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Triple Drain Pinball Podcast Episode 68 - Tom is DONE with LEs!
871 Plays8 days ago
Hosts: Joel Engelberth, Tom Graf and Travis Murie
Today we didn’t have much time buy we wanted to squeeze in an episode before Chicago Pinball Expo! We dove deep into our thoughts on Stern’s latest game, Star Wars Fall of the Empire as well as our thoughts on Spike 3. We ended the episode with an overview on what to play and see and Expo. Please come say hi if you are there and hopefully we can record another episode shortly after we return. Enjoy!!
Thanks again for all the support everyone:)
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YOUTUBE - https://www.youtube.com/@tripledrain
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Merch: https://silverballswag.com/collections/triple-drain-pinball-podcast
More Merch: https://www.zazzle.com/store/tripledrain
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/triple_drain
Travis' stuff: https://www.youtube.com/@ThePinballCompany
Tom's stuff: https://www.youtube.com/@Foxcitiespinball
Joel's stuff: https://www.youtube.com/@FlipNOutPinball
Shoutout to Jackson Gee and his incredible artwork. jacksongee.com
Shoutout to Brad Johanson and his company Alter Creative Media for his intro video. Altercreativemedia.com
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Transcript
Big Day and Delays
00:00:08
Speaker
We're Triple... Triple Drain.
00:00:24
Speaker
All right. ah Travis, you want to repeat all all the all of what you... Nope. I'm good. yeah yeah we Travis was telling us all about his day. He's got a big dad man big day ahead of him. He's got to go to the man doctor.
00:00:38
Speaker
The man doctor. The man doc. got the band doc and an hour and 20 minutes. So, uh, we, it's going to be a short one for us. Um, what do we do? We always apologize. Sorry. It's been over a month, you know, there's no, we just, sorry about that.
00:00:53
Speaker
Uh, yeah, it's life is busy. That's what we say every time. But, um, i Believe it or not, manufacturers don't release games based on our schedule, and I don't know why they don't do that yet.
Missed Media Day and Scheduling Conflicts
00:01:04
Speaker
Joel, we were on the media list for Star Wars to film content there, and I don't think any of us were there.
00:01:12
Speaker
But we were on there. like Hopefully, our time went well. I don't know what they did during in those 15 minutes. I don't know either. We, um, unfortunately we were invited. Triple drain was invited to the media day, the star Wars media day. We did not go because it was on a Wednesday and that's hard.
00:01:27
Speaker
Uh, Wednesday, Fridays we could do Fridays. We can do Wednesdays very hard with work and life and, uh, all the things. But hey, we're here now. it's We're recording. we're career we We are recording the Friday before.
00:01:40
Speaker
We are recording the Friday before Pinball Expo. So we got a lot to cover. We don't have a ton of time to do it. um But let's start with the important stuff.
Unexpected Mood and Pinball Prep
00:01:49
Speaker
Tom, how are you? Depressed.
00:01:53
Speaker
What? what That was not what I was expecting at all. ah ah So two things. Why? Let's talk about it, Tom. Yes, please. Let me have a drink.
00:02:06
Speaker
Okay. is Are you drinking a mule already? Moscow That's a virgin. Oh, okay. He's already drinking at 830 in the morning. I'm fine.
00:02:17
Speaker
ah no ah no i'm fine Okay, good. ah And we really, how is your microwave? did Did the microwave get installed? Is it solved?
00:02:28
Speaker
How is the microwave? it's It's installed, yes. ah It's working fine. ah i had to take back the the the covering because yeah it didn't fit the space. But ah other than that, it was it's fine.
00:02:47
Speaker
I'm happy. Oh man. I'm so happy for you. I know. Um, I do know you've had a busy last few weeks, uh,
Pinball Tournament Success and Star Wars Debate
00:02:53
Speaker
slaps. There was a tournament, uh, that Tom, you streamed and participated in same with you, Travis, you were there. Uh, you guys were both very successful. Travis really had to be there. Yeah. He was kind of, it was kind of his thing. Um, so we will talk more about slaps later.
00:03:09
Speaker
ah But let's talk about Star Wars. Let's talk about Star Wars. That's the big game. Stern's big game that's out. There's Star Wars and there's Spike 3. So where do you guys want to start? You want to focus more on Spike 3 or Star Wars? Tom, I'm going to let you take the lead, and I want you to share your thoughts on either of those topics.
Star Wars Game Critique
00:03:26
Speaker
Star Wars. Let's do it. Ellie, not good.
00:03:35
Speaker
Okay. Good take, Tom. This is okay. ah tom Tom was. i have to We got spicy Tom tonight. This is our today. This is awesome. Tom was our elitist.
00:03:46
Speaker
He was that guy. He was the, I don't want to back glass unless I can see myself in it. That was Tom. grab but something changed something changed and i don't know what i don't remember which game it was i don't i'm not saying it was king kong but i know king kong you're like i'm gonna go pro i'm gonna go pro i think it started wick John Wick, okay. right. might have been Wick or X-Men around that time.
00:04:11
Speaker
I remember Wick. Wick was out before that. but for Yeah, it was definitely. And I remember we're at the we were we we did media day with Wick. and When we were at media day, yeah. Tom was getting that itch. We could tell. like he was we are back He was like this, but yeah. yeah But you didn't. You you you showed restraint and you got the pro. And you still have your Wick pro, right?
00:04:33
Speaker
I do. Okay, so just quick side step. WIC Pro, you enjoying it? You enjoying the code updates? Yeah. Yeah, it's ah it's an ah definitely an improvement. Okay. Because it's pretty close to finished, right? It's like.97 or.8. I think that's.98. Yeah, okay. now Not a ton left. But all right, so our elitist is no longer an elitist. He is more... i you you're buying a ah You're going to buy us a Star Wars Pro, right?
00:05:04
Speaker
I have one in my basement currently. oh i have i haven't played it a lot, but i've I have it. But there's ah there's an l LE right now at Lumberjack Johnny's.
00:05:16
Speaker
yeah Yep. And I got an LE right behind me here. This is Zach's from Flippin' Out. And Travis, what game do you have behind you? right i don't see... I have a stool behind me. don't see any pinball machines. I don't, are you allowed to be podcaster without a pinball machine?
00:05:31
Speaker
I don't. I mean, I've got, I've got trophies. Oh, where's your, yeah. Yeah. Where's your, where's your top four at a major trophy? My awards, my achievements. Joel, where is it? Yeah, see it right back there. I don't have it.
00:05:45
Speaker
Tom, why does the Star Wars LE suck? I mean, you just started strong. You start with a bold statement. Why does the LE suck? I don't think there's anything that grabs you into buying the LE compared to the Pro.
00:06:01
Speaker
I mean, i i don't I don't see one feature that's like, hey, that's awesome. I got to i got to grab that.
00:06:13
Speaker
The Jabba with the ball doesn't ja grab you?
Gameplay Mechanics and Accessibility
00:06:16
Speaker
The Jabba with the ball, the mechanism that drops, the, ah what is it? We talked about this a lot.
00:06:24
Speaker
No, the AT-AT or the AT-AT. Oh, the little model. Whatever you want to call it. Yep. It's, ah you know. yeah Darth Vader head. Does that not convince you?
00:06:39
Speaker
No, neither does storm trooper head. Dang it. So there's nothing on the play field. What about the center ramp that goes up and down? Does nothing for me. So literally, and literally nothing on the play field.
00:06:51
Speaker
I think from what I've shot. hmm. The pro ramp seems to work better than the LE. Now, maybe it's a level thing or something to that extent, but I've noticed. What do you mean by work better? Like it it's smoother? It doesn't rattle? Yeah, like the like the shot into the center in the back. Yeah.
00:07:15
Speaker
Like I, find I find, find when I'm playing the l LE version, it drops off the ramp more. And like I said, it could be just how the location has it set up and it, it, it's dropping like your shots aren't, aren't making it kind of thing. so Gotcha. But, um, Yeah.
00:07:35
Speaker
yeah ah So I, I, what about art? I respect your opinion, Tom. Yeah. We, we got to find something that about the LE that Tom likes artwork. What about that?
00:07:48
Speaker
I really don't like the LE artwork. Okay. I'm like an autograph from the CEO. Damn it. Okay. An autograph from John Borg on part of the apron. I'm looking at right now. You just don't like that. It's so Hoth focused.
00:08:04
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, i I'm a huge Star Wars fan, but like i'm right now I'm looking at the premium going like, man, the premium looks better to me.
00:08:16
Speaker
i but okay I would say... But that's just me. I'm going to hold out my art opinion until Expo where I can see all three models in person. Because right now, I got the LE sitting right here.
00:08:28
Speaker
I think the art looks awesome. now But I do understand... i And in Stern does this. they've They've done this with a lot of their games where the LE art always seems to be very focused. And if you don't like the thing it's focused on... like like I'll be honest. I mean, this is not Stern. But Harry Potter, I prefer...
