Transcript
Speaker: Thanks for tuning in to episode 111.
Speaker: This is the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
Speaker: I am Josh Roop.
Speaker: I need to remember to announce myself.
Speaker: And my co-captain with me, as always.
Speaker: Scott Larson.
Speaker: And Scott, it's funny that you got that message that, like, I need to – it's funny because I've never thought about introducing myself.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And it wasn't until recently, until, like, I don't know, about 20 episodes ago.
Speaker: Mike, I probably should say who my name is too.
Speaker: Well, I just want all the glory.
Speaker: It's fine.
Speaker: It's fine.
Speaker: That's fine.
Speaker: I just assume everyone knows who I am.
Speaker: So if you, it sounds like Foo Fighters are getting lined up to start hitting the line here in July.
Speaker: There's still some Iron Maiden pros.
Speaker: I picked one up as you can see there in the corner.
Speaker: If you're watching us on YouTube, an amazing game.
Speaker: Scott, where do you get all your games from?
Speaker: Flipping out pinball and absolutely.
Speaker: And guess what is coming soon?
Speaker: I just got the shipping notice.
Speaker: It's my Godzilla topper.
Speaker: I was going to say venom.
Speaker: So yeah, yeah, no, no.
Speaker: So I got the narwhal topper coming, but I've heard that it looks a lot better in person.
Speaker: So even though I've been a little frustrated with their topper efforts, I am excited to see this one because the, I am sucker for light shows and I'm sucker for the immersion experience.
Speaker: So I still, I got my Rush Topper too.
Speaker: So I got, it's two for toppers.
Speaker: So I got my Rush Topper and I got my Godzilla Topper and got it from Zach and Nicole Minia flipping out pinball.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: You got to order from flipping out.
Speaker: They've got plenty of stock and they're willing to work with you on what your needs are and whatnot.
Speaker: They're great to work with.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: I've never had any issues with them.
Speaker: So let's move on to our guest.
Speaker: Our guest contacted me.
Speaker: I want to say it's been a couple months ago.
Speaker: And at first I didn't know if it was real or not because you get fake emails every once in a while and they're like, you know, the prince of Saudi Arabia wants to give you money.
Speaker: So wait, wait, that's a fake.
Speaker: We, we had someone reach out wanting to discuss pinball because they do the 99% invisible podcast.
Speaker: We got talking.
Speaker: They left a phone number and I figure if they're brave enough to leave a phone number, I better call it.
Speaker: So I met Martin Gonzalez and we started kicking it off and talking a lot.
Speaker: And he was a fan of the L1 episodes we'd done.
Speaker: And he was doing a bit of research for the 99% Invisible podcast.
Speaker: And it sounds like you have a ton of behind the scenes extra info that you weren't able to, you know, you have only like 30 minutes to do this episode.
Speaker: And so we wanted you to come on and come hang out with us and talk about this.
Speaker: Yeah, half that even because it was half and half.
Speaker: We reran an older episode and then I did some new stuff and it was about Roger Sharp.
Speaker: And so when I first started working the show, you know, I found this story about Roger Sharp and I was like,
Speaker: oh, this would be an awesome story.
Speaker: This would be so cool.
Speaker: And then I did what I always do when I have a story idea, which is I type in 99PI and then the story thing.
Speaker: So I typed in 99PI pinball and it popped right up.
Speaker: I was like, ah, they did it 10 years ago, of course.
Speaker: It's like one of the oldest running podcasts from when people were first trying to get into podcasts.
Speaker: And so what I did is the first half...
Speaker: I use the Roger Sharp movie as an excuse to be like, OK, we'll rerun this old one.
Speaker: And I mix the show every week.
Speaker: So I gave it a fresh mix, put some new music on there, just spruced it up a little.
Speaker: And then second half I did, you know, I interviewed Keith.
Speaker: I talked about my turn and stuff.
Speaker: But yeah, I only had, I think, like 12 minutes for my segment.
Speaker: So I.
Speaker: really had to pack a lot in there and i knew i wanted to talk to keith but i i just like couldn't find an email address you know like i think by design i'm sure but uh i was like emailing whatever stern generic emails i could find and so then i was like well these guys had them on they'll be able to get me in touch and you guys put me in touch uh and you know we had this great interview but uh
Speaker: You know, it was like we talked for an hour and I pulled maybe like five or six clips of him.
Speaker: I was like, oh, there's so much good stuff I can't put in.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But yeah, I really appreciated the help.
Speaker: And, you know, I played a little clip of you guys also saying like, oh, he's the goat.
Speaker: Like, yeah.
Speaker: I put a montage of people saying he's the goat because I tried to get him to say, yeah, he won't.
Speaker: He won't.
Speaker: He would not.
Speaker: So I was like, all right, I got to pull some other people calling him the goat.
Speaker: We we actually have a shirt on our so silver ball swag.
Speaker: If you want to get loser kid stuff, we actually made a funny shirt that has Keith as the as a goat, a cartoon goat wearing wearing this hat that I'm wearing right now, the old hat.
Speaker: And it's just for fun.
Speaker: But it's hilarious.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then Josh and I ended up just getting on this free-ranging conversation because, you know, it's like I used to be a music guy before I was doing podcasts.
Speaker: I was like touring around with bands, like doing sound.
Speaker: I talked about this a lot on the episode, but like I'd use like the...
Speaker: I think it was called Pin Finder.
Speaker: Is that separate from Pinball Map?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Yeah, I did not.
Speaker: This was like 10 years ago.
Speaker: There was a pretty bare bones.
Speaker: I think it was called Pin Finder.
Speaker: There was a Pin Map, I know for sure, like Pinball Map too.
Speaker: Yeah, so I use Pinball Map now.
Speaker: I can't remember if it's the same map or something different.
Speaker: I was touring with Blitzen Trapper, this Portland band, when I was living there.
Speaker: One of the guitar players is super into pinball.
Speaker: It's just a huge thing in Portland.
Speaker: We'd go cruise around every city, try and find one, and you'd be like...
Speaker: oh, Louisville, Kentucky has like a lot of cool machines because they have like all this bootlegging and gambling and stuff.
Speaker: So like, oh, what a great hotspot.
Speaker: You know, so we just cruise around and try and like play.
Speaker: And then, yes, are doing podcasts just before the pandemic.
Speaker: I was working on Rick Rubin's show before Malcolm Gladwell.
Speaker: And I've been working in IAMPI for like a year and a half.
Speaker: But yeah, before that, like up until then, I was a music guy.
Speaker: So Josh and I were like vibing about music and like just talking about that.
Speaker: Like his touring days too.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which was very short, but it was still fun.
Speaker: Did you guys do Warped Tour?
Speaker: I forget what you told me.
Speaker: Was it Warped Tour?
Speaker: We did get to play a couple dates, but it wasn't a full tour.
Speaker: But I actually was the...
Speaker: was the dad of the group.
Speaker: So, you know, I was on the booking the shows and doing all that stuff.
Speaker: And so,
Speaker: It kind of got, I don't know, you can only be a dad for so long because it's like, okay, children, I'm done.
Speaker: Yeah, that was my job too whenever I tour.
Speaker: There were a few times where I would be like, I'm like 27, but this band is 23 or 24 and I'm like wrangling people who are partying.
Speaker: It just like got so exhausting.
Speaker: But I did a lot of touring with older bands.
Speaker: Like I tour with Calexico a lot who are all like older guys and it's like much chiller.
Speaker: Blitz and Trapper, those guys were older, you know, so it's, it was a mixture, but yeah, being a tar dad, it's like so exhausting and you know, well, it's weird.
Speaker: Cause like you said, you did 10 years ago and I, that's about when I did, it was about 10, 15 years ago.
Speaker: And it's like, it almost feels like a different world from back then, especially when you move on with life and whatnot.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: It just, it's, it's weird.
Speaker: Just, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, it's like I used to drive for like six hours a day and now I just like click on Pro Tools all day, which is like fun, too.
Speaker: And like I get to research cool stuff and do cool stories.
Speaker: But yeah.
Speaker: And, you know, when we were talking about podcast stuff and like podcasting, I think is a similar place to music where like you're trying to get like the money.
Speaker: There's a lot of money, but it's in weird places and maybe you can chip off a little piece of it.
Speaker: But like it's there's like such a divide.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I feel really lucky.
Speaker: Like we're part of Sirius XM and we're like well funded.
Speaker: We've been around forever.
Speaker: So there's like, you know, it's like stable and nice, but like, oh my God, my old job just laid off like 20% of their work for there's like layoffs.
Speaker: Podcasting is this in this really chaotic space.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: You know, I the stuff I do is like dense research, sound design, whatever.
Speaker: And but what I listen to a lot is more like what you guys are doing, where it's just like a couple of people chatting, having a nice time.
Speaker: Like and it's like a lot easier.
Speaker: I think the whole thing is moving more in that direction because it's like we spend months on a story and it's resource intensive.
Speaker: And so there's only so many shows that can do that.
Speaker: Like, you know.
Speaker: Every story we do goes through like five or six rounds of edits of everyone on staff weighing in and there's like 13 or 14 of us and like, you know, it's very elaborate and there's like, oh, you guys can just call each other up and call someone like I'm jealous of how easy this is.
Speaker: What's funny is like, so I went to Puerto Rico in January and we were doing this like food tour and we got to revolve around through the couples that were there on the tour.
Speaker: We met a gentleman that worked for NPR and he was actually working for CNN when the towers got hit.
Speaker: Oh my God.
Speaker: Doing that.
Speaker: And then he also came to Utah and covered the Emily Smart story, which if you're not familiar with that, go ahead and I guess Google it.
Speaker: It was,
Speaker: It was pretty intense for us in Utah at that time.
Speaker: It was kind of like a shocker.
Speaker: We went from like a, you know, everyone left their doors unlocked to like, this could actually happen because it was in our backyard.
Speaker: It was a child kidnapping.
