Yeah, lets talk about something important, who gives a shit about Kaneda, I want to see the game already, Andrew has it been submitted yet?

Posted 9 days ago.

Well I canceled my LE and they refunded my deposit so there's one more available for you guys. Still looking forward to seeing the reveal though.

Care to share why?

in the EU, the seller must sell to an european customer without any taxe. the customer is paying tax of his country.
it's normally how it works.

heighway should normally noticed a price without any taxe for european customer.
so as bristish and french TVA are the same, the french customer should pay a little less than 7000€ + shipping
the danish customer should pay 7220€ + shipping etc

Does anybody know if there will need to be a special type or different type of playfield cleaner, with the monitor being in the playfield? Or is it covered (which I'm sure it is with something) so no need to worry about scratching or dulling? Can anyone who has a Full Throttle step up and clarify?

Thanks

The monitor is covered by a clear plastic screen, No special cleaner needed. I waxed & treated it like all of my other pins.

EDIT

Heighway and team is now scheduled for 4 pm on Friday.
Is the Twin Peaks party friday night also at the same time as the Stern Party?

Thanks,
Jeff

You can choose to pay VAT / sales tax in the country of origin, in the EU.

Doesn't need to be tax-free, then taxed in the country of receipt.

So unless the Danish customer particularly wants to pay extra taxes (to the Danish government), then they can pay the same amount of tax as UK buyers, but at the loss of all tax revenue to country of residence.

I hope Aliens makes it to the Expo.

Is the reveal at Expo going to be streamed live? I can't make it this year, but eager to see it at reveal and hopefully flip.

If there is a heighway party, which would be awesome, hopefully it's not on Friday night when 400 prospective customers will be elsewhere

image (resized).jpeg

Im not sure if it will be live streamed, but Heighway confirmed they are filming the presentation

Still pending Fox approval.

ok ... how does a potential customer base help pressure Fox to make a decision?
These seems pretty important for the marketing of the pin and grabbing those dollars before someone else does at the Expo.

Got back from Wales a couple of hours ago, after spending some time at the Heighway facility today.

Will write a more detailed post later, though without some specifics.

The team were filming approval videos today, and hope to finish it tomorrow - sending it off as soon as possible thereafter. So whilst the approvals are a continual process, the final (production) approvals videos have not yet been passed off to Fox.

However, Fox have indicated that it could be a very fast turn around provided that they're happy. So Expo should be on, still.

that sounds really optimistic. Fox has been made out to sound like a bureaucracy but who knows? Hopefully. Seems like it might be a minor disaster if it's not approved in time.

So this pretty much means the pin is in his final stage (production) and the only thing pending now to show it on expo is that Fox approves the approval videos of the production pin.

Heighway are now dealing with the LA office directly. So they're speaking to the people that are making the decisions.

As far as showing everything publicly and launching it, yes. There are still a few things that need to be received / fixed before production though. Will write more detail tomorrow, or later tonight after a nap.

Best to do a power nap, only take 20 minutes

Great news & thanks for sharing

Should or Will?

Should sounds a little back door openish

So was the filming done on production models or the two prototypes? There's some conflicting posts here:

The last post by Heighway indicated, "As soon as we receive approval from FOX, we begin production immediately. Parts orders will be waiting for that green light. The plan is to begin production in September and to begin shipping games by the end of October." Which to me means production probably won't start in September if they are still seeking approvals?

Thanks for clarifying.

Things always seem to take much longer than expected so I don't get too disappointed when stated timelines aren't met. In the end I just hope for a killer product.

My advice for Heighway would be to put their promo video online as soon as it is green lit. Let people get "hands on" Alien for the first time at expo, but don't hold back the reveal till then. There is going to be a super amount of competition at expo this year, with both Batman and JJP3 being revealed there. If we can see and discuss Alien for an entire week or more before expo from footage, I think that will be very beneficial.

Sure, if Fox approves it in time.

I don't think the approvals stuff being done will take the form of a promo. It's an exhaustive process of documentation. I think they'll want to wait a little longer on a couple of parts and revisions for some kind of final, production promo video.

That said, it would be a good idea to put the original private promo video from March online, once approval is granted for the whole caboodle

It's well cut and showcases David Thiel's sound design well. Would be a nice teaser for those who haven't seen it.

.

It was the video of his work that pushed me into placing a deposit down on this game. I think once they show the video of the full game, the rest of the LEs will be spoken for. That would be a nice place for heighway to be in before the expo and right before production is to start.

Once the "game" is approved, they don't have to keep submitting every video they make of it, do they? If the game is signed off on, isn't it out in the open? The game will show up at expo (hopefully) and there will be tons of videos made of it there, so I'm hoping they can jump the gun on those videos.