00:08:44
Speaker
the wizard edition are over the, over the collector's edition art. And it's just because like when I, the level of Harry Potter fan, I am, I'm, I want to see the characters. i want to see all of the things. And, yeah and, and that's what I think sometimes I know. Like, um,
00:09:03
Speaker
uh deadpool deadpool's art i almost like the pro art more or even turtles turtles i i like the the pro art on turtles more than the le art because sometimes the le art gets very specific so i see what you're saying there um we gotta find something tom likes that he likes on the le more okay the expression lighting system that would be about that expression lights it's not on the pro It's not on the pro. There you go. That's a good marketing pull. Well, maybe that's a question. Is there anything? Cause you're saying, I don't, you look at it as there's nothing on the LE that I want to buy, but is, do you feel that there's anything on the pro that you're missing?
00:09:42
Speaker
Like, but honestly, not at all. and Okay. Okay. entire Reflection glass.
00:09:51
Speaker
shaker motor assembly no this is interesting no i i like this joel i like this because here's why because i know joel joel you're like super positive about everything right which is perfectly fine it's not a disc he he rides a golf cart around it's fine it's no big deal tom has i mean tom you were like fully immersed that you're a unique avatar for buying pinball because you're you're You've been in the top 100 before.
00:10:21
Speaker
You've won state
Pinball Machine Preferences and Code Complexity
00:10:22
Speaker
championships. You played it if but you played in world championships, right? ah think so And you buy LEs. He's bought many LEs, yeah. Right. That mix is rare that somebody that's that ingrained in pinball to that level that crosses the barrier of tournament player, collector, enthusiast, does it all, right? Content creator.
00:10:43
Speaker
Sex Sex icon. Yes, exactly. OnlyFans icon, everything. Tripod Tom, let's go. So what what I'm so fascinated by this is because now we're kind of seeing this merge to where I think your opinion, what you have on it, and this isn't kissing your ass or anything, but I i find your opinion fascinating on this because you do cross over so much on that, that I think it's such a unique opinion that maybe...
00:11:09
Speaker
Not saying like yours would be any more valuable than anything else, but i find it far more interesting because you come from ah background that you've purchased enough LEs over years at a time, not just recent. So this isn't recency bias. Like how long have you been buying l LEs for up to this point?
00:11:26
Speaker
I, I, the first, the first LE I bought was Avatar. Okay. So, so over a decade, long time. Yeah. Yeah. Over a decade. Okay. So I'm just pre-facing that for the listeners and now I'll get out Joel and Tom's way, but yeah, I find this, I find this fascinating.
00:11:42
Speaker
It is, it is interesting. And I mean, I understand Tom, you've, you've written the cost increase of an LE. Like you've, you've personally experienced that more than most. And, and so I understand You went from like, well, why would I not get the l LE? It's the smart buy to now like I'm going to show a little more reservation.
00:11:59
Speaker
Right. But you're making, I also know that you're you're not just making the decision based on price. You actually are looking at the game and thinking, I think I will enjoy the way that the pro plays better than the l LE. So, ah and you' you've mentioned the the ramp. You feel like the middle ramp is more consistent.
00:12:16
Speaker
And one thing we haven't mentioned yet is the ball save. We've talked about this on our outside of the podcast. Go ahead. I do not like the ball save at all and the on the LE premium.
00:12:30
Speaker
and i Like, to me, it's just, I don't know, maybe it's a tournament player in me, but like I just don't like like draining your ball and then like, oh, I'm going to press this button and maybe it'll save my ball.
00:12:45
Speaker
Maybe. Yeah. you You had made the comment in our chat that you said you would be livid if, or maybe that wasn't your word, but it was you would be very upset if if the yeah the deciding factor of of one of a game in a tournament was whether or not you timed to the magnet just right compared to your opponent.
00:13:08
Speaker
when if it was just ball save like you've you've spelled jedi you've hit your spinners you've spelled jedi it should be a guaranteed ball save on a pro it would just give you another ball but on a premier elite no you still have to time that button press right and hope that the magnet throws it in the right but but is it always a timing thing i mean is it a guarantee that you time it right and the ball is going to come back to you Um, is the ball possibly going to hit the flipper underneath it? Or is it gonna like go up the apron and come back or, you know, you know what I'm saying?
00:13:45
Speaker
I hear you. But to me, that's why i love it. That's why I love the ball save to me. What the way that I look at this, is now that I've played the LE, if I was to play a pro, what would be the missing feature?
00:14:00
Speaker
What would be the thing that I would, that I'm like, like, I just, I miss that. Like my perfect example is Deadpool. I love Deadpool pro. But man, that Katana, the way that you can hit that left orbit and the ramp, can you can like then just hit that left orbit over and over again and tell if it's spitting in the pops. like That to me is, don't get me wrong, a Deadpool Pro, I would love it. Love it, love it. But now that i've I had owned the premium for years, the mech that I would miss is that that up-down Katana ramp.
00:14:30
Speaker
On this, what is the mech that I would miss if I wasn't playing a premium or LE? 100% the Magnet. And, and, and to me, that is the, when I look at the the two streams that I've done and this, maybe this is a negative or a sad point, but the highest or the most exciting moments I've had on stream is saving the ball with the magnet.
00:14:51
Speaker
Sure. And it's just because magnets are magical. thought you were going when you drain, it's the most exciting thing. I'm like, in every single stream of it's super exciting. That's why streams are so much fun. Yeah. it's No, magnet magnets are magical. So it's like, you see the ball draining. You know what would be the magical moment for me?
00:15:10
Speaker
Getting the ball in the Duttstar Hall. That would be the most magical thing yeah that could happen. We can talk about that. But to me, the magnet, the magnet is there's just something about like, I feel like you earned it.
00:15:26
Speaker
You earned the ball coming back. You've like, I do like that about certain games. You know, Godzilla has the oxygen destroyer mode in ball three or um other ones. Now Cactus Canyon, and the new one has, if you if you drain out the left side, you have one shot to to hit the right drop. Like you earned your ball back. now But there's something about the magnet that it's just...
00:15:47
Speaker
Whoop. The way that it. For Tom on this, if it was something similar to, um, uh, hell the games, like I can't, I can't think of the game for like Pharaoh, for instance, right? Like what if you had two other flipper buttons, right? Or an extra flipper button on each side and you could pulse the out lanes for like force ball save. Would that have been something that you would have found? think have liked that better personally, but that's just me, I guess.
00:16:15
Speaker
I feel you. No, I mean, that was kind of my take when I first saw the the force when i first started doing it. I mean, it was cool at first, but then I got to where I wonder what would happen if it could have been like this.
00:16:26
Speaker
But admittedly, i haven't. I've played like maybe five games total or I guess including Slap C, like maybe eight games total on Star Wars. So I'm trying to figure out.
00:16:37
Speaker
at least from a premium LE standpoint. So I played like maybe four games total on it now. And I've only used it maybe three times. And I'm like... one for three or maybe two for four, somewhere around there. So yeah, it's kind of like- It's not a gimme.
00:16:53
Speaker
Right, it's not gimme. Am I pro? I've saved the ball 100% of it. It's a gimme on the pro. You're 100% success rate. um just So basically what's cool about Star Wars is there's spinners on the left, and or on both orbits, and when you when you rip the spinner, you're spelling Jedi.
00:17:11
Speaker
So on a pro, you have to spell Jedi, J-E-D-I. And once you've done that, ball saves lit on both out lanes, you drain, Boom, you get a ball back on on a premium or LE. If you spell J E, what that gives you is you get to like pulses.
00:17:25
Speaker
burn You can hit the button twice to try to save your ball and and you can do them at any time. But it's but you really got to time it right. You got to wait. You know, if you drain out the left outling, you got to wait for that ball just end up.
00:17:36
Speaker
There is a ball printed on the on the play field. You got to wait for that ball to be just to the left of that. And then you, boop you pulse it and it'll just rocket the ball over to the, to the, to the shooter lane. If you go on the right one though, that's where it gets tricky. You have to kind of wait for it to bounce off the apron, pulse it, have your flipper up and it'll kind of throw the ball up in, into the play field.
00:17:56
Speaker
Um, if you spell Jedi though, yeah you get the super, you get the big pulse, which is you still have to time it though, where when the ball goes to drain, you, you hit it and it'll grab the ball and it'll just hold it there.
00:18:08
Speaker
And then it kind of pulses itself in a way where it'll rocket it back up. What's tough though, is it'll rocket it back up in the play field, but unless there's some spin, there's a chance it could rocket it straight up and it comes straight back down.
00:18:20
Speaker
Just watch Joel's tutorials. Yeah, it's it's really, i love it. Like, I love that aspect, but I also understand right how people like yourself would hate it.
00:18:31
Speaker
It's the uncertainty, the inconsistency that is and unfortunate. if i this is This is my other thought. Like, yeah, I hate it, but like, you you know, we've used the word casual. So,
00:18:49
Speaker
People who who don't listen to pinball podcasts, people who don't engulf in the content, do you think they are going to realize that there's a ball save there?