Speaker: Anywho, but he was talking about he worked, he works now for the very first, it's like PBS.
Speaker: It's the channel actually Sesame Street started out on before it went to PBS.
Speaker: But they figured out during the pandemic that this format is a lot cheaper to run
Speaker: people actually want to watch it.
Speaker: And they were finding out like they're spending all this money on cameras and all this like high definition equipment.
Speaker: And you got us doing this off of like my, this is my cell phone and my laptop.
Speaker: And they were realizing, oh, we, we don't need to be spending all this money on equipment and still we can get a good product that people are going to watch.
Speaker: And so COVID really shifted the mindset of, of how production should happen as well.
Speaker: And to be fair, like the equipment that we have now is crazy good compared to what it was even like five, 10 years ago.
Speaker: Yes, you're right.
Speaker: I'm talking on a newer microphone and a newer computer, but this kind of stuff would be crazy expensive 20 years ago.
Speaker: Well, I'm here in Stitcher's studios, which are quite nice.
Speaker: It's a real luxury to be able to record in this nice booth and sound good.
Speaker: And I engineer recordings for other podcasts.
Speaker: And then also I mix ours.
Speaker: And it just sounds incredible in here.
Speaker: But, you know, yeah, there's there's room for everything.
Speaker: It's like I listen to a lot of movie.
Speaker: I'm a big movie guy.
Speaker: So listen to a lot of movie podcasts and stuff.
Speaker: It's like after all day of mixing these like dense, intense stories that are like very rich and like deep.
Speaker: Then I'm like, I kind of just want to hear a couple people talk about movies afterwards.
Speaker: So there's room for everything.
Speaker: But definitely.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, I admire what you guys do.
Speaker: It's so labor intensive.
Speaker: I mean, if you haven't checked out 99% Invisible Podcast, it is very well produced.
Speaker: You guys do an awesome job with it.
Speaker: And it hooked me listening to the... When I called you, because I was like, I don't know if I hadn't even heard of 99%.
Speaker: I'm not going to lie.
Speaker: And so I listened to the most recent episode, which was on about like...
Speaker: two people saws.
Speaker: Those things you don't see ever anymore.
Speaker: It's like a Looney Tunes thing.
Speaker: But it was interesting because listening to this episode, you would have never known that they were getting stolen off the walls of
Speaker: cracker barrels because there's places where they can't use chainsaws, but they can still use these saws to chop down trees.
Speaker: And so no one was making them anymore.
Speaker: So the best place you could do was steal them from cracker barrels.
Speaker: That's our whole thing is we try and find stuff where it's like, hey, there's this thing that you haven't thought about, but there actually is like a whole history behind it.
Speaker: That's why it's 99% visible.
Speaker: So
Speaker: You know, I've been here for like a year and a half, but I've been listening to this show for like years and years.
Speaker: It's like really influential to me.
Speaker: And so it's cool because then I bring my own perspective and I really like, you know, yeah, old films have these like really cool distinctive sound effects.
Speaker: I get to like put cool sound effects on it.
Speaker: So like if you listen to this episode, there's like a lot of cool, you know, I'll go find...
Speaker: I was like, let me find the era of pinball machine that he would have that Roger Sharp would have been playing.
Speaker: Let me use that specific one.
Speaker: And then our composer Swan, I sent her these pinball sounds and she like cut them up, made some samples and she gave it kind of like a little T-Rex Jeepster kind of like fun little garage groove and then like use the pinball sounds as like synth and percussion on it.
Speaker: And like it's just so we have like so much fun doing it.
Speaker: It's so cool.
Speaker: But yeah, so when I saw this Roger Sharpe movie coming out, I was like, oh, this is a perfect excuse to like get super nerdy.
Speaker: And like, I've always been super into pinball.
Speaker: But then this kind of like uncorked a different level, you know, of like going and playing a lot and like talking to people.
Speaker: But I'm still like such a novice and I don't really keep up on stuff that much.
Speaker: It's really just like.
Speaker: you know, I listen to you guys.
Speaker: I listen to Silver Ball Chronicles, which is like more history stuff, but like, I don't know.
Speaker: I don't like go on inside and on these long threads or something.
Speaker: It's like, I, I don't really keep too much.
Speaker: I'm going to get you guys in trouble.
Speaker: There's going to be a thread about.
Speaker: how rude this all is but um bring it on yeah it's like i'll kind of find out that something's coming because it like shows up on location yeah no i get you but yeah so i got to get deep in stuff and then i you know hadn't even like heard of keith until like you know a few months ago because i was just researching like who designers were and everything and i heard him on your guys podcast and he was talking about that like pop
Speaker: bumper in the right on the right and like being in control versus being out of control and it's like i just like love this like i gotta get the i gotta talk to this guy about this
Speaker: And when I, when we're doing edits, everyone just like, was like, we love this guy.
Speaker: He rolls.
Speaker: I was like, yeah, he's awesome.
Speaker: And he actually really helped me figure something like, you know, just like talking to him.
Speaker: He talked about how there's two kinds of players, like people who like to just shoot around and have a nice time, check out all the objectives and people who were like points.
Speaker: And I was like,
Speaker: oh, that's why I like, I'm not that great in terms of stuff.
Speaker: Cause I just want to like vibe and shoot.
Speaker: Like I'm, I don't want to like figure out how to get the highest score possible.
Speaker: It's like, not really how I'm set up.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: How, how do you guys fit into that?
Speaker: Like category.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I'm, I'm like you where I, I like just kind of wandering through the game.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Hey, I'll, I'll start this mode or I'm doing this thing.
Speaker: And,
Speaker: I couldn't care less about points.
Speaker: I mean, it's kind of fun when you're entering your initials, but for the most part, I just like exploring the game.
Speaker: Yeah, but you know, it's hard to do that in a tournament setting, but I don't know, Josh, I don't even know how you approach games.
Speaker: It depends on the day.
Speaker: I love both ways.
Speaker: I do love to explore a game and see all the little nooks and crannies like Indiana Jones where you're going through the mine cart video mode.
Speaker: If you go a certain route, it will actually pop you out to the WB frog and he does a little song and dance for you.
Speaker: It's cool to find little Easter eggs like that.
Speaker: I love exploring the games, but there's just something about blowing up a game and just be like, yeah, I dropped 5 billion on Godzilla this weekend.
Speaker: Yeah, you got, I see one in your background.
Speaker: You can do that.
Speaker: I think, I don't know.
Speaker: I have to look at my insider, but I think my best score is like 500 million or something like that.
Speaker: It's like, I'm not, I'm not, I haven't had a billion.
Speaker: Or like you have an Infinity Quest back there too.
Speaker: I don't think I've gotten more than one gem in a game ever.
Speaker: And I've played it dozens of times.
Speaker: It's actually still, that game is surprisingly challenging.
Speaker: It still is fun.
Speaker: But to actually complete the modes...
Speaker: I, you know, there's, there's two easies to middle and one hard.
Speaker: And so a lot of times I, I end up getting about 85% through and that's just, that's just how I roll on that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But it's super fun.
Speaker: It's so deep.
Speaker: Like, but yeah, you know, I, I can only ever play these games on location.
Speaker: Like I live in Brooklyn.
Speaker: I live in an apartment.
Speaker: Like I can't like,
Speaker: I can't get a home game.
Speaker: And so, you know, I have to like go play them and you only get so much time and you only have so many dollars, you know, it's sort of sad up.
Speaker: So, you know, unless if you're Kate Martin, you know, who works at buttermilk bar there in Brooklyn and can play the pinball machines when there's some downtime.
Speaker: Yeah, I really love buttermilk.
Speaker: There's like a whole area around there, the whole like south part of Park Slope where you can just bar hop around and go try stuff.
Speaker: And like, yeah,
Speaker: I go up to Williamsburg a lot too, but I don't know how prices are in other places, but it's pretty solidly a dollar a game in a lot of parts of New York, which is a little annoying.
Speaker: But down in South Slope, it's more typically you get three for two or four for three or something.
Speaker: So I go practice down where it's a little cheaper.
Speaker: You're like, oh, I can...
Speaker: I can get a lot more bang for my buck down and practicing over here.
Speaker: But yeah, no, New York is like weirdly kind of tough in a lot of ways, especially now I've noticed it's like whatever the last three or four Stern games are is like what's everywhere and which makes sense.
Speaker: But the older games are kind of like falling off, you know, and
Speaker: there's one Lord of the Rings and it's like just beat to hell like it barely plays you know it's over 20 years oh no totally yeah it's like if I was an operator I would be like alright let's get some boo fighters in here or something you know but yeah I definitely miss like playing some of that older stuff that's like kind of what I came up on
Speaker: And there's this really great place in, you know, I grew up in Providence, Rhode Island, and my parents still live there.
Speaker: And there's a great pinball museum there that I absolutely love called Electromagnetic.
Speaker: And I go there all the time.
Speaker: So I was just there a week or two ago.
Speaker: And I just have like a soft spot for some of these older ones that they have, like.
Speaker: You know, they have Whodunit.
Speaker: It's like Whodunit.
Speaker: I love Whodunit, but you never see... You don't see it anymore.
Speaker: Yeah, there was a place in Portland across the street from a bar I worked at, and I was just going to play Whodunit all the time.
Speaker: And like, you know, I want to see them take some of these old games and do remakes like they did with Beatles, you know?
Speaker: My dream is if they do like a Columbo reskin of Whodunit, that's like my dream table.
Speaker: And you know, the ball save could be like, just one more thing.
Speaker: So like...
Speaker: Whoever owns the IP if you're listening, make my dreams come true.
Speaker: Yeah, you know.
Speaker: Well, and there's something about those older games too.
Speaker: Someone pointed out to me, especially with the 90s games, they were attempting instead of like shoot the ramp and shoot the captive ball.
Speaker: It was like, especially with Houdini.
Speaker: The elevator.
Speaker: You know,
Speaker: Yeah, go for the elevator.
