Transcript
Speaker: Thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
Speaker: We are on episode number 28.
Speaker: Today, I've got my co-captain with me.
Speaker: Scott Larson.
Speaker: And Scott, will you do us the honors of doing the intro of who is with us today?
Speaker: Well, I think I introduced him last time, but I will continue.
Speaker: This is the man who last year had the single best year in pinball history.
Speaker: He not only won the Twippy for the best game, he also released what will be one of the best games coming up.
Speaker: And he also won Pinberg and he also decided to ride a unicorn.
Speaker: We have Keith Elwin.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Hello.
Speaker: Not a bad year, right?
Speaker: I know, right?
Speaker: Not at all.
Speaker: That's a fantastic year.
Speaker: It's a little better than my year.
Speaker: And my year was pretty good.
Speaker: Yeah, that's good.
Speaker: Oh, my goodness.
Speaker: It's been a little bit since we've had you on, Keith.
Speaker: Some things have happened.
Speaker: I mean, the last time we had you on, we were joking about dinosaurs, and then Jurassic Park came out.
Speaker: Yeah, that was all unscripted, too.
Speaker: You guys just kept talking about it.
Speaker: So I was like, all right, we'll talk about the day to East Jurassic Park.
Speaker: Yeah, let's lean into it.
Speaker: Okay, well, Josh, you did have the day-to-day Jurassic Park back in the day, so.
Speaker: Yes, I did.
Speaker: And at least there was a reason for it.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Yeah, I think you had just picked it up and you kept talking about it.
Speaker: And so I'm sitting here thinking to myself, huh, all right.
Speaker: You guys are trolling me.
Speaker: We're trolling the troll, yes.
Speaker: Not the troll.
Speaker: You're the goat.
Speaker: Or the kid.
Speaker: We keep hearing you called the kid now.
Speaker: The kid.
Speaker: The great kid.
Speaker: How's the weather in Chicago?
Speaker: Is it still freezing there?
Speaker: I haven't seen the sun in months.
Speaker: So do you have to wear leggings over your shorts?
Speaker: Actually, so we have two guys here committed to wearing shorts every single day.
Speaker: And they give me crap when I wear pants.
Speaker: So I am not the worst, it turns out.
Speaker: Well, I do live in 5,000 feet above sea level, and we have guys here that wear shorts every day of the year, and it's 18 inches of snow on the ground and below freezing.
Speaker: I don't get it, but hey, that's just me, I guess.
Speaker: I'd do it.
Speaker: I'd do it.
Speaker: I'm only outside for maybe 10 seconds.
Speaker: See, and that I get.
Speaker: I'm out in the freezing.
Speaker: I'm fixing people's heaters, so I get warm enough to skip out and get in the cold again to go fix someone else's heaters, so.
Speaker: Yeah, and half the times I go to work and scrub, so it doesn't matter.
Speaker: That's one step above pajamas is what I hear.
Speaker: I don't even think it's one step.
Speaker: I think it's equivalent.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Well, I know that everyone listening doesn't want to hear Keith talk about his shorts, so let's dive in really quick.
Speaker: We hear that 1.0 finally released today.
Speaker: Are you excited to finally have that burden off your shoulder there, Keith?
Speaker: It's releasing as we speak and yes, yes, I'm pretty excited.
Speaker: It's been a long time.
Speaker: I know the game's only been out for like seven months now.
Speaker: Come on now.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It was quite an undertaking.
Speaker: There's a lot of code in there.
Speaker: Almost twice as much as Iron Maiden.
Speaker: So it's...
Speaker: Yeah, the scope was that we were able to barely squeeze it into in a lot of time, and I like how it came out.
Speaker: No complaints.
Speaker: Has anyone seriously complained about this game?
Speaker: Like, seriously, it's... Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Oh, come on.
Speaker: I'm hearing it's the greatest thing that Stern's ever made, which is saying something compared to Lord of the Rings and whatnot.
Speaker: You know what I'm saying?
Speaker: I mean, Jurassic Park's definitely a shooter's game, and I knew that going into it.
Speaker: So I knew some people would complain that the shots were too hard.
Speaker: And, you know, that's fine.
Speaker: It's how I intended.
Speaker: And like I said, it was a change of pace to me for Iron Maiden because I made the shots pretty easy on Iron Maiden, I think.
Speaker: So I wanted to do something a little different on this game and make it a little more of a shooter's game, but at the same time still retain some easy shots.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It is what it is.
Speaker: Now, that's the question.
Speaker: When you're actually developing a game, I've always said this is the hardest thing to do is that you guys are always trying to thread the needle, that you're trying to appeal to one, the tournament guys.
Speaker: You're also trying to appeal to casual guys.
Speaker: You're trying to appeal to the home market.
Speaker: You're also trying to appeal to the number one person on the IFPA, but you're also trying to appeal to the 850th
Speaker: thousandth person on the IPA.
Speaker: How do you actually approach that?
Speaker: And is it even possible to put all of that in one game?
Speaker: No, no, it's all about finding middle ground.
Speaker: And part of my design strategy for Jurassic was seeing the games around it, releasing before and after and trying to differentiate between this game and the other games we're releasing in that time period.
Speaker: So, uh,
Speaker: I made the decision to make a kind of a complex shooters game.
Speaker: Um, it was tough knowing that, uh, like even Gary complained, but the, uh, the map feature, well, the Nautilus players aren't going to give her far, very far in a map, but it was like, well, you know, we got this cool ball eating T-Rex.
Speaker: You hit the truck.
Speaker: It spells T-Rex.
Speaker: He comes down and grabs the ball and he, he was sold.
Speaker: So, uh, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's a struggle finding a balance.
Speaker: Well, and right now everyone's talking about the minigame you just came out with.
Speaker: Well, it's been released for about a month now, correct?
Speaker: Yeah, hard to tell.
Speaker: I've been playing it for so long.
Speaker: So was the minigame always part of the actual pinball experience or was it something that kind of came along later in the process?
Speaker: I had always planned to have it accessible through the menus as a little cheat because that's what we do in the office.
Speaker: We have a build that has, you basically go in there, you can start pretty much any mode you want.
Speaker: And everyone was doing that.
Speaker: They were opening up, cheating into it, playing it.
Speaker: And so I kind of get my wheels going.
Speaker: And then when Dwight did his God mode with an adjustment,
Speaker: I said, this is great, but it kind of sucks that the average person on location can't access it.
Speaker: And so I talked to our system guy, Mark Guidarelli, and he's like, oh yeah, no problem.
Speaker: I can just, just like we do with the tournament, selecting, you can just hold a button, you can play a special game.
Speaker: I was like, great.
Speaker: And so then I set about to see how I can make it different from the actual Nublar Wizard mode.
Speaker: So being a video gamer, I know these guys will take these old tired games and
Speaker: Rejuvenate them by doing speedruns.
Speaker: So I came up with the idea.
Speaker: Well, let's just take this existing wizard mode we have and add a timer and make an easy path kind of set for you.
Speaker: So if you really want to try to get a great time, you're not you're not spending all this time, you know, catching dinosaurs and saving people.
Speaker: You're just kind of making a beeline out of there.
Speaker: And that's how it was born.
Speaker: Now, I played this two nights ago.
Speaker: I went over to my buddy's house and we did have a few questions.
Speaker: So the truck sets out a path for you, which is basically on the east side of the island.
Speaker: You're going all the way down.
Speaker: Do you have to follow that path or is that just a suggested route or does it even matter?
Speaker: Well, see, now in 1.0, however you start
Speaker: Escape Nublar Challenge, whichever direction the truck's facing, that's your easy route.