So it's been approved?! If so this is exciting news!!

I don't think so

I think we're still waiting. Down to the wire now.

One 'final' prototype, albeit missing a few components that haven't come in yet, and with non-final revisions of some new, yet to be revealed features. They'll finish building up the second when they're done making the approvals videos.

There are no production models because:

a) approval of everything hadn't been applied for as of yesterday
b) a logic (control) board still hasn't come in yet for first test (though it is expected to work), for a major feature
c) brand new unannounced features need to be refined before production. ones I saw were placeholders.
d) likely need tweaks to many mechanisms - not necessarily manufacture, but assembly or the way things are configured
e) one of the toys is to be revised cosmetically, at Fox's request
f) production simply hasn't started

To an extent. In my view it won't be playable to the public at Expo and it would be a real mistake to allow it. Andrew did not state that it wouldn't be, but he was careful to state what they were aiming for, for Expo. Playing the machine underlined this. My view is that this is realistic and a good thing.

Furthermore, there hasn't been any serious play testing of the new prototype (rather than original early one) and will no doubt require refinement to make it acceptably reliable for shows, location or home use. Plus, whilst Andrew assures me code is 85% done (100% = production and it 'goes gold'), sound and video aren't anywhere near all hooked up (even if files are pretty much done), neither are all the animations and the game UI, and quite a bit is still placeholder.

Hardware and software will be prone to failure, and that would lead to disappointment.

Even assuming it was refined enough to not disappoint people ... if someone's rough or is unfortunate to break one or more major things, that would be a real setback for production. The two prototypes are being shipped over to Chicago for two of the US development team to take home, so that they can see how the code and media are working in the flesh. Up to this stage, they've relied on virtual testing, imagination and reports from Wales. Them receiving the machines ship shape and ready to do the final pre-production development on is far, far more important for Heighway (and potential customers) than a few people playing (and quite possibly breaking) the machines at Expo.

As of now, these are nothing like 'sample' games that JJP and Stern put out on location post announcement, and stress test extensively in house, before production models ship to customers.

They are in the final furlong and this will quickly change, but not in 8 working days until they head to Expo.

Hasn't been sent for approval (unless HW were really quick bundling all the media, annotation and documentation today and conveying it to Fox).

--- proper write up coming later this evening.

As time has gone by and other games have come out, like BM66LE, and now JJP#3, I'm wavering on AlienLE.

After BM66 comes out and all of the Expo reveals, I'm gonna let the frenzy play itself out I think. Exercise a little patience for once.

I think Alien will be next year. It doesn't sound like everything will be ready within the next 60 days. Just my opinion.

It is what it is, I guess.

I wish Andrew and his team the best.

Well this is good. If the delay is adding features, then I'm fine with that.

that is what the crowd wants to hear

The biggest Problem first.

Have you been able to build your pre-production and sample 10 games that were your plan previously? These comments make it sound like you are still at your prototypes and haven't moved to the 'pre-production' games as you called them. Any clarification on that of your previous stated road to production vs current status?

From 29 days ago...

I get not 100% software done (100% is kind of a misnomer in software dev anyways ) but rubberduck's observations/relayed info makes it seem like things are further behind than estimated previously.

Sometimes I feel like a 'ok, plans have changed...' kind of angle on those updates would help vs stating matter of factly where things are now, as if it were always that way. Just an observation... and how people consume the info.

Thx

Id be out of a job if software was ever 100% done

--Jeff

Make more unlicensed games...

This.

I'd never want to go through this licensing nightmare. Plus it lowers costs.

Not necessarly. Licensing can provide a ton of assets and an existing story to tell.

When you make an original theme, you have to come up with the elements yourself, which takes time and money.

I'm just as curious to see this game in person as anyone else.

Andrew mentioned that we might change or refine some things, I'm sure something will only come to light after the US team is actually standing in front of the game and flipping for the first time. I would think it would just be details that an in-person experience reveals, nothing major.

We've all been involved from this side of the pond, we've seen video etc, but nothing substitutes really playing the game!

If the state of the game is anywhere near the condition that rubberducks describes and is missing several features and toys,
and has not been playtested enough before expo, I would not show it there at all.

Much better to just show videos of what it will look like and of the pre-production models.

It doesn't take much for people to get disappointed and underwhelmed in places like expo. Why take that chance when the game is so close to being finished and you can then show it in all its glory to the public?

I realize that Heighway is really keen on finally showing a game to the public and that expo is the best place for that, but it could also be the complete opposite. First impression matters. Just look at what happened to The Hobbit 2 years ago. (a totally different situation of course with the hobbit's then underwhelming playfield graphics, but still..)