaker: I was going to say really quick.
Speaker: The comments or opinions of the guest do not reflect Luther King.
Speaker: Oh, no, no, no.
Speaker: Don't beat Chris.
Speaker: Don't beat them up.
Speaker: And don't beat me up either.
Speaker: I'm just saying.
Speaker: The irony is, you know, he leaked the turtle pics and he said, I'd do it for anything.
Speaker: You know, if I've got pictures of it for the pinball community, I will die on my sword.
Speaker: I don't know, whatever.
Speaker: He made it sound like, you know, he was doing something noble and he'd do it about any game.
Speaker: And then, of course, oh, and I've got Guns N' Roses, but I'm not going to show it.
Speaker: That wouldn't be nice of me to show it.
Speaker: Anyway, I'm calling you out, boy.
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: No, no, that's fine.
Speaker: Actually, Chris, Chris, don't leak things, please.
Speaker: I mean, you can talk about them and you can tell people, you know, stuff.
Speaker: Just don't leak things, especially if I'm involved.
Speaker: I actually enjoy this was the best pinball reveal that I've been a part of just because I really had absolutely no clue.
Speaker: what was coming up.
Speaker: And so when Josh texted me, he's like, hey, did you see the rumors of the new title?
Speaker: I'm like, really?
Speaker: And this was like 12 hours before.
Speaker: And so it was just so much fun to actually say, huh, I had absolutely no idea.
Speaker: And so I just get a look at it.
Speaker: It was great.
Speaker: No, I think that's the idea.
Speaker: That's the way that Stern would prefer all of them to go.
Speaker: You know, it's people who apparently, you know, and listen, I'm the worst guy in this regard.
Speaker: My sister, when we were young, I have an older sister.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I love to tell her what presents she was getting for Christmas before.
Speaker: Because because I thought everyone wanted to know what they were getting.
Speaker: And so I'd be like, I know what mom and dad and she'd be like, no, shut up.
Speaker: Don't tell me.
Speaker: So so so what I'm saying is I get it.
Speaker: I understand why people want to say things.
Speaker: um it makes sense uh but at the same time it's like if you wait um you know uh what is it what good things come to those who i don't know whatever yes no yeah
Speaker: It's totally good.
Speaker: It's more fun.
Speaker: It's certainly more fun.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: And I think at the end of the day, you know, now people have an expectation of how many games are going to get released, you know, in a year by Stern.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Everyone's like, OK, about this time, we'll probably get something or about this time.
Speaker: Well, it's never it's never quite, you know, like, OK, I know every June 4th we're going to get, you know, a game or something.
Speaker: It's not quite like that.
Speaker: Um, uh, but at the same time, it's, you know, wouldn't it be great if you had no idea what it was and then it turns out to be something you like.
Speaker: Um, now if it's something you hate and I worked on it, um, uh, then apparently we, we, we could never be friends.
Speaker: We wouldn't be compatible.
Speaker: Uh, so.
Speaker: Well, I guess we could be friends in real life.
Speaker: Cause I I've enjoyed every project you've done so far.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: And I know Scott loves Iron Maiden just gushes over that game.
Speaker: Hey, I appreciate it.
Speaker: I'm one of those guys who when people came out, they're like Iron Maiden.
Speaker: Like, yeah, I mean,
Speaker: I give Keith all the credit on that one, though, because the rules and how he set that game up within that universe and actually Chuck Ernst's team and all the animation and display stuff they did, that game became way more than what I could even have imagined.
Speaker: Like I had, you know, expectations, but at the same time, what it turned into, it is special, I think.
Speaker: What I was thinking when I see your art, it reminds me of, so when I was growing up in the 80s, and you go into the bookstores, because back then they had bookstores, and you go into the fantasy novel, you know, the Conan the Barbarian type stuff.
Speaker: And I would pull it out and I would look at the cover, because that's how you bought a book, right?
Speaker: And I would look at it and I was like, holy cow, did any of these guys take art classes?
Speaker: Like, it was so bad.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, seriously, the muscles were in the wrong place and it looked like it was.
Speaker: I like the fact that you started this by saying, when I look at your art, it reminds me.
Speaker: And then you went into this whole thing about how people.
Speaker: No, no, I think it's fantastic.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: Keep going.
Speaker: Yes, yes, yes.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: What I'm saying is that there are so many times when I look at some old pinball art from back in the day where, yes, there are some great ones, but there are some where you're like, oh, my gosh, this is terrible.
Speaker: And then you come along and you say, yeah, this is how it's supposed to be.
