What a cluster F$&@. As a preorderer I’m not surprised but still mad and sad. There are good people screwed over by that Ahole Andrew. Successful business ... someone should write that author of that article with a followup story idea. I need a drink ....

Going to break pinside rule #1, Be Nice!.
Andrew Highway is a Dick!
Highway his real last name, seems like even his last name is a scam?

Draining now. Time to move on.

Mighty quiet from a few members from the midwestern states...

From the Daily Telegraph (Oz) article via google images. Could this photo be more inappropriate? Sheesh. Is this where the Alien money got spunked?

(Andrew Heighway at Manly wharf. Picture: Adam Yip / Manly Daily).

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Heighway-Robbery its a double barrelled surname.

He was/is quite the shyster.

im going to guess riding on the hydrofoil with Andrew?

“send balance for your le, its ready to ship asap”
andrew heighway robbery

Alien... Predator... Whoever wins... We lose

all i think we get it.... heighways out... people lost money..... its horrible. Unfortunately those people are beyond help at this point and its sad. But can we steer this forum back to helping keep the ones that are out there functioning / alive?

I haven't been tracing pinball stuff to much lately but, I checked in a couple weeks ago and saw that a container was being prepared. Last Monday I was on CoinTakers site and thought about putting in an order for an Alien pin, but decided to hold off because I was busy with some family matters. Fast-forward to today and I see that my dreams of an Alien pin are all but gone. Sad days.

I feel bad for all the people that last money on this "deal." What a wild and shitty ride for you.

Assuming there is actually a container with games in it, I'd love to be able to get one!!! Such a fun game! Oh well.

RIP Alien

Dozens of people just discovered that they're never going to get the game they paid for and have been waiting months or years to receive. I'd expect that plus discussion of the apparent Heighway bankruptcy to dominate this thread for the foreseeable future (vs. technical discussion from the handful of folks that actually got a game). If you want to limit discussion to tech support for game owners, you're probably better off just starting a new, more focused, thread.

No you need to keep and open yours. Enjoy it for awhile. Then think about taking it to some shows to let public play it. You could also start a side business making mods or parts for repair. I know you'd be glad later on having decided to keep it and and go down that path.

To everybody with monetary or emotional investments in this, I'm sorry for whatever loss and frustration you're dealing with. What a total waste of time, money, and resources this has become for so many.

There is a dedicated thread for that already.
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/heighway-pinball-support-full-throttle-and-alien

Come sail away, come sail away, come sail away with me.

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Or the owners’ thread.. which I started, but of which, sadly, I will never be a member.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/get-away-from-her-you-bitch-alien-club-all-members-expendable

..haha, how prescient that I put “members expendable” in the title... laugh or you’ll cry.

Maybe, I'll worry about it all after/if I actually get it. But I'm not really convinced that it's something I want to look at all the time. Until it's here it's not really something I'm gonna worry about. I'm not the guy to take it to shows and whatnot though, I'm no spokesperson for the game.

Just went through too much BS to want to dredge it up in stories for people over and over.

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What a shit show...

It's always been a shit show if you could get through the unabashed fanboys that dominated the thread and really skewed this whole thing. So much history of belittling and attacking most any member who didn't tow the total sunshine rainbow line, just like Predator.

Sad to see this happen, but I'm not surprised. It looked like a 50/50 chance for years now, so either way I guess I wasn't going to be surprised at what transpired.

I find it bizarre that a number people hitch their cart so vociferously to something that's far far removed from them, other than wanting a theme. Some people associated with the pin also took it upon themselves to speak on behalf of the company on the forum again and again, which was obviously fraught with much peril. Plenty of reputations flushed down the toilet. Others were already there and have solidified their status.

Caveat Emptor.

Condolences to all.

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I honestly never watched this movie. Can somebody tell me who won?

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I won't ruin it, it's a pretty good movie you should watch!

Predator did a flying Suplex from the top turnbuckle but was disqualified when he fell through the ropes.

Wow...I just got back from a work convention to discover this! Not that anyone is really shocked I'm guessing. I feel horrible for everyone who was paid in and got nothing. Even my wife just looked at me at stated (the obvious) "never pre-order a pinball machine again"...and I'm one of the lucky ones who got an SE. I hope you do get your game Aurich and can at least appreciate what you, Ferret, daudioguy and many other good people who got sucked into this cluster did (and continue to do) for this title. Overall it might have been a shitshow from the top but some good people did some GREAT work on this one.

Well, I talked with my distributor, and my money is safe, and I'm out on my LE. Too many unknowns as far as the future and parts and all that stuff. I'm switching over to something else, not sure what yet.

"I am contacting you today with potentially good news. We have had a customer drop out from the production schedule of the Alien Pinball LE. This means that we will be able to get a machine to you sooner rather than later. If you would like to take advantage of this situation that would be great as we can fulfil your order sooner rather than later.
If you could please contact me promptly if you would like to take advantage of this situation. The trim colour that we will be able to offer you is green as this is the colour that the machine has been produced in. We can certainly add your unique LE number to the machine. To fully take advantage of this opportunity we would require that the remaining balance be settled for the machine plus the shipping.
Thank you for your time and I hope to hear from you promptly and your decision on this opportunity."

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How many people actually got their LE’s before the doors closed? Same question for standards? I’m curious how many games they actually delivered in all these years.

So I was just about to put my machine up for sale because I finally reached All Out War and I come to the Alien Thread and everyone is pissed off. Did something bad happen with Heighway with the new owners?

No, the value of yours just went up substantially.

Tits up.

I'm guessing around 150 +

A 'pre-production game' purchased at TPF 2017 was marked as PA-0025. Another pre-prod machine was marked PA-0038.

My machine now is stamped as 'checked' on 05 Dec 2017. It is marked P-0130.

Another machine stamped as 'checked' in Nov 2017 is marked P-120.

Or