Whitewater 2!!!

Agreed. All A.P. needs is that one great theme. If I were AP, I’d look at Stern’s out of production DMD catalog and see which of those themes A.P. feels they can significantly improve upon or modernize by reimagining in 2021 and beyond. Themes such as Game of Thrones, Rolling Stones, Lord of the Rings, AC/DC, Ghostbusters or Metallica with a modern display would sell...

dont have any doubt on what you (and Josh) are doing on the code aspect

we had lots of talks exchanges about Oktoberfest, and i know that you're listening and really care for feedback, while finally the result is there : OF is top notch with no doubt !

keep up the good work

(and now enjoying my Houdini)

That interview was something else. A number of inside scoops + several throw the previous regime under the bus details you don't generally hear aired publicly.

Nordman finally finds a real pinball company.
This is great news for Dennis and the hobby.

Three years at Deep Root,.......no engineering support !! Wow....

With Americans rock solid build quality, Nordman, posible Franchi art, and Roger Sharp?
This could work like gangbusters.
Congrats.

Message from the Freeeek Kingdom.

47:00

David - " ... in this 3 weeks that Ive been there I've already brought on 3 junior game designers who are already working on their first games."

Dr pin - "Are these people that we are familiar with? ... are they 'no names' ?"

David - "When you see these people you will know their names, yes. But right now we're going to keep that kinda quiet."

Planning on announcing one of the new designers games in "6 months".

One of them is surely Jack Danger ...

AP could be about to come up with some pretty good stuff with Nordman sharing his experiences of do's and dont's with new blood designers, perhaps including some cool new ideas.

Dennis starts working on his new game..... today!

Congratulations to AP and Dennis Nordman

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I love this announcement. Look at HOH and it’s innovation. AP wins big with Dennis as the guy designs great games.

Well, finally some good news.
Congrats to AP and Dennis.

I love many of Nordman's games, but am I missing something with EHOH? What innovation exactly has he brought with EHOH?

I have the same question. I don't have much time on EHOH, but nothing about the game felt particularly new.

Ok, what in the world is that?!

Not sure about the specifics, but his designs forced Stern to pack the biggest BOM in years

The innovation with EHOH is with the code. The layout is familiar but also deceptively simple. There are physical ball locks all over the place and the haunted house is on par with the MM castle. Everything just came together perfectly.

Nordman knows how to put together a design, and listening to the podcast, he’s there to mentor and guide some younger designers. What I like about AP is they acknowledge missteps and accept constructive criticism. Hopefully the next few games will be huge for them.

$1k Topper?

So it sounds like Joe Balcer was the biggest problem at AP. Glad Nordman is in and has a stable job.

Elvira3 is awesome. My fav Stern in years.

Now AP just needs to hire an art/creative director.

It's definitely a sum of all the parts thing. It's a great shooting game and there are some interesting touches, like the Deadhead Crypt toy, the house is a nice sculpt with a neat ghost lighting effect, and the trunk is different. It's not the most amazing game from a hardware perspective, but it's good for a Stern and then the software makes it truly special.

Agree 100%

BTW I couldn't care less about Elvira herself (since I'm not a 70 year old man) but it's the closest thing we will ever get to a MST3K pin

Yeah. That's the real appeal. Lyman watching a hundred hours of crap to get the best clips

The trailer feature at the end of the game is a work of art.

That sounds like an over-simplification to me, David Fix mentioned a lot of things he's already addressed with purchasing and the like - I certainly hope Joe didn't have to deal with that kind of stuff all the time. My reading between the lines is that Joe's personality may not be the best for the role David wants the lead designer to play, mentoring others, etc. so he was moved to a contractor role. They didn't mention art too much but again my take on it was that no one on that podcast (including Nordman) were very impressed with the art on prior games (particularly OKT) so I expect some big changes in that area as well, this has been a pretty common complaint of AP games here and in general too.

Since we are going for easy Zingers...

You share their hairline, though.

Not just MST, but also for fans of horror comics from the 70's, it's basically a DC House of Mystery pinball, just missing Cain of course. Elvira even had a brief revival of the House of Mystery comic in the 80's for a few years.

Dennis likes swoopy ramps and EHOH has no swoopy ramps, which I think could have made it more fun and interesting. I blame Stern on that one. Perhaps AP will let him be a little more free.

Nordman makes really fun games, and David Fix sounds like his experience will really help the company. This puts AP on my radar.

