Enjoying the Stern Insider Connected Quests during the month of December? We sure are! My wife, oldest son and I are all having a great time playing so far. The December 2023 QUEST-A-POOLZA month is a little over half over with the highest number of badges possible to be earned (29).
And the plot thickens.
Personally, I have earned all the badges to date as of 12/18/2023, the two December seasonal badges, all six Venom score challenge badges and all eight of the 7 days of 007 badges.
To put this in perspective among all Stern Pinball Insider Connected players in the world that participated, completing and earning all 8 James Bond badges was done by a mere 165 players in the world. Three of those are my son, wife and myself.
You might think, well, that’s because there aren’t that many Insider Connected players, right? Well, to figure this out, I checked out what is the easiest badge on Insider Connected to earn. It’s the play any 5 Spike 2 Stern Pinball games. You have to be registered and logged in with QR code on Insider Connected, but five games played is a fairly easy badge to earn.
Here’s how many have earned this badge as of this writing:
79,728 – and this number will increase as more players enter the pool over time. It will only grow.
The most challenging to earn Venom badge is the 10 billion cumulative points to earn KNULL How many in the world have earned that so far in December (this number will increase, as this quest runs through 12/31)? 181 players.
Before the month ends, more Stern Insider Connected players will earn Knull by scoring cumulatively 10,000,000,000 points.
What badges are left? Godzilla – the 12 days of Kaiju starts 12/20/2023. 12 badges, with some that are, well, not easy to complete.
Will cover the gameplan for conquering and earning Godzilla’s 12 badges herein, including the three most challenging quest badges to earn for on location players. Home players, especially pinheads that aren’t pinball wizards, that own Godzilla still might find these very challenging.
That’s just it with these Insider Connected quests: on location players have an increased level of difficulty over home players. So much that it would be cool to get some sort of additional icon or badge for completing all these quests completely on location. Stern calls these “verified locations.” Would love to see Stern think about that in the future.
But before we get to those mighty Godzilla badges, let’s back up a bit.
Over the last few months, we’ve been updating at PGM the Stern Insider Connected Quests. Here’s a recap of these detailed posts on the quests just in case you haven’t followed:
- DECEMBER 2023 (this month) – Stern Insider Connected December 2023 Quests for Virtual Badges Details, Game on!
- NOVEMBER 2023 – TIME-SENSITIVE – November 2023 Stern Pinball Insider Connected Quests: Godzilla Day, George Gomez Spotlight and The Heroes Quest
- OCTOBER 2023 – Stern Pinball Insider Connected Quest October 2 – 31, 2023: Jurassic Park Dino DNA – PlayGamesMore
My wife, son and I have been trying to complete as many as possible of these Stern quests. All quests completed to date have been on location and I have personally completed them. I’ve spent the $$ money $$ on location playing these games and reaching the required scores and/or whatever else has been required.
In particular, my wife has been really excited playing and earning these Stern Insider Connected quests and badges. She checks her phone, tracks her progress, she’s really into this, which in turn, makes me more interested in playing because it’s something we do together.
Starting December 20,2023 the 12 days of Kaiju officially begins, and a few of the badges will be the most challenging of the December 2023 quests, including three that I’m not certain I will be able to complete. As follows I’ll cover them, out of order somewhat intentionally, because some require others to be completed.
#2 Most Difficult: Godzilla – score 25 billion during the 12 days across all games played
This might seem easy to some Godzilla pinball wizards — and if you own the game at home and/or are very good at the game, then yeah, maybe this one won’t be so difficult — but my best ever score on Godzilla, as of this writing and before this event started, is not even 300 million. Here it is shown on my Insider Connected stats page from Stern:
268 million is my best after playing 72 games. That is a far cry from 25 billion.
Doing the math to get to 25 billion is even more sobering.
This means if I average say 50 million per game, and that’s merely a guess of what I might be able to achieve at current level of skill average, I will need to play 500 games in 12 days.
Huh?! That’s a crazy number of games. If the average price paid for each game is 50 cents per play, that’s quarter busting $250 USD worth of Godzilla to earn the Godzilla badge. This is clearly a badge that favors those who own Stern’s Godzilla pinball at home, or really good Godzilla players, not on location players of skill similar or worse than mine.
But let’s put the money spent aside, because while that’s a lot to spend on pinball over 12 days, that’s not even the worst potential scenario.
No, that belongs to taking the time to play 500 games over 12 days.