Speaker: So if it's facing a right, you'll take the left side route, facing left, you'll take the right side route.
Speaker: And it's a suggested route for speedrunners.
Speaker: If you take that route, you're not going to get a very good score, but you're going to get a good time.
Speaker: So there's two different ways to play this game.
Speaker: If you're playing for score, you want to take the difficult route and you're rescuing more people, you're capturing dinosaurs, which is even more points.
Speaker: The rescue streak bonus applies, so the more people you rescue without losing anyone, the more points it's worth.
Speaker: So there's two different ways to play it.
Speaker: If you're getting your feet wet and you don't really care about time, certainly take the easy path, but it's going to reach a point where you're going to be escaping almost all the time, so you're going to start dabbling into the more difficult path.
Speaker: can you basically just say, I don't want to rescue anybody.
Speaker: I'm out of here.
Speaker: I am out.
Speaker: I am gone.
Speaker: Because it seemed like we had to rescue at least one person or two people before we actually could move on.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That dynamic had to stay, but pretty much every paddock has people to rescue.
Speaker: So you do, you get a big bonus if you hit every single paddock in the game.
Speaker: So the, the paddock, it said the, the map path that it sets out for you,
Speaker: is basically simulating that you took that side up during regular gameplay.
Speaker: So if I get to Nublar legitimately, every paddock I visit then becomes the easy path when I get to Nublar.
Speaker: So when you do the Escape Nublar Challenge, it's basically simulating a path that you took, that you rescued a bunch of people, you captured these dinosaurs, so now that's the safe route out.
Speaker: You're retracing your steps.
Speaker: There are still a couple of stragglers laying around and need to be rescued, but you don't have to capture the dinosaurs because in theory they've already been captured.
Speaker: So that's kind of your bail on everyone else that's stranded in the park and get to the helipad.
Speaker: Do you see you guys using this in tournament mode?
Speaker: Because I actually see this as being a very broadcast friendly way of actually playing the games.
Speaker: Because that's basically how pool is.
Speaker: I mean, pool, they play nine ball because it's fast and it's easy television.
Speaker: I could see this being a very easy thing that they could either, you know, on Twitch or on ESPN Ocho or whatever.
Speaker: No, no, I didn't.
Speaker: That wasn't part of my thinking, but part of my thinking was that whenever I'm playing with people, people generally don't like playing with me.
Speaker: If we're playing a multiplayer game, they'll run off and start playing something else while I'm taking my turn.
Speaker: So, you know, to me, that represents a problem in pinball.
Speaker: So this was kind of a partial solution, I think, is to make basically a mini mode where I'm not going to take that long.
Speaker: You know, I'm pretty much down to
Speaker: Aaron Powell, Ph.D.: Around you know two and a half minutes to beat it so if it's trying to play you know my buddies or whatever I know my turn will be over.
Speaker: Aaron Powell, Ph.D.: In two and a half minutes, no matter what so they'll stay put and hang around they'll interact so that's something i'm trying to bring hidden here.
Speaker: Well, and the other thing too, I noticed today, I got an email because I'm an all access person and you guys are doing an actual competition with this mode within the all access program.
Speaker: Are you seeing other people getting down to two and a half minutes or is that like kind of what we should be trying to aim for or if we're trying to enter the competition?
Speaker: Well, I think to me, the two minutes is a magical mark.
Speaker: It's very difficult, but possible.
Speaker: So I think...
Speaker: That's great.
Speaker: There's not a handful of people in the world that can possibly do that.
Speaker: I wouldn't hold myself to this time per se.
Speaker: Whatever time you get, the important part is you escaped.
Speaker: Right now, I played for time for so long that now I'm actually going through and playing it for points and trying to figure out where the bar is for maximum points.
Speaker: Right now, I think it's about 2 billion.
Speaker: Oof.
Speaker: I think I had about 200,000.
Speaker: Well, what I'll do is I'll start on a speed run, and if I mess up the first paddock, then I'll switch to the other path and try to get for points.
Speaker: Bold strategy.
Speaker: Cotton, we'll see if it pays off, right?
Speaker: Yeah, but I'm looking forward to people podcasting their speed runs and bragging rights and everything that goes with it.
Speaker: Now you took this down to Logan's Arcade and loaded it up.
Speaker: How did the community accept it?
Speaker: What was their response?
Speaker: I'm assuming a lot of people knew about it because of the proximity to Stern.
Speaker: But what was your experience?
Speaker: Oh, it was very positive.
Speaker: So a lot of the hardcore players was like, yeah, it's great.
Speaker: I played for a while.
Speaker: I won a free game.
Speaker: And it was like, I didn't want to play it again.
Speaker: But I used my credit to play Dublar and try to get on that high scoreboard.
Speaker: So it's doing what it was meant to do.
Speaker: It was just kind of rejuvenating a game that if you don't have time to play a half hour, whatever, you can play this three or four minute game and still get your name up there.
Speaker: And one of the things I had Rick do was put during the Escaping the Boy Challenge, just permanently show the scores that you're chasing at the top three scores.
Speaker: So partially that's bragging rights.
Speaker: So your initials will be up there for everyone to see every time they're in that mode.
Speaker: So I think that's important.
Speaker: Well, and it's brilliant, like you said, because a lot of people, they look for a balance in their collection at home where they have the long players like Lord of the Rings, but they might have a short player like Braum Stroker's Dracula.
Speaker: And depending on their evening, they say, hey, I'm going to flip on Braum Stroker's because I got five minutes and it's going to kick my butt and then I'm going to move on with the rest of my night.
Speaker: Or, you know, I've got a couple hours, let's play some more of the ring.
Speaker: So that's an awesome idea.
Speaker: That way it's you get the best of both worlds in one machine.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And there's specific design decisions I made, such as you get three trucks.
Speaker: No, no more, no less.
Speaker: You're not getting any more trucks.
Speaker: And tilt ends game, which should discourage death savers.
Speaker: So it's going to be consistently that every time.
Speaker: It's never going to change.
Speaker: They're never going to have extra trucks, never going to have extra balls.
Speaker: Once you're in that mode, you're in that mode.
Speaker: You know your parameters.
Speaker: You know what you need to do.
Speaker: So I was listening to TPN, the pinball show, whatever it was, and Zach Manny had mentioned that he feels like this mode is cheating.
Speaker: What do you think of that?
Speaker: I want to know what your thoughts are because I have heard some people say this is kind of like cheating the machine by getting to the end mode and seeing the end mode without putting the work in for it.
Speaker: Well, it's not the end mode.
Speaker: That's the thing.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: That's what I thought.
Speaker: It seems like a misconception to me, but I just wanted you to clear that up.
Speaker: When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth is the actual wizard mode for beating the game.
Speaker: This is more of a story-themed wizard mode because that's what I had to work with.
Speaker: So it got the most attention.
Speaker: Whereas when Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth, hardly anyone's going to get there.
Speaker: So we didn't really want to spend that much resources on it.
Speaker: We decided to focus it all on Nublar and make it its own little mini-game.
Speaker: Just along with what you said, I think it's great because a lot of times I only have five to ten minutes.
Speaker: And so I come down on my go to game as Iron Man because I know I'm only going to spend five to ten minutes on it.
Speaker: And then I just go back up and do whatever I need to.
Speaker: And so having a game that actually fills both of those niches, I think, is a brilliant move.
Speaker: Yeah, thanks.
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I don't know why people think it's cheating.
Speaker: It's okay.
Speaker: I think it's because of the misconception there.