Speaker: And like it was all places.
Speaker: The places had names in the game and it created more atmosphere to that game and more that world under glass that we don't see much anymore.
Speaker: But it does become a little confusing.
Speaker: It's easier when you're going from game to game to game.
Speaker: It's like shoot the ramps.
Speaker: Oh, I know what the ramps are.
Speaker: You know, it's a little hard sometimes to be like, what's the elevator?
Speaker: But at least in that game, it's like smack dab right in the middle.
Speaker: It's like, well, I think I can figure that out.
Speaker: And like, you know, they also have a lot of like, you know, they go all the way back to like, you know, 40s or 50s.
Speaker: They have like cool older stuff.
Speaker: But the last time I was there, I got really into some like Gottlieb.
Speaker: I don't know the difference between the system 80s, but like there and there's like A's and B's and whatever.
Speaker: I'm not that deep on it.
Speaker: You know, I listen to Silver Ball Chronicles, but a lot of it.
Speaker: one over my head but like um they have this block that has a mars god of war volcano and black hole all three together and i like spent a long time on those and i was like these are so fun and they're not like you know the theme is just like a fun like it doesn't have to be like ip it's just like no no space like i i love those those ones i i will say it's we've talked about this on the show before though is
Speaker: that is really cool for the 70s, 80s, and maybe even the 90s.
Speaker: It's almost a killer for a game to not have some sort of recognizable theme now.
Speaker: You can get away with it, but it's a lot harder than the 70s through 90s, which you would get just casual people going through and playing arcades.
Speaker: But you almost need to have a reason to get up from your...
Speaker: from your bar stool and go over to play it.
Speaker: If you see Godzilla, then you're like, oh, okay, I know what Godzilla is.
Speaker: If you're like,
Speaker: giant radioactive lizard you're probably not going to go over to it yeah yeah well but it's also like look at like one of the highest selling pinball machines of all time was spirit of 76 and it was that's a completely different era though i know that's what i'm saying is like you could get away with that in the 50s 60s and 70s even like roger sharp so it's kind of funny that we say like adam's family is the greatest selling pinball machine of all time
Speaker: And he's like, no, no, it's like the greatest modern, like the greatest DMD because some of those EMs were selling.
Speaker: 50,000.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Difficultest numbers.
Speaker: They said that Spirit of 77 probably is the highest group.
Speaker: I can't remember how many that one has.
Speaker: I bet Pinside has something on it.
Speaker: It was a crazy amount.
Speaker: But getting back to what you were saying, though, is a lot of locations, they tend toward having the newer games.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: That's actually how it always used to be because games used to be beat to shreds.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so you'd put them on location and they would just run the wheels off and then they would sell it off to buy a new one because everything was so grooved or just worn down.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so –
Speaker: And even modern games have that similar vibe where someone can route it and then say, okay, well, time to move on and get a newer version so I don't have as much.
Speaker: Oh, man.
Speaker: Yeah, there's already a lot fewer Avengers than there were.
Speaker: They all got replaced with Bonds and Foo Fighters because they were probably just all beat up.
Speaker: Yep, yep.
Speaker: I have a real soft spot for Batman 66 and there's like not a single one in New York and it's, you know, what five years, six years old or something like it's not very old, but it's just like they get these things get cycled out so fast.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Well, it's Batman 66 is kind of a,
Speaker: higher price machine as well.
Speaker: I think it was.
Speaker: Well, it was, yeah.
Speaker: It was like, Oh, this crazy $700 more than what the standard ones are.
Speaker: But I mean, that was still when games were, you know, a premium game was like 6,200 or something.
Speaker: So they're like 7,000 for a game.
Speaker: Now it's like,
Speaker: okay you want a premium game it's 95 yeah i have a suspect because i used to play i again a lot of this is based around like what was across the street from where i worked or went to college you know so they had um a dark night near another place i worked in portland and i just that's like i've logged so many hours on that and when i was just in providence there's a place that has like a completely everything new dark night it was like the best dark night i've played in like 10 years and i was like
Speaker: Yes, because, you know, yeah, those those things are all like the any time I've seen one in the wild, it's like barely functioning.
Speaker: They're shredded.
Speaker: So this is totally rebuilt.
Speaker: And like I was like, I'm in heaven right now.
Speaker: So, you know, but yeah, there's a lot of games I would love to play, but there's not a single one, you know, like the closest Doctor Who is in like
Speaker: asbury park you know and i love doctor who and jackpot like you know you can't find him anywhere so it's like that's my that's my hope is some of these you know you you start to see him coming back a little bit there's like uh there's a future spa somewhere there's weirdly like lots of i actually have one of those oh really it's a very interesting game it's a vibe man
Speaker: There's like weirdly a lot of getaway high speed too.
Speaker: I've like really been playing.
Speaker: They made tons of.
Speaker: Yeah, they're everywhere, which is rad.
Speaker: Like, I don't know.
Speaker: It's for some reason, maybe it's just like easy upkeep, but I play that one a lot.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: By the way, that's the same designer who did star Wars.
Speaker: We were talking about that earlier.
Speaker: Maybe off.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And you were wondering who designed the stern star Wars.
Speaker: It's the same guy who did high speed.
Speaker: Nice.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: there's, I don't really know the distinctions of designers, but everyone's a mile ago, like, oh yeah, Jackpot has the same kind of the mechanism as the time expander.
Speaker: Oh, of course it's like the same guy.
Speaker: Like I, I, I'm like just starting to learn about all that stuff.
Speaker: But like, you guys are so much, I was excited to come on and talk about some of the stuff.
Speaker: Cause I'm like, Oh, you can explain this to me.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I don't know anything, but.
Speaker: Yeah, you know, it's, but it's, it is weird.
Speaker: It's like, there's what is or isn't there.
Speaker: Like there's a lot of monster bashes around it's, which is kind of right, especially the remake is around.
Speaker: But like, I think we were talking earlier about how like people are hoarding their medieval madness and there's like one or two in New York and they kind of like their originals and they just need a lot of upkeep.
Speaker: So it's really like catch as catch can.
Speaker: There's, there's a kind of abundant attack from Mars, but weirdly like medieval madness, it's a little stingy.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, no, it's a little weird in New York.
Speaker: I kind of like use pinball map and keep an eye out while I'm traveling.
Speaker: And I'm like, I'm a real annoying and vigilant pinball map person because I'm like going to seek out machines.
Speaker: It's like, oh, I'll go to Queens just because they have like a better Tales of Arabian Nights than the one at Buttermilk.
Speaker: No offense.
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: Like, you know, like, you know, yeah, like they have like a pristine wind up in Queens.
Speaker: But then if I go all the way there and it's like broken, I'm so annoyed.
Speaker: So I'm like vigilant about on pinball map, like commenting.
Speaker: I'm so pedantic about it.
Speaker: Because like, I don't know.
Speaker: Yeah, that's happened to me where I've been like, I'm going to travel for a game and it really works.
Speaker: So, you know, I'm pretty, pretty active on there.
Speaker: And I spent a lot of time just cruising around like, you know, I'm doing some traveling this fall and I was like scoping out.
Speaker: I'm like, all right, I'm going to be in Portland.
Speaker: Like, you know, who has a, you know, Lord of the Rings in good condition or something I can go play because we'll stop it for it, you know.
Speaker: I kind of miss those days.
Speaker: I remember those days when I first got into pinball and it was like, you'd find out about what it was new to you.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And you'd be like, Oh, this is just, this is amazing.
Speaker: And so you had to do travel and, and you know, you finally get there and then it was just.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It just wasn't.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It was, it's so fun learning those games.
Speaker: And, and I think that's why we get so excited by new games is because we want that same sensation when we first got in the hobby of enjoying the,
Speaker: The whodunits and the the Kongos and games like that.
Speaker: Yeah, it's really it's tough if you can only ever play on location.
Speaker: Like I just played Godfather for the first time.
Speaker: And, you know, I played for 20 or 30 minutes.
Speaker: I was like, I'm not entirely certain what's going on here yet.
Speaker: Like when they're that deep, it's that trade off we were talking about, about like what works at home versus what works on location.
Speaker: And so those older games are fun because you can kind of get the hang of it pretty quickly.
Speaker: You play Attack from Mars for a little bit.
Speaker: You know what you're doing.
Speaker: You know, you're trying to go for it.
Speaker: Well, they also had the lights on the play field that pretty much, like if you hit that shot, it moved up one light.
Speaker: And so you had a visual representation of how far are you in the game?
Speaker: I mean, modern games are, they have a similar thing, but it's just not as in your face.
Speaker: And actually, this is something I talked to Keith about because we're like theoretically a design podcast or like that's our focus.
Speaker: And so I was asking a lot of questions about design and I was like, yeah, man, these screens, like a lot of times,
Speaker: I think there's a few like these Jersey Jacks or, you know, where you kind of are struggling to figure out how, like what you're supposed to be doing in that moment.
Speaker: And so he was like, yeah, you know, we're trying to balance lights and screen because the lights and the call outs really are like, you don't have to take your eyes off the play field, but it's,
Speaker: It's kind of like, you know, no offense to like Tesla owners, but you know, I tried out a Tesla and it was like, everything's on this screen and you have to look.
Speaker: It's a different way.
Speaker: And I spent years like driving a tour van where it's like, Oh, I can reach over and adjust the air and the music and whatever without looking.
Speaker: So it's that kind of like divided attention thing.
Speaker: So I think that's why I've been vibing on these older games lately.
Speaker: Cause they just like had to communicate with lights and sound.
Speaker: They, they couldn't lean as heavily on the screen.
Speaker: And then,
Speaker: you know now in the modern era you can just put whatever on there and and playing clips and stuff and so sometimes you're playing bond or something you're like do i need to watch this clip or do i need to like focus on the game like um always focus i had that with halloween have you guys played halloween yeah you're like that's what i was just thinking too you're like oh i'm looking at this cool michael myers and then it like drops the ball while you're not looking you're like stranger yeah there's just a little light it doesn't it just like flashes really discreetly you're like ah
Speaker: That's what I was thinking too.
