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Pinball News and Pinball Magazine Podcast
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Pinball Industry News: May 2020 Re-cap

PodcastAnalysis updated 3d ago1 hr 51 min listenBy Martin Ayub, Jonathan Joosten
From the creator

Martin Ayub (Pinball News) and Jonathan Joosten (Pinball magazine discuss the pinball industry news of May 2020, including the reveal of a new TNMT pinball, companies moving, new people being...

Listen on Pinball News and Pinball Magazine Podcast

Highlights

  • Illinois manufacturing restart allowed from May 29, 2020 (Phase 3 of recovery plan) with 6-foot distancing or barriers between workstations
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was originally scheduled to launch at Midwest Gaming Classic in early April 2020 but was delayed
  • TMNT LE limited to 500 units
  • TMNT game uses no video footage from original 1980s animated series due to licensing or quality issues
  • Stern implemented a two-week production ramp period before TMNT became available for purchase, unlike previous launches like Stranger Things
  • Raymond Davidson was the number-one ranked pinball player in the world at the time of his hiring
  • TMNT game features a bidirectional spinning disc mechanism on Premium/LE models but unidirectional on Pro model as a marketing differentiation
  • Dutch Pinball Open Expo viability uncertain due to potential six-foot social distancing requirements making event unprofitable or uninteresting

Notable quotes

“Manufacturing was allowed to restart with either six feet of distance or impermeable barriers between employee workstations, as it says in the details, and ramped up cleaning and disinfecting between shifts.”
Marta Lev
“Unlike previous models like Stranger Things that was immediately available when the games was announced, in this case, there's still a two-week period in which the games need to be manufactured and distributed amongst distributors.”
Jonathan Euston
“Code-wise, I was sort of blown away but not in a good way in the sense that there is a lot to do in this game. And with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles being such a kiddie type of theme, I think the game is way too complex for what it sort of looks like and appeals to.”
Marta Lev
“I was having a discussion with someone about that Raymond Davison being hired and that person was wondering, well, the press release that was sent out basically brags about him being such a good pinball player, but it doesn't say much about how good he is at writing software.”
Jonathan Euston
“For a brief moment of time I also had a teenage griffin ninja turtles pinball machine from data is in my collection which I actually quite enjoyed... since the turtles are always hiding in the sewers, this game has no sewer shot.”
Marta Lev

Entities

  • Stern Pinball· company
  • Dutch Pinball Open Expo· event
  • Midwest Gaming Classic· event
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles· game
  • Illinois· location
  • Netherlands· location
  • United Kingdom· location
  • Pinball Magazine· organization
  • Pinball News· organization
  • Dwight Sullivan· person
  • Gary Stern· person
  • Jack Danger· person
  • Jeremy Packer· person
  • Jerry Thompson· person
  • John Borg· person
  • Jonathan Euston· person
  • Keith Elwin· person
  • Marta Lev· person
  • Raymond Davidson· person
  • Zach Sharp· person
  • Zombie Yeti· person

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