Speaker: Well, people need to understand, if this was a mode buried deep in a game where 1% of the pinball property is ever going to see it, I would have got no resources for it.
Speaker: It would have been... If you've gotten to Number of the Beasts on Iron Maiden, that was very simple, straightforward.
Speaker: because I knew hardly anyone would get there.
Speaker: So it's just resource allocation.
Speaker: How much do you want to spend on something nobody's going to see, whereas put as much stuff up front that everyone can enjoy.
Speaker: So call it what you want, but I'm probably going to do this moving forward with all my games.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Well, I think that's one of the questions we had.
Speaker: Do you think this minigame is not only something, we'll probably see it on your games, but do you think it's something that will be adopted through all the other games as well?
Speaker: Because it's, like Scott said, it's kind of more friendly to time play.
Speaker: You know what I'm saying?
Speaker: I'm not sure.
Speaker: I haven't really talked to any of the other guys, but I'm definitely, it's in the menu now.
Speaker: So if it's available, you can hold down the flipper buttons and access it.
Speaker: So I'm assuming the other guys are looking at it, but I haven't actually talked to them.
Speaker: So here's another question with the mini games basically giving you a different way of playing a game.
Speaker: What are some of the older games that you could look at and say, huh, that would be a lot of fun if I had the time and the programming prowess, I would love to design a mini game for that game.
Speaker: I mean, the first thing that comes to my mind would be Encore on ACDC.
Speaker: because that is so hard to get to, but once you get to it, it's such a great wizard mode that, yeah, that would be my first choice.
Speaker: That's a good one.
Speaker: Yeah, I can't even, yeah.
Speaker: I haven't even scratched the surface on the wizard mode on ACDC, so I'm just lucky if I get multiball.
Speaker: Yeah, see, that's my point exactly.
Speaker: It's such a great mode, but nobody sees it.
Speaker: So that's why I'm trying a little something different.
Speaker: I kind of did the same thing with Iron Maiden.
Speaker: He's like,
Speaker: you know, here's this wizard mode, but if you beat the entire game, there's something special reward for you.
Speaker: You know, kind of like the Valinor type, do everything, beat everything, this is your reward.
Speaker: But, I mean, how many people have actually seen Valinor?
Speaker: So it's not enough to really spend a lot of time on it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm kind of skeptical about whether or not anybody but the top 10 players have actually been to Valinor.
Speaker: Well, anyone else has taken off the glass of their machine, too, so, you know...
Speaker: I have.
Speaker: And let me tell you, I used to operate a Lord of the Rings, and I had one at my house while I was shopping it.
Speaker: And it was right about midnight.
Speaker: I was like, I'll play a quick game of pinball before I go to bed.
Speaker: And I kid you not, it was almost 2 a.m.
Speaker: when I finally got to bed, but I got Valinor.
Speaker: So it was totally worth it.
Speaker: See, that's the exact story that Eric Minure had is he was at his brother's house and he played and it was like Christmas Eve.
Speaker: And yeah, it was the same thing.
Speaker: It was about midnight and he started a game and about 2 a.m.
Speaker: he started screaming and his brother came running out asking what was wrong.
Speaker: Yeah, that's quite the game of endurance, but I love it.
Speaker: Great game.
Speaker: Yes, yes.
Speaker: So, so I'm curious, I don't know if people out there in our audience know what goes on kind of at Stern, but you're, you're kind of at the end of your game, your Jurassic park game.
Speaker: And what does a daily schedule, what is it like for Keith going on from here on out?
Speaker: Like, I know you can't tell us anything about your game that you're, you're building now, but like, do you guys just sit around and play pinball and just kind of come up with ideas?
Speaker: Like, I, I don't know what, what happens.
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: Uh, so game three is designed.
Speaker: It's pretty much in the can and I'm working on game four at the CAD stages.
Speaker: So there's always something to do.
Speaker: I just didn't know if it's like, you know, two o'clock I, I, I do yoga and then three o'clock.
Speaker: I, I don't know if it's scheduled out.
Speaker: If you guys have like a really relaxed schedule or what you do there.
Speaker: So the first year I worked here, yeah, I literally had nothing else to do cause I hadn't had any games released, but, um, yeah, now that, you know,
Speaker: Iron Maiden, Jurassic Park are, you know, they're still doing runs of them.
Speaker: So I still have to go out in the line and spot check them now and then.
Speaker: So, no, I managed to stay busy.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: What do you look for when you go to the line?
Speaker: So usually the, in final, they'll have questions like,
Speaker: Today I was asked, well, how should the, cause we're there, Jurassic Park's back on the lines and sometimes we'll get new guys and we'll say, well, how's this control room feed supposed to feed?
Speaker: Is it supposed to hit the top of the sling or is it supposed to hit the flipper?
Speaker: So you all have to go out there and tell them exactly what it's supposed to do.
Speaker: And then they'll make notes and make sure that's what it does.
Speaker: So it's pretty simple.
Speaker: Saturday's coming up.
Speaker: Everyone's talking about already.
Speaker: Pimberg is going to be opening up at noon Eastern Standard Time.
Speaker: So as the champ of Pimberg last year, do you have to set that line or do you actually get to jump the line as a returning champion to defend your title?
Speaker: Well, that would be nice, right?
Speaker: That should be a perk.
Speaker: That should be a perk.
Speaker: But unfortunately, it is not.
Speaker: So, yeah, no, I'm just a peon when it comes to that.
Speaker: See, that seems crazy to me because even like American Ninja Warrior, they have two lines.
Speaker: They have the lines of people who routinely are basically the invite line.
Speaker: And then they have the, hey, whoever wants to try, you can wait in this line.
Speaker: It seems to me if you are the top 100 player, or at least were in the top 100 last year, you should immediately get, I don't know, like priority seating or priority...
Speaker: Yeah, it should include a VIP pass for next year's.
Speaker: I agree.
Speaker: So if Doug Polk was listening, make it so.
Speaker: Well, I understand they're trying to make it available to everybody.
Speaker: But I mean, come on.
Speaker: It would be absolutely ridiculous if they're like, well, we want to see Keith Elwin in the finals this year.
Speaker: But unfortunately, he was 1400th on the list.
Speaker: So he just didn't push F5 fast enough.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Nah, I don't know.
Speaker: I don't need special treatment.
Speaker: I've never had problems registering.
Speaker: So as long as you don't forget, you should be fine.
Speaker: At least hit the wait list.
Speaker: And it seems like they almost blow through the wait list every year.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What is your favorite memory about Pemberg?
Speaker: Any Pemberg?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And this last one.
Speaker: Well, any Pemberg, I think it's the first year they had this stage and all the streaming stuff.
Speaker: That was pretty fun, even though I got third that year, but I had a lot of fun because it was so different than anything done previously.
Speaker: This year, man, this year was a blur this past year.
Speaker: I barely remember playing.
Speaker: Okay, well, I do have one question because I was watching the stream and I saw you cradle up with a ball on the right flipper on Metallica and then you live caught and flipped again with the right flipper and kept the ball cradled.
Speaker: I've never seen that happen.
Speaker: All right, I'll take your word for it.
Speaker: Okay, well, I'm like, is that a routine move?
Speaker: Like, my attitude is like, I don't even see how that happened.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I must have been aiming for something.
Speaker: I don't remember.
Speaker: I totally forgot.
Speaker: I even played Metallica.
Speaker: So, yeah, well, you did.
Speaker: You did just release Jurassic Park, so I assume you were bouncing back and forth between.
Speaker: Yeah, that was that was really draining between.
Speaker: I didn't really get a break because I had to go get feedback on Jurassic between rounds.