Speaker: And this is what makes it great.
Speaker: It really does push it to a new level.
Speaker: See, see what I did?
Speaker: No, that's good.
Speaker: You guys really helped my self-esteem tonight.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: No, I'm joking.
Speaker: No, I'm not joking, but I'm joking to be dismissive of it.
Speaker: I actually do appreciate it.
Speaker: But having said that...
Speaker: um i think there's a lot of charm to to some of that stuff like i so i was a um i grew up i was a uh a sega kid like i had a sega master system instead of a a nintendo entertainment system um that's terrible right um not at all i had the genesis well i went with the genesis so i never had a super nintendo so
Speaker: Okay, okay, there you go.
Speaker: After that, I became platform agnostic.
Speaker: I treat them all the same.
Speaker: But having said that, Sega box art was terrible during that era.
Speaker: Awful, awful stuff.
Speaker: Like classically awful stuff.
Speaker: I, there's a charm to that to me.
Speaker: And to this day, I still sort of, um, think about that.
Speaker: Even the, you know, the Genesis era, there was some, there was some pretty bad stuff too, but there was good stuff as well.
Speaker: And I try to, I, I try to, um,
Speaker: I try to care.
Speaker: I think what I've learned is in the gaming world, at least back then.
Speaker: And I, and I know this because a lot of the people who are at Stern used to be, you know, working in, in the gaming world.
Speaker: And I've been told, I think this is, I want to say Greg Ferris told me that Kevin O'Connor said at one point, and I could be totally wrong.
Speaker: So I probably shouldn't even mention names.
Speaker: So I apologize, Kevin and Greg, if I'm wrong.
Speaker: But that Kevin used to say that they were nothing more than glorified carnival artists.
Speaker: And I don't know, like in my mind, I go, well, so does that mean like he felt...
Speaker: he felt like they were treated that way?
Speaker: Or was that actually like an endearing thing?
Speaker: When I see Kevin, I got to ask him.
Speaker: But I don't know if it's good or bad, but I get it.
Speaker: And he's not wrong, I don't think, just on the level of essentially all you're trying to do is get someone's eye to look at something.
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: At its core form.
Speaker: And I don't know if he meant that because I'm guessing their schedules were worse back then than they are now.
Speaker: Only because of how many games they were putting out back in the heyday in particular, but...
Speaker: So I was going to say back in their day, though, you know, we talk about half naked women on pinball because that's what it used to be.
Speaker: So you you guys have overstepped that now and you don't have to do that anymore unless it's something like Elvira, which is empowering.
Speaker: But yeah, you look at the World Cup soccer.
Speaker: I know Kevin O'Connor did the artwork on this one.
Speaker: And it's I actually like it.
Speaker: It's a little bit cheesy.
Speaker: People say that the artwork's not that great.
Speaker: But I always joke, though, it's like we have all these soccer players and then we have a female ref and booty shorts right down the middle of the flippers.
Speaker: No, Kevin, Kevin's fantastic.
Speaker: I love Kevin, like Kevin and Greg.
Speaker: Obviously, you know, Greg, Greg is sort of, I guess I'd call him my mentor and in the pinball space or whatever.
Speaker: I don't know if he'll, I don't know if he'll take that one or not, but, but, you know, I look up to those guys.
Speaker: I mean, you know, it,
Speaker: The way they had to do things back in the days before we had computers with with doing optical prints and things like that, just to get to the point of of line is insane to me.
Speaker: And and I have the utmost respect.
Speaker: And I know that they also were working, you know, back then they produced way more games than they do now.
Speaker: uh technically although we're getting close aren't we now come on too many games in a year anyway says the guy who just had two back-to-back anyway um uh no there's way too no um i'm just saying because i can't afford uh but uh uh yeah no um i i don't i don't take that as a bad thing and and yes uh at the end of the day um there has been bad i've never looked at it like i was going to improve anything that had been done all i looked at was
Speaker: If I was going to do this, I wanted to do it my way and I wanted to hopefully get to do it again.
Speaker: And that was that was my only goal.
Speaker: And it's it's literally my only goal project by project.
Speaker: Well, I don't I don't foresee any time soon that people are going to say, you know what?
Speaker: We don't want any more zombie yeti.
Speaker: I mean, people like I said, I feel like it's the standard.
Speaker: And I don't mean any downplay to anyone else.
Speaker: I really appreciate what Franchi does, what Dirty Donnie does, Kevin O'Connor.