00:18:59
Speaker
Zero chance. Zero chance. Unless you know it's coming. and even when you do, that's what you said, Travis, you've only done it like three or four times and your success rate is one. My brother, the first night we streamed it, and as you've already said, we do drain a lot.
00:19:15
Speaker
So we've had we had ample opportunities. I don't think in that first two hours of Jared streaming, I think he saved his ball like one time. And it's just like you have to figure out the timing. It's not like life ring on Jaws where it's like the moment you you see it going to the outlane or right when it hits over the outlane switch, you hit the button. Like you have to wait for that ball to get right where it needs to be. yeah It's a learning curve.
00:19:38
Speaker
I think too, it's important. Like what a lot of people got to understand. And sometimes us being in the pinball industry or listening to content, we get kind of too far in the weeds in this that we, we forget what it's like to be brand new.
00:19:50
Speaker
ten ballll Right. So there's going to be different levels, different tiers of, features that are easily accessible to people, or I've heard this term thrown around a lot, approachable, like there's, you know, it, it differs, right? So for instance, the light speed multiball, which is found right up the middle center ramp, that should be like the easiest thing for anybody that steps up to get to. Now that doesn't mean somebody brand new to pinball is going to do it every single time because it still requires you to do something skillfully.
00:20:19
Speaker
Then when you take something to where you have to take your hands off the flipper buttons, hit an action button that's in the middle of the lock bar. Yes. If you're brand new to pinball mind exploding, you don't know that
Player Experience Levels
00:20:30
Speaker
exists. There's no way. So I see that as a feature that it's only if you're already fully involved in pinball, you've seen the trailer, you've maybe watched a couple of videos. You might have a grasp on it. You kind of know what's there and then you start going after like it still takes a little while to figure out a little while to learn.
00:20:49
Speaker
And, you know, I don't think people just walking up to a game on location, they're going to understand that. Now, somebody that buys the game for home, they may not understand it at first. Who knows?
00:20:59
Speaker
But I think they'll they'll start to figure it figure it out over you know a period of time. I think that's that's really what it boils down to. I think from a game theory standpoint, whenever you're putting something in a game, you do have to think of what type of player will see this feature and interact with this feature.
00:21:17
Speaker
Right. And so it's kind of like, that's what marks a great game that you have something that's easily interacted with. Like, that's why everybody loves Godzilla. Cause it's the met that's right up the middle. People can hit. That's why people love attack from Mars. Exactly. It's, it's fairly intuitive that somebody within maybe three,
00:21:35
Speaker
two to three games could figure out. Now let's take the force, you know, the force save. How many games do we think somebody that's kind of played pinball a little bit, but not fully ingrained in it, just plays on location every now and again with a beer.
00:21:48
Speaker
Like how many games would it take them to figure out that it's not only there, but to figure out how do I even qualify? How do I even know it's even qualified for me to use? You know, there's so many steps to get to that point. It would take a while. And then it would take a while for them to get the timing right.
00:22:05
Speaker
like And that's what this is. I would definitely say it is a it is a feature that you have to see somebody do. or And it's, yeah, it's not a gimme. It's not like it's lit by default when you first plunge. And want to preface. That doesn't mean it's not a cool feature. We're just talking about accessibility of said feature. It's like saying a wizard mode is not cool because it takes forever to get there. You know, it could still be cool. It's just...
00:22:27
Speaker
How easy is it for somebody to understand that concept and in a game that's as chaotic as pinball? Yeah, you know, it's incredibly difficult to get somebody to understand even the basics of it, let alone something that's second or third level beyond the basics.
00:22:44
Speaker
So. We're not going to be done with Star Wars, but i the game that left for me to have Star Wars all year was Medieval Madness
Medieval Madness vs. Cactus Canyon
00:22:52
Speaker
remake. i had I had the Wizard Edition, and that is about the most accessible, approachable.
00:22:59
Speaker
like You don't have to teach nothing with that game. you you can so You can put anybody in front of that game, and they're going to figure out what to do almost immediately. that is And I understand that is really why that game is so beloved,
00:23:12
Speaker
is because anybody can have a good time on that game. And um when I had it here, i I really had a great time on it. um I will tell you right now, I don't think I'm going to buy one.
00:23:24
Speaker
I don't think I'm going to buy one anymore. And I was on the list to buy one. And after having it a week or whatever, it just, to me, I get it. I understand my wife loved it.
00:23:35
Speaker
uh she thought it was great and i remember i said between this and cactus canyon which one do you like more she's like medieval madness absolutely um did you hear that travis you got to start a rental program it's I just, but to me, I think it's an amazing game. And if people own a medieval madness, I totally understand why you do, but maybe it's because I want, I want more out of pinball. Right. And I think the two of you guys want more out of pinball. You need that challenge, that depth in the code, the things to do.
00:24:05
Speaker
i had heard a lot of people, once you destroy the cat, the cat, wow, the castle once, you know, the 10th time, the 15th time, then now we'll do times to wear times to wear out. Tom and I told you that three years ago, brother.
00:24:17
Speaker
Yeah. I get it, but once I had it I mean, I get it. I played the heck out of that game when it was here, and i get I understand. It's not that the novelty of destroying the castle wore off. It was just more of like a, what's next? What's the next goal? My goal was always to stack the different modes and then try to play Royal Madness or but the Medieval Madness, the Multimole Madness mode, the stacked mode.
00:24:37
Speaker
My biggest issue with Cactus Canyon is the fact that the trolls is so hard to get to. My son, who wants to play the game, couldn't get to trolls and that to me is like that sucks that you have an amazing mech that's stuck behind code and there's a lot of people that aren't going to see that and so um to me i'm not i'm not here to bash medieval menace i think honestly i think it's a fantastic game and the people that are are going to buy one i think will love it it's a fantastic game um but it's just so weird to go from that game to this game my wife played star wars and
00:25:10
Speaker
for four minutes and she was done. and And she just, to it was just in her mind, it was a whole lot going on. And she's like, I just kept draining. I just kept draining. It's a fan layout. It should be approachable, right?
00:25:24
Speaker
No, it's tight. Those shots are tight and they are dangerous. i So I've heard, I've actually listened to a lot of content. Like I rarely do, but I wanted to get the vibe. And I heard a lot of people early on Talk about that. And I remember telling Tom, I'm like, I don't think people are even watching the trailer and realizing how tight some of these shots are. Like I just, but and I mean, you can go out there and you can do a simple count
Star Wars Pinball as a Tournament Game
00:25:49
Speaker
too. There's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight shots, right? Eight. Like eight major shots out there. And you take something like ACDC, right?
00:25:58
Speaker
There's only five major shots out there. Now we're not counting scoops or we're not counting the drop targets of the side, but we're talking like just playing the game vertical. right? yeah And whenever you have that many shots, the real estate starts dwindling down a little bit. Now they're writer right. And there are ways to manipulate more shots if you have horizontal action. So you have a dynamic layout with an upper flipper. We see Keith Elwin do that a lot.
00:26:24
Speaker
We've seen ah Eric from JJP be able to do something similar to that. So there are ways to work around that. But when you have that many shots on a two flipper game,
00:26:35
Speaker
You're not going to defy the laws of physics and measurements, right? There's only going to be so much real estate. So naturally it's going to make it play a little bit faster. Plus the other part to this game, you don't have much stop and go, right? The only true stop to this game is a Sarlacc pit.
00:26:51
Speaker
Like to me, in my opinion, that's about the only true stop because then even the scoop, like you hit it in there. Yes, it'll pause it a little bit, but How's it going to fire it out? Like on the games I played, the copies I've seen, the ball is like pure chaos. It's everywhere. The loop shot is a stop shot.
00:27:08
Speaker
It kicks it back into Vuck. Okay, a Vuck that kicks it back up, right? Yeah. And then what? Like, are you going to backhand the Vuck again? No. Like on the fly? No. Sure. sure The Sarlacc pit is absolutely the... You hit that. If you hit that fast, that thing can spin around there for 10 seconds. Oh, yeah. It'll stay there longer. It'll stay there for like 20 seconds. Yeah, yeah. Wow. But my point being... to hit the ball faster, apparently. My point being, though, it's not it's not meant to be a stop-and-go game.
00:27:34
Speaker
No, like it's just it's just not. Yeah. And so you mix that in with the with the tighter shots and then you have two pops at the bottom. Yeah, it's it's going to it's going to eat you up a little bit if you're not careful. Like that's just that's just the reality.
00:27:49
Speaker
The more that I've played the game, the more in the fact that Ray Day is on the code, I think Raymond has done a fantastic job. That's one thing. The code is already at a level. that there's okay so there's eight major shots each shot represents a character each character is going to have three modes attached to it let's do some math 24 modes then there's vader modes i think there's like six vader modes job java modes there's like four and there's almost all of that is already in the game and the game just came out like it's they've done a fantastic job and ray gives a lot of credit to a guy named andrew apparently andrew is a local guy in chicago who um
00:28:25
Speaker
who got hired after, after Tim left. Andrew's one of the software guys. Yeah. And so it's like, him lawyer too Ray basically said, Andrew, Andrew and him have kind of tag team this together.
