I have to say with the few very vocal cranks/haters/*ssholes in the group if I was a podcaster or streamer I'd be tempted to just say "F it!", take my pinball, and go home!

However, I'm sure they realize that the large majority of the population is appreciative of their hard work to provide these entertainments, as judged from their download numbers, etc.

As a fan of many of these pinball personalities I'm looking forward to their new podcasts and relieved that we aren't losing them altogether.

Question, will the individual regular podcasts be subscribable in itunes seperately, so you see updates to just those immediately without having to filter through every single podcast put out by The Network?

Everyone has a giant chip on their shoulders these days. The sense of entitlement is through the roof. I blame the "president" for setting a terrible example...

Keep up the good work Zach, and just ignore the haters. Vocal minority with nothing constructive to add.

thepinballnetwork.org would be perfect.

Nah. Only an insecure tool would do something like that.

So which podcast is going to have Greg and Dennis on it?

Yeah I thought they mentioned him in the original promo that caused all the hub bub.? Anyway maybe it was all in my mind. Firmly on team Greg here.

I call BS on this. Zach has always been in on over-priced lighting mods, aka PinStadiums. These black lights are basically another variant of that.

I thought the 3 of them had a great exchange, at least at the first 1/2 of the podcast, with differing strong takes. It was interesting and entertaining. I wish Dennis would speak up more but I get that he tires easily...

I agree it's a more interesting dynamic with Dennis in the mix.

It might make more sense to make the The Pinball Show an alternating week thing, always includes Dennis, is long form (60-90 minutes) that goes in-depth on recent news, has certain fun segments, etc. There's not that much to talk about for a long-run weekly IMHO and you end up with questionable time fillers like the "Dennis/x on the couch" segments and 20 mins of Zach talking like a baby about a minature Dennis, etc. that has nothing to do with pinball and many find off-putting.

...And then have the mid-week show just be a quick catchup on current events, 30mins max, focussed and to the point.

Honestly their reviews have always been hogwash. They are too theme oriented vs. gameplay. e.g. IJ being the top reviewed game on their list. The minute they de-rated IMDN they lost me. IMDN is a friggin' classic and hits on ALL cylinders. You just have to have grown up listing to musicians that know how to pull their friggin' pants all the way up.

Not that it matters, opinions are like *ssholes, every forum has some.

I think as a condition of entry you should have to have something positive to share about pinball. It can't just be the guy that shits on everything because "he's no shill". lol.

To your credit Dennis I find your ads for the Roanoke Pinball Museum at the beginning of each Eclectic Gamers Podcast episode to be highly entertaining, strange voices and all. Well done, sir!

It appears that K-man has taken up a large piece of the inside of your head. Nobody cares, he's water under the bridge.

Exactly. I really hate it when he gives away a free NIB pinball machine at the end of every show to a lucky listener!

Is this available in podcast form?

I'm subscribed. Never came up. It doesn't seem to be part of any specific podcast channel either.?

Really impressed with the amount of effort it must have taken to produce this.

Great voice acting too!

On the topic of toppers, Stern has apparently decided that toppers are like LEs, or even SLEs for a hit game. They introduce artificial scarcity by only producing a small number of each that doesn't come close to satisfying the potentially addressable market.

This affords them several advantages (from their perspective):

1. They can plan for a batch of 500 or whatever the number is going to be, order all the parts, get them made and be done with it. No making a batch, evaluating actual demand, making another batch, potentially sitting on or god forbid having to clear out excess inventory at a reduced margin, etc.
2. They can skim the cream from the top of the topper market with pricing that is obviously ridiculous in terms of the BOM.

By making the toppers rare and expensive they maximize their profit/effort ratio. But by only addressing the high end of the market, you have to question whether what they are doing is actually good for their overall market and pinball in general. I can't imagine that intentionally disenfranchising the majority of their customers for a particular game with each "limited" topper release is buying them much goodwill in their customer base. And the raw greed of it is unsightly at best. So you end up with a majority of their customers that just tune out toppers that otherwise might bought some because of the hassle and pricing, or develop strong negative feelings towards them and those who promote them (*ahem* Zach).

You may argue that nobody needs to buy a topper, but the exact same thing can be said for anything in pinball, including the pinball machine.

My opinion is that Stern would be better off in the long term by making the toppers accessible to a majority of their customers (manufacture to meet demand, priced "reasonably", whatever that means in pinball). It's fine to occasionally offer something that is very exclusive so long as there are plenty of regular toppers that are not.

Okay, finally got to the end of this one.