Speaker: Cause I was playing Halloween and it's like, you're watching the scene.
Speaker: Also.
Speaker: It's like, why is my brain?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Halloween messes with my brain because it's spontaneous.
Speaker: You know, the, the ball just apparates, you know, it just, it just appears right above the flipper.
Speaker: And if you're not paying attention, you're smoked.
Speaker: Oh, it's so fun though.
Speaker: But yeah, you got, you got to stay on it.
Speaker: But I, I really like the way that they do the locks is so cool.
Speaker: And the upper play of it, like, I really like it, but it kind of, I think it,
Speaker: It pretty much disappeared from New York, but there's the Ultraman, the kind of the Kaiju skin.
Speaker: I go play the version.
Speaker: Yeah, that one's super fun, too.
Speaker: So I go play that sometimes.
Speaker: But yeah, it's just really like catch a sketch can, you know, whatever I whatever I can find.
Speaker: And so it's so different from like when I was living in Portland where you're like, oh, every bar has been like, I kind of miss that aspect of it.
Speaker: But there's a few good spots.
Speaker: Like I went to Sunshine Laundry, which just reopened, but it seems like they're having like some kind of legal permitting issues.
Speaker: They can only have, I think, like four or five machines.
Speaker: It's such a bummer because you're like, well, of course, if you can only pick four or five, you're going to pick these newer Stearns that earn.
Speaker: But, you know, I know they have a deep collection that's not out.
Speaker: And I'm like, you know, pull out some of these older games, please.
Speaker: Yeah, we were actually talking to Greg Pavarelli about that at Sunshine Laundromat and just kind of the issues they've been going through with that.
Speaker: But it sounds like they're open for good now.
Speaker: It just seemed like it seemed they were getting shut down almost every month there for a second.
Speaker: That's New York, man.
Speaker: Yeah, it was crazy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So, yeah, I also wanted to make sure that I told you guys this story, speaking of stuff that we had to cut out from the episode.
Speaker: We had this whole subplot.
Speaker: Speaking of living in Portland,
Speaker: about these mob wars in portland and it was like so interesting and it just was like too many ideas you know i i had this short segment and so it was like something's got to go and so i wanted to tell you guys you know mayor la guardia in new york was like oh there's all this like mob pinball stuff and it's easy to kind of go like oh yeah i mean it's a little bit of an overreaction a little melodramatic
Speaker: But then you like you hear about some of these stories and you're like, oh, the mob was really like pinball was a mom thing.
Speaker: And Portland has this history because it was, you know, part town of like gambling, prostitution, like a lot of like vice.
Speaker: It's like a big was a big vice city always.
Speaker: And so I'm guessing that's why pinball has just kind of always been around.
Speaker: But this story I want to tell you guys is from the 50s.
Speaker: And it was theoretically illegal in Portland too back then.
Speaker: Just like a lot of cities had bands.
Speaker: Chicago, like the epicenter of pinball today, like it was illegal there too.
Speaker: So it kind of like went underground and became like fully criminal.
Speaker: And there are a couple competing mob bosses, Stan Terry and this guy, Big Jim Elkins, which I'm a sucker for like, you know, that's like a great mob name.
Speaker: But so they they got into this turf war and they would like do raids and like steal each other's machines or steal the money out of them or sabotage them.
Speaker: You know, it was like a like real like mob style.
Speaker: So then in 1955, Big Jim roped in the Teamsters who like, you know, I'm extremely pro union, but there was this era where the Teamsters were basically like a mob.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: And so they came up with this scheme and they made a phony union called Coin Machine Men of Oregon.
Speaker: And so they had a few different tactics, but one of them was, you know, they would do a picket around the bars that Stamp Terry had.
Speaker: And, you know, people would be like, oh, I'm not going to cross the picket line.
Speaker: So it was just like a lot of kind of shenanigans.
Speaker: And so finally, Terry called in some connections via Las Vegas, and they put some pressure on the Seattle Teamsters.
Speaker: who were coordinating with the Portland ones.
Speaker: And so then the Teamsters kind of like pulled their support from the coin machine men and were turning these pickets and boycotts back around on Big Jim and like squeezed them out.
Speaker: You know, it's just like kind of like this little tug of war.
Speaker: And so Big Jim came up with this plan.
Speaker: He was like, I got to get try and get my machines back or get back in the game.
Speaker: So he hired this guy named Herman Bugsy Burns, which when's the last time he met a Bugsy, you know, another great mob name.
Speaker: So they, Bugsy and his gang posed as pinball repairmen, or this was the plan.
Speaker: They were going to pretend to be pinball repairmen.
Speaker: And they would go to the bars with Stan Terry's machines and go, yeah, we're going to swap these out for some new ones.
Speaker: We're going to load these up to make some room.
Speaker: And the truck's coming in an hour with like the new machines, which in the 50s, like you could probably get away with that.
Speaker: you know, probably get away with that.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: There's no, yeah, sure.
Speaker: Sounds good.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Let me know.
Speaker: So they had this whole plan in place and, you know, big Jim was kind of like waiting for the right time to strike.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: You know, Bugsy was like, you know, I got to do some crimes.
Speaker: I'm a crime guy.
Speaker: And so while they were waiting for the plan to take effect, they went and robbed a Safeway, which is like a grocery store.
Speaker: I don't know if you guys have them or if it's regional.
Speaker: But yeah, so they were they went and robbed a Safeway and got busted.
Speaker: As they would, right?
Speaker: Just hanging out.
Speaker: What are you doing?
Speaker: It's going to rob us up.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Sorry, Safeway.
Speaker: Yeah, we got to do some crimes.
Speaker: We were crime guys.
Speaker: And so that was kind of the end of Big Jim's scheme.
Speaker: And so this all took place over like a year or two.
Speaker: And so he actually wiretapped the Teamsters and he turned the recordings over to the FBI and the local newspaper.
Speaker: And it had, you know, this whole like racketeering union thing.
Speaker: So he was able to like get off.
Speaker: And it was a big deal.
Speaker: There was like a couple of years of like Senate hearings about Portland mob.
Speaker: And then, you know, there was a there was a big election where they were like, we're going to clean up the mob.
Speaker: And it just kind of like these pinball wars like had all these repercussions.
Speaker: So you're like, oh, this actually was like really central to the story of the mob in the Northwest.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so then it makes like mayor LaGuardia seem a little less of like, like insane.
Speaker: You're like, Oh, that was like a reasonable political position.
Speaker: Like that was a way to like take a stand against the mob.
Speaker: But yeah.
Speaker: So anyway, we just, there's this whole story beat.
Speaker: I'm so glad I got to tell it somewhere.
Speaker: Cause it was super interesting.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: If you want to read more about it, you can Google like, you know, Big Jim Elkins.
Speaker: But I got a lot of this Finn J.D.
Speaker: John wrote this article that I pulled a lot of this stuff from.
Speaker: So you guys can, yeah, go Google if you want to learn more about the Portland Mob Wars.
Speaker: But so they weren't actually using the pinball machines for gambling.
Speaker: They were using it as like money laundry.
Speaker: Essentially, they were using it for.
Speaker: Yeah, you got it.
Speaker: I guess not necessarily money laundry, but it was.
Speaker: You're robbing a bank essentially at that point because you've got some inquiries going into it.
Speaker: No, absolutely.
Speaker: For money laundering and also just straight up, we've got bars, we've got pinball machines.
Speaker: It's a way to just make money.
Speaker: It's the Willie Sutton model.
Speaker: Why do you break into pinball machines?
Speaker: Because that's where the money is.
Speaker: At that point, they had flippers and everything.
Speaker: Like we were saying, it wasn't just pure gambling, but I'm sure at first it was like, oh yeah, here's that earlier more gambling style.
Speaker: But, you know, yes.
Speaker: Okay, by the way, that whole story sounds like an episode from Grand Theft Auto.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: It totally does.
Speaker: I've never played the game, and I'm like, yeah, you're the mob guy, and you need to go play with the pinball machines.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, go raid the machines, you know?
Speaker: Yeah, go raid the machines.
Speaker: Okay, here's your quest.
Speaker: Go steal the machines.
Speaker: Tell them that the next one's showing up.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, the side quest for bonus points is you rob the Safeway, but if you get caught, you lose.
Speaker: Yeah, I bet.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's so cool.
Speaker: Yeah, it was fun.
Speaker: So yeah, that's the other reason I like going to pinball museums and stuff because they have these older games and you can go play them and you can go, man, all that fuss about this.
Speaker: It's so fun.
Speaker: And this one that I like going to in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, Electromagnetic,
Speaker: they have a lot of like doubles and triples and like, have you guys ever seen?
Speaker: I think you should leave.
Speaker: Do you know what I'm talking about?
Speaker: Oh, it's great.
Speaker: Netflix show and Bob Odenkirk in one sketch plays his character where he's talking about having doubles and triples of all his classic cars that he has an own.
Speaker: But he's like, yeah, you know,
Speaker: Doubles is good because then you can put one in your garage and drive the other.
Speaker: But like triples is best.
Speaker: And this is total like triples is best.
Speaker: Like there's some of these 70s, 60s and 70s machines.
Speaker: They have like two or three.
Speaker: They have like a Star Trek that's like signed by the whole cast, you know, and then one that's more of a players or, you know, like they have such cool stuff and they're expanding too.
Speaker: So you can go play the entire history of pinball all the way up to, you know, they have Avengers and stuff like that.
Speaker: That's newer Stearns.
Speaker: They have some like custom ones.
Speaker: Someone took one of those, the Pinball 2000.
Speaker: I think it was like the Revenge from Mars.
Speaker: Is that the Pinball 2000 one?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, they have like a custom.
Speaker: They made a white wood and custom programming and stuff.
Speaker: I think it was like a Frozen theme maybe or something.
