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Triple Drain Pinball Podcast
Triple Drain Pinball Podcast
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Triple Drain Pinball Podcast Ep 56: Alice, Avatar, X-Men, Expo, LET'S GO

PodcastAnalysis updated 3d ago2 hr 5 min listen
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Triple Drain Pinball Podcast Episode 56: Alice, Avatar, X-Men, Expo, LET'S GO Hosts: Joel Engelberth, Tom Graf, Travis Murie Here we go again back with another episode before Chicago Pinball Expo....

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Highlights

  • Keith Elwin invests significant mental capacity in every aspect of game design, including team management across art, code, and sound direction, not just playfield mechanics.
  • Alice in Wonderland features custom-molded sculpts throughout the playfield with minimal flat plastic, custom stopwatch with screen, Cheshire Cat topper, and side rail lights with color-changing LEDs.
  • Alice's mini playfield has significant randomness without clear player control, contrasting unfavorably with Twilight Zone's condensed design that provides control despite randomness.
  • Alice's art direction was originally black-and-white line work by Zombie Yeti, later colored by another artist to achieve the young-adult sexualized aesthetic.
  • J-Pop's original Alice design contained incomplete areas (foam core prototypes) that Melvin had to finish or complete as project continuation.
  • Zombie Yeti is the head of Stern Pinball's art department.
  • Alice in Wonderland does not shoot well based on layout analysis; described as having poor ball path design despite strong visual presentation.
  • Pinball Pulse is a new tournament-focused podcast/livestream by Tom on Fox Cities Pinball Twitch with 98% tournament talk content.

Notable quotes

“What I'm saying is, yes, Keith obviously relies heavily on his mechanical engineer, Harrison Drake. He relies heavily on his coder, Rick Nagel. But what's really cool and where I've gained a lot of respect for Keith Elwin is just the amount of mental capacity and thought process that he puts into every aspect of the game.”
Joel
“I was just like, this game does not look like it's going to shoot well at all. Like, it just did not look like that was the aim for it.”
Travis
“So there was clearly things that he had to finish or complete. But anyways, all that's come out, it's very polarizing.”
Travis
“Like, even when we saw it, did Sammy Yeti do the art? He did. He did the original. He did all the original art, but it was all just black and white.”
Travis
“I'm looking at this mini play field going, where are the flippers? And then it's like, oh, yeah, there's there's magnets in there. OK, I mean, I've played Twilight Zone before and there's magnets in that, but there's only like one objective.”
Tom
“I wonder if that's why the sculpts exist the way that they do because it does cover up some of the shortcomings of the layout itself.”
Joel
“We're just three idiots with a microphone. We are. That's really what it boils down to. Except for Tom. Tom's not an idiot. So it's really two idiots and Tom.”
Travis
“So, Joel, take it away. Okay, plug it. Describe it. Tell us all about it. So, Joel just told you it's basically tournament talk.”
Tom

Entities

  • Dutch Pinball / Barrels of Fun· company
  • Stern Pinball· company
  • Pinball Expo· event
  • Pinball Pulse· event
  • UK Open· event
  • Alice in Wonderland· game
  • Foo Fighters· game
  • Twilight Zone· game
  • Asher Lefkoff· person
  • Brian Eddy· person
  • Davey with Stumbler Mods· person
  • Harrison Drake· person
  • J-Pop· person
  • Jack Danger· person
  • Joel· person
  • Kaneda· person
  • Keith Elwin· person
  • Kerry Hardy· person
  • Lior Mods· person
  • Melvin· person
  • Rick Nagel· person
  • Tom· person
  • Travis· person
  • Zach McCarthy· person
  • Zombie Yeti· person

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