Speaker: I mean, the artwork nowadays is just above and beyond, especially anything that was produced in the 2000s and early 2010s.
Speaker: And it's just there was a turn, and I swear it was with either Magic Girl or Alice in Wonderland,
Speaker: turn of this is what pinball art could be and should be and ever since then everything has been a step above the rest especially I think it opened the door basically what you're saying is this is the turning point this is once everybody saw that they said we want more of that style and that really opened the door for other artists you know like Dirty Donnie, Franchi and all them to be able to do what they do is that what you're saying Josh?
Speaker: Yes that's what I'm saying
Speaker: Well, so first off, somebody write a book quick so that I'll at least have a footnote in history, if that's true.
Speaker: Secondly, that's a joke.
Speaker: I don't really care.
Speaker: But secondly, I have it a little different.
Speaker: And I'm going to tell you right now, Dirty Donnie, when he did his work with...
Speaker: Actually, I believe Tanya was the programmer when he did that first one-off Metallica.
Speaker: I think...
Speaker: His work is what put John Papaduke on a search to find someone, and that's how he found me.
Speaker: So I give Donnie the credit.
Speaker: I think Donnie changed things, but that just enabled me to come in and make my little mark on it or whatever.
Speaker: I mean –
Speaker: Listen, at the end of the day, there's always somebody better at everything.
Speaker: Um, and especially with art, I know there's, there's better artists than me.
Speaker: I know there's, there's better people, uh, out there now.
Speaker: Do I think that there's a better person perfectly suited, uh, for the types of schedules and the types of, of, of frenetic, uh, work and, and, and stuff in pinball?
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Not right now.
Speaker: Uh, most, most of my artist friends that I try to be like, Hey, would you be interested in pinball?
Speaker: And I tell them the schedule and, and sort of, you know, kind of the flow of it.
Speaker: They're like, nah, not a chance.
Speaker: Um, but, but again, you know, I was a user interface designer, uh, for years.
Speaker: Uh, and, and I think that lends itself, um, in particular when working on play fields and stuff like that.
Speaker: Um, you know, uh,
Speaker: So I don't know.
Speaker: I just tripped and fell and stumbled down some stairs that sort of bent my spine in the right form to sit in this chair and do this.
Speaker: Did I tell you about that?
Speaker: I was in the hospital for a long time.
Speaker: No, you did not.
Speaker: I'm sorry, it's a terrible joke.
Speaker: Horrible joke.
Speaker: Such a terrible analogy.
Speaker: The only way I could end it was with a joke.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: It's good.
Speaker: It works.
Speaker: It works.
Speaker: You know, but on the flip side, though, and coming a little bit back to the art, sometimes in the world before they could actually have games that had good art.
Speaker: So I'm thinking back in like Intellivision Atari games.
Speaker: Sometimes they only had that one shot to sell the game.
Speaker: And some of those images were pretty amazing.
Speaker: I still think of the centipede art on the side cabinet, I think, is one of the coolest art things.
Speaker: And of course, it has...
Speaker: very little to do with the gameplay because it was just pixelated dots, but it really is iconic.
Speaker: And so some of that art back in the day was great and other was just trash.
Speaker: I completely agree.
Speaker: I think a lot of that was because the artist was left to do what they do.
Speaker: It was up to their imagination.
Speaker: Like, how do you do that?
Speaker: And so, you know, some artists need a lot of direction and some artists don't.
Speaker: And I think a lot of those folks who were, you know, essentially, probably they came from the advertising world.
Speaker: A lot of them were traditional painters or admin.
Speaker: I think they excelled at that stuff.
Speaker: And obviously, the good ones were usually snatched up by a company.
Speaker: And that's why you saw specific companies have good box art and specific companies have bad box art, Sega.
Speaker: And so, yeah, I completely agree with you.
Speaker: And it's funny because...
Speaker: And this is a struggle I have all the time.
Speaker: And I know I forget who it was.
Speaker: Maybe it was maybe it was that Zach.
Speaker: You know, we haven't talked about Zach in a while and he doesn't get a lot of time on podcasts.
Speaker: So Zach Meaney, I'm calling you out.
Speaker: No, I think I saw a portion or somebody sent me a clip or something of them talking about the Avengers play field.
Speaker: I can't remember if it was him who said it or not, but something along the lines of they were surprised at...
Speaker: usually I cram stuff all over a play field, and on the Avengers, it looked like I had some restraint, right?
Speaker: And I was like, I don't know if that's an insult or not.