Speaker: It's just super cool.
Speaker: I've actually played a, well, I played a homebrew version.
Speaker: version of this same person actually yeah or was it like on a pinball 2000 machine
Speaker: Yeah, it was very similar.
Speaker: Oh, this has got to be the same one.
Speaker: I think he made it for his daughter or something.
Speaker: Because I did talk to the designer.
Speaker: I can't remember.
Speaker: It was at Chicago when I saw it.
Speaker: I guarantee you this is the same one because how many people made their own?
Speaker: Yeah, it's a total one-off.
Speaker: Yeah, I kind of love that.
Speaker: I was watching videos of Keith's Archer machine when I was researching.
Speaker: I was like, th is is just so good.
Speaker: It's way beyond my mechanical competence to do something like this.
Speaker: So I just like love it and admire it.
Speaker: You know, it's so cool.
Speaker: Yeah, definitely.
Speaker: Do you have any other wild stories you ran into while you were doing the podcast or?
Speaker: I liked at the end of the podcast, you guys redoing the attack for Mars.
Speaker: Yeah, that was seriously for a nerd.
Speaker: So if you go on Internet Archive, you can download someone posted a ROM dump of all the sounds.
Speaker: And what we do is at the end of...
Speaker: the episodes not every single one but by and large we you know we give a little shout out that we're a stitcher in Sirius XM production and Roman would just the host would just like riff something into the mic or whatever and then when I joined up like I love crazy sound design and stuff and I started getting really into like making the craziest tags at the end possible and it would be like this 15 second joke that would do with like sound design
Speaker: And even my very first episode was about an airport in Ireland.
Speaker: And I like, you know, brought the episode in for a landing.
Speaker: It's like my first week.
Speaker: I just did a little sound design thing of like, oh, is your captain speaking?
Speaker: And I'd like airplane sounds.
Speaker: And like I put myself over like a fake speaker and everyone's like, oh, this guy's
Speaker: nuts like he'll do anything so uh i went on internet archive and downloaded the rom of all the attack from mars sounds and there's you know like 500 or something and i was like clicking through trying to find all the juiciest ones and like you know and so then we did you know flying instead of flying saucers from mars flying saucers from stitcher or whatever and so it's just like all these i i sent roman a clip of attack from mars i was like trying
Speaker: do this delivery and i i put in like the music actually i got to hear the raw music i was like oh this sounds like amazing actually like it's super lo-fi coming through the speakers but i was like this stuff sounds great like everything sounded awesome so yeah we did that fun little clip and yeah i don't know i there was a lot of cool keith stuff i'm sorry keith like you
Speaker: Give me now your time.
Speaker: And I only like could pull a couple things, but it was so deep.
Speaker: And one thing I talked to him a lot that I enjoyed was about collaboration.
Speaker: And that really resonated with me because we make our show in a very, very collaborative way.
Speaker: It's like one of the most collaborative things I've ever been a part of.
Speaker: you know, one person will write a script and they've got an editor and the editor will help them shape it up.
Speaker: And then we do a thing where Roman and the producer will read each of their parts, like a, you know, a live read and they'll play back clips and stuff and everyone will give comments and weigh in and then they'll go away and record their two parts separately.
Speaker: And the producer will cut it in pro tools and edit it, put music on there and everything.
Speaker: And then we'll do another round where we all listen to notes and then they'll,
Speaker: incorporate those notes and we'll do another round of notes and then they pass the episode to me and i mix it and add sound design and stuff we'll do another round of notes so it's like every episode we do gets touched by you know if there's like 13 or 14 of us at least two-thirds of the staff touch every single episode at some point super collaborative so i was asking keith about that i was like you know what how
Speaker: how do you collaborate?
Speaker: And he just gave like such deep shout outs to his whole team and kind of talked about the relationship of like, I'm designing these shots and I go to my engineer and he's like, yeah, I can't do that.
Speaker: Like, oh yeah, this thing isn't going to work.
Speaker: And so then, you know, he does that.
Speaker: And then,
Speaker: When he's working with the programmers, you know, I talked a little about this in episode that they can go back and tweak the code and be like, oh, let me change the objectives once I see how people play it.
Speaker: And I just like love talking to him about all this collaboration.
Speaker: There's no way one person can be the master of like play dynamics and design and mechanical engineering and software engineering and sound and video.
Speaker: It's like it takes it takes a village to make the machine.
Speaker: And so
Speaker: You know, even though he gets credit as like the auteur, he was like, no, I wouldn't be anywhere without my team.
Speaker: And I really love that vibe.
Speaker: Like, I really love Barry and like Bill Hader.
Speaker: And he's like, oh, yeah, I got this cool shot because of my like assistant director suggested it or like, oh, this camera operator did a really great zoom set.
Speaker: Like he like refuses to take credit for the whole thing.
Speaker: He's like, no, it's like the sum of all the parts.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: yeah yeah i i felt bad i was like i really wanted to include this was just like too many things he he sent me a cool clip also there's like a crazy machine testing room where they stress test all the parts you know like you know just solenoids firing and stuff i was like can you give me like a little 10 second recording of that and it just sounded crazy it's not like the craziest factor factory ever and like i don't have time for that either but i was just like oh this is so so cool well when we got to tour jjp it was cool because uh
Speaker: Godfather hadn't been revealed yet, but they were testing it back in the corner and we were all like, so can we go back?
Speaker: And they're like, no.
Speaker: Yeah, just that monster.
Speaker: What happened if a wind just breathed through and knocked off that blanket and we got no.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh yeah, and it's full circle.
Speaker: It's a real mob game.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I'm looking forward to trying it some more, but...
Speaker: You know, when you're doing all these like quests and stuff, I was like, oh, I kind of want to shoot a little pinball.
Speaker: Oh, and but that was another funny part in episode two is like, I was like, all right, I'm talking to Keith.
Speaker: I got to enter my first tournament.
Speaker: And I've just been chicken because like I was saying, I'm not like a points player.
Speaker: And I see some people playing and they're intense on the machine around or wherever it's like.
Speaker: So I got kind of dragged to one and I, I had a lot of fun voice memoing my way through like getting my butt kicked.
Speaker: And I just was like, that's something I just love is if I can like mildly embarrass myself on air, I'm always willing to, you know, I did a story where I took an adult, this is like years ago, but I did took an adult swim lesson and I had a producer, uh,
Speaker: point a mic at me in the pool being like, oh, like I'm scared.
Speaker: So it's like, I just like love mildly embarrassing myself on the mic.
Speaker: And that was like pretty fun.
Speaker: It's like, yeah, I just, I just got dreaded.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I will say just so you know, for people who are more like you and me, Martine, where we actually do the, the play for fun, you can go to pen tips.
Speaker: So it's actually a website that you can actually pull up and it does have like,
Speaker: hey, here are the top two things or top three things that you need to do in this game.
Speaker: And so that does help for people who are on the fly and just like, I just want to have a good time.
Speaker: But it'd be nice to have a good score too.
Speaker: Well, and the other part too is like when I first got into tournaments, Bo and Karen's came to Utah because we had our big, it was Salt Lake Gaming Con and it was a huge tournament.
Speaker: And he just happened to be in Utah at the time because of
Speaker: His main job.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: His main job.
Speaker: And so, you know, it was intimidating having someone that was a top five, top 10 player in the world and you're playing against them.
Speaker: And, but the, the cool part was, is, you know, he could tell I was intimidated and he's like, well, which games haven't you played?
Speaker: And I was like, I've never played starship troopers at that point.
Speaker: And he's like, okay, we'll just do these two things and just don't stress about anything else.
Speaker: Just keep the ball alive and do these two things.
Speaker: And so I've noticed, though, at tournaments, a lot of people are very willing to help.
Speaker: Yeah, sure.
Speaker: You just have to ask, because I know that some people get offended.
Speaker: Like if you're talking to someone like, Hey, you do this, this one.
Speaker: I'll tell you.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Most people it's, it is a social thing for them.
Speaker: And really a lot of these local tournaments.
Speaker: I mean, come on.
Speaker: If, if you win, you win.
Speaker: It's, it's really so minimal that it's not to finish my third place of win that I just got.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm not diminishing it.
Speaker: I'm just saying, I'm just not saying don't open your 401k with it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I was very proud.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But what I'm saying is that for them, I mean, the whole point of these is that, Hey, we want to hang out with people, you know, just people.
Speaker: And we've said it before.
Speaker: The, the beautiful thing about pinball is how it's something that regardless of your political affiliation, your religious affiliation, your social affiliation, your gender affiliate, just insert whatever thing here,
Speaker: It doesn't matter.
Speaker: You can still play a game together.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And coming together, because that's the, I think that's one thing that's really helped pinball thrive in the last five years is because we've lost that ability to connect with people.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's, that's really the main reason I'm, even if I get my butt kicked, I'm going to like hang out, but then, you know,
Speaker: I can still kind of play dumb a little bit, you know, I don't know much longer.
Speaker: I can rock that, but I'm just being like, oh, I'm like new to tournaments or whatever.
Speaker: And, you know, I made friends with in the episode I played two voice moments of me getting my butt kicked by this guy, Hunter, who then I ended up just like making friends with him because I sent him a link.
Speaker: I was like, hey, I talked about you kicking my butt in the show.
Speaker: And.
Speaker: then we were playing each other in Foo Fighters and I was like, man, I'll level with you.
Speaker: I've played this like three times.
Speaker: I don't understand it.
Speaker: And he showed me something with like the drop targets where you like get the power up things.
Speaker: I still haven't totally gotten the hang of it, but I just like hit a really nice wave.
Speaker: And then I like, I think I knocked him out.
Speaker: Actually, I can't remember if I knocked him out or if I just beat him, but I kind of like, he showed me a couple of things just like to be a nice guy.
Speaker: And then I just like accidentally racked up a huge score and he's like, God damn it.
Speaker: You should have waited until after to show me, but people are pretty generous with the knowledge.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: But it's fun though.