You can learn a lot about Zach by listening to his braggadocious take on the video game industry. Having no relevant recent knowledge or experience to pull from doesn't stop him from making "strong take" statements like Nintendo should sell their games on competitors systems, and the Xbox Series S is pointless, etc.

I realize that making bold inaccurate statements is in style in 2020, and frankly I wish Dennis has taken the bait and shut him down hard, but I guess his strength was dwindling by that point. And yes, Tony knows about 1000x more about video games than you do Zach. It's true.

Re: Nintendo

New York (CNN Business)Shiny new video game consoles from PlayStation and Xbox are flying off the shelves this week. But their competition, Nintendo, wants gamers to know it still has the best-selling video game console.
In the United States, Nintendo sold more than 735,000 Switch and Switch Lite consoles in October, the company confirmed Thursday, citing numbers from NPD Group. That's up 136% compared to the same month last year, and the second highest October sales for any gaming console besides the Nintendo Wii, which sold 807,000 units in 2008.

Those numbers are just a slice of the success Nintendo has enjoyed, especially during an ongoing pandemic where many people are staying home in an abundance of caution. The Nintendo Switch has now sold more than 63 million systems worldwide and has been the best-selling game console -- beating the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One -- for 23 consecutive months.

The Switch has handily outsold the Microsoft Xbox One consoles, maybe Microsoft should stop selling hardware and just make Forza and Halo for the Switch and PS5? ...all the real gamerz will buy the PS5 anyway, it's the top spec kit.

Re: Xbox Series S

The fact is the low cost Series S + Xbox Game Pass package represents the best value per gaming $ available in new gen consoles and will appeal to the mass market that just want to play games and don't need to "flex". Think of it as the "above ground pool" of the new consoles.

Finally, the new PS 5 DualSense controllers are getting rave review for bringing truly innovative haptic feedback to console gaming.

I know all this and I'm not even a gamer - I have to spend all my free time doing playfield swaps on my NiB Sterns...

I appreciate the response. I do often listen to Eclectic Gamers. I was using the segment as a standout example of Zach just talking smack on a subject right out the bottom of his ass (as he often does), and doing so with misplaced confidence. I can only assume it was meant to be entertaining, probably trying to get you to react, etc.

In any case, it was annoying as fuck. If you know you don't know about something, then act like it Zach! A little humility goes a long way these days.

Anyway, keep up the work, maybe it will get better...

Just like to thank you Craig for taking a realistic stand on these ongoing playfield issues. Your reaction as a relatively new NIB purchaser, as well as those of Mrs. Pin on the recent Slam Tilt! episode, I think accurately reflect those of actual new-to-pinball buyers. Even as a used pinball collector (well-used 80's and 90's games) for over 20 years, I remember how gutted I was when I made my first NIB Stern purchase in 2016 only to have the CC start chipping in < 100 games. I actually was so pissed I sold it and bought a friends minty HUO 2013 model which had far superior shiny thick clear-coat.

While old-hands in the business or hobby might be more tolerant of a few "purely cosmetic" faults, the reality is that the market growth in pinball are mostly new home buyers, and they perceive (rightfully) that if they spend $9500 on a luxury toy for their home, that it should arrive in perfect condition and remain so for possibly as long as they own it, given relatively light use in a home basement.

The large manufacturers, meanwhile, have been taking advantage of selling into this new premium market at premium prices while still relying on product QA and a customer support network from the mostly by-gone commercial era. Different standards apply, they need to accept that people expect PERFECT playfields. Make it happen.

Kaite is dead right about the TWD playfield layout, one of the worst in recent memory.

But they were both wrong about R&M, though it is difficult to get setup so the shots are fast and flowing, and it is less forgiving than a Steve Ritchie layout that way, but if you can make your shots it's all flow and speed.

C'mon Zach, as a medical professional you should realize by now that Dennis is only capable of loving himself.

Well this is going well...

For f'sake people, it's a bloody pinball podcast, awards show, and forum. It's absolutely meaningless in the larger scheme of things.

Chill out already.

The very fact that Kaneda can win a Twipy 12 times in a row is proof that:

A) The Twipy awards aren't rigged, at least not by the organizers.
B) The pinball community has no class.

Now let's all get over ourselves and go rebuild some flippers, put up a high score, or something else productive.

Exactly, and the worst part about Zach's "subliminal" over-promotion of new games ("BUY! BUY! BUY!") are all the innocent victims it produces... ... ...

...I suppose there are some Kaneda fans out there somewhere with no ability to discern grossly self-indulgent hype/spin from reality. Maybe Flippin' Out Pinball should sponsor his podcast and tap into the potentially lucrative market of "unawares".