Speaker: I don't think it is, but I want to say my goal is not just to cram stuff all over the place.
Speaker: I want to give you your money's worth, don't get me wrong, but at the same time, I try to...
Speaker: I try to design things.
Speaker: So here's an example.
Speaker: Do you know Mike Mignola, the creator of Hellboy?
Speaker: Have you seen his artwork, obviously, right?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Look at his work versus, let's say, someone like Jim Lee.
Speaker: And a lot of people objectively look at that and go, oh, my goodness, Jim Lee has so much more detail.
Speaker: Therefore, it's better.
Speaker: I'm telling you right now, I'm calling you out, Jim Lee.
Speaker: That's not true.
Speaker: Mike Mignola and what he does is is actually much more complicated to be able to actually simplify forms and.
Speaker: and communicate information in that stylized manner and more of a designed manner is actually much more difficult.
Speaker: And so my struggle is always finding that middle ground between the two and
Speaker: Avengers, because of the shortened timeframe and everything else, really lent itself to me being able to do that.
Speaker: And the fact that I had to draw so many characters, I'm like, I don't want to clutter the spaces.
Speaker: I need to have openness to
Speaker: um to be able to draw people to the silhouettes of these these characters so that was intentional um you know it was actually quite thoughtful um and i don't take it as a as an insult and i don't know if zach said it or not i just know that he doesn't get enough uh uh you know advertising uh in the the podcast space not at all
Speaker: No, I do get exactly what you're talking about.
Speaker: Hellboy versus Jim Lee.
Speaker: It seems a little bit like Frank Miller.
Speaker: And if you look at that, it's a completely different style and it's it's also a perfect style.
Speaker: It's just a stylistic choice and it doesn't have to be exactly.
Speaker: what if you look at what Jim Lee does, it looks very much exactly like you would anticipate the ideal comic book artist to be.
Speaker: But that doesn't mean every comic book artist has to be like that.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But and at the same time, the amount of effort going between the two.
Speaker: Now, I'm not saying Jim Lee doesn't spend more time than Mignola on something.
Speaker: Don't get me wrong.
Speaker: But what I'm saying is there's actually much more time and thought that goes into the way he Mignola crafts the simplicity.
Speaker: You know, it's not like, oh, I'm just I'm just using less lines.
Speaker: It takes less time.
Speaker: It's not quite that way.
Speaker: So, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: So one of my final questions, we've talked a lot about video games tonight, and I don't know if you've ever listened to us before, but Scott and I really do enjoy video games and think that the platform would lend well to pinball.
Speaker: If you could pick one video game license that you could do the artwork for pinball, doesn't matter how obscure or how mainstream it is, what would you pick to do for pinball?
Speaker: See, I have a terrible answer to that.
Speaker: let's hear it a really terrible answer to that that people are will probably hate me for um tony hawk pro skater now that would be awesome i i think it's like the perfect pinball uh crossover franchise in my opinion the idea of combos the idea of stringing things together obviously rails uh let's uh let's give it to keith ellen anyway um yes uh
Speaker: I think, in my opinion, especially the soundtrack, everything about it,
Speaker: is perfect.
Speaker: And I've actually been talking about that so much because obviously the, the HD, you know, Tony Hawk one and two remake came out and I've been playing the heck out of it.
Speaker: Pretending like I, I'm a, I'm a young lad again.
Speaker: And by the way, I'm not nearly as good as I used to be.
Speaker: I'm not saying I'm bad, but for crying out loud, like is something changed because my timing on reverts just, I don't know, something's weird.
Speaker: Anyway, yeah,
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: It just something's off.
Speaker: But but I love it and I don't care.
Speaker: Also, some of those new tracks on the soundtrack.
Speaker: Who cares for those?
Speaker: Let's turn those off.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I miss the old soundtracks.
Speaker: But but yeah, that would be my answer.
Speaker: I could give other answers.
Speaker: But I think in my opinion, in my head, that's the perfect fit.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Could you please, could you please promise me that you're going to put some weird mustache on there like skateboard?
Speaker: So you can put Tony Hawk with, with that, with that comb, you know, that, that comb mustache that for some reason, the dude's like 45 on skateboard.
Speaker: The art is, is fantastically weird.
Speaker: So you're saying we should remake that one.
Speaker: I'm with you.
Speaker: Yeah, well, put Tony Hawk, but have that weird handlebar mustache or something.
Speaker: Oh, no, I was going to say, no, I completely agree.
Speaker: See, and I think, and this is why I think your idea is genius on this one.