00:28:36
Speaker
And, and so you almost got double the amount of people working on, on star Wars and they've done a fantastic job with the code. Um, Now, the more the more I've played with it, though, the more I've thought, I think this is going to be a fantastic tournament game.
00:28:49
Speaker
I'm not the tournament player. Maybe I'm wrong. But Ray is the tournament player. And the the speed of this game, i don't think I don't think tournament guys will have to do much to make this game...
00:29:00
Speaker
brutal or like to keep the ball times short. That's what I mean by that. Like, I think the layout itself will keep the ball time short. Do you disagree, Travis? or no I mean, it's, it's whatever. I will say this as a tournament player and I'm not saying this cause you're saying Joel, like I say this as a tournament player. Cause this is so played out.
00:29:19
Speaker
These games, in my opinion, are not created with the tournament player in mind. The tournament player is a niche within a niche, right? Like these games have to be, Yeah. And it's it's like, I hear this like all the time. Like, let's just get this straight out, guys. Like, seriously, these games have to be designed in order to be manufactured at scale. That's what a lot of people are forgetting. Like they wonder why certain shots aren't the way they are or, hey, they need to be wild. They need to be like this homebrew. It's like, no, they need to be in a way that it can be repeated, repeatedly manufactured.
00:29:53
Speaker
Like two to 5,000 times. Right. But on top of that, it's, you know, I don't think like, look let's tell face facts. How many elite level tournament players are designing games like right now in the industry right now?
00:30:05
Speaker
Can we, can we start naming them off so we can just put this to bed? It's like, Is it this besides Ellen? Is that it? Yeah, sir seriously, name anybody that's an elite level tournament player that designs pinball. are you saying hardware design? Because if you talk about code, i mean. Anybody that designs the pinball layout.
00:30:22
Speaker
The layout? I'm not talking about code. I'm talking about the layout. Elite level players? Any tournament player. Any tour tournament player? Any tournament player. Well, I think i think Eric Minier is a very skilled one.
00:30:36
Speaker
I'm not talking about skilled pinball players. I'm talking about tournament players. I don't know if Eric, I don't Mark Seiden plays in tournaments. So we can name off like two in the entire industry. and tournaments Yeah, exactly. There's not many, but there are people.
00:30:50
Speaker
So my point being, so this is my point, right? Yeah. You have all these designers because it's a unique thing to be able to design a pinball machine. But you don't have elite level players, elite level tournament players designing the machines.
00:31:05
Speaker
You just don't. Like you have Elwynn and that's it. So we need to get out of this thinking these games are just made for tournament players. say no I wasn't saying that. I wasn't saying Star Wars. Yes, you were. wasn't saying Star Wars was designed for the tournament players. I know you're not. I'm saying I hear this all the time from other people.
00:31:25
Speaker
Right. Then these just playing that they're they're just designing games they want to play themselves. I mean, they're designed to be fun. That's what they want. But let's face facts. Is John Borg seriously designing it thinking, you know what?
00:31:38
Speaker
What will the tournament player think about this? Is that really his priority from the beginning? Do you think Brian Eddy's coming up and saying, you know what? What will the tournament player think of this fast lock? Like, of course, it might play out later on in the design, right? When you're doing software, you're doing comp install and stuff like that.
00:31:55
Speaker
But the reality is, guys, these games have to be designed To be fun, to go on location, to take a beating, to go into homes. they That's what they go off of. Otherwise, here's the thing.
00:32:05
Speaker
Here's the thing nobody thinks of. Tom knows where I'm going with this. Oh, yeah. the game The games that have to be bastardized the most, that are the longest players, are literally the games that are designed by the most elite tournament player.
00:32:21
Speaker
So you're saying Elwin sucks at designing tournament games? my point being is he designs with the end user in mind. He designs to make sure you're able to maximize your ball time for as long as possible.
00:32:37
Speaker
That's on purpose. That's not like... That's not a happy accident after five or six designs. And that's what I hear people talk about this all the time on other podcasts, other their YouTube videos, message boards. it's like, guys, like, let's think about this logically real quick. So that's just my little tangent.
00:32:52
Speaker
That being said, you can make any pinball machine a tournament game if you want to. Take all the posts out. Take all the rubbers out. Make things woodchopped. You could do it. Now, the key is... Is the game just going to be fun just to play? Is the multi-balls going to be fun to get to? Is it fun once you get into the multi-balls? Is it fun figuring out where the multipliers are at?
00:33:12
Speaker
And I think, honestly, i think the way Raymond thinks about pinball, knowing what I know, I don't see any way that this rule set... isn't fun once you're able to peel back the layers of the onion.
00:33:24
Speaker
Now, that being said, the game plays super fast, so it's super easy to be in modes and you may not even realize you're in modes. I've seen that happen plenty of times. So it's like, how do you balance that, right? How do you make somebody aware that they are in a mode, that they're in a game, and when you only have so many inserts out there to show that, right? It's not like there's three modes or something like that tied to each shot, but yet there's no way besides knowing the colors of what mode you're qualifying at the time. Right. So it's kind of like, but it's like that for any pinball machine, pretty much like not everyone, but it's just, it's hard to know everything that's in there.
00:34:03
Speaker
Right. Oh, for sure. And I, I think Raymond, I mean, that's what the software designers, they, they've been given a layout and then they got to make, they got to make their code work with the layout. Now I understand they are working directly with the designer. So they do have some input there, but yeah,
00:34:17
Speaker
you know Ray was but was essentially given this layout and been like, okay, make Star Wars now. And Dwight was in the same situation back in 2017 when Richie was like, here's my layout. And then Dwight has to make Star Wars happen. So I get it.
Impact of Movie Clips and Playfield Dynamics
00:34:31
Speaker
um And I think Ray's done a fantastic job. I will say just code alone... movie clips galore audio galore like the movie clips have synced audio there are there are moments a lot of the moments that you what ray said on stream was mike vinacore watched all the movies apparently he's the biggest star wars guy he he jotted out all the scenes that he think would be good modes and then they started care like looking at scenes based on characters like let's make that an obi-wan mode or that a luke mode or leia mode So they that. question.
00:34:58
Speaker
All the modes in the movie clips are in the game. It looks great. That's your question, Travis. My question is, Tom Graff, to Joel, since there's very little stop and go here, yeah how many of those movie clips have you been able, while you're playing, yeah have you been able to watch? i we've We've had this conversation. No, i'm just asked I'm just asking for a friend. I'm just asking for friend. It's Spike 3. It's a bigger LCD. I've watched some.
00:35:22
Speaker
Oh, look at it. There you go, Tom. There you When you finish a mode, every mode ends on the Luke shot. And that's why you said stop and go. It it can hold that ball in Vuck as long as it needs to to finish the mode.
00:35:33
Speaker
Right. So that's an intelligent way to code around what the layout's giving you. Like that's very smart to have every end shot to a mission end at the Luke because it does give you a second to breathe and it gives you a second to see, like to hear the sounds or see whatever or see where you're going to next.
00:35:52
Speaker
right but the fact is the only place to end the mission is pretty much there i mean now invader modes you can end it back at the scoop so you have to choose the two places where the ball can stage momentarily and that's what makes it difficult when you don't have a game that has a lot of staging which is cool like everybody loves flow we hear that all the time but at the same time when you have so many modes you're going to have to find a way to be able to have people experience those movies and stuff like that. Right. So it's like, yeah, that that's the tough part about it. That's the tough part about modern pinball, trying to figure out your way around that and navigate that.
00:36:28
Speaker
Stern has done lot of up posts, a lot of up posts in the in lanes. That's that's, and because then you can end modes or start modes on ramps. Um, and I am surprised. I am surprised that star Wars doesn't have an up post in,
00:36:43
Speaker
ah for just that to start a mode or to show something. i almost felt like it was going to come with that when I heard about it. And I first, you know, saw the trailer, like the first thing in my head was like post, but maybe it's just because we're like chimpanzees, right? We're just trained to think up post with Sterns at this point. Yeah.
00:37:00
Speaker
but Um, Tom had already brought this up. The the Death Star shot. The Death Star, it's when I look at a pinball machine, if you know if my wife's stepping up to the game, and usually you want to instruct, well, do that. Do that thing. Unfortunately, the coolest mech in the game, besides the magnet, the coolest mech in the game is the Death Star.
00:37:23
Speaker
But no casual is going to start Death Star multiple. That shot, I'm looking at it right now, that shot... It seems like the light lock target, the droid shot in front of the AT-AT, it looks like that shot is wider than the Death Star ramp.
00:37:41
Speaker
why that Why the AT-AT target isn't thinner to allow the Death Star ramp to be wider? I don't know. I don't know. But the Death Star ramp is a very tight shot.
00:37:55
Speaker
not Not only do you have to hit it, you have to hit it clean, though, because the way that the mech currently is designed, if that ball isn't clean, it is not going to stay locked in the Death Star. It's going to rattle in some way and come right back out.