Speaker: Like I actually, I think that he probably laughed about it.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: We, we had a good, he's like, I can't believe that I told you how to do it.
Speaker: And then you just went farther in the, I was a little embarrassed.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I was like, Oh, that was unusual.
Speaker: That was like very lucky.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But like, you know, I I'm pretty good at creature.
Speaker: Actually, I really love creature.
Speaker: It's just like him vibes with me.
Speaker: It's a great.
Speaker: And so, yeah, I beat someone.
Speaker: I was like, hey, actually, I'm like pretty good at creature.
Speaker: Like, let me show you my tactic.
Speaker: And which is like, just try and try and hit that move your car as soon as you can.
Speaker: and collect the film along the way.
Speaker: But like you can, they were trying to get FILM and I'm like, you can get a decent bonus from that.
Speaker: But if you just go for move your car and if you can really practice nailing that every time, then you like that more than makes up for the point difference.
Speaker: And so it's like, oh, OK, cool.
Speaker: I have a great strategy for creature.
Speaker: I can hang with that.
Speaker: Now I need to learn the strategy for like 80 more games, you know, like and there's a new I'm like, OK, now I learn the food.
Speaker: I learn the bond one.
Speaker: So that's the one thing where I'm like, th is is a lot of work if you want to like stay sharp.
Speaker: And like, yes, well, and it's harder to because like when I first got into it 10 years ago,
Speaker: the biggest strategies were for the nineties bellies Williams games.
Speaker: It was like making sure you just shoot left orbit on theater of magic over and over and over until, until it tells you to shoot.
Speaker: I think it's still the left orbit.
Speaker: It's like, and you'll blow up your score that way or giant pneumonic.
Speaker: It was light spinner and I love Johnny.
Speaker: You know, they have one of those here and I just like, I love giant pneumonic.
Speaker: It's super underrated.
Speaker: Now it's like,
Speaker: Now Godzilla's like, well, I could go for damage.
Speaker: There are five different ways you can do it.
Speaker: Well, okay, but that speaks to how well-balanced modern games... Modern games have really taken, especially Stern, have taken that tournament-friendly vibe where they don't want the one path to a big score.
Speaker: They want to say, look, you can go this way, you can go that way, you can...
Speaker: Create your own and you can still build a score, have it be fun, but not always have to take the same path.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And when I, another really interesting thing that Keith talked about is he was like, you know, we'll put some multi balls close to the start.
Speaker: So they're pretty easy to get.
Speaker: Like, you know, you start off the gimme.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Gimmies.
Speaker: Avengers.
Speaker: You got to thought it's pretty, you can start that door by accident if you're not careful, you know, like, so if,
Speaker: I usually do.
Speaker: Someone's, you know, you want to try and save that.
Speaker: And, you know, for when you're in a gem quest, but also if like someone doesn't know anything about that or is just there to like flip and have a good time, they have a pretty high likelihood of accidentally starting Thor.
Speaker: If there's flipping around, they're like, oh my God, multiball.
Speaker: And like that stuff is like really fun.
Speaker: You want to make it accessible.
Speaker: And I feel like when I when I go to bars,
Speaker: I'll see people hop on Godzilla and just having a blast, you know, like people really have fun with that game.
Speaker: And, and that's really what it's about.
Speaker: It's like, what's fun and enjoyable.
Speaker: And then other stuff, you know, you can be ahead and you can be like, well, yeah, I really like this, like one specific thing, but like, you know, then you can't bring your friends, you know, like, yeah, I try and bring my friends who like,
Speaker: are much more i mean i'm a medium but i try and bring my like super casual friends and then i'm just now starting to make friends in new york who are like hardcore and i'm like oh you guys are on a different place i don't know if i'll ever get there they're totally on i i can't get that i just respect and admire and hang out and try and like learn a little but like you know i got other hobbies too it's not just like some people that's their life if you ever want to melt your brain on tournament talk
Speaker: just talk to Travis Murie.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Holy crap.
Speaker: He's a top 10 player.
Speaker: Well, no, he's, he's 24.
Speaker: I just pulled it off.
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: And I apologize.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The other 23 that I just short changed.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Well, I'll put it this way.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: 21, 22, 23, 24.
Speaker: Let's see if you've heard these names.
Speaker: Josh Sharp.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Keith Elwin.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Eric Stone.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Travis Meary.
Speaker: So that's really good company.
Speaker: And then just two above him is Colin McAlpine.
Speaker: And these guys are crazy, crazy good.
Speaker: Here's my rank.
Speaker: I'm number 16,813.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm 260th in New York out of let me see here.
Speaker: We got 513.
Speaker: So I'm like right in the middle in New York, you know, not too bad.
Speaker: But, you know, it's like it's fun.
Speaker: Well, OK, so let me point that out, though.
Speaker: That shows that there is a very tight demographic that is bundled in the middle of saying, hey, we're really OK.
Speaker: Maybe at the beginning, I guess, however you want to say it.
Speaker: But like once you get beyond like the top 500, top thousand, then it really goes into very casual.
Speaker: So it shows how much how much reach even casual players can have in pinball.
Speaker: And you're the perfect example where you don't have machines like you have to travel to them and you are.
Speaker: I guess the beauty and the curse of what you're doing is that you don't have to worry about investing in a game, but you're also beholden to whatever.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's right.
Speaker: You're that's why I'm on these hunts.
Speaker: It's like, if I could, if I had space, I would totally get, you know, like a doctor who or something like, and every once in a while, hop on the marketplace and just be like on, on pin side.
Speaker: Like, that's the only reason I go to that is just go,
Speaker: How much would that run me?
Speaker: And you're like, you know, even if I had an extra five grand, where would I put this thing?
Speaker: Come on.
Speaker: You can put an apartment.
Speaker: Oh, my neighbor would not be stoked.
Speaker: He already has to hear me like playing music all the time, like, and looping the same part of a podcast over and over.
Speaker: I don't want to put him through anything else.
Speaker: You can put headphones on them.
Speaker: Actually, that's your key.
Speaker: Get a modern game, get a headphone jack.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Well, even just like the mechanics.
Speaker: It's like, you know, I can hear my next door neighbor like walking.
Speaker: I can hear their floorboards creaking.
Speaker: Like that's the New York life.
Speaker: Like it's real thin walls.
Speaker: But you just have to kind of pretend like in like sometimes you'll hear someone.
Speaker: I'll hear my downstairs neighbor have a loud conversation where he's all hyped up.
Speaker: And I just have to like.
Speaker: You're like, but he can't hear me, right?
Speaker: Like, you just have to like.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, no, no.
Speaker: Dispension of disbelief.
Speaker: I'm in the bubble.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So that's why I like coming to this studio.
Speaker: It's like, you know, I come in here once or twice a week and you're just like, all right, I can crank the speakers up and I can mix and I know I'm not bothering anyone or if I'm talking like it's just going to be totally isolated.
Speaker: So I would love to get my own studio and I would love to get my own pinball room.
Speaker: And so who knows, you know, maybe.
Speaker: If I get married and have kids or something, I'll go back to Rhode Island and go.
Speaker: That's what one of my coworkers did.
Speaker: He just moved back to Rhode Island where his wife's from and just was like, oh, we can buy a house here.
Speaker: It would be crazy to buy anything in New York.
Speaker: There's just no reason to.
Speaker: So I go visit him and I'm like, oh, this is nice.
Speaker: And I go play.
Speaker: I go to the pinball museum.
Speaker: I'm like, oh, we got to fund more with this.
Speaker: right out.
Speaker: But I mean, it's New York, baby.
Speaker: It's like the best city, you know?
Speaker: And there's a new place on Long Island I want to check out that I think has like 100 machines or something.
Speaker: It's like just opened up a couple months ago.
Speaker: And there's some places in New Jersey where you can like go play a lot of stuff.
Speaker: So that's my next thing is like round up a little posse, borrow someone's car, go like spend two hours on a train and go be like, all right, this place has like a ton of like 80s golly, but I'm going to check this out.
Speaker: you know.
Speaker: It's my next move.
Speaker: Well, I will say there is a guy in New York that you should probably find out.
Speaker: His name is Charles.
Speaker: What's up, Charles?
Speaker: Hit me up.
Speaker: Yeah, definitely.
Speaker: He can take you on the tour.
Speaker: He's actually really good friends with Sunshine, and he knows about all that stuff.
Speaker: He even has a big Lebowski.
Speaker: So if you've ever wanted to play one of those, go ahead, Charles.
Speaker: There's actually a couple of those.
Speaker: There's one in Sunshine, and there's one at Rulo's Across the Street in Buttermilk.
Speaker: So I play that a lot.
Speaker: I actually like, I love Lebowski.
Speaker: I think it's great.
Speaker: Well, okay, Charles, it's M-A-R-T-I-N at 99pi.org.
Speaker: Hit me up.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: Drop me a line.
Speaker: I probably shouldn't be giving my email on the internet, but only email me if you have, or if you have a really good idea for a story that's not pinballed.
Speaker: Email me.
Speaker: Or if you're a Nigerian prince who wants to smuggle money out of your country.
Speaker: Yeah, listen, you know, I have...
Speaker: I live in New York, which is not expensive at all.
Speaker: And so I have tons of disposable income to just like spend around, you know?
Speaker: It's not a problem.
Speaker: All they need is your social security number just to verify it's you so they can send you money.
Speaker: It must be so cheap living in Utah.
Speaker: I'm jealous of you guys.
Speaker: It's so expensive here.
Speaker: Actually, it used to be in the last in the last 10 years.
Speaker: It's gone crazy.
Speaker: I gotta say, man, a little bit.
Speaker: It's not New York.
Speaker: Oh, my God.
Speaker: No, it's outrageous here, especially like, yeah, in the last year or two.
Speaker: But Salt Lake City rocks.
Speaker: You know, I think it's a really underrated city.
Speaker: I think it's so cool.