Speaker: I just introduced my son to Tony Hawk's Pro Skater because I have it on my Xbox 360.
Speaker: I downloaded it for whatever it was, $10 or whatever.
Speaker: And he has been so addicted to that game, the idea of all these combos and everything like that.
Speaker: But also, and this is selfish on my part, this is probably the closest we'll ever get a ska song into a pinball machine.
Speaker: Oh, my gosh.
Speaker: Drop the ska.
Speaker: It's the worst music ever.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: No, it's not.
Speaker: It's when a 12-year-old... It's the music that a 12-year-old had goes in his head while he gets an extra mozzarella stick with his combo.
Speaker: Okay, are you going to have him do an Aquabats theme now?
Speaker: Hey, you said it.
Speaker: I'm just... Your genius is bringing this up.
Speaker: I'm just going to back it.
Speaker: Hey, can I just tell you the Aquabats follow me on Instagram?
Speaker: Okay, that's... Listen, I'm big.
Speaker: I'm big.
Speaker: Anyway...
Speaker: I remember the day that I found that out and I went, what?
Speaker: Anyway, so, yeah, listen, I'm all for it.
Speaker: I think it would make perfect sense.
Speaker: I do have one other potential candidate that –
Speaker: I'm not ready to reveal yet that I have an idea on and an angle on it that I actually do want to pitch to someone at Stern because I do think it has legs and I do think it's it's something that could be done.
Speaker: But and I'm not saying Tony Hawk doesn't either.
Speaker: Don't get me wrong, but I don't know that I don't know that's interested in that other than me.
Speaker: We might have missed the window with the HD remake coming out.
Speaker: I think so.
Speaker: I think so.
Speaker: But hey, I've got my vote.
Speaker: Yeah, he's ToeJam.
Speaker: Oh, you read my mind.
Speaker: No, no, not ToeJam.
Speaker: I was actually thinking Alex the Kid when you said, no one's going to like this.
Speaker: And I'm like, because I grew up on Alex the Kid from the original Genesis.
Speaker: I love Alex the Kid.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: No, no, no.
Speaker: What about the classic Atari that will always be the best game they have ever made?
Speaker: E.T.?
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: That's not bad.
Speaker: Hey, the play field could just have lots of pits.
Speaker: The ball just falls down in pits.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Because they went and the game was so bad, they buried it.
Speaker: That's the best part of the story.
Speaker: Like it was so bad.
Speaker: They went out in the middle of nowhere and buried all the extra games that no one bought.
Speaker: Well, it's ironic to be because that was part of the gameplay.
Speaker: Like he literally would constantly fall down in these little holes and then, you know, get Reese's Pieces and then whatever.
Speaker: What a terrible game.
Speaker: That would be the wizard mode is you're burying all the games out there.
Speaker: You're collecting all the games to a race that was ever made.
Speaker: Yeah, it'd be like Diamond Collect on Congo.
Speaker: You're just collecting one after another after another just to stick it in a pit.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I like the way you guys think.
Speaker: Do you want to start a pinball company?
Speaker: I have an idea for specialized legs.
Speaker: We'll start there.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Okay, let's start there.
Speaker: You know, eight legs.
Speaker: It wants to be an eight legs.
Speaker: That's what.
Speaker: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Speaker: I was going with six.
Speaker: Eight.
Speaker: That's brilliant.
Speaker: Octo-legged.
Speaker: Oh, ouch.
Speaker: Oh, it sounds like a James Bonds reference, but I'm going to move on now.
Speaker: I've read those.
Speaker: Oh, thank you, Austin Powers, for ruining my love for James Bond.
Speaker: Man, no kidding.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: All right, well, I'm going to wrap this up.
Speaker: You know, you've been awesome, Mr. Jeremy Packard or Zombie Yeti.
Speaker: I don't know what you prefer, honestly.
Speaker: Well, I have no preference.
Speaker: I think Jeremy Packer is a boring name, but I think Zombie Yeti sounds dumb, too.
Speaker: So I don't know what I write.
Speaker: Okay, I will say I was on vacation over the weekend and we watched all the Hotel Transylvania movies.
Speaker: And in the second one, when he came, this is out of left field, when they're thinking about moving to California, they're like, yeah, we have a lot of mixed couples.
Speaker: I invited some in the neighborhood.
Speaker: And he comes in, it's like, and this is Melissa or whatever her name was.
Speaker: And she's married to a werewolf.
Speaker: And the guy's looking at her like, what?
Speaker: immediately I thought that's zombie Yeti right there.
