People
Art Director
Johnny Fraser-Allen has worked as a professional concept designer and illustrator specializing in building worlds for both big-screen blockbusters and tabletop games for 20 years. Honing his conceptual design craft on films like The Hobbit for Guillermo del Toro and Peter Jackson, The Narnia Chronicles for Andrew Adamson and Tintin and The BFG for Steven Spielberg over a 15-year career at the renowned Wētā Workshop.
No stranger to the Jim Henson Company, Johnny has illustrated and sculpted the components to both the Labyrinth and Dark Crystal board games as well as designing all the creatures for a yet to be released TV show. He designed the dragon and goblins featured in the recent hit film Portable Door. His modular Labyrinth Gaming terrain has been featured several times on Adam Savage’s Tested show. As a lifelong Labyrinth and pinball fanatic, art directing the official Labyrinth Pinball machine for Barrels of Fun has been a fulfilling step in a journey that started for him when he first saw the film 34 years ago.
Marketing Graphics
Blake Dumesnil is an award-winning Senior Art Director and Graphic Designer at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX. He is one of the few artists to work with NASA’s astronauts and Russia’s cosmonauts on official flight patches for International Space Station missions. He has designed emblems for 9 ISS missions along with other NASA missions. Blake’s love for pinball started early as his father brought home machines before home collecting was ever a thing. He has worked for numerous arcades and pinball leagues, along with the Texas Pinball Festival. He is a co-showrunner of the Houston Arcade Expo.
Game Rules
Phil Grimaldi is a cognitive scientist specializing in how people learn and remember things. He discovered pinball while studying at Purdue University over a decade ago, and instantly fell in love with the game, as well as the complex mental skills required to succeed. Since then, he has been involved in nearly all aspects of the pinball scene: fixing/restoring/re-theming games, playing and directing tournaments, and co-founding the Space City Pinball League of Houston, TX. Thanks to Barrels of Fun, he can now add pinball development to that list! Phil designed the high-level rule structure for Labyrinth pinball and advised on the physical game design.
Bowen Kerins is well-known from his PAPA tutorial video series and his championship pinball play, including five PAPA and IFPA World Championships. He built the rules for Alice Cooper’s Nightmare Castle and Rick and Morty at Spooky Pinball, and Final Resistance at Multimorphic. He knows the rules and strategy of most games and game designers inside and out. His work on the rules for Labyrinth pinball has been invaluable. Make sure you watch his video tutorial on Labyrinth!
Animation
Trent Armstrong is a motion graphics and VFX artist who began playing pinball—mostly Taxi—in college with friends. This native Alabamian moved to Texas in 1997. He and his wife quickly acquired a Taxi. His friend Gabe introduced him to the Texas Pinball Festival a few years ago, where he was blown over by early versions of Multimorphic’s P3 games. Trent animated a P3 logo reveal for them which they promptly included in their games. That simple act gave him the courage to approach Barrels of Fun about being involved in Labyrinth pinball, and his animations have made the game more fun and interactive.
Engineering Design
Travis Moseman designs spacecraft for aerospace business proposals. He was a video game kid and car nerd forced into pinball by his husband… who now kinda regrets it. Travis enjoys Space City Pinball League events, volunteering as a pinball tech at The Wormhole in Houston and working on odd jobs at Barrels of Fun!
Software
Eric Priepke is an old guy now, but he was around when arcades really started to take off — and he loved them. Any time he could manage it, he was at an arcade, until he eventually got a job at the local Aladdin’s Castle. That job taught him how to clean and maintain pinball machines and the manager taught him how to really play. Understanding the game rules just made his interest in pinball grow even stronger. Sometime in the mid-90’s, he got a Twilight Zone, and other machines followed. His first foray into programming pinball was updating the code for Cactus Canyon, a Williams machine that was never really finished. That project led to the opportunity to write the software for Rick and Morty at Spooky Pinball. Now he’s just here having Barrels of Fun!
Technology
David Fawcett is responsible for holding all the technology together. His dynamic career spanning technology and game development, brings extensive expertise to this pivotal role. David’s journey began at Astrazeneca, working in data operations. He then led technical teams at IBM, specializing in Backup, Storage, Oracle, and Unix. In 2014, David’s dream of creating games led him to Spooky Pinball, where he authored software for six pinball games. Today, as Chief Technology Officer at Barrels of Fun, he oversees OS, network, servers, inventory, manufacturing ERP, and software development.
Manufacturing
Paul Sulisz is a hands-on and highly motivated individual with over 35 years of manufacturing engineering experience. He possesses a deep understanding of today’s manufacturing technologies and how to leverage them for a competitive edge. With a proven track record in various engineering and management roles, Paul excels at turning ideas into reality and driving cost savings. His experience includes implementing lean manufacturing practices, designing efficient work cells, and taking digital technology to the next level. Throughout his career, Paul has demonstrated his proficiency in tools like Solidworks and Mastercam, as well as extensive knowledge of industrial technologies, CNC machining equipment, and industrial programmable controllers. Paul is a dedicated professional with a passion for innovation and efficiency. In his role as Director of Manufacturing at American Pinball, he successfully set up the production line, designed fixtures, improved line effectiveness, and achieved a production rate of 11 games per day.
Founders
Designer and Chief Executive Officer
David van Es has 20+ years of experience in the Film and TV industry. David worked for Spooky Pinball for 7 years providing creative and production services, asset creation, project management, licensing, and business development. He has been involved in pinball for almost his entire life, having started his own pinball amusement route in Australia when he was 16. He enjoys all creative aspects of pinball including the repair and restoration of old machines. David’s passion to create world-class products makes him the perfect person to lead the Barrels of Fun team.
Chief Business Officer
Brian Savage retired from Fun Publications, Inc. after running the Hasbro-licensed G.I. Joe Collectors’ Club for 25 years, and the Hasbro-licensed Transformers Collectors’ Club for 12 years. During his tenure, he produced 34 International Collector’s Conventions that were attended by thousands of fans from all over the world (GIJoeCon and BotCon). He was in charge of manufacturing over 500 licensed G.I. Joe action figures and over 150 licensed Transformers action figures, as well as publishing over 450 magazine issues. His expertise in the collectible world is a huge asset to Barrels of Fun. Brian’s first experience with pinball was when his dad brought home one of the first Bally Fireball home edition machines in the late 1970s. He enjoys not only the games, but restoring them, and has a lot of games in his collection.
Location
Barrels of Fun, llc
4903 W Sam Houston Pkwy N Ste A100
Houston TX 77041
(281) 313-5400