Speaker: Keep it that way.
Speaker: Keep it that way.
Speaker: The traffic's not bad.
Speaker: It's not East Coast bad because I used to live in D.C., but it's good.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, and you guys have the giant streets.
Speaker: I've heard this story might be, you know, like I work on a show about history.
Speaker: I love kind of collecting these old stories.
Speaker: I heard a possibly apocryphal story that the streets were designed to be that wide so you could U-E a horse-driven cart.
Speaker: Like that's why those streets are like six, seven lanes wide so that you could like do a U-turn on a horse-driven cart without having to go around the block.
Speaker: Even if it's apocryphal, that sounds fun, right?
Speaker: It sounds cool because this was, well, Utah, at least from the Anglo-Saxon settlers of Utah, they were all Mormon pioneers.
Speaker: So they came and it was set up by a grid system.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which is actually pretty easy to get around.
Speaker: Oh, it's super easy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: When I moved to D.C.
Speaker: 15 years ago,
Speaker: Oh, more than 15.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker: That was the first time I actually bought a Garmin because I don't know if anybody knows this, but all roads spontaneously end up at the Washington Monument.
Speaker: I have no idea why I always ended up there, but I was always so lost because it was so difficult to get around.
Speaker: Now you have GPS and it's not a big camera.
Speaker: That was like a revolutionary system back then because everything was so confusing.
Speaker: Oh, my first couple of tours, 2009, 2010, no one had, like iPhones had just come out, but like no one had them yet.
Speaker: And I was like printing out MapQuest directions.
Speaker: Yep, MapQuest.
Speaker: Maybe it was Google Maps at that point, but like, yeah, I definitely would print out driving directions from like,
Speaker: all right, we're going from like Atlanta to Raleigh.
Speaker: Like, all right, print out my directions, whatever.
Speaker: Like that was how I started out touring.
Speaker: So that gives you an idea of like, you know, it was, it was a different time and you know, now it's talking to your kids.
Speaker: They must think that like we came from the stone age.
Speaker: You're like, how did you ever get lost?
Speaker: And I'm like, Kate, let me just tell you how difficult it was on a car trip.
Speaker: You had to keep visual contact of the car in front of you because if you got lost, then you had to say, well, they could either be 10 miles behind us or 10 miles in front, but we have no idea how to hook up.
Speaker: I mean, seriously, you got to pull over and wait.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's not that long ago.
Speaker: Well, I always love, you know, I've been in New York for about five years now.
Speaker: I, I was, you know, at first really like, Oh, I got a map everywhere.
Speaker: But now it's like, um, I love when you get to the point with the subway, I'm like, uh, Google maps.
Speaker: I have a better app.
Speaker: idea here you know yeah i i think i i'm i got this don't worry about it i got you but uh yeah and so you know i don't know uh new york rules i'm trying to make some pinball friends here you guys have my email now so if you uh want to be friends
Speaker: and go play some pinball, get in touch.
Speaker: And also it was just like, people are so friendly.
Speaker: Like I've made a lot of friends just like, you know what I'm doing.
Speaker: Yeah, New York is known for being friendly.
Speaker: No, it's true.
Speaker: People don't believe me.
Speaker: Well, also I'm just a friendly person.
Speaker: I like going around chatting people up.
Speaker: But like, man, I can't tell you how many times.
Speaker: You know, you're just flipping and you just like talk to someone and chit chat and make friends.
Speaker: And it's like, it's pretty cool.
Speaker: And so I've, I've gotten some tips that way and like made some connections and it's just like a, it's a nice hangout.
Speaker: I just, I wish there were more older machines.
Speaker: That's my one critique.
Speaker: So if, if you own a bar in New York and you want to like get some pinheads together, like people can play Stern anywhere.
Speaker: You need a co-op.
Speaker: You need a co-op.
Speaker: Oh, does that exist?
Speaker: Pinball co-ops?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Rochester.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So you were talking earlier about Delaware.
Speaker: So Rochester, our friend, Bruce Nightingale from the slam tilt podcast, he's up there down in Delaware.
Speaker: So the Delaware collective is Fox Fox.
Speaker: So yeah, Joe Fox, Joe Fox.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So, uh, and they have him in, in Portland too.
Speaker: So there are people who don't have the space, but they're like, Hey, we do a co-op.
Speaker: And so when people buy games, they put them in.
Speaker: It's a cool, like communitarian view of like-minded pinheads who just want to play.
Speaker: So that's, Hey, maybe that's something I know it's completely different in New York or even warehouse space.
Speaker: Oh, I mean, you know, there's always places in like Ridgewood or Bushwick or whatever.
Speaker: Like if, hey, okay.
Speaker: M-A-R-T-I-N at 99pi.org.
Speaker: If you want to get a warehouse together, if you've got a whodunit and want to convert it into a Columbo with me,
Speaker: The other one actually that I really... Okay, maybe you guys have podcasts.
Speaker: I want them to do a Dune.
Speaker: I love Dune and I'm hoping... Dune would be interesting actually.
Speaker: Dune would be an interesting one.
Speaker: Because it can be one of those ones where like some of them are very... Some of the themed ones are very literal and some of them, you know, are just like...
Speaker: kind of drawing vibes and so like you could just do like ride the sandworm or whatever you don't have to like be super literal at doing it's just like there could be all kinds of cool ideas with it and you know you could take one of these you know like what they did with the beetles where they're just like i don't know we're just gonna take a table and kind of refresh it
Speaker: You do one of these like water worlds or Stargates or Congo's or something.
Speaker: You can just like give a fresh coat of paint and put some sandworms on there.
Speaker: And, you know, I would contend with that.
Speaker: Starship Troopers.
Speaker: Like, you know, there's some space ones already existing.
Speaker: Just have a good time.
Speaker: So Dune is like this weird like point of.
Speaker: It's a super deep dive.
Speaker: Yeah, I haven't gotten into it.
Speaker: I've watched the David Lynch one and the new one.
Speaker: I got the book and haven't read it, but it's this hilarious point of contention on our staff where a couple people feel really strongly pro and a couple feel really strongly con.
Speaker: And it's become a bit to debate it.
Speaker: It's the pro-dune and the anti-dune.
Speaker: When we have guests at the meetings or if we have a new hire or something, the first question is like,
Speaker: what do you think about Dune?
Speaker: And then there's like groans.
Speaker: Everyone's like, no, don't start this.
Speaker: And then it's like, all right, be careful.
Speaker: And then, you know, the last person we asked was like, oh, I haven't seen it.
Speaker: And it was like, good.
Speaker: The only safe answer.
Speaker: Don't get a Dune take.
Speaker: But I love Dune.
Speaker: The 1980s show, though, was so confusing that they actually printed out the movie.
Speaker: Oh, the movie, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, the movie was Sting.
Speaker: It was so confusing because if you didn't read the book, you have no idea what was going on.
Speaker: They finally printed out these handouts to hand to people when they bought their tickets to explain the story.
Speaker: It's not as good, but I do kind of... I'm a big...
Speaker: I'm just like a big film guy.
Speaker: I love David Lynch.
Speaker: And, you know, I actually have just been I'm almost done watching all of his.
Speaker: I've been on like this quest recently.
Speaker: So I was like, I got to watch Dune.
Speaker: I was like, oh, this kind of rocks.
Speaker: And the CG is like pretty cool.
Speaker: Like I love like janky 80s CG.
Speaker: It's like a little budge.
Speaker: And so it's like, you know, like these older games we're talking about or like, you know, I was telling Scott earlier that.
Speaker: you know, in like April or May, 2020, I like ordered some kits and I built, uh, with a raspberry pie, built a super Nintendo and a game boy.
Speaker: And it's just like, I don't know, man, something about super Nintendo level.
Speaker: Like that's exactly where I am.
Speaker: And you know, the there's limitations, but then within that you can do cool stuff.
Speaker: So I love when I'm watching old, like an old Sam Raimi movie and you're just like, yeah, there's like janky blood spurting everywhere, but like, it's like fun and silly.
Speaker: And I kind of prefer that to like,
Speaker: more modern stuff so i don't know yeah i love it but yeah okay so anyway dune dune and colombo those are my pitches or if anyone wants to make a 99 pi pinball game we got a lot of ideas you know it's like uh we have this slogan uh always read the plaque you know like a lot of times we'll tell a story and the button will be like and if you go there there's a plaque that tells you the story and so that's like one of our slogans and it's like that would be the uh
Speaker: you know, that could be one of the modes or whatever.
Speaker: We do a lot of train stories.
Speaker: You could do a little cactus Canyon train thing, you know, like we, so if anyone wants to do an IMPI pinball machine, it would be really cool.
Speaker: You know, I don't know how many would tell.
Speaker: You should hit up a Matt and Reby Hardy from WWE wrestling.
Speaker: They, they know a gentleman that has made their own, their own Ferris Bueller's day off.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: And, and then they also made a house of Hardy pinball machine because he won like,
Speaker: I think they named him a quest for gold.
Speaker: Cause he's one title.
Speaker: He's like a wrestler.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: My, my, it is too esoteric.
Speaker: I'm like pushing, pushing my Columbo agenda.
Speaker: That's okay.
Speaker: I'd take a Babylon five.
Speaker: There's like tons of star Trek ones.
Speaker: Let's, let's do a Babylon.
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: I, I just watched Stargate.
Speaker: I always like... Oh, Stargate would be good too.
Speaker: Like a real good Stargate, not the shoot the barrel.
Speaker: Yeah, that game's like fun.
Speaker: But I watched the movie.
Speaker: I was like, this movie rocks.
Speaker: Like this movie's really... I was all in.
Speaker: I like the movie.
Speaker: I think it's fun.
Speaker: It's the only time that James Spader actually didn't play the evil guy.
Speaker: It's like the one show.
Speaker: Yeah, I was like... And it's I think the guy who did like Independence Day, right?
Speaker: I'm like, oh, this is a cool blockbuster.