Speaker: So first off for clarification, you have children, right?
Speaker: That's why you were watching those.
Speaker: I do.
Speaker: Yes, I do.
Speaker: I have three children.
Speaker: Uh,
Speaker: I do too I watch a lot of things that are questionable in that very same way those aren't bad actually I love Genndy Tartakovsky who did those films so regardless of anything I can't hate them because of his wonderful animation which by the way speaking of video games quick plug the Samurai Jack game that just came out he actually helped work on it it's actually worth playing I'm surprised I have no idea about that game
Speaker: Yes, I know.
Speaker: And it's on every platform.
Speaker: I think it's probably on your phone.
Speaker: But no, I played it on Xbox and I loved it.
Speaker: I couldn't stop playing it.
Speaker: It was bizarre.
Speaker: Are you addicted to Among Us like everyone else is right now, too?
Speaker: Oh, my kids are playing.
Speaker: They were playing that.
Speaker: My kids.
Speaker: Oh, my God.
Speaker: My kids do it for me.
Speaker: Like, I I love the memes.
Speaker: I love and I and I like watching.
Speaker: But no, I have not actually played myself yet.
Speaker: I'm telling you, we got to get an Among Us night together and all see who the imposter is.
Speaker: It's going to be a hoot.
Speaker: So I'm too busy stuck with like the NES, the the NES where it's like I'll play Contra, but only if I can use the code for 30 people because there's zero chance I'm going to play that game.
Speaker: See, yeah, the kids are spoiled nowadays.
Speaker: Games are too easy.
Speaker: Yeah, they don't remember how hard those games were.
Speaker: Like, do you remember trying to play Ghosts and Goblins for the first time?
Speaker: You want to know something?
Speaker: You laughed at like seven seconds.
Speaker: I, did you ever, I, uh, ghouls and ghosts for Sega Genesis.
Speaker: I'm sure you remember that one.
Speaker: The, the, I, I could play that game and keep in mind, you have to go through the game twice to beat it.
Speaker: I could play that game, uh, and actually go through it and beat it with, without any cheating whatsoever.
Speaker: Um, that's how lonely of a child I was anyway.
Speaker: Well, if it makes you feel any better, I actually sought out the hardest game ever made, the one that was voted the very hardest game ever made, which is Battletoads.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And I dedicated myself to make sure I could beat that game.
Speaker: And I finally did.
Speaker: And whoever made that game, the first three levels are fun.
Speaker: The rest, the dude needs to be punched in the nose because that was just a ridiculously hard.
Speaker: See, I thought you were going to go somewhere else with a punch.
Speaker: Oh, speaking of which, see, I'm now I'm giving myself away here.
Speaker: I'm just getting us distracted from leaving.
Speaker: They just did a brand new Battletoads game on Xbox.
Speaker: I know a lot of people.
Speaker: This is not a popular opinion.
Speaker: It's it's actually enjoyable to play through.
Speaker: It's not something you would ever go back to.
Speaker: But it's it's it breaks up the gameplay.
Speaker: It's not terrible.
Speaker: The style of it.
Speaker: Obviously, I like bright and saturated colors.
Speaker: So it was like eye candy to me.
Speaker: It's not terribly funny, but there's like one joke in it where I go, boy, I wish all the humor was like that.
Speaker: But but it's if you like Battletoads, you'll love this because you you can't fail at it.
Speaker: It's it's made for the the the kids nowadays.
Speaker: See, and I'm going back through Super Mario 64 right now because it got re-released for the Switch.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Holy crap.
Speaker: I don't – when did that game become so hard?
Speaker: I remember as a child it was a cakewalk and now – You had a lot more time on your hands.
Speaker: No, I'm going to tell you what it is.
Speaker: I'm going to tell you what it is.
Speaker: This is – and by the way – Camera ankles.
Speaker: No, it has everything to do with the N64 controller and the fact that that analog stick was a higher height than analog sticks are nowadays.
Speaker: So you had a little more control and it actually had crevices to lock into specific places and the camera would turn.
Speaker: So you could always get the camera perfectly behind and actually get perfectly going forward, backwards or to different degrees in between.
Speaker: So I personally, I'm telling you, that's what it is because I played it on a Super Nintendo or Nintendo 64 not long ago.
Speaker: And that's the difference.
Speaker: That's what's making it harder for you because you can pretty much just sort of meander wherever you want.
Speaker: And you don't have quite the sensitivity from a stop to a run.
Speaker: Gotcha.