BRING ON A KILLER ARTIST. Don’t drop that ball, AP. Get someone dynamic & contemporary that blows us away.

Exactly, you have to try Hot Wheels, it's my fave game of 2020

Wow, there is a lot of great stuff in that podcast including Dennis being quite frank about some of his Heighway experiences and that he and Franchi are working on a game for CGC. Sounds like whatever was planned for game 5 is getting bumped up and will now be Game 4 which may be followed by a game from one of the new "young" designers they are bringing in. This is the first time I've ever really heard of / from David Fixx but he really sounds energized and gung-ho about the process and future for AP, I'm really looking forward to seeing how this all plays out.

rosh it's a really good thing you got that Houdini code update out, sounds like you and Ferret are going to be really, really busy!

He basically admitted to as much during TPF or somewhere. He had double d ramps on the left that got cut for cost. He also had a large physical toy in the lower left drain area for the Manos Hand Of Fate spinning wheel

But the game that as produced is still pretty packed in my opinion.

And agree. Nordman has made some great ramps. Up there with Dan Langlois as best ramp designers. Let him do his magic AP

Shhh! It's only a beta!

Wow!! Big news! This is absolutely the right move, a bit late but great still. I sincerely wish Joe all the best, he's a great guy but to me he's a great engineer, design is a little different, you need a little of engineering, taste and a lot of imagination to make a great pinball machine...Dennis has all of those qualities in spade. I'm genuinely excited for AP now. Watch out Stern, JJP and Spooky you guys are about to get some real competition from AP....Finally!

Can't blame a man for not using his talent or listening to him. He had to work with what was.

LTG : )

Let me put it this way, I believe Ferret and I were the only ones who did not take last week off.

I don't expect much to change on that before it is officially released in a week or so. Still a few more things I want to do on Houdini, but will have to wait, I want to get all of these improvements and new stuff out to owners.

Congratulations to AP on the recent new staff additions !

Super excited to buy my first AP pin.
I have liked their pins from the start, just waiting for a theme and an art package I want in my basement.
I think the future is looking bright for AP!

I'll give you one example that killed AP on route here for the OP I worked with. AP not fixing the crash bug introduced in the Houdini audits for more than 6 months (it may have been longer, we bailed at 6 months) was RIDICULOUS for a company that supposedly wants to build cred with operators. This was a critical bug for operators and should have been a priority, but it was not. I asked Barry about it at least monthly. Mentioned it to Josh a few times. Nothing. We couldn't go back because the prior version of the software had other issues with the game playability. It sucked. Also, the system menu is made for home users, not really functional and well arranged for operators. Stern and JJP are doing the system menus correctly for operators with clear layout and quick access. AP's graphical system menu is a mess (unless it's changed radically since Houdini).

But yeah. AP blowing off fixing that important audit crash bug that made it impossible for the audits to work right caused the OP I worked with to drop the game and he wasn't interested in AP after that. That was the end of AP around here.

4sjh2n (resized).jpg

I dunno, I think his response might be a little different this time around.....

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Wow, that's great news for AP. If anyone can make a fun pin that reverses the steep downward sales trend of AP machines, it's Dennis. If they do it right, he can do something that will sell more than all three AP pins so far combined. I guess the AP owners decided to double down on making this work instead of bailing. A nice surprise. Looking forward to seeing what Dennis does if unencumbered. Stern taking his mechanical hand of fate wheel and whoop de do ramp off Elvira3 really sucked.

Holy crap. How did THAT happen?

Just listened to the podcast; I'm a big fan of AP's games and a huge fan of Nordman's work, but always think we need more fresh blood in the hobby... so hearing he'll be mentoring 3 new designers and AP's planning on at least 2 games a year is incredibly exciting. Nice job American! Can't wait to see what you guys put out.

No idea.... He might have a little shorter leash, is my guess. He just came back from a 90 day timeout.

Seems a little unfair. I thought we were allowed to have opinions!?

I saw he was blocked too, not going to spend the effort necessary to determine what he did to get that status.

It would be really interesting to see what Nordman had planned for EHoH, prior to Stern's BOM reduction efforts.

There's a recording of that panel somewhere where he shows mockups of the things he had designed. Unfortunately I don't know where it is or which panel it was...

Not if you can't control yourself, its not a hard concept to grasp.

Controlling your opinions?
Does he get a refund for his contributions to pinside?

Controlling what you type.
EDIT: Please if you are going the "'Merica freedom of speech!" angle this is not an American site, no public.