Speaker: So, yeah, pretty busy.
Speaker: So you're like, I got to win this Pinberg thing so I can get that out of the way so I can go get some feedback.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: My feet were killing me that weekend.
Speaker: Oh, I bet.
Speaker: So what makes a tournament game great?
Speaker: I don't know if there's any one thing, because I used to think it was a variety of ways to attack it, but at the same time, there's games like Dracula, as you were saying, they were like, hey, do the thing.
Speaker: I challenge you to do the thing.
Speaker: And if you do the thing, you're greatly rewarded, stacking all three multiballs.
Speaker: So I'm not sure.
Speaker: I think part of it is not...
Speaker: Something that you're not doing the exact same thing over and over.
Speaker: To me, scared stiff.
Speaker: Now that the tournament strategy is just get into multi-ball, cradle at the left and just keep shooting the left ramp over and over again.
Speaker: And to me, that doesn't make a good tournament game.
Speaker: It's very boring for the audience and the player.
Speaker: It would seem to me that there would be some sort of exponential scoring component where you could even come back on ball three, even if you had two house balls on the first one, where it's not just continually chopping wood, where if you, you know, if you hit that shot five times, it's worth this much, but Hey, hit it 10 times.
Speaker: It's worth significantly more and maybe, you know, hit it 20 and you just completely blow the game.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I despise linear rule sets, so I will never do that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: As much as I love Tron, I don't think it's a fun tournament game because, yeah, somebody has a 50 million ball one.
Speaker: I know it's like, I got to settle down for 15 minutes, chop wood to catch him.
Speaker: So what's your favorite tournament format?
Speaker: I assume you've played in a couple of tournaments, right?
Speaker: I've read about them.
Speaker: Let me think.
Speaker: I think that would be Pinbird.
Speaker: OK, the the old style where you have the ticket or the current style.
Speaker: The match play style.
Speaker: I like.
Speaker: OK.
Speaker: I like being told what to play, when to play it.
Speaker: I really like that as opposed to here's 12 games, pick five, just keep dumping money in, play it as many times as you want until you qualify.
Speaker: To me, that's boring.
Speaker: I like the challenge of not knowing what I'm going to play, who I'm going to play.
Speaker: I think that adds to the fun of it for me anyway.
Speaker: What else you got, Scott?
Speaker: I'll tell you guys a secret if you want.
Speaker: Yeah, sure.
Speaker: We won't tell anyone, I swear.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: We added a fourth skill shot to Jurassic Park after you get the double super skill shot.
Speaker: And this will unlock something that you may not notice right away, but you probably will eventually notice.
Speaker: And I'm going to leave it at that.
Speaker: Okay, now everyone's going to rush out and start playing Jurassic Park as much as they can.
Speaker: What's that one thing I've got to figure out so I can post it on the internet first, right?
Speaker: Everyone's going to be the first.
Speaker: We should have a contest.
Speaker: You're the first person to figure this out.
Speaker: I saw your teaser picture that had the DNA molecule.
Speaker: So maybe it has something to do with that today.
Speaker: No, Mr. DNA is back.
Speaker: I was going to put him on a milk carton, but I didn't have time.
Speaker: So I just threw him up as a temporary profile picture.
Speaker: But he is back and he's mad.
Speaker: He was mad he was gone.
Speaker: So we actually revamped that a little bit.
Speaker: We have an instant info screen now that shows which ones you've collected, which ones you need and how to get them.
Speaker: So it was actually kind of good that we left him out because that gave us an excuse to go back and
Speaker: Give a little bit of an overhaul.
Speaker: A couple of the ones that I've deemed too hard were made a bit easier.
Speaker: So people should be getting more DNA.
Speaker: Should see more Mr. DNA.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Now, were they hard for you or hard for mortals?
Speaker: Both.
Speaker: Some of them were pretty ridiculous.
Speaker: And I was like, nobody's ever going to get this.
Speaker: So, you know, some of them that were four shots, I made three.
Speaker: Some were three.
Speaker: I made two.
Speaker: And the good thing is that you can just, anytime you're in Instant Info, you can look up and say, hey, I need this one.
Speaker: Okay, it's left ramp, right helipad target.
Speaker: So it's no longer a mystery.
Speaker: Does anybody get confused when you're, because you're fleeing, you're actually coming toward you.
Speaker: And so the truck is actually pointed the opposite direction of the way the map is showing.
Speaker: Does anybody get confused by that besides me?
Speaker: Well, it depends if you're in main game or Nublar.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, I guess in the Escape Noobler, I kept saying, it took me a second to figure out, oh, no, it's mirrored.
Speaker: So it's exactly the way it's supposed to be.
Speaker: Yeah, the idea all along was that you're going to navigate to the visitor center, then the wizard mode would be getting out of there.
Speaker: So I had to pick a direction.
Speaker: So that's how it works.
Speaker: Can you give us some of your design philosophy?
Speaker: Because I know that, you know,
Speaker: We talked about Iron Maiden the first go around.
Speaker: You said you kind of wasn't like Judge Dredd is what you were kind of looking for, but something more flowy, but something you love shooting or.
Speaker: I compared it to Judge Dredd.
Speaker: Yeah, I don't really like Judge Dredd, but it was a unique attempt at kind of a similar layout.
Speaker: My design philosophy is this.
Speaker: You should get mad at yourself.
Speaker: for missing an easy shot but you should also get excited if you make a hard shot that will always be my delight design philosophy so for example jurassic park i shoot the left or i miss the left ramp i am now mad at myself but then i hit the o and i'm excited so to me if a game has all easy shots then you're you're just to me it just becomes like
Speaker: you expect to make the shots and if you don't, then you get mad at yourself.
Speaker: So I wanted to reward the player and Iron Maves the same way with the, the revive spinner on the left side.
Speaker: It's a tough shot and it's great if you make it.
Speaker: Plus it gives you, you know, the outlying ball save.
Speaker: So I also want every shot to do something.
Speaker: That was a big thing with Jurassic.
Speaker: It has so many count-ups, you know, we call them bear kicks because I think that was one of the first games to actually start
Speaker: counting shots.
Speaker: It's like, what do we do that's at all?
Speaker: I can't think of anything.
Speaker: So we'll have a count up and give specific rewards.
Speaker: And then usually later in the design process, we'll, we'll think of that reward.
Speaker: So, so to me, it's important not to have empty shots.
Speaker: What's the hardest shot on Jurassic park?
Speaker: Oh, I know it's the O shot, but that's by design.
Speaker: What are you talking about?
Speaker: I think it's the,
Speaker: the smart missile when the truck's in the way.
Speaker: I have an easier time with that than I do hitting the O-Shot.
Speaker: The O-Shot's annoying, but it's so great when you hit it.
Speaker: Maybe it's just me.
Speaker: I choke up.
Speaker: I always get Chaos-A-Lit, and then I always fail to start it by hitting up between those pop bumpers.
Speaker: It's definitely a hard shot, too, but that's why there are such great rewards on it.
Speaker: The smart missile awards would be extremely game unbalancing if that was an easy shot.
Speaker: Totally agree.
Speaker: The one that I have the hardest with is the one that you hit with the upper flipper that goes up to the... Which shot is that?
Speaker: It shoots across and then goes up to the wire ramp.
Speaker: The Raptor Tower shot?
Speaker: Yeah, the Raptor Tower shot.
Speaker: It just is going so fast, I break it every single time.
Speaker: If I get it, I'm like, woo, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, any shot deemed to be difficult should give you.
Speaker: So the Raptor Tower shot advances some awards, including awarding fossils in your super tranks.