Speaker: Okay, Josh.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: I'm a nerd.
Speaker: No, we're nerds too.
Speaker: Hey, we have an, I have a Nintendo 64 still in my house.
Speaker: And so just get the game and bring it over and we'll figure out how to play it.
Speaker: I've got my N64 as well.
Speaker: We'll, we'll do a game night.
Speaker: I've also got my old NES.
Speaker: And if you want to play Battletoads on the old NES, I got it.
Speaker: I don't think I have that.
Speaker: I do have a game genie though.
Speaker: And I bought like 90 games when they were like three bucks each back in the early days.
Speaker: So smart.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Those 90 games are now worth at least $90.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: $92.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: Actually, you've probably got some gems in there.
Speaker: Trust me.
Speaker: That's...
Speaker: But anyway, no, I listen.
Speaker: I appreciate it.
Speaker: You guys were fantastic and you made me feel good.
Speaker: I will probably go to bed tonight without crying.
Speaker: This is the first.
Speaker: No, I'm joking.
Speaker: No blisters on the hands from working so hard.
Speaker: yeah no no exactly no no no i i no listen i i thank uh you guys i thank the pinball community uh for uh allowing me to keep doing this and obviously uh i thank the overlords at stern who continue to trust me um and let me work uh hopefully i'll get to do it a few more times and hopefully uh i won't have games releasing back to back ever again
Speaker: Well, I'm hoping your game is coming to my house next week.
Speaker: So that's the plan.
Speaker: I hope so, too, because I'm going to claim I'm sick and go to Scott's house.
Speaker: So that way I can skip work and get to play the new Avengers.
Speaker: That'd be awesome.
Speaker: Oh, you'll love it.
Speaker: You'll absolutely love it.
Speaker: And not because of the artwork.
Speaker: Except that middle ramp on Turtles, I think, was designed by Satan.
Speaker: I cannot hit it.
Speaker: Seriously.
Speaker: Oh, there's a there's a time.
Speaker: So, well, I'll tell you the inside baseball.
Speaker: John Borg told me he said he said turn the flipper power up all the way because it's not by default.
Speaker: So because he likes to just jam it up in there.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Like that's that's his whole thing.
Speaker: I don't do that.
Speaker: I actually have a thing where I think it intentionally has to be a combo shot to get it up.
Speaker: So I'll basically do the crane combo, and with the speed coming around the second time, that's the only way I can get the power to get it up there.
Speaker: But I'm pretty...
Speaker: pretty consistent, I think.
Speaker: Oh, geez.
Speaker: It is dumb luck if I hit that shot.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: It's just crazy.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: And I'm chimp flipping it.
Speaker: I'm trying to hit it as much as like it just, no.
Speaker: And what I do is when I launch, I actually do like the second stage.
Speaker: So I push it in.
Speaker: So the lower flippers activated and the other one's not.
Speaker: And so I just wait and I try to hit it.
Speaker: It's so hard.
Speaker: Don't don't just just don't even do the second stage thing.
Speaker: Just just bang that thing like literally as it's coming around from a full launch.
Speaker: It's it's you want to hit it right right about the timing is just when it's it's passing over the flipper so that you're hitting it right on the tip.
Speaker: And it'll work every time.
Speaker: Like, like it's at least at the, you know, I think I've got mine adjusted correctly.
Speaker: It seems, it seems to work for me every time.
Speaker: It's just a matter of, of being just a hair too fast or too slow if it doesn't happen.
Speaker: But, but you know, the shot that kills me.
Speaker: and this is mind-numbing, is actually the pizza parlor shot.
Speaker: For some reason, for some reason, I have to hit that from the left flipper and actually bounce it off of the pizza target to send it off there.
Speaker: Yeah, which is the stupidest thing ever.
Speaker: I don't know why that shot gives me trouble, but it does.
Speaker: I always seem I can't hit it under pressure.
Speaker: All of a sudden I'm rattling around and I'm hitting.
Speaker: No, listen, I can't play under pressure.
Speaker: I could not do – I was watching the Stern TMNT little mini competition thing the other week, which by the way was fantastic.
Speaker: And I'm watching them do these little tiny challenges and I'm going, holy crap, I could do that one just as fast or faster.
Speaker: And then I go, oh, wait a minute, but not if I had to do it on demand.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, like it wouldn't happen at all.
Speaker: I couldn't do it.
Speaker: So if someone wants to get ahold of you, Jeremy, where, where do you want to be chatted at?
Speaker: I guess.
Speaker: I don't know, man.