Speaker: Even if you don't know all the lore or whatever.
Speaker: So...
Speaker: Yeah, or I watched Starship Troopers, which, you know, I like the Starship Troopers pinball, but I was like, oh, this movie is like pretty fun.
Speaker: I went on a Paul Verhoeven deep dive too.
Speaker: So I don't know.
Speaker: Yeah, it's so funny to look at some of the IP that like they were just taking swings and you're like, sure, Lethal Weapon 3, why not?
Speaker: Okay, okay.
Speaker: Well, the Johnny Pneumana game, the funny thing is,
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Did you hear the story on that?
Speaker: So it was George Gomez.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So George Gomez.
Speaker: Well, okay.
Speaker: So it actually wasn't a movie.
Speaker: It bombed.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It didn't do well, but I love it.
Speaker: The designer, he went, he went and they gave him like a preview and he watched the movie and he got back and he called Williams and was like,
Speaker: can we get out of this license?
Speaker: No, I'm a sucker for mid nineties, like internet side, like hackers and the net and stuff.
Speaker: So I watched Johnny Numonic.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, then that was so, wasn't that the one where the internet was taking over and like exploding power lines when they were trying to, or the Sandra.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's the one.
Speaker: And like, right at the beginning, she goes to like pizza.com and orders a pizza.
Speaker: And I was like, it's real.
Speaker: Like, I love that.
Speaker: Or like, yeah, how,
Speaker: i just watched rewatched hackers recently like i love those like early 90s internet movies and i think that's why i like johnny mnemonic also because yeah it's not so literal they're like here get some megabytes or whatever like i i love that stuff so i'd love to see some more esoteric things but also you know they got big licenses this is a big it's a bigger market now they can't do like world cup and just have that little cute little dog back there you know yeah
Speaker: Doggy soccer.
Speaker: I'm from Argentina, so this was a huge World Cup year for me.
Speaker: So if they want to do a World Cup update with Messi, I would buy that for a dollar.
Speaker: Are you excited that Messi's coming to the US?
Speaker: Yeah, now you can go see him in Miami.
Speaker: I really want to.
Speaker: I've never seen him play in person.
Speaker: And also the World Cup next one, all the semifinals and finals are going to be here.
Speaker: I have my uncles and cousin went to Qatar and they saw the finals and were there and cheering.
Speaker: I was like,
Speaker: Oh man, he keeps saying he's going to retire.
Speaker: But he might come back.
Speaker: Like that's the only sport I care about is every four years.
Speaker: I'm like, I want Argentina to win.
Speaker: Well, you got one.
Speaker: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker: Broke the old, uh, uh,
Speaker: Maradona.
Speaker: Oh my God.
Speaker: That was like, that was like three months before I was born.
Speaker: I just missed it.
Speaker: So I was, I was hyped up in my lifetime.
Speaker: So anyway, if you guys want to do a new world cup, you know, I would, I would, that would get my seal of approval.
Speaker: Feature messy prominently, but yeah, I don't know.
Speaker: Well, we're going to, we're going to go ahead and wrap this up.
Speaker: One, one thing though, cause you said Dune Stern was trolling last week that they were at the licensing app at,
Speaker: licensing convention in vegas and gary stern did take pictures in front of the dune yes oh my god we'll see if they do what's the life the one i was more excited about that no one's pointed out i was like scott did you see he was in front of obviously green day stuck out i was like yes there was green day and lizzo but muse in the bottom left of that picture like musely use the band muse yeah
Speaker: I don't really know them at all, but someone did them at karaoke.
Speaker: You need to get into them.
Speaker: What's the song?
Speaker: Black Holes something?
Speaker: Someone did that at karaoke and just blew me away.
Speaker: Yeah, the guy was hitting all the parts.
Speaker: I was like, this band is crazy.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I don't really know them.
Speaker: But yeah, you know, like if they did what like the music that no one's ever going to do a table of what I'd be like the Ahmad Jamal, like or Chico Hamilton, like old jazz guys tables like no one's going to buy.
Speaker: Yeah, Josh wants the Aquabats.
Speaker: Did they take a picture in front of Aquabats?
Speaker: Wait, okay, real quick before I go, what's this licensing convention?
Speaker: This is crazy.
Speaker: So whoever owns the IP to all these things shows up and wheeling and dealing?
Speaker: Yeah, so what it is is every year they have a big licensing convention down in Vegas.
Speaker: They go down there and essentially all the IPs down there set up booths and they go around and they discuss if their product mixing and mingling with pinball or whoever's down there
Speaker: makes sense and they kind of talk some numbers.
Speaker: They may even lock in a license at that point.
Speaker: uh it's kind of a showcase he took pictures in front of barbie and tupac barbie machine would rock where's the barbie machine i'm so excited yeah i think barbie i'm like barbie and oppenheimer together i want to see both of them i'm so excited so yeah that would be an interesting mashup oh yeah like they can do two skins of the same machine that would rule no i'm i'm so hyped so yeah i hope they make a barbie machine that would absolutely rip
Speaker: I would almost guarantee that there's going to be a muse.
Speaker: A muse.
Speaker: I hope that didn't sound mean because we talked about muse before.
Speaker: I was like, who's muse?
Speaker: I think it's really up the aisle of what they're doing right now with Foo Fighters and Sophia.
Speaker: I almost guarantee there's a Green Day.
Speaker: It would not shock me.
Speaker: Green Day would be great if it were American Idiot.
Speaker: I think American Idiot or anything before that.
Speaker: If they did a Dookie and
Speaker: Mm hmm.
Speaker: And then broad and stuff.
Speaker: OK, here's my pitch.
Speaker: If any certain people are listening.
Speaker: ABBA ABBA would sell so much.
Speaker: Oh, my God.
Speaker: I would die.
Speaker: Yeah, there's no there's an Elton John.
Speaker: Oh, you love Elton John.
Speaker: Announced it, but it's I mean, yeah, it's a rumor open secret that Jersey Jack.
Speaker: Oh, I'm going to shreds and I love Elton.
Speaker: That should be the yellow brick road.
Speaker: I can't hit those notes or that would be my karaoke song.
Speaker: But yeah, I know so many people who go crazy for like the Mamma Mia movies.
Speaker: And like those songs are so catchy because, you know, like the Foo Fighters are cool, but I'm I don't you know, I listen to a lot as a teenager.
Speaker: I don't need to like hear every Foo Fighters song again every time I play.
Speaker: So a lot of the ones on location actually now have the volume turned down a bit because it's like otherwise they would the bartenders would like flip the machine over if they heard ever long.
Speaker: We'd go crazy.
Speaker: Like there's one place where it's like almost completely off.
Speaker: And I'm like, I don't know.
Speaker: That's fine.
Speaker: I've heard.
Speaker: It's like in Wayne's world.
Speaker: Hey, no stairway to hell.
Speaker: No stairway.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But yeah, okay, so we've got some ideas, Stern, if you're listening.
Speaker: You can go back through if you want my consultation on an ABBA machine or a Columbo machine.
Speaker: Maybe a little John Cassavetes mode.
Speaker: We corner the market on film dorks.
Speaker: I can help you with the Criterion-themed machines if you want.
Speaker: So hit me up.
Speaker: You guys have my email several times at this point.
Speaker: I was going to say, if you want people to get a hold of you, what is that email again, Martine?
Speaker: It's M-A-R-T-I-N at 99pi.org.
Speaker: But only if you want to be friends and play some cool pinball or if you have a really good story idea, don't send me a boring story idea.
Speaker: Send me a good one.
Speaker: And also plug your podcast.
Speaker: I want to go to this licensing convention.
Speaker: I'm going to see if they'll send me.
Speaker: That sounds fun.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: 99% visible.
Speaker: I mix it every week where it's a bunch of geniuses that I work with.
Speaker: I'm like, you know, stoner musician guy surrounded by like the most insane, incredible journalists.
Speaker: So I'm always proud to support them.
Speaker: And, and I'm happy they let me come on two or three times a year and just do a dumb like music story or something.
Speaker: So I have a, I have some cool ones in the pipeline, but you know, I just, I mix the show every week.
Speaker: So I,
Speaker: That's my main thing.
Speaker: And then I go, when I have something I'm super interested about, I'll tell a story about it.
Speaker: I'm on Twitter a lot.
Speaker: That's my only social media, which is, it's Verispeeder, like an old tape Verispeeder.
Speaker: So V-A-R-I-S-P-E-E-D-E-R, Verispeeder.
Speaker: And you got my email.
Speaker: That's the only stuff I have.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I don't have that much to plug.
Speaker: So yeah, hit me up if you're in New York.
Speaker: I want to play some bimball and are a nice person.
Speaker: Definitely.
Speaker: If you want to get a hold of us, we are LoserKidPinballPodcast at gmail.com.
Speaker: Also, all of our socials.
Speaker: That includes YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, which honestly we don't post anything on TikTok.
Speaker: But Twitter, all at LoserKidPinball.
Speaker: Hit us up there.
Speaker: I actually even did like a link tree.
Speaker: So if you go to our Facebook or to our Instagram, you can just click that.
Speaker: We'll take you to the merch website, silverballswag.com slash loser kid.
Speaker: I'll take you to our sweet, sweet shoes.
Speaker: You know, you're going to want a pair for October when we come out and everyone's wearing their shoes.
Speaker: You're going to wish you like, oh, well, I didn't get the memo.
Speaker: You're getting the memo right now.
Speaker: But yeah.
Speaker: what you got for Scott, send us out.
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: I'm really looking forward to our 3.0 hats that are in development.
Speaker: So definitely look for those too.
Speaker: So anyway, leave us a review, subscribe, all that fun stuff.
Speaker: Be nice to get a few.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, we'll send you one.
Speaker: We have to, we want to get some more updated reviews.
Speaker: So sounds good.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Talk to you in two-ish weeks.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Bye.
Speaker: Shut up and sit down.