I think a really good day, spending all day at the arcade, might yield realistically 50 or so games of Godzilla, but this is admittedly an estimate, as I haven’t tried to see how many games on location of a single game I could play in one day without being an obnoxious game hog. Really, we need to share the game with other players, not camp out playing if there’s only one in the place and other players are lurking about.
Go on, let’s probe these bleak numbers.
We’re talking maybe 5 (good)-10 (marginal) games per hour, and I’m not physically going to be playing more than six or so hours of Godzilla pinball in a single day. So, while mathematically, I could spend ridiculous amounts of time at the arcade 10 of the 12 days during this event and get to those 500 games, it’s extremely unlikely to happen because we have lives outside of playing Godzilla. We need to do things Godzilla never worries about on screen like, you know, eating, sleeping, working. The entire 12 days are not a holiday for some of us, anyway.
The holiday, yes, don’t forget Santa.
It’s not likely to happen in only 12 days considering three of these 12 days are Christmas Eve, Christmas and New Year’s Eve. So, worse I’m left with more play time available 9 of the 12 days, not all 12. Stay with me, though because we do plan to play all 12 days of the quest.
Finally, for the entire year, all of 2023, I’ve only played 700 or so games as of this writing. It seems pretty much impossible for me to play 500 Godzilla games in 12 days.
And even if I can play 500 games of Godzilla in 12 days, would I even want to play that many? I love the game, it’s my most favorite Spike 2 Stern Pinball game, but that’s a crap ton of Godzilla to play in a relatively short period of time.
(Humorous aside: I’m thinking of that scene in A Clockwork Orange where Malcolm McDowell has his eyes lid-locked, forced to watch)
After 500 games of Godzilla in 12 days … ?
So, how can I make this score? Just give up? Abandon the challenge before it even starts? The answer, absurd humor aside:
Must learn to score higher at Godzilla! Score much, much higher.
I need to be able to score over a billion in a single game, or maybe multiple billions, and need to do this during the 12 day event multiple times. A single billion score game, dramatically reduces the number of Godzilla games necessary to play.
If I can get my average Godzilla score up to say 200 million per game … well then only 125 games would need to be played. This is what I’m going to attempt … and probably will fail. Stay tuned on this one!
Luckily, there are a bunch of resources available to polish and improve your Stern Pinball Godzilla game.
Linked for every Stern Pinball Spike 2 machine in the PlayGamesMore spreadsheet (pictured above, tab is “Real Pinball”) are rulesheets like this: Stern Godzilla Rulesheet – Games / Wiki Rulesheets – Tilt Forums.
Add to this I’m scouring the web for videos, tips, and more to help me become a better Godzilla pinball player starting tomorrow officially! Bookmark this article, because I plan to return with updates sharing anything I find that’s helpful. Use the comments below, readers, and share whatever Godzilla scoring tips you know/find/ett. Thank you!
#3 Most Difficult GHIDORAH –
play Godzilla
all 12 days:
12/20 – 12/31/2023
This might sound easy, but again, if you don’t own Godzilla at home, you have to seek out businesses: barcades, arcades, etc, nearby that:
1. are open during the three holidays (Christmas Eve, Christmas and New Year’s Eve) and times we can make it to play during the other days during business hours
2. other pinheads aren’t already playing Godzilla if the business only has one machine
3. the machines are in working order, no mechanical problems.
We ran into issues this month playing a Venom Premium machine (#3) that caused an extra ball to be added to the playfield that when one drained, the ball would be over, yet one still in play.
Luckily, Godzilla is a fairly common on location game around where we live, so if one business doesn’t have Godzilla, we can pivot to a secondary or maybe even third or fourth alternate location to play. Of course, more time driving around, will mean less time to play and improve skills at the game, which hurts progress with the second most difficult badge (Godzilla).
#1 most difficult badge:
King of All Monsters
In order to earn this badge, pinheads need to complete and earn all 12 other Godzilla badges. If we miss even one, no King of All Monsters. To recap these are all of them:
That’s why this is the most difficult and promises to be most rare of the quest badges.
That’s my summary of the 12 days of Kaiju Godzilla quests. How are you doing in your quest progress this month? Having fun? How many of these badges are you going to earn?
