really? who? there is no one left there.
seems like you and Mr. Fix have something in common...

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It has completely locked up twice. Not a crash and reboot, but totally locked. Hasn't happened in a while, but it's nice to have the backup CPU just in case.

You're right. The people I saw today were 100% figments of my imagination.

not a difficult question, who?
what kind of CPU did they give you?

Mitesh gave me a small, square shaped CPU that goes in the backbox.

Saw some other people assembling games and some others in their office. Sorry, I didn't stop to get any of their names. Thought that would be a bit strange.

I feel like he was telling the truth. When your direct bosses are finance guys who probably don't care how pinball is different from everything else they do, its expected to perform the same. I don't know the qualifications are for running a pinball company and maybe Fix didnt have the answers either, but if what he says about and absentee owner is true, I think we can agree that makes it tough..

Thats what I'm thinking. Here is your severance pay. Aimtron looking like some people called it. Treyboi left cause he was so offended lol.

One of the good things about GTF is that it uses a readily available mini PC with readily available PRoc boards. And many other standard pinball parts. Think Oktoberfest is the same. API switching to their own board system is my biggest concern about buying their games going forward. Maybe the new boards are readily serviceable but would need to understand better. Same reason I wouldn’t buy a Turner machine at this point with their proprietary playfield board.

And Houdini have a different PC, not the mini.

LTG : )

Listened to part of the interview, and just, wow. Not going to fact check it all, as that would take just way too much time. It is nice that Jason Knapp has been vindicated as David has now acknowledged that the company was looking to sell. So a few quick fact checks . . .

When David arrived, it was not just me and Mitesh on staff, off the top of my head, there was Joe Balcer, Shalin Shah (EE), Michael Grant (sales), Dave Brennan (support), Joe Schober (contract developer), Ish Raneses (animator, possible he was let go right before Fix arrived), Rohit Mehta (ME), Kishan Modia (purchasing/production), and a bunch of folks in the factory, including Jorge Cardero who was great at final testing and final playfield tester Deepak (never knew his last name, he did not talk much, but was with AP before I was). I'm sure I'm missing some people. Also Matt Kern was on contract and had done music/sound on the first three games, helped a little on LOV with voice calls, and then also did music/sound on GTF and I think he did some work on BBQ as well, but not 100% sure. Bobby Lazzara was a contract animator, but he was then hired under David. I should also mention that Roger Sharpe was doing consulting, advising and licensing at the time. Also, conversations with Scott Gullicks and Frank Gigliotti for LOV started 6 months before David arrived and the deal was finalized right around the time David came on board. So again, things were not as dire as David likes to portray.

As far as BBQ selling more than Hot Wheels in the first year, well, I guess it depends on how you look at it. Hot Wheels started production, 25 units were made, then covid hit, the factory was shut down, then as things started to open back up, the factory was moved to a new facility. By the time the assembly line was put back together and parts acquired (can you say supply chain, I knew you could) it was pretty late in the year before the line was rolling again. So yeah, possible BBQ outsold that, but at least 500 Hot Wheels were shipped in that next year, and pretty sure that crushes BBQ sales.

Overall, I grade the interview, three Pinocchios -- was going to give it 2.5, but the are no fractional Pinocchios.

Is the GTF classic P-roc or APs new system? I'd want to know that before buying one.

Houdini and Oktoberfest originally used the same computers. Hot Wheels used a slightly newer version until they switched to re-furbished HPs due to supply chain issues, and don't recall what was used when those ran out. LOV used raspberry Pi 4s. Houdini does require a computer with both HDMI and VGA, where the others only require HDMI. Houdini could be updated to run on a computer with two HDMI ports, but the mini-display would also need to be swapped out.