00:38:10
Speaker
I've had a lot of rejects. Tom, you had a great quote. What did you say? The Death Star is rejecting me like women in high school. Something done like that. it was It was very funny. um no no Tom, but what are your thoughts on Death Star? Just tell us tell us all about it.
00:38:25
Speaker
I, it's weird. Cause like I'm my particular pro model game. I can backhand the death star just fine and and get it in, into the mechanism for a lock.
00:38:41
Speaker
But if I hit a clean shot from the left flip or excuse me, the right flipper, yeah. So left flipper backhand, I'm fine. Right flipper, right up the middle, right into the heart of it. And I i don't know if it air balls or something, but it does not go in.
00:39:00
Speaker
Yeah. And I don't know, and I'm not trying to discourage people that have it on order. I think i think Stern is very good at figuring out fixes or ways to adjust. I do have faith.
00:39:14
Speaker
that like this is an important mech. They've proven this many times on previous games. um Stranger Things is ah is a good example of the Demogorgon mech, of having to adjust it or making fits to make it so the mech works the way it's supposed to.
00:39:28
Speaker
I do think there will be ways to do that. I do think, though, and like if you turned off the motor of the Death Star, you can bash the Death Star all day long. That would be a very easy way to start to do virtual locks.
00:39:41
Speaker
You could do that. And i don't i I would never want somebody with a brand new game to just assume that, I'll just make it virtual and live that life. um I do think we will find way to that worked. Might as well just turn off the magnet.
00:39:54
Speaker
No, no. But the Death Star, I will say there is a very cool, when you start Death Star Multiball, when you finish it, is it is a very cool moment. It is a very cool mode, the way that they have that programmed. It just sucks that it's the hardest shot in the game.
00:40:11
Speaker
And it's also the coolest mech in the game. And that's unfortunate. It's kind of like the milk crate mech in Houdini. It's like, this is the coolest mech in the game, but no casual will ever see that ball thrown back because they're never going to hit that shot.
00:40:25
Speaker
I mean, you know, when it comes to the Star Wars, though, I mean, it can easily be coded around, right? You could make light speed have something to do with the Death Star at some point. Like you could always, I'm sure there's plenty of modes in there we just haven't discovered yet that has something to do with the Death Star besides Death Star multiball.
00:40:43
Speaker
you know? So, yeah. And I think too, you know, not to discourage people if they're wanting to play the game and this isn't the pinball company, Travis talking, this is like pinball player, Travis talking like everybody's going to have, everybody's going to have different opinions and different wants out of a game. Right? So if you're the type of player that wants a game, that's super fast, super challenging, and you enjoy star Wars,
00:41:11
Speaker
yeah this will be the game for you because it is star wars it does have the sounds to it it does have the music to it and the sounds sound excellent like i can't yeah really spot three for the small speakers the audio is really good well oh on your on your pro tom you don't have the tweeters i don't the tweeters are legit yeah the sound like audio the sound on this is crazy with the sound You know, it's funny. There's like, there's like a actual like metal plate that you can unscrew and it looks like you can add one.
00:41:45
Speaker
Oh, for sure. I think there, I think that's going to be upgradable. Like, I think that was something they talked about of all of, we're going to talk about spike three because I think it makes a year from now. Great.
00:41:57
Speaker
Well, that's why I'd like to wrap up what I was about say in a nice bow. Then we could talk about Spike 3 or whatever you guys want to talk about. that you know I think the thing that I would tell everybody if you're watching content or you're listening to people and you're kind of deciding whether or not, like just keep in mind, the track record of the people behind the software is great.
00:42:16
Speaker
really great Raymond's put out some bangers with. Yeah. Don't, don't get me wrong. I mean, i right I'm happy with the pro. I'm just saying that. Oh yeah. No, I'm saying there's just, there's a difference between like, of course we could talk about the play field design all day long, you know, cause the coders and the software people have to,
00:42:32
Speaker
have to work within the confines that they have. But I think that there's certain meat there software wise that you can go to places with. And I think if you're a star Wars fan, you like fast games, you'll probably like this.
00:42:43
Speaker
Now, if you prefer the L one layouts and you prefer dynamic layouts, then of course, like any logical person's going to tell you, yeah, this might not be the game for you. i mean, that's just the obvious thing because there's no upper flipper. The flow is a little bit different. Like it just, it just depends. Right. But that's,
00:43:02
Speaker
That's the difference. That's, that's, that's a stern way. Cause they put out several games a year that are all radically different from each other. so I, I don't want to I know we've said a lot of negative towards this, but I, I, what is Stern done very well? um Or what I, you know, pat on the back or where, where are they winning with star Wars?
00:43:19
Speaker
um They manufacture the games. know damn only Code animations. That's what I was going to say. they When they announce the game, it gets out. This is a brand new game and it's got this depth of code. Huge win.
00:43:32
Speaker
yeah they've like Really impressive. The layout's not a bad layout. I mean mean, it's not. it's It's just got some tight shots. and I like it better than the 2017.
00:43:44
Speaker
i do I do too. This game is more fun to shoot, in my opinion, than the Steve Ritchie Star Wars.
Comparisons and Technical Difficulties
00:43:51
Speaker
Yeah, I think I could probably agree to that overall. I think the only thing is, is I probably find, I find this new Star Wars more fun to shoot than the old Star Wars, but I find the Death Star shot when you hit it on the old Star Wars and you get like hyperspace multiball and you get like, you destroy the Death Star.
00:44:11
Speaker
Like I really want something like that in this game like um as well. Yeah, I mean, I guess on this i guess we could say moment, but I'm just talking about like, yeah, just like like, that's a wow factor to me when you're like cashing in a 20 or 40x hyperspace jackpot, right? There's no 40x in this. Well, oh yeah, yeah.
00:44:33
Speaker
Like we need Dwight to come in and just take the multipliers from two x to 200x, yeah. you kim You can loop the center ramp when you're in multi-ball and all of a sudden that's the that's your cash out shot. You can just boom, boom, with multiple balls.
00:44:47
Speaker
That's really a fun thing to do. Yeah, I mean, there's things there. I'm just saying like just that one specific shot that you're just like, okay, did it in victory. Yeah, I mean, it's kind of weird. It's like the totality of what Star Wars is the 2025, like better than 2017. just to find that one shot.
00:45:04
Speaker
e i just i would just want to find that one shot that exceeds the Death Star shot for me personally on 2017. Does that make sense?
00:45:14
Speaker
You should try draining and then saving the ball with your magnet. That's a pretty awesome shot. but The first time okay the first time i address first time I did it, it was pretty dope. I'm not going to lie because the ball actually staged where Yoda has the pinball right on him and it just stayed there. I wasn't sure what was happening. I'm like, is it supposed to come up? Why is it just there? So quickly hit the action button one more time.
00:45:36
Speaker
It just fired it straight up. yeahp I'm like, this is awesome. This is so cool. man And then it happened again and I hit it and nothing happened. I'm like, shit, I missed it. It's not so awesome right now. So I'm trying to figure out the timing. You'll find it. You'll find it. It's got drain better, Joel. That's all it is.
00:45:51
Speaker
If you have a Star Wars on order, I really i think you are i think you will really but like enjoy the game. As a Star Wars fan, you will really enjoy the game. But my question to you is, yeah I think a good comparison here is you have Star Wars, Stern Star Wars that just came out, and then you have...
00:46:05
Speaker
You have JJP's Harry Potter. So two ginormous themes. With that said, I'm going to start with Tom. which which of those Which one of those games do you feel they they they met the assignment better?
00:46:23
Speaker
Like huge themes. These should be cash cows, evergreen titles. They should make a ton of them. So with that audience in mind, With the audience being so big, which game do you think met the mark better?
00:46:36
Speaker
I'd have to say Harry Potter. And why is that? Just overall presentation. I mean, it's ah i mean right now, it's it's a hard it's a hard comparison because Harry Potter's been there.
00:46:53
Speaker
at least ah a little longer than star Wars. And, um but if, if we're talking, if we're talking like art packages and like play field layout and what you're getting, i would have to give the nod to Harry Potter.
00:47:11
Speaker
Okay. um Yeah, we could do that break. I i mean, i because I think they both go ahead. We know, maybe we don't know, but like Harry Potter is supposed to go to like the 1.0 code at Expo.
00:47:26
Speaker
And there's actually a beta. I haven't i haven't downloaded it yet because I just haven't had time. But um I plan to do it this weekend and check out what's what's changed. But, um you know,
00:47:41
Speaker
i don't I don't think we're going to see Star Wars finished till like the next three titles at Stern have been released. And that's just, and and that's not a knock to like, you know, the people on the code. That's just, that's just what's been presented to us the last year or two.
00:48:02
Speaker
So, you know, that's where I'm saying it's like a very hard comparison because the game's not going to be finished for for a year. All the modes aren't going to be in the game in Star There's a ton. I mean, there's already more modes in the game than I think most people could even work through.