Speaker: Like, I don't know.
Speaker: I'm terrible.
Speaker: Just leave a comment on your Facebook.
Speaker: You know, yeah, postcard Instagram, my Instagram, which is just, you know, zombie Eddie or Facebook zombie Eddie also or whatever.
Speaker: Like those are the easiest places.
Speaker: But I'm really bad about messages.
Speaker: So like post on like an actual like like post or whatever or comment on an actual post and say that you messaged me and then I'll look for it.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: I'm terrible.
Speaker: And Scott, where can they find us?
Speaker: Actually, the easiest place is to message either of us on Facebook or LoserkidPinball.
Speaker: We also have an email, Josh, that goes to Josh.
Speaker: What is it?
Speaker: LoserkidPinballPodcast at gmail.com.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: And, oh, lastly, let's.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, I I'm sorry.
Speaker: I apologize.
Speaker: I want to add one thing.
Speaker: Let's not forget about the go.
Speaker: If you need a pinball machine, go to flipping out.
Speaker: Talk to Zach Meany at flipping out.
Speaker: Oh, man, I totally forgot to talk about that.
Speaker: Hey, and we, as any special, very special guest, it's a very special episode, we will send you out a hat.
Speaker: And we do have some.
Speaker: We haven't been pushing them lately, but we do have hats and beanies, and it's getting to be winter season.
Speaker: So if you're interested, contact us, and we can get you one of those boss hats or beanies out.
Speaker: And I'll throw a grab bag of stickers in there because I've been getting them from Sticker Mule because they're cheap and fun.
Speaker: So I want to go to sticker robot.
Speaker: Anyway, go on.
Speaker: No, it's sticking.
Speaker: No, I, um, I, I will return the favor.
Speaker: I've got goodies.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: I want to end it on one thing.
Speaker: This is, I want me a 30 second answer.
Speaker: You got to pick between your two children, Avengers or TH mutated turtles by the golden standard.
Speaker: Which one are you giving the twippy this year?
Speaker: Oh Lord.
Speaker: I, man, I'm not, neither, neither.
Speaker: It's going to go to something else.
Speaker: I don't, I don't know.
Speaker: I listen, I don't care.
Speaker: No, I'm not saying if it goes to some of the odds, if you had to pick, if you, if you had to pick between the two projects, yes, if you had to pick between the two projects, which one are you giving it to?
Speaker: Oh, geez.
Speaker: I can't.
Speaker: I can't.
Speaker: That's like asking, like, which one of your kids is your favorite?
Speaker: My middle kid.
Speaker: Oh, he's got a choice?
Speaker: Awful.
Speaker: Terrible.
Speaker: Okay, okay, okay.
Speaker: He's actually not my favorite kid, but I know, like, when I'm in a retirement center, he's the one who's going to come and take care of me.
Speaker: So he's my sweetest kid.
Speaker: My other ones would be like, whatever, Dad.
Speaker: Peace out.
Speaker: Poor kid.
Speaker: What a wonderful note.
Speaker: So you doubled down on just first off, you picked a kid, then you doubled down and said, no, he's not my favorite.
Speaker: No, no, no.
Speaker: No, what I said is that I don't have a favorite kid, but he's the one who's going to take care of me.
Speaker: Oh, okay, that's better.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: I didn't mean to put words in your mouth.
Speaker: That is a wonderful note.
Speaker: We're going to end it there.
Speaker: Thank you so much, Zombie Yeti, for coming on.
Speaker: We really appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to come hang out with some schmucks like us.
Speaker: Would you believe I was working the whole time?
Speaker: But go on, yes.
Speaker: Yes, I believe nonstop.
Speaker: It's 11 o'clock where you're at, and you're still just penciling away on the next project.
Speaker: Well, it's the Tony Hawk re-theme.
Speaker: We all know.
Speaker: No, it's just a pitch.
Speaker: No, I'm kidding.
Speaker: No, it's not that.
Speaker: I wish it was.
Speaker: Well, you've got us all sold.
Speaker: Okay, good.
Speaker: Oh, and by the way, could you guys possibly get like a certified letter talking about all that stuff about I should be paid lots of money and junk like that?
Speaker: Could you get that?
Speaker: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker: Yeah, we have a lot of sway with Stern.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Listen, I'm well taken care of.
Speaker: Stern's very kind to me.
Speaker: Otherwise, I wouldn't be smart.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: They're very kind to me.
Speaker: They're very nice.
Speaker: Well, thank you again for coming on.