Speaker: So as I said, if I make a hard shot, I try to make it rewarding at the same time.
Speaker: Now, the one challenge I had on the escape mode is you can move around the shots.
Speaker: And so one, how do you do that?
Speaker: And two, that was the easier way for me to shoot around that shot as opposed to just bricking that shot all the time.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So that was a dynamic I built in to make you think twice as a speed runner.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: If you hit the truck, it's going to shift the rescue rotations.
Speaker: And if you hit it again, it'll shift it back to where it originally was.
Speaker: So if your last shot is on the O shot, Adrian to speed run.
Speaker: So now you have to think to yourself, well, I mean, I could take three shots at this O shot at the time.
Speaker: It's going to take me to hit the truck, get the ball back under control and shoot whatever I think is the helipad.
Speaker: So that's just a little risk reward action I threw in there.
Speaker: It's like, okay, if you want to make the easier shots, you're going to have to waste time doing it.
Speaker: So that was the whole incentive behind hitting the truck to rotate your shots.
Speaker: So what you're saying is you can, it sounds like if you turn the truck, you have an option of shifting them one direction, but if you hit it again, it goes back to the original.
Speaker: Is that correct?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: There's only two different spots from where each rescue spawns.
Speaker: So yeah, if I hit the truck, it's going to, it's going to move to the easier shot.
Speaker: And if I, you know, if I hit it again, it's going to move back.
Speaker: So if you're in a speed run, you want to keep your truck facing the same direction.
Speaker: So if you turn it to collect the easier shot, well, now you got to turn it back before you leave the paddock in order to stay in that easy path.
Speaker: I'm not going to be offended if you can't answer this question and you can just tell me Josh, no, but.
Speaker: do you get to pick your themes?
Speaker: Is there, can you kind of tell us the process of picking themes?
Speaker: Oh, no.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Don't worry.
Speaker: Uh, I'm the little man on the totem pole.
Speaker: So, um, hopefully someday I'll get to pick my themes.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I didn't know if it was like, you get to set the table and they, they give you a list of themes and you say, okay, I'll take that.
Speaker: Or if it's.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, we'll have meetings say, what do you guys, what do you guys think is cool?
Speaker: And what do you guys think is not cool?
Speaker: But,
Speaker: As far as saying, I want to do this theme, I have not experienced that, no.
Speaker: So I was kind of sneaky.
Speaker: I knew that we were going to record with you.
Speaker: And I was listening to this flipping podcast last week.
Speaker: And Tommy said that your games are so good.
Speaker: He's a fan for life.
Speaker: And essentially, if a Keith Elwin game comes out, he's just going to buy it.
Speaker: And the only thing that would prevent him from buying one of your games is a terrible, terrible theme.
Speaker: It had to be absolutely just the worst theme.
Speaker: So I went to Facebook and I asked everyone, what's the worst theme you could think up?
Speaker: And I want to pitch some of these to you, Keith, and see, because I want you to pick one of these and then we'll throw it to our audience to see if they would or wouldn't buy the game, even though you were designing it.
Speaker: Yeah, let's go.
Speaker: Matt Shablum, he submitted U.S. Supreme Court pinball.
Speaker: Can we do a C-SPAN game?
Speaker: Yeah, let's do C-SPAN.
Speaker: Yeah, we'll do C-SPAN.
Speaker: The History of Toast or Laundry Day.
Speaker: Some of these I'm going to leave out because I feel like you'd actually make, like, I don't feel like My Little Pony is too far out of the park.
Speaker: Well, that's Gary's favorite.
Speaker: He's been dying to do that forever.
Speaker: Oh, okay.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So, Keith, you're a brony.
Speaker: Is that what it is?
Speaker: Yeah, for the bronies.
Speaker: One of my favorite Bob's Burger episodes.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay, let's see.
Speaker: We got Pinball Podcaster Quest for the Twippy.
Speaker: That's a good one.
Speaker: Thank you, Ian, for that one.
Speaker: Franchi says, Everyone Poops.
Speaker: It's a children's book.
Speaker: It is.
Speaker: So there's that theme.
Speaker: Let's see what else we got.
Speaker: Jeff Patterson put the Aquabats.
Speaker: I don't know if you've even heard of them.
Speaker: I don't even know what that is.
Speaker: See, I didn't know if you would or not because you are from San Diego and they're from San Diego.
Speaker: Anyhow.
Speaker: All right, let's see.
Speaker: Battlefield Earth, the old John Travolta movie.
Speaker: I don't know if you remember that one.
Speaker: Battlefield Earth, yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: That would be a great wizard mode.
Speaker: I'll say that.
Speaker: Scott Larson did colonoscopy, a journey to your core.
Speaker: Does that come with assets?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yes, it does come with assets.
Speaker: Get my joke there?
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah, assets.
Speaker: Yeah, got it.
Speaker: Sorry, this is family friendly.
Speaker: Come on, guys.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Oh, come on.
Speaker: I got it.
Speaker: It's medical.
Speaker: Chris Chandler did Antique Roadshow.
Speaker: Oh, I actually like that show.
Speaker: I think that pretty much there's some other ones on here, but I'm not going to touch them.
Speaker: So, yes, some of them were not family friendly.
Speaker: So, yes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I can imagine.
Speaker: Oh, sorry.
Speaker: I want to go with Jeff Rivera's too.
Speaker: Anything country music theme.
Speaker: And he means like the new pop country, not like Johnny Cash or anything like that.
Speaker: He's like Keith Urban, you know, that newer stuff.
Speaker: I think a Dolly Parton would sell a new Dolly Parton.
Speaker: Vault the Dolly.
Speaker: I like it.
Speaker: Vault the Dolly.
Speaker: I really like that game.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay, so Keith, those are your options.
Speaker: Let's go back to them really quick.
Speaker: So Supreme Court Pinball or C-SPAN, The History of Toast, Laundry Day, any country music theme, Pinball Podcaster, Quest for the Twippy, Everyone Poops, Battlefield Earth, and Colonoscopy, A Journey to Your Core.
Speaker: Oh, and Antique Roadshow.
Speaker: So if we're basing these themes off toys that integrate into the game, I would say Laundry Day.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Laundry day sounds like an episode of a SpongeBob.
Speaker: That's what it sounds like.
Speaker: Just with just kinetic energy all over the place.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I can picture a, you know, rotating device dryer with a magnet grabs the ball and you're drying your clothes.
Speaker: I can picture this.
Speaker: Alrighty audience.
Speaker: We're going to, here it is.
Speaker: Keith has picked his theme.
Speaker: We're going to throw this to the face page.
Speaker: All we're going to ask is a simple yes or no.
Speaker: If Keith L. One came out with laundry day, the pinball machine, would you or wouldn't you buy it?
Speaker: Simple as that, right?
Speaker: I can make a game out of that.
Speaker: It's something everybody can relate to.
Speaker: Like I said, there's a mechanical devices you can put on there.
Speaker: So there's a game there.
Speaker: And it would probably be absolutely epic.
Speaker: And it'd probably be in the top 10 no matter what.
Speaker: That's the funny part to me.
Speaker: It's all about perspective.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right, Scott, you got any other questions really quick?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I have a question.
Speaker: Is the the beanie we sent you, is that keeping you toasty warm during the wintertime?
Speaker: Yes, yes.
Speaker: I keep it in my gym bag.
Speaker: I mean, that thing covers my neck if I pull it all the way down.
Speaker: Oh, it's crazy big.
Speaker: I actually have the one with the stripes and the pom-pom on the top.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, and basically I could walk around the house with that alone and still be hot.