00:48:20
Speaker
there's are There's a ton there. The game's far from shallow. But when I think of the audience, the question that I have, and... and ah my view is I kind of think there are areas that both of the games have missed the mark. And what what i mean by that is yeah if this game is supposed to be for such a huge audience, that means a lot of novice, a lot of casual players.
00:48:41
Speaker
In my opinion, both of them have challenging layouts. Like they're both, they both like the speed at which the ball comes back on Harry Potter. Yeah. I think is very challenging. And then just the overall, ah like, I think they both have very challenging layouts for, for novice players. And then I both think,
00:48:57
Speaker
The complexity of the code is there's so much going on in both of them. I think it would be very hard for a novice to know what they're doing or how they're doing it ah without instruction or somebody showing them what to do. Now, Star Wars does a good job of like you qualify mode by hitting standups. You can fall into a mode. Essentially, it's any standup is your spelling force. And then any major shot will start a mode. So I think novice, any novice should be able to start a mode pretty easily on Star Wars.
00:49:25
Speaker
We've already talked about this on Harry Potter. You got to hit the scoop shot. well So you got to be, you got to hope you get in the scoop shot. Yeah. I, I think what's interesting with Harry Potter and star Wars, like if I was to compare both and again, this is just me. Like, I know people are gonna be like, well, you don't sell JJP. So you're just saying like, you know, this is, this is me, the pinball player speaking. I think what's unique to me,
00:49:44
Speaker
is that if I look at Harry Potter and Star Wars together, i see Harry Potter as more like it's the world, right? Of Harry Potter. Like that, like I feel like that's the world of like its whole universe that it has compared to what I see on Star Wars.
00:50:00
Speaker
But yet when I start playing the game, I feel like when I play Star Wars, I'm actually experiencing Star Wars. Whereas if I play Harry Potter, I don't feel like I'm necessarily experiencing Harry Potter unless I go to very specific places with the game, like very specifically focused on like the upper play field, like going for the schnitt or whatever that's called. i just just I disagree with that. I just feel like you don't know like the lessons. Like I still, I played it a couple of times. I still don't even know.
00:50:31
Speaker
When I'm in the lessons, when I'm in Han versus Greedo, I know damn well I'm in Han versus Greedo in Star Wars. Like that's the difference. Hey, Tom's going tell why tom why tell him Tell him why he's wrong.
00:50:45
Speaker
Joel, that was interesting. You sounded like you just became AI digitized. Oh, for real? Oh, I came in weird. Oh, that's weird. I was saying that ah nothing looked weird on my end. Nothing worked weird. on Sorry, guys. ah These are not the droids you're looking for.
00:51:01
Speaker
they're They're on to us. sounded exactly like C-3PO. Oh, that's really... I hope that comes through the major in the end recording. What I was saying was, Tom... See, and I disagree with Travis because when I play Harry Potter and I'm i'm actually in a movie...
00:51:19
Speaker
ah it it follows the movie sequence. So whereas like where Star Wars, it's like, okay, sometimes I'm in like, you know, A New Hope and sometimes I'm in Return of the Jedi and sometimes I'm in Empire Strikes Back. And, you know, it... it it And I'm not saying that's bad, think more...
00:51:44
Speaker
i think i think there's more um cohesiveness in, in some of those lessons with, uh, with Harry Potter, then, then. Yeah. I mean, if if you're talking about sequential order, if you're able to absolutely like pay attention to it, then yeah, of course, because they have the movie separated from each other. So they have their own little ecosystems built in Whereas, you know, with star Wars, you're not necessarily going into and saying, I'm playing a new hope.
00:52:15
Speaker
Right now and I'm gonna I'm gonna go through all the battles of a new hope like um I don't know I mean it would have been cool if they would have done something like that but I think even if I pick like say Movie three from Harry Potter, right?
00:52:29
Speaker
Like once I get a ball and a flipper, there's so many lights going on and so many things stacking up on each other. Like, I don't know where I'm at in that particular movie at that point. I just know I'm in the movie.
00:52:41
Speaker
So i'm trying to play the movie in my head. Now, kudos to anybody else that knows exactly where they're at in the movie. I just know I'm not skillful enough to realize that unless I'm like trapping up. looking up and figuring it out that's just that's just how i feel when i'm playing it whereas with star wars it's not as much yeah with star wars unless like if raymond all of a sudden or andrew decided just to latch on like 30 things on top of han versus grito then i'd be a little bit more confused but maybe it's just my eighth brain i can't process that much at any given time it's overlap versus focused and that's something that
00:53:13
Speaker
Harry Potter has zero hesitation with the overlap. You can have, you can have a lot going on all at once while star Wars. It's very focused. It's very focused of you are going to have, am I, am I really, i sound weird again.
00:53:32
Speaker
I mean, not as weird as you usually do, but I mean, it's kind of like you're like a chat GPT AI right now gone broke. I mean, if it's Bench. Robot Joel.
00:53:45
Speaker
If it's consistent. Joel's been replaced. If it's, uh, is it still that way? Cause if we need to stop and restart. No, you
Spike 3 Platform Improvements
00:53:54
Speaker
sound great, buddy. You sound great. Let's just push forward. Let's, let's go ahead and stop then. And then we'll, we'll do a new recording here.
00:54:00
Speaker
We're back. I don't, I'm going to have to edit that way. Apparently I was sounding like a robot. I have no idea if that's going to sound, if that's going to be in the final. all Well, I have to edit the trans the cut. We started a new whatever. Here we are. ah We realized we have like 20 minutes left. So we've got to wrap this. This is how you drain properly. So Stern, make your LEs better.
00:54:26
Speaker
a
00:54:29
Speaker
How do you really feel, Tom? Okay, we're going to talk about Expo, but it's ah the reality is there's there's a lot that JGP has done right with Harry Potter. There's a lot that Stern has done right with Star Wars.
00:54:41
Speaker
And when you have themes that are that big... There's no way to be perfect. There's no way to to do whatever. It's just to me, it it is surprising that I think both of them have somewhat challenging layouts when this is such when there's such big themes like they didn't they didn't simplify, in my opinion. They didn't make it like, well, let's make it a an easy shooter. Like um I just keep thinking of a Medieval Madness because that was the last game that was in in the house where it's very friendly, like ah a more friendly shooter.
00:55:06
Speaker
So ah we want to talk about Spike 3. We want to talk about Spike 3. We're going to keep it short and sweet. What do we like or what's exciting to me? This is Stern's platform moving forward. What do I see that's in Spike 3 that I'm excited about?
00:55:18
Speaker
The one thing we all agreed on, the bigger screen is awesome. I really like that. um They found a way to add a bigger screen without it feeling like they didn't go to JJP level where it's this massive, like the whole back box. You still have an awesome Translite.
00:55:33
Speaker
The way they squeeze this this screen in, it's the same size. um Rayman did say this is a 1080p screen. It's actually 1920 by 1080. The previous one was closer to like 720 resolution.
00:55:46
Speaker
resolution And the DPI is higher on this screen. So the the image quality, like it looks like the blacks are richer. the The screen is bigger. It does genuinely look like a better screen.
00:55:58
Speaker
And I am a fan. I am definitely a fan of the screen. um The audio, I have not heard the Pro, but the LE has their smaller speakers, but there's tweeters. I do think the audio sounds better. It's fuller.
00:56:10
Speaker
It's more crisp. The fact that the audio is better, fantastic improvement. Things I don't like. i don't like the expression speaker lights. I don't, I like the look of these more.
00:56:24
Speaker
and And one of the reasons is the plate that they have to diffuse the light, it's all white. So now it just looks like you have white speakers, like big white rectangles.
00:56:35
Speaker
And I just, I don't like it. And when you actually look at the speaker lights themselves, there's not many LEDs in there. So if they would added other LEDs in the white open areas,
00:56:46
Speaker
Maybe, maybe that would look better, but I'd be curious if somebody is going to make it where it's like make a black plate, but only show two white rings. Maybe that would look better in my mind than the large white rectangle. I don't love it.
00:56:59
Speaker
I don't love it. Um, one change I did see. go ahead. No, that I was just going to say they can just put a like a black, something black behind it. yeah I think there's going to be something to do. i just don't like how it's all white.
00:57:13
Speaker
Modders, you heard Joel. Yeah, there's your idea. um What I will say is... On the CPU board itself, there are three header pins for, or three areas for, it says cabinet accessory, um speaker accessory, and topper accessory. So i in those those and this one, the speaker accessory and the cabinet accessory are plugged directly into it. So there's no separate node board for expression lights on this game.
00:57:40
Speaker
So it's very clear to me, I think moving forward, The capability of having expression lighting is going to be right there for them to use on every game. Now, whether or not the designer decides to use it, I don't know. And then on Star Wars, you know, they made the decision that the pros won't have, like, it's not routed in the cabinet. You can't put expression lights into the pro.
