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Episode 211 - Shark + No Eat Ball = Jaws
PodcastAnalysis updated 6d ago1 hr 7 min listenBy Dennis Kriesel & Tony Kurkowski
Pinball: We go over Stern Pinball's Jaws and the No-Eat-BallGate that has manifested. We also spend a bit of time talking about Princess Bride and Little Shop of Horrors and use that as a springboard...
Highlights
- Stern's Jaws pinball does not have a shark that eats the ball, contrary to community expectations.
- Stern's design team created an early prototype of a shark-eating-ball mechanic for Jaws but removed it because it wasn't fun.
- Princess Bride is being developed for P3 as a third-party game rather than a first-party Multimorphic title.
- A new pinball company is developing Little Shop of Horrors based on reporting from NAP Arcade.
- Modern pinball prioritizes gameplay and rules depth over toys to maintain engagement for home collectors, whereas 1990s arcade machines relied on toys as eye-catching attractions to drive coin drops.
- Data East's Tommy is one of the only pinball machines based on a musical, and possibly the only one besides 1776.
- There is a rumor that American Pinball had (or was developing) Masters of the Universe as a pinball title.
- J.J. Pease either obtained or is developing Top Gun or Maverick pinball licenses.
Notable quotes
“Shark + No Eat Ball = Jaws”
“Because if there's not a shark that eats a ball, the game doesn't have toys. And this is what's wrong with modern pinball is it's not 90s pinball.”
“At the price of these games, if that was a deal breaker for you or you want it to be a deal breaker, absolutely. Let it be a deal breaker. We're talking multi-thousand dollars.”
“Toys were eye catching because when the game's not playing what else could they do but have toys on the play field... In today's world these games need to stay entertaining.”
“Gameplay and flow and fun and just the enjoyment of it... That's the home market. That's how they actually keep them.”
“I haven't seen this much toy blowback on a Stern game since Mandalorian, where, remember, everyone just got really hung up that the baby Yoda figure didn't move.”
“I just think it's weird that maybe not too weird because I've seen it before where everyone's just sort of not everyone, but a lot of people are kind of rallying around that. Maybe because they want to hang their hat on.”
“Why has not [Masters of the Universe] been done? Because that was terrible. It was a terrible movie. But... No, I meant the cartoon.”
“Shots are the new toys... I don't like that expression because I think shots have always been really important.”
“We're trapped in the gravity of the moon. What do we do? We die.”
Entities
- American Pinball· company
- Data East· company
- Multimorphic· company
- Stern Pinball· company
- NAP Arcade· company/media
- Godzilla· game
- Jaws (Stern)· game
- Little Shop of Horrors· game
- Mandalorian· game
- Princess Bride· game
- Don's Pinball Podcast· media
- Eclectic Gamers Podcast· media
- Mrs. Penn's Pinball Podcast· media
- Pinside· media
- Slam Tilt Podcast· media
- Stern Insider Pinball Podcast· media
- Triple Drain Pinball Podcast· media
- Dennis· person
- Elwynn· person
- J.J. Pease· person
- Nagel· person
- Nick Baldrige· person
- Roy Scheider· person
- Tony· person
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