Speaker: Oh, another month and we should see the sun again here in Chicago.
Speaker: Yeah, we won't see it here in Utah for till May or June, somewhere around there.
Speaker: Something like that, yeah.
Speaker: We get these weird winters out here.
Speaker: They toy with us.
Speaker: Oh, it's almost summer, and then we get like a blizzard comes through for some odd reason.
Speaker: Well, at least I live by the ski resort, so I can actually go skiing.
Speaker: Yeah, ski Chicago, man.
Speaker: Come on.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Ooh, like water ski Chicago?
Speaker: Like Lake Michigan?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Uh, it's different here.
Speaker: So Keith, what, what shows are you going to this year?
Speaker: Uh, you guys, you guys kind of take turns on going to different shows, right?
Speaker: Well, I'm not sure.
Speaker: Um, probably expo cause it's in my backyard.
Speaker: Uh, probably pinnberg cause it's awesome.
Speaker: Uh, other than that, I have no plans.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: He doesn't want his groupies to know.
Speaker: He is probably true.
Speaker: Stalkers.
Speaker: Yes, it's true.
Speaker: I'll tell her when I'm going to MGC and then I don't show up.
Speaker: I'll never hear the end of it.
Speaker: You have to wear your Clark Kent glasses.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Seriously.
Speaker: Worst disguise ever.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Oh, he's got glasses.
Speaker: I can't tell Superman.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So you've been at Stern for how long?
Speaker: About two years.
Speaker: I am nine days shy of three years.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: So what has been the best surprising thing about working at Stern?
Speaker: It's so funny because you hear how everyone thinks things work here, and it's completely not true.
Speaker: This is a great place to work.
Speaker: It's really relaxed.
Speaker: It's fun.
Speaker: All these rumors about Gary ripping stuff out of games is hilarious because everyone on the inside knows it's actually the opposite.
Speaker: He's sitting there jamming stuff in your game, so it's...
Speaker: It's a great place to work.
Speaker: I have no complaints.
Speaker: Well, I can't remember if it was on our show when you were on Head to Head, but you were talking about you had pretty much all designed Jurassic Park.
Speaker: And then Gary was like, where's the mech?
Speaker: Where's the eating dinosaur or something like that?
Speaker: And you're like.
Speaker: That's a great example.
Speaker: It's like, all right, here's a T-Rex that moves back and forth.
Speaker: And Gary's like, no, it's got to eat the ball.
Speaker: It's going to be expensive.
Speaker: I don't care.
Speaker: It's got to eat the ball.
Speaker: So it's like, all right.
Speaker: So I thought for sure the two bank was toasts.
Speaker: And so we went ahead and did all that with the T-Rex.
Speaker: Gary sees it.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: I love the two bank.
Speaker: We're keeping it.
Speaker: So it's, it's not, this is the best job on the planet.
Speaker: No complaints.
Speaker: Awesome.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: By the way, I will say on the speed run on escape, I loved that the dinosaur is like a Labrador.
Speaker: Who's just looking at the dog at the ball the whole time.
Speaker: It's like a dog.
Speaker: Can I play?
Speaker: Can I play?
Speaker: Can I play?
Speaker: Well, he needs to stay out of the way.
Speaker: So yeah, that's all he can do.
Speaker: Now is 1.0, is that really a landmark for you?
Speaker: Or is it you feel that, okay, everything I've envisioned in the game is basically there and now it's fine tuning from there?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: We're not adding any more features, which are obviously the time consuming part of code development.
Speaker: We can always tweak, make obviously bug fixes, but...
Speaker: It is feature complete now.
Speaker: It's not missing anything.
Speaker: Now, you also, is it a struggle for you since you're doing, you seem to be doing more than the standard designer in that you're actually doing the rules simultaneously as you're doing the play field.
Speaker: Is that different than how other people approach it?
Speaker: It seems like in the past, people have done the play field and the coder
Speaker: envisions the rule set.
Speaker: But it seems like you are way more involved in that than I would previously think, I guess.
Speaker: It's true.
Speaker: My programmer, Rick Nagel, is he's new to pinball.
Speaker: He knew nothing about pinball coming here.
Speaker: And he's just like, tell me what to do, man.
Speaker: I'll do it.
Speaker: I don't care.
Speaker: And so we work great together.
Speaker: And he'll come up with some ideas, but he pretty much just
Speaker: takes what I give him and says, yeah, I can do that.
Speaker: And if I, if he can't do it, he'll say so.
Speaker: But, uh, for the most part, yeah, this, uh, this team works really well.
Speaker: So that's another question that I know you kind of, I don't know if you kind of answered just there, but do you guys try to keep the teams together as much as possible?
Speaker: If something's not working, you kind of jazz it up or how does that work?
Speaker: Uh, so yeah, we're, I mean, so the core team is considered the engineer, which is Harrison Drake, uh, myself and, uh,
Speaker: the head programmer, which is Rick.
Speaker: So as far as I know, we're staying together.
Speaker: So I know we kind of, we kind of know how each other work.
Speaker: You know, I'll, I'll screw something up really in one of my CAD files.
Speaker: Harrison will be quick to point it out and just fix it.
Speaker: Then tease me about it, but it's, it's good.
Speaker: No, we were a really good dynamic.
Speaker: And then do they just kind of insert the artists and everything as you go along or.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The artists usually comes in halfway through the project.
Speaker: Same with the sound guy.
Speaker: And it's usually like who's available and who wants to do it at that point.
Speaker: Well, everyone wants to do a Keith game, right?
Speaker: All aboard.
Speaker: All aboard.
Speaker: Alrighty.
Speaker: Well, if that does it for questions, I would like to move on to, I sent this over to you too.
Speaker: I don't know if anyone else has noticed this past couple of days, but slap saved called it quits.
Speaker: They have shut down their podcast for now.
Speaker: We want to wish the best to Jason and Matt and Chris that all did a slap save at one time or another, but we're going to do a segment still in their honor.
Speaker: So this segment still is the flip bolt torch.
Speaker: For those that don't know about this, if you've never listened to a slap save episode, flip bolt torches, we're going to pick a year and we're going to pick a manufacturer.
Speaker: And we're going to go through the list of those machines in that criteria.
Speaker: We're going to decide which one we'd flip.
Speaker: So that means we'd buy and then automatically turn around and sell it for the profit.
Speaker: Which one we'd bolt to our floor, or which one we would throw in a bonfire to torch.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So the year that we've picked is 1995, Bally Williams, and this was a great year.
Speaker: The list of these machines are Attack from Mars, Congo, Dirty Harry, Jackpot, Johnny Mnemonic, No Fear, Fear of Magic, and Whodunit.
Speaker: Eight titles in one year, that's insane.
Speaker: But I'm going to ask you two, whoever wants to go first, Keith or Scott, which one of these would you flip first?
Speaker: and sell for the profit.
Speaker: What kind of profit are we talking about?
Speaker: I already have my answer.
Speaker: That would be Theater of Magic.
Speaker: Okay, why Theater of Magic?
Speaker: Just because you can make a good profit off of it?
Speaker: I think, yeah.
Speaker: I mean, it's a gorgeous game.
Speaker: People go crazy for it.
Speaker: Personally, I think it's boring, but I could see why people are drawn to it.
Speaker: So that's not a game I'd really want in my house, but I know I can make a profit on it.
Speaker: So that's my answer.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: What about you, Scott?
Speaker: That's my answer too.
Speaker: So my buddy who has the Jurassic Park LE that I'm still waiting for him to sell to me, but I don't know if that's going to happen.