00:58:00
Speaker
Um, But there's no, no, but like it's all there. So I'm excited. I'm excited for what the platform is. Is it as game changing revolutionary industry, you know, first as we kind of thought it could be no, but is it an improvement on spike too? I do. I do think is it's an improvement on spike too.
00:58:20
Speaker
Um, So we'll have to wait and see on on what's next because, the you know, Goma has already said not everything Spike 3 is in this game. So we'll have to see beyond that. Travis, any thoughts? You have not said a word since we restarted. I mean, machine it's it's Spike 3. It's been interesting. I think one of the things I noticed right off the bat when they first put out the trailers and everything, I think I told you guys this immediately. I'm like, it's...
00:58:43
Speaker
Interesting that they're leading talking about the spike three platform when the majority of people that see this will not care. no idea what it is. Yeah. Yeah. They just, they won't know. Right. So I've kind of found that in us pushing the game in our own company marketing, we haven't even like made any mentions of spike three at all. Like it's just, just because I think when people are buying a game, a pinball, they're not buying the platform.
00:59:10
Speaker
Like they're just not, they're buying the theme, they're buying the fun. It's like, how how do you explain to somebody because it says spike three, like that would insinuate that they're huge fans of spike two, right? It'd be like, if you're buying a console game of Xbox or PlayStation, you're already an Xbox or PlayStation fan. So you're excited about the PlayStation five existing.
00:59:31
Speaker
But that being said, like, of course, yeah, the sound sounds great and all that. I think it's just, I found it fascinating how they decided to lead with Spike 3 stuff beyond or above what this game actually is on, you know, on any of the promo stuff. So it's kind of like, it's kind of working through that too, because we we've sent some, obviously we've sold some of the Star Wars games.
00:59:55
Speaker
And what I found most fascinating about it is the people that we didn't mention spike three, two or anything like that, even setting up the games, they didn't even realize even while playing it, that the LCD was bigger, right? They noticed the sound, they noticed the sound, but they didn't realize. And I had to point it out to them and they're like, and they're looking at it, looking at their other games or they're kind of like, okay, it's still screen. What's the difference? And I'm like, Oh, it's a little bit bigger. Right. And so then it, then it clicks off, but that just goes to show you it's, um,
01:00:25
Speaker
It's interesting what people value. And even we went to a recent show that was 95% new people to pinball, right? Yeah. And they were all far more fascinated with what was under that glass than anything Well, I wanted to test it out.
01:00:43
Speaker
And that's the key, right? Like if we're trying to get this product and expand pinball, right? In order to expand, that means you've got to find somebody that's new.
01:00:54
Speaker
you so find somebody that's new, then they're going to see pinball. Do they want to know what's under the glass or do they want to know what the platform is? I get you. And I understand if you crack dealer, yeah that's just that's just the interesting part to me. So I, I just, I find it fascinating that that's what's being led with that. I'm not saying it's not cool. I'm not saying the screen isn't you know beautiful. I'm not saying the sound, like the sound is fantastic.
01:01:21
Speaker
I just really wonder, you know, I don't think people are going to care about it near as much as some people think. Like, I think it's just going to take a long time for people to really, like, maybe the cabinet's going to change with the next one because we keep hearing, right, that yeah that not everything's in there. So it's like, but yet some of the Spike 3 stuff has came out recently before Star Wars. So I'm more curious to see what will the full package look like And what does that equate to for the end user? Like, how does that benefit the end user for a more fun experience overall when playing and dealing with their pinball machine?
01:02:00
Speaker
Yeah. I hear you and I hear what you're saying. I mean, you have more experience in this than me, but if, if novice are looking at games and they're like, well, we could get this or this. And they're like, well, that one, that screens three inches bigger. So let's get the one that's like, like anybody looking at it, not even novice, like anybody. I mean, course. Yeah. I see people that are brand new to pinball all the time. And I I've never led, I've never led what's dreamed by. I will say this. I will admit this.
01:02:24
Speaker
When you get somebody that's brand new to pinball, And you point out that there's movie assets. Like that's cool to them. They find it that's cool. They just, they never notice it at the beginning just because they're so focused, laser focused pinball. you should be focused on the game, the pinball, the physical. Yes, yeah I see what you're saying. I just, yeah what I think is the improvements that they made. I like the improvements that they made and I'm excited to see what they make with this platform going forward. so there's two of them. There's two things that I'm really happy that they made. The sound.
01:02:55
Speaker
And the HDMI out, like on a personal level, I'm ecstatic about HDMI out. That is awesome. I mean, I've streamed the game twice to have one cable. One cable is the only thing I got to plug into the game.
01:03:07
Speaker
And then I've already configured my end here to get it to work with sound and audio where it's just like, boom, re reliable consistency. It's just, boom, I'm plugging one cable in. And I got direct audio and and HDMI. I think for for people that are getting new into creating content, the fact that you won't have to buy, you know, hunt down one of these boards to do the LVDS direct capture is is awesome. I think this is this is it's it's it's ah it's a tool that that i I'm surprised that Stern did, but I'm so glad they did it.
01:03:37
Speaker
This is another reason I'm mad at Stern. Travis has a bunch of those boards. Joel has a bunch of those boards. I'm buying all the LEs and streaming them.
01:03:48
Speaker
I have one Stern board. They haven't sent me any boards. This board is the one that you get out of Australia. ah that That's where I get my from. Yeah, they're great. uh okay so spike spike three boom check um we only have uh 13 minutes left 13 minutes so we got a rapid fire rapid fire uh pinball expo we're gonna be there tom's gonna be in the streaming room uh if you if you say hi to tom uh bring him food um but yes tom will be in the streaming room uh i will be walking around travis will be rocking around you don't have a booth you're not a booth babe this this uh
01:04:24
Speaker
this one right no no there's yeah no chance ever i would not i don't want to work a boot at booth at expo ever again okay so travis will be walking around um game rumors let's talk about game rumors yes so there's oh rumor i thought you said like ru i thought you meant rumor as an r-o-o-m-e-r-s i'm like is that something new okay no rumors okay Let's just go through the... ah So, American Pinball, I don't know what they're doing. They're hinting at something, but I don't even know if it's pinball or if it's redemption game. I don't know what's going on. Wait, American Pinball has a move there?
01:05:00
Speaker
I think they've... I don't know. I know there's something. Okay. Okay. CGC should have medieval madness Merlins. They should probably also have cactus canyons with the new kits. Definitely play the game with the new kit.
01:05:12
Speaker
Um, I know barrels of fun. We'll be there with Dune. Uh, they've already said that they're trying to set up some games in some different areas for you to really experience the sound and the lighting and go play that. Cause that's such a unique experience. It's like the house system. I think is what they call it. Right. Yeah. I want to really check out Dune.
Anticipation for New Pinball Releases
01:05:29
Speaker
yeah dune is The sound and the lights are just... Yeah, it's wild. like i still I think it's underrated for the pinball industry. It's so really good. yeah And that's the game my wife keeps talking about, which she doesn't talk about pinball, but Dune really made an impact on her. If you don't give your wife a Dune, I'm going to slap you. I know. I really...
01:05:48
Speaker
can't You notice how every game that his wife likes, he's like, okay, it's gone. It's one. It's one game. It's one game she would want. beats You just said she liked Medieval Madness.
01:05:58
Speaker
Okay, so she's liked some more than others, but like she wasn't like, hey. She liked Stranger Things hitting the Demogorgon. Where's that at? Yeah. yeah I think Dune, if I was to buy a game... Tom, are you seeing it? Yeah, Jared and my brother and Nicole would both want Dune. Maybe I should just buy one.
01:06:15
Speaker
But it's really good. It's Joel's passive-aggressive behavior. David, did you hear that? I think Joel just said, we're going to take Joel from maybe I should just buy one to I'm going to buy one. I'm going to do this for David. Okay, you need a Dune, Joel.
01:06:28
Speaker
I know. If only you knew somebody that sells Dunes. If only... news if only... I had an opportunity to buy one, and then I bought X-Men. Yeah, how's that working out for you?
01:06:40
Speaker
I think I'm muted. I sneeze. X-Men, I'm enjoying X-Men. I'm still holding out hope. The code is still... It's still coming along, but it's getting better. Where is it? I do enjoy X-Men. Right there?
01:06:50
Speaker
Oh, okay. Oh, the code. Oh, I see. Oh. Nicole doesn't like it, so it's going to stay for a long time. Has generic Stern topper on it. Yeah, I hope they release that. So, Stern, is there a chance...
01:07:02
Speaker
It would be amazing if they released some accessories before ah Expo. They've done that before to a release some accessories that people get to see at Expo. And also, if you guys remember last year, they released Metallica Remake right before Expo.
01:07:17
Speaker
I don't know. I don't know if they're releasing anything before Expo. would be cool if they did. But I don't know. So Stern might have something new. I don't know. Otherwise, play Star Wars. Regardless, play Star Wars when you're at Expo. We keep hearing rumors about an alleged Walking Dead remake. Walking Dead remake, which I don't know.