UPDATE 12/20/2023 @ 9:23pm PST:
Day 1 of 12 progress
Time played on site (Purdy’s – Sumner, WA): approximately 5 hours
Number of Godzilla games played: 50 (lifetime Godzilla games played: 122)
Total score over 50 games: 2,763,189,840
Average score per game = 55,263,797
Highest single game score = *327,732,280
Badges earned = 8 of 13
Badges that remain: Jet Jaguar (1 of 5 days played) Mothra (score over 500 million in a single game), Ghidrah (play all 12 days), Godzilla (cumulative score of 25 billion)
* NOTE: highest actual game, I was somehow logged out (just like my Deadpool fiasco!) – that score was: 469,780,300
UPDATE 12/21/2023 @ 8:20pm PST:
Day 2 of 12 progress
Time played on site (Next Level Pinball & Arcade – Hillsboro, OR): approximately 5 hours
Number of Godzilla games played: 46 (lifetime Godzilla games played: 168)
Total score over 46 games: 2,708,864,720 (Day 1: 2,763,189,840)
Average score per game = 58,888,363
Highest single game score = *304,307,340
Badges earned = 8 of 13 (no new badges)
UPDATE 12/22/2023 @ 11:00pm PST:
Day 3 of 12 progress
Time played on site (Next Level Pinball & Arcade – Hillsboro, OR): approximately 5 hours
Number of Godzilla games played: 68 (lifetime Godzilla games played: 236)
Total score cumulatively: 10,047,369,410 over 164 games
(TODAY 12/22/2023) – DAY 3: 4,575,314,850 – 68 games
DAY 2: 2,708,864,720 – 46 games
DAY 1: 2,763,189,840 – 50 games
Average score per game = 67,284,041
Highest single game score = 354,712,320
Badges earned = 8 of 13 (no new badges)
UPDATE 12/23/2023 @ 11:59pm PST:
Day 4 of 12 progress
Time played on site (Next Level Pinball & Arcade – Hillsboro, OR): approximately 7 hours
Number of Godzilla games played: 44 (lifetime Godzilla games played: 280)
Total score cumulatively: 13,175,527,040 over 208 games
(TODAY 12/23/2023) -DAY 4: 3,128,157,630- 44 games
DAY 3: 4,575,314,850 – 68 games
DAY 2: 2,708,864,720 – 46 games
DAY 1: 2,763,189,840 – 50 games
Average score per game = 71,094,492
Highest single game score = 335,716,760
Badges earned = 8 of 13 (no new badges)
UPDATE 12/24/2023 @ 3:15pm PST: The arcade where I played today closed early on Christmas Eve so was cut short playing to 1.5 hours. I literaly was the last customer to leave and still had credits on the machine, which the bartender refunded me.
Day 5 of 12 progress
Christmas Eve 2023
Time played on site (Purdy’s – Sumner, WA): approximately 1.5 hours
Amount spent: $7.50 USD
Number of Godzilla games played: 15 (lifetime Godzilla games played: 295)
Total score cumulatively: 14,571,791,150 over 223 games
(TODAY 12/24/2023) -DAY 5: 1,396,264,110 – 15 games – $7.50
DAY 4: 3,128,157,630- 44 games – $22
DAY 3: 4,575,314,850 – 68 games – $22
DAY 2: 2,708,864,720 – 46 games – $22
DAY 1: 2,763,189,840 – 50 games – $20 USD spent
Average score per game = 93,084,274
Highest single game score = 348,481,630
Badges earned = 9 of 13 (+1 badge, earned Jet Jaguar badge, see below)
Every day so far, average score in games played for that day has increased, so in that light, anyway, am improving at Godzila.
UPDATE 12/26/2023 @ 2:15pm PST:
Day 6 of 12 progress
Kind of a bummer end to this quest for us.
We drove around on Christmas attempting to find some place nearby, any place, that was open and had a Godzilla to play, but none were open. I noted above concerns about the holidays and whether or not businesses would be open to play and turns out this was prophetic.
This sort of took wind out of our sails, because we lost our streak and momentum. We decided to leave it here and not play any more this month on this quest. This means we definitely won’t get the daily badge (missed playing at least one day), Godzilla (25 million cumulative, although I have almost 15 million with half the even over, so could earn this if I decided to keep playing), the 500 mil badge (another one that could be possible), and of course, King of All Monsters (because you need to earn all badges to earn this one).
So, unless at some point in the next few days we change our minds and decide to play more, this is where we’ll end.
Overal, pretty good month if it ends here, because of the 29 badges I was able to earn 24 of the 29. If we had been able to find a business on Christmas day, we’d still be going on this. Also ended our streak of 24 days in a row playing, so will have to come back to this one another time to earn 30, 45, 60, 90 and 120 day streak.
Good luck to others still playing!