Speaker: The Theater of Magic, he had it.
Speaker: He had three J-pop games.
Speaker: He had Theater of Magic, Circus Voltaire, and Tales of the Arabian Nights.
Speaker: And he was trying to shake up his collection.
Speaker: He said, which one would you sell?
Speaker: And everyone in our group said, you should sell theater because it doesn't provide the same fun, the other ones, but it still has a good value.
Speaker: So I don't miss it at all.
Speaker: I think I'm right there.
Speaker: I'm right there both with you.
Speaker: I think I would sell Theater of Magic.
Speaker: As tempting as whodunit is and the profit I'd make off of that, I really do have to go with theater.
Speaker: Is there a profit on whodunit?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I met a man once that bought a whodunit because he thought he was going to make thousands of dollars off of it.
Speaker: And then he bought it.
Speaker: I can't remember how much he bought it for, but he was trying to sell it for like five, six grand and it just wasn't moving.
Speaker: He's like, I don't know what's wrong.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He's delusional.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So we've all agreed we're getting rid of theater or flipping it.
Speaker: Which one of these games are you bolting to your floor, Keith?
Speaker: Congo.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Not attack or... Well, that's pretty much it.
Speaker: I already have two attack from ours, so... Plus, I can pretty much go to any location on the planet that has one.
Speaker: So, Congo is much harder to find out in the wild.
Speaker: Yes, it is.
Speaker: And my same friend who actually, he powder coated it.
Speaker: He made it beautiful.
Speaker: He got a different trance light on it.
Speaker: And then he called me and said, hey, by the way, I sold Congo.
Speaker: And I'm like, what?
Speaker: It's a fun game.
Speaker: I didn't get to the end of it.
Speaker: However, I do own an Attack from Mars and it is one of my family's favorite.
Speaker: And so I would have to bolt Attack from Mars.
Speaker: And I have the LE, so it has the jumping alien on top and
Speaker: It's really pretty, so I'll take that one.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah, it's definitely a tough call between us two, but like I said, I can play Attack from Mars anywhere, and I own two myself.
Speaker: So yeah, if we're looking at this list, that wouldn't be my first choice.
Speaker: You just like the hippos comment on Congo.
Speaker: Hippos!
Speaker: That game is just a fun shooter, I think.
Speaker: Yeah, it really is.
Speaker: I've actually owned both attack for Mars and Congo, and I'm going to say attack for Mars because Congo left my collection.
Speaker: It's, it's a great game.
Speaker: It really is.
Speaker: And just honestly, my nine-year-old son, he loves that game.
Speaker: He keeps asking me where we're going to get a Congo back.
Speaker: I have to break the news to him today.
Speaker: I don't know if we'll ever see a Congo again.
Speaker: I don't know if that was a good decision to get rid of that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm glad I picked up mine when I did back when they couldn't give them away.
Speaker: So no regrets.
Speaker: Oh, I don't blame you there.
Speaker: Alrighty, guys.
Speaker: Which one of these games are you throwing in a big old fire and torching?
Speaker: No Fear.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I like No Fear.
Speaker: It seems very fast, very circus-like.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, Jackpot does nothing for me.
Speaker: It really doesn't.
Speaker: It's the layout seems very boring.
Speaker: And so I would never own a Jackpot.
Speaker: So I don't hate.
Speaker: Well, OK, yeah, I hate Jackpot.
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: A little angst there, huh, Scott?
Speaker: Yeah, a little bit.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'd get rid of whodunit.
Speaker: It's one of the games out of all these.
Speaker: I just, I have, I've played and played and played and I just can't get into and yeah, is what it is.
Speaker: It feels like you should be more satisfied in playing whodunit.
Speaker: You're right.
Speaker: But I'll still burn jackpot.
Speaker: It's fine.
Speaker: I remember when whodunit first came out, we thought it was amazing.
Speaker: Oh, look, you know, cause it's a story based game.
Speaker: You're, you're collecting weapons, you're collecting clues.
Speaker: And then, yeah, it's kind of went downhill from there.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, it feels like one of those choose your own adventure books for a nine year old.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Or playing clue.
Speaker: It's just at the end, you're just like, okay, well, that was kind of boring.
Speaker: And I have two different strategies for no fear.
Speaker: No matter what you're doing, you're shooting the looping ramp or you're just continually shooting the scoop and taking a kick out, kicking it back into the scoop until you get over the edge.
Speaker: Those are the two strategies.
Speaker: So is this one of the reasons, no fear is one of the reasons you don't like putting scoops on your game?
Speaker: No, it's just if you're going to have a scoop, don't have it award something potentially great and don't have the kick out so you can just repeatedly shoot it over and over.
Speaker: So there you go.
Speaker: Yeah, Scoops, it seems like it's I'm going really fast in a game and oh, I'll just pause for five seconds while it does something and spits it back out.
Speaker: I'm not a big fan of Scoops either.
Speaker: They're okay.
Speaker: On some games, I guess.
Speaker: Tron, I think is fun, but it's... Yeah, if I can get away with an up post and a target, I'll do it.
Speaker: So we'll hear you do a recap.
Speaker: We're all going to flip Theater of Magic.
Speaker: Keith is bolting Congo while Scott and I are bolting down Attack for Mars.
Speaker: And we're all, oh, I guess we're not all going to, but Keith was going to Torch No Fear.
Speaker: Scott is doing Jackpot for some odd weird reason.
Speaker: It's just not fun.
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: I'm seeing a resurgent right now with Jackpot.
Speaker: I don't know if it's because Jack Danger is playing it a lot or whatnot, but
Speaker: It's a fun game.
Speaker: I think it's a fun game.
Speaker: Okay, so I'd flip it then.
Speaker: To me, okay, I will say this about Jackpot.
Speaker: I own one.
Speaker: I don't think it's the greatest game ever, but I think it's pretty brilliant how they did the multiball in so many stages.
Speaker: It's so hard to get through.
Speaker: It's like when you get to the supervisor.
Speaker: To me, that's the saving grace of Jackpot.
Speaker: If it weren't for that, yeah, I'd find it pretty boring too.
Speaker: I think the play field should look prettier.
Speaker: It's an ugly play field.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: That giant visor with the lights, there's nothing really to look at.
Speaker: Yeah, it's not much of a looker.
Speaker: As a tournament game, I enjoy it.
Speaker: I have one in my collection.
Speaker: I actually don't know where it is right now.
Speaker: It's storage, I think.
Speaker: When it's set up in my collection, I don't really play it.
Speaker: But it was a big hit where I had a...
Speaker: pinball party at my house and I put two inch flippers on it.
Speaker: A little side tournament and people were going nuts about it.
Speaker: So if you're bored of your jackpot, do that.
Speaker: It'll reinvigorate it.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: It's always those little tweaks that make a game so much better, isn't it?
Speaker: Well, with the center post, yeah, because you add a lot of center post strategy.
Speaker: Oh yeah, that's true.
Speaker: It's amazing how much a center post will change your entire strategy on any game.
Speaker: I think that pretty much does it for us.
Speaker: I can't think of anything else that we had on our list.
Speaker: You've been such a gracious guest.
Speaker: We really appreciate you always coming on, Keith.
Speaker: And we appreciate you making us somewhat semi-famous because you're wearing our hat to the tournament.
Speaker: It's a good hat.
Speaker: Well, we're making that limited edition shirt, so we'll be getting you that too.
Speaker: I used to wear that head-to-head shirt, and look what happened to them.
Speaker: And just warning you guys.
Speaker: We haven't reached 100 episodes.
Speaker: That's usually when people drop off.
Speaker: And everybody who's listening, I'm on the lookout for Jurassic Park LE.
Speaker: So if you want to sell one, hit me up.
Speaker: Why would you sell one at 1.0?
Speaker: That's the worst time.
Speaker: No, no, I want to buy one at 1.0.
Speaker: I don't want to sell it.
Speaker: You're asking people to sell it.
Speaker: It's like they at least got to play 1.0, then sell it.
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: People there's like other games coming out.
Speaker: So you want to sell it so you can free up that space.
Speaker: Oh, I get it.
Speaker: I absolutely get it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Problem is I'm not very bad at selling games.
Speaker: I'll just put them in storage.
Speaker: And now he reaches the point where I have 50 games in storage.
Speaker: And I was like, I don't remember what I have.
Speaker: No, I'm the worst.
Speaker: I actually, I hate negotiating to buy and sell things.
Speaker: And so I end up just buying them.
Speaker: I actually, I'm not kidding.
Speaker: Today, I looked up and I found a Jurassic Park LE and I told my friend who's really good at flipping games.
Speaker: I'm like, hey, go and see what you can get it for because I want this game.
Speaker: So it's, he's my, he likes doing that stuff.
Speaker: I hate it.
Speaker: I hate it.
Speaker: It's part of the disease, man.
Speaker: He's just like, oh, I love this game.
Speaker: I love this game.
Speaker: Ooh, the new shiny game.
Speaker: This game's going to storage, or I'm selling it.
Speaker: It's part of the beauty of this hobby.
Speaker: Well, legitimately, I have Shrek, which is fun enough, but I look at that and I think, what else could I have in this spot?
Speaker: And I could think of a million games.
Speaker: I would take Jurassic Park.
Speaker: I'd take Iron Maiden.
Speaker: I'd take Black Knight.
Speaker: I'd take any of those.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: I I'm trying to buy a Jurassic park, but they won't sell me one and I do not own an iron maiden.
Speaker: So, uh, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, I thought, well, didn't, didn't you give away your iron maiden for a prize?
Speaker: I did.
Speaker: Uh, it was a pro.
Speaker: Uh, I was like, if I ever want to honor maiden, it's going to be a premium.
Speaker: Cause I liked the looks of that.
Speaker: The whole reason I had a Jeremy do the Egypt package.
Speaker: Cause I'm a big Egyptologist.
Speaker: So it was like,
Speaker: Hey, we're going to quote unquote, theme this power slave.
Speaker: You know, I just wanted all the Egypt stuff in there I could get.
Speaker: So that's the one I want.
Speaker: Jurassic, I definitely want a premium as well.
Speaker: So but unfortunately, they're all backordered and I can't get one.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So if anyone out there has a has a premium, you know, help Keith out because he has a rough time getting ahold of these machines.
Speaker: Actually, there is a premium Iron Maiden here that has been on sale, and I would love to take it home.
Speaker: But my nine-year-old, six-year-old, and five-year-old may get nightmares from it.
Speaker: Does it also play into your decision, too?
Speaker: It's like, I don't really need to buy this game because I can just go to work and hit Stern Alley and just play it for however long and be good to go.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I have one pinball machine set up in my condo right now.
Speaker: It's Harbor Lights by Gottlieb.
Speaker: But yeah, when I moved to Chicago, I left all my games in California.
Speaker: And yeah, I miss them.
Speaker: I miss being able to play them.
Speaker: But at the same time, it's also nice having space.
Speaker: Since I have three games shoehorned in my office, I have a Beat the Clock.
Speaker: I have a Jurassic and a Iron Maiden test games.
Speaker: So I get enough playing here that when I get home, I'm good.
Speaker: I'm good with my wood rail.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: Do you have a game, a grail game out there right now that you're saying, I want that?
Speaker: Oh, it would be something older for sure.
Speaker: You know, from when I grew up, I've always wanted a cheetah, uh, stargazers on that list.
Speaker: Uh, pretty much, you know, the obscure eighties Stern electronics games.
Speaker: Those are the games I grew up playing and love.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: I have a hard time letting go in any of my Stern games.
Speaker: I got rid of the galaxy a while ago and I regret it.
Speaker: But definitely Cheetah and Stargazer at the top of those lists.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So anybody listening who has a lead on a Cheetah or a Stargazer?
Speaker: No, no, I'm not buying any more games.
Speaker: Stop.
Speaker: Wait till I move back to California.
Speaker: Which is never because you're building the next 10 Stern games.
Speaker: Yeah, probably never.
Speaker: But, you know, a guy can dream.
Speaker: You can vacation.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: I can go visit them anytime.
Speaker: When you hit up Gary, whatever they're paying you, they need to pay you more.
Speaker: Because, man, seriously, these games are amazing.
Speaker: They're redefining modern pinball, in my opinion.
Speaker: They're fantastic.
Speaker: Thanks.
Speaker: Yeah, my next game will be completely different from the other two games.
Speaker: So, yeah, hope everyone likes it.
Speaker: The problem is it's going to be displacing all my old bolt down games because I'm going to have a Keith wall.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: Well, and even I don't know if you listen to we had Josh Sharp on here a little while back and he says it's rough now because it's like seriously, it's like, well, Keith's next game's coming out soon.
Speaker: What do I have to get rid of to put this into my collection?
Speaker: I've been to Josh's house.
Speaker: That's an easy answer.
Speaker: Oh.
Speaker: Got leave orbit is got to go, my friend.
Speaker: That is the worst game ever.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: Does he have an orbiter one?
Speaker: Because I hope he does with the warp play field.
Speaker: No, no.
Speaker: He's got a Gottlieb orbit, which we were using it in some tournament there, and it was constantly slam-tilding itself.
Speaker: And we were just like, why do you even have this game?
Speaker: Oh my goodness.
Speaker: So, well, thank you, Keith.
Speaker: We appreciate you coming on.
Speaker: We appreciate you shooting the breeze with us and taking time out of your, your busy schedule and, uh, come to say hi to all these little peeps.
Speaker: So not a problem.
Speaker: Thanks for having me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Thanks a lot.
Speaker: We'll see you.
Speaker: Oh, wait, hold on.
Speaker: Hold on.
Speaker: Hold on.
Speaker: If you want someone to get ahold of you, we got to do the whole spiel.
Speaker: I forget.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: If you want someone to get ahold of you at all, how do you, how do you want them to contact you?
Speaker: Uh, me?
Speaker: Yeah, you.
Speaker: I don't.
Speaker: Okay, that works.
Speaker: I'm not a recluse, man.
Speaker: I live in a cave.
Speaker: Facebook's fine.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: You never know.
Speaker: There's people out there.
Speaker: Like I said, you've got your groupies.
Speaker: You are the Guns N' Roses of our time, right?
Speaker: Yes, I have groupies.
Speaker: They're all guys, but I have groupies.
Speaker: You and Rush, right?
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: They're all guys.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: If you want to get ahold of us, we are loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com.
Speaker: Get ahold of us on Facebook at loser kid pinball podcast.
Speaker: If you want to get one of those sweet beanies, like Keith was talking about that can go all the way down to your neckline.
Speaker: I just got a, I got a fresh batch in, uh, hit us up if you'd like that at Gmail or Facebook, or you can even contact Josh, Josh, good Hannah.
Speaker: You can contact Scott or me.
Speaker: We'll get it done.
Speaker: So we really appreciate you coming on.
Speaker: Thank you so much for taking out your time.
Speaker: No problem.
Speaker: Enjoy.
Speaker: Thanks.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Thanks.
Speaker: Shut up and sit down.