01:07:39
Speaker
we will have to i We will have to see if that's a thing. We will know more in a week. How excited are you for a Walking Dead remastered? I streamed Walking Dead a few weeks back and actually really had a great time with that game. yeah um so Would I ever own it? No, it's disgusting.
01:07:55
Speaker
um my It's disgusting, that game. But I'm very curious to see what direction they go with with the remake, whether or not they change the art or what the LCD is. But the code, I really i really enjoyed that game when I had it. So i I would absolutely be excited for a remake to play it and um and stream that.
01:08:13
Speaker
um JJP is going to be having Harry Potter's. im Personally, I'm excited to play. i want to play the arcade edition and the wizard just because I want to see how different it is. But I do want to play it more, especially with the finished code, the 1.0 code that'll be there.
01:08:27
Speaker
Spooky will be there. i don't think they're in a position to release their next game. So I guess it'll just be Evil Dead. With that said, they've had a lot more code to Evil Dead since last time I played it. So I'm i'm looking forward to playing that game more um myself.
Expo Attendance and Merchandise
01:08:43
Speaker
Uh, what else do we have? I assume Turner pinball be there with Merlin's arcade. It'll be cool to see those guys again. i don't know if multimorphic is going to be there. If they are, I would assume that they'll have, I i would want to play that game. Yeah. I would assume a distributor usually is there, uh, from, with a piece from them with a, with P3. Uh, yeah, there's a lot to, who are we forgetting?
01:09:05
Speaker
There's, uh, I don't know. There's like 75 companies spooky. Maybe. I would say it should be here Pinball Adventures I don't know what's naming off people I just don't know if there's going to be new games DPX Are there going to be statues of Bally Williams stuff Is Cary Hardy going to be walking around with those everywhere Maybe that's what Stern should do That's a great idea If Stern really wants to move Star Wars units They need to like start selling Star Wars figurines I don't know why they haven't thought of that yet
01:09:37
Speaker
I do personally think they should, that there should be pit more pinball merch. I've always thought that I think as cool as the artwork is, why, why every, why every game doesn't have a t-shirt or something related to that. I don't know.
01:09:50
Speaker
ah now I understand apparel probably is a whole nother license. There's probably only a reason. Oh, there here we go Yeah. But I do wish there was more merch. One thing I have not asked for though is what are you going to do with more? What are you goingnna do with more merch?
01:10:04
Speaker
and you wear You just want more lunch boxes. That's all you want. I guarantee people would just be handing Joel stuff as he's there. So don't worry about it. would love more shirts.
01:10:14
Speaker
I would love more shirts. This is like a backdoor way for Joel to get free stuff. That's not what I'm saying. When i I think of pinball. Hey, everybody out there listening. You know what I really want? New hubcaps for my golf cart. You bought, God.
01:10:30
Speaker
You buy the machine, you buy accessories for the machine. just want Stern Pro Circuit hat. That's all I ask for. That's merch. That's what saying. know, but I want one. Okay. Do they make one?
01:10:42
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, apparently Alwyn has one. well, talk to him. I'm not stealing Keith's hat. No, Keith is finishing at every single every single design, right? So he's probably finishing all the merch. Yeah.
01:10:58
Speaker
One man band over at Stern, yeah.
Expo Interaction and Presentation
01:11:00
Speaker
I just thought we have seven minutes left. So ah reality is we will all be at Expo. If you see us, come say hi. We'd love to talk to you. Aren't you doing like a... I am doing a presentation. panel, yes. What's your presentation about?
01:11:12
Speaker
Pinball Media Creation. Jack Engelbert. Jack Engelbert, yeah. media creation okay it's me and uh loser kids and my brother and retro ralph and honestly our outline for the presentation is very small so it's really it's shocker if you guys are there feel free to come ah we're gonna have a lot of audience at participation or just questions i don't i don't know i don't know what people want to hear i would love to do a streaming uh seminar Yes, that would be that. And I would just bring everybody to my booth during Expo.
01:11:49
Speaker
beat like you Don't touch that. yeah No, see that. Don't touch that. We and so we do have a seminar. It's I think it's a it's either 10 or 11 on Friday. So come. Oh, they gave you the prime time then.
01:12:03
Speaker
Sure. Right. I don't Jared and I get there Friday morning. ah is it in the morning? Saturday late. Yes. Joel, how much are you paid to do this? I get a free ticket to Expo.
01:12:15
Speaker
So ah nice yeah, if you present, you get a ticket to Expo. So I got a, so Jared and I get free tickets Expo, or at least that's what Josh Roop is telling me. So if I go to check in and they're like, we don't have you on the list, we'll be in trouble.
01:12:27
Speaker
So we'll have to figure that out. Yeah. Check under Jack. See you later. Let me see. What time are you doing this Thursday? Friday. Yep. And in the morning, the morning, the morning, the morning, the during the Stern tour, probably there'll probably be four people in the audience, but you know what?
01:12:47
Speaker
I think we'll have a great conversation with the four people. And, um, uh, isn't that when you usually, you and Jared usually come in and announce in my booth. I will gladly commentate whenever you need me to commentate. Oh, there you are. Yeah. Joel Engelbert flipping out and triple drain.
01:13:04
Speaker
I thought it was Jack. It was Jack originally. They changed it to Joel, but his last name's still Engelbert, though. Okay, forgot the h It's fine. I'm calling you that from now on, Mr. Engelbert. We'll be at um I can't wait to hear from Ralph and Josh, though. I bet they have some good stuff to talk about.
01:13:22
Speaker
yeah I know. and Your brother's not even on there either. I know, I think Jared's going to have a mic, so he'll plenty to talk about. joe Yeah, I want to hear what Jared has to say. Can you get Ralph's autograph for me? sure Sure. I'll get right on that. Yep.
01:13:35
Speaker
Thank you. Um, we got four minutes. Travis said very clearly that he had to leave. He's got, I have to go to the man doctor. Okay. a man doctor I'm 41 years old. i got to have 40 year old. Enjoy your prostate exam.
01:13:48
Speaker
I don't think it's that yet. I didn't have to do like any, uh, what you call it? Fasting or anything like that. So no blood work. your elbows on the table. yeah yeah Cough twice. yeah Yeah. You'll love it.
01:14:02
Speaker
Anyways, let's wrap it up. Let's wrap it up because we're already at that point. Tom, you go first. are wrapping right now? Oh, we're ending it. We're plugging. Let's plug it up. plugging. Let's plug.
01:14:14
Speaker
I'm streaming Expo on my Foxy's Pinball channel on Twitch. Otherwise, look for me here on Triple Drain. There you go. Travis, go for it. Yeah, I'm Travis. I'm right here on Triple Drain. You can find me also on the Pinball Company YouTube channel. And then you can also find me in the audience heckling Joel whenever his thing is.
01:14:36
Speaker
And then, I think you're busy. i would lie yeah I'll try. I'll try to get there. There's just so much going on. I think I might be at the media mixer if I can make it up there in time because I'm playing certain pro circuit event. and I got to do all this other stuff, too. I would have loved to do the media mixer on Thursday, but yeah, we we can't head out until Friday. But you're big leaguing all of us. And then you're giving like a panel about media creation.
01:15:00
Speaker
Yeah. Children, man. It's crazy. Engelbert. Let me tell be there. We'll be there. um Yes. Please come say hi. And I'm Joel. I do the flipping out YouTube stream every Wednesday. And then also this obviously triple drain.
01:15:11
Speaker
So check out all that. um But yeah, I, we will probably hopefully record again soon because if there's something announced at expo, it'll be fun to talk about, but ah also it'll be fun just to um discuss what we did at expo. So hopefully we we can record again within the next few weeks and and knock one out, which, yeah, we just, this was a long gap between our last recording and this one. So hopefully that won't happen again. But please come say hi. If you're at Expo, please come say It will.
01:15:39
Speaker
Spoiler alert. It totally will. to Tom and I have other stuff to do, Joel. Like we have contract negotiations. We have, I mean, yeah, we have streaming. I get I mean, I don't stream, but I'm sure I i would have streaming if I did.
01:15:53
Speaker
If you're, yeah. No, i actually I actually look forward to seeing you two. So it'll be fun. Can't wait. It'll be, look forward to it. Expo is always a good time. no know Not only to see you guys, but just to meet people and talk. And there's so many great people there.
01:16:05
Speaker
ah Please say hi to people. And if you're waiting in line, talk to the person you're waiting in line. Like everybody there loves pinball. Make a friend. Just be social. Have a great time. um Where deodorant. Make friend. Yes. Where deodorant.
01:16:20
Speaker
And if you're, if you've, just There's a t-shirt merch, Joe. if you've started if you finish a game, behind you before you start another one. ah don't yeah Don't spend 40 minutes on ah on a pinball game.
01:16:34
Speaker
like just If there's people behind you, let them play. but it's Have a great time. have a great time yeah Don't start a four-player game. that's that's just If it's just you, don't do right don't do it. yeah You deserve to be slapped.
01:16:48
Speaker
and On that note, ah Tom, you get the last words. Have fun at Expo.