The Color of the Dead

I’ve been sitting on LA-via-Boise’s Gelli Haha’s debut, Switcheroo, for too long. Released on June 27th of this year, it’s a fever dream of a dance record and one of the most playful albums I’ve listened to all year. It’s like what I can imagine a trip to a McDonald’s play-place on acid with an endless supply of Skittles might feel like.

With not-so-quiet confidence, Gelli Haha let their freak flags fly, and it’s refreshing seeing an artist reinvent themselves (singer Angel Abaya released a radically different solo album in 2023 before moving to LA) in such an infectiously joyful and silly way. As Harry Tafoya noted in their review for Pitchfork, “She may be weird as hell, but from here on out, defensiveness will have no place in Gelli Haha’s universe.”

“Bounce House”, an early single off the album, feels like an appropriate selection in a week when the predominant discourse was about a game having too much color and when no one seemed to be having very much fun.

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There’s never a dull moment in pinball, as they say!

This week, Stern Pinball revealed The Walking Dead Remastered, the updated version of the Lyman Sheats-coded, John Borg-designed game from 2014. We’ve got all the release details in our launch article, so pull that up if you want a just-the-facts take.

Since the reveal, much has happened in community discourse about reactions to it, along with some minor controversy.

First, there was some confusion about who from Stern was involved in updating the game's code. Metallica Remastered’s marketing leaned into promoting Raymond Davidson’s efforts on that project, so many speculated early that fellow programmer Elizabeth Gieske might be leading the charge. Including us! In an early draft, we used Elizabeth as a placeholder and neglected to remove that detail upon publication, even though it wasn’t included in official announcements.

Later, Stern confirmed with me that longtime team lead Mark Guidarelli is heading up code on The Walking Dead Remastered, with support from his team and John Borg.

And this is where the discourse exploded.

Since no one outside of Stern has seen or played this game in person yet, and because most of us had a picture in our heads of what this game should look like before release (anchored by the 2014 game and dreams of a comic-inspired version), the most immediate reaction by the community was to the game’s unorthodox approach to the art package. Those reactions, at least online, skewed decidedly negative.

When I first got our press kit photos, my immediate gut reaction was shock and confusion. It’s not that the art was technically bad; it’s just that it seemed completely incongruent with the established tone of the IP, and more specifically, that of the first few seasons of the mainline Walking Dead TV show.

Even in the first three seasons of the show, a diverse color palette might look something like this.

A more typical color palette, however, looks like this, mainly a range of desaturated earth tones and shades of grey.

If you look outside the mainline TV series and head into comic territory, or even some of the spinoff series, you get more color, but this game is not based on those things.

Regardless, it’s only a pinball machine, one that’s subject to creative impulses, licensor requirements, and other business needs. These games almost always look way better, or at least less offensive, when you see them in person. Once that happens, usually the art of the game becomes less of a talking point.

For all the people who didn’t like the art initially, I’ve seen quite a few who are excited by it or coming around to it on repeat viewings.

The last note that’s worth digging into for release week is this little bite of controversy around the Woodbury sign on the game.

Apparently, the version of the sign used in promotional photos (Nov 4th, above) was traced back to an old community mod by maker Joe Kace from about 2014. This detail was pointed out to the Stern team by Joe on Facebook within hours after launch. I’m told that the Stern team reached out directly to Joe to resolve shortly after it was brought to their attention. New photos (Nov 5th, above) show a modified sign, which is what will be used for production games.

How did it get into the game in the first place? The team drew inspiration from both The Walking Dead show and sourced imagery from the original game (some of which may have included mods) to make this version, and they were not aware of the provenance of that particular item until it was pointed out. Honest mistake.

Look for Stern to stream gameplay footage on November 14th.

Full disclosure: this clip was first shared by Anime Dude’s Pinball Podcast. We re-uploaded it sans watermark for a cleaner look. Aesthetic crimes are still crimes, but we’ll take the heat in the name of art.

The video showcases a neat gimmick (nay, innovation) that Spooky Pinball has been hyping from their upcoming Beetlejuice release. Dubbed Spooky Speak, it lets players talk to the game and have it talk back using audio clips from the film. Seems like something that could be fun for those who have picked up the game for a home environment.

Speaking of hype, Cary Hardy was kind enough to share his exclusive piece of pre-release content freely with the pinball public in a YouTube video. It contains one of Brady Hearn's custom audio tracks, “Till Death”. It sounds very Beetlejuice-y.

Earlier this week, the Van Nuys location of AYCE Gogi was fortunate to be one of the first public locations with a Winchester. They streamed it through On Tilt pinball, with game designer Karl DeAngelo along for the ride. Given that many are accustomed to seeing Karl defeat games with superhuman ease, some were surprised that Karl seemed to struggle to find his shots (he did still blow the game up on his first playthrough, to be clear).

After chatting with Karl about his experience playing the game on stream, he attributed missed shots to it being a new copy of the game he’s never played before, and also, “unlearning muscle memory from the many hours of playing the prototype I have at home.”

Alright—last morsel of info for the week. This Facebook comment by American Pinball has been making the rounds in various pinball communities. It is in response to a comment on a post about a recent new hire. While it’s sounding increasingly likely that we’ll never get a production version of the Cuphead game that’s been in the works for years, we may still see a new release from them, based on a new license, in 2026.

However, with most of the experienced team gone from the company, who is left to design and build it?

Ryan and Scott from Pinball Map run a regular series that highlights one new or interesting pinball location each week. This week, Ryan writes about Hotel Xcaret México.

You find yourself at this time slipping on a light sweater to help you push through today’s Autumn breeze in relative comfort. A few leaves fall past, nearly hitting you. A drop of rain shatters on your skulltop, straining your tenuous sense of warmth and comfort. Your boots squish into a rotting pumpkin.

You might like the idea of Autumn, but “actually, this sucks,” you shout.

And like magic -- like an unspoken wish fulfilled by a jinn -- you are whisked away to Quintana Roo, which is a state in México. In this state lies the Yucatán Peninsula. Think Cancún. Think Tulum. And breathe, the Mayan Riviera. Before you can even replace your loafers with flip flops and your sweater with a tank, you find yourself checking in at the front desk of today’s Location of the Week, the Hotel Xcaret México. It’s a luxury, all-inclusive, family-friendly, gastronomical, sustainable, respectful of Mayan culture, 5-diamond resort nestled in a jungle on the beach.

You’re not scared by this unexpected teleportation, and most importantly you’re not mildly cold. With that discomfort addressed, you snap your fingers and order a Pina Colada. It’s free, basically, paid for via the room fee.

As you swim from pool to pool beneath the fronds, barely touching concrete, barely touching your mouth to anything other than colada, you spot an extension cord snaking through the jungle beyond. You follow it and soon find yourself in an opening. The sunrays illuminate a mini Mayan temple with two blasphemous pinball machines perched atop. A Premium Bond and a Premium Jurassic Park. Both Premiums, as mentioned. You mount the steps.

The rest is history. You GC both machines. You swim some more. And then when it’s Spring again you teleport back home, having now mastered it on your own. You leave a 5 star review, because Hotel Xcaret México is really nice. In your review, which in a way is this column you’re reading now, you also remind others to double check that they still have pinball before booking because who knows.

Hotel Xcaret México
Carretera Chetumal - Puerto Juarez Km 282, Playa del Carmen, Q.R. 77710
Website

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