The Confessional

Have you seen the Millennial Optimism trend? It picked up steam toward the end of last year—Gen Z waxing nostalgic about early-2010s Millennial culture. Skinny jeans. Stomp-clap indie rock. Those heavily filtered Instagram photos. As a (now old) Millennial, I get it.

As one YouTuber put it: "People miss a time when they felt happy about the future, or imagine that there would be any kind of future, when they didn't wake up every day and ingest new man-made horrors beyond their comprehension."

Josiah Gogarty, writing for GQ, made the case that this is more than a flash-in-the-pan TikTok moment. The nostalgia cycle is moving on from the '90s and 2000s, and with the world seemingly on fire, younger generations are starting to embrace the Millennial Cringe ethos over the sharp-edged cynicism that dominates today's internet.

Radio Free Alice is a new band from Melbourne with just one EP—2025's Empty Words—but "Rule 31," a one-off recorded while touring, sounds like the bands I was listening to heavily in the early 2010s. Interpol. Two Door Cinema Club. Bloc Party. That tracks, given they worked with producer Peter Katis (Interpol, The National, We Were Promised Jetpacks) on the album. Same lush, crisp guitarwork. Same serious-but-earnest delivery.

The song hits the Millennial Optimism vibe, maybe without meaning to. It channels the era's sound, but in a longing, world-weary way—like it's looking to the past to fix the malaise of the present. There's optimism there, but it's the kind that knows better.

2025 TWIPY voting is now open. We'll be collecting votes through January 20th.

If you've voted in past years, you'll notice we scaled way back. Seven categories, all focused on commercial releases. No homebrews, mods, or content creator awards this time.

A few things drove this. The hobby has gotten a lot bigger and more diverse since 2017, when the TWIPYs first started. The various scenes we used to cover—homebrews, streaming, mods, location play—have matured to the point where doing them justice requires more resources than we had available this year. Last year took 11 committee members and dozens of volunteers just to source and vet nominees across all categories. Add in the production side (results show, trophies, live event, sponsorship sales), and it was a lot.

So this year we went back to basics. Fewer categories, a pre-recorded results show in partnership with the Bash Pinball Podcast, and more breathing room to figure out what the TWIPYs look like going forward.

Voting has been strong so far. I'd love to see us hit at least 1,000 votes this year, and thanks to the streamlining, voting takes 5-10 minutes max.

Vote here: https://twipys.com/2025-twipys-ballot/

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Since it's been a while between newsletters, I'm leading off with a couple of fresh stories we published on Kineticist this week, then recapping a few pieces from the holidays you may have missed and clearing out a few other odds and ends.

Matt Owen got a chance to talk with Sterling Mitoska (you may have seen him on social media as Sterling Plays Pinball), the teenage pinball prodigy tearing up the IFPA rankings charts in his quest for a future top-3 rank. He talks about favorite games, competitive motivations, and more.

We take a detailed look at some concerning trends for the stalwart pinball database, IPDB.org. Updates are down. New game listings are down. Search traffic and visibility too. Is the site on its way out? How much longer can the community count on it as a resource?

While I haven't published a newsletter recently, we've been busy. Besides getting TWIPY voting ready (thanks for the help, Will!), we've published a handful of new pieces on Kineticist.

Some Spooky Pinball fans got big mad at this article. Talk to author Matt Owen about pinball for a few minutes, and he'll no doubt profess his love for 2024's Evil Dead release. But as he explains in a later edit following social media backlash: "After taking a beating in online comments, I would like to clarify that this list only includes pins that were announced in 2025. In my opinion, Evil Dead was the best pin announced in 2024, but here, I'm focusing on games that were announced in 2025. Sorry, Ash."

Matt also gave us the final edition of The Score Card for 2025, recapping Free Play Florida, Pincinnati, and the Winter Bash tournaments.

In mid-December, we tracked down the people behind the new Switzerland-based pinball manufacturer, World Pinball, and confirmed that work is underway on an upcoming Resident Evil release.

Since publishing, we've learned a few more specifics:

Both the Stars and Raccoon City trims will have all options included, plus an unknown "mystery option."

Finally, we covered some of Stern's struggles with the launch of The Walking Dead Remastered, with some optimism for what might be coming in future code updates.

A few other things that have been on my radar the last few weeks.

Just when you thought they were dead—American Pinball is making noise as a potentially viable manufacturer again, with a fresh logo and a call for applications across the pinball production spectrum. I've had some talks with people behind this revival, and while I wish them the best, I remain skeptical. Look for a new game announcement sometime this year.

In an update shared on January 1st, the leadership team behind the IFPA published a new Code of Conduct and continued refining its Diversity and Inclusion code, while addressing questions about Women's Division events in 2026 (unchanged) and whether a new WAB will be formed (not in the same way). I'm expecting more details in the coming weeks as the new board is finalized and announced.

Podcasters Punk Rock Pinball launched their own IFPA-style entity called the Punk Rock Pinball Association. It's focused on casual competitive play, meant to complement the IFPA rather than compete directly. Their stated goals of growing competitive pinball nationwide and creating meaningful opportunities for beginner and mid-level players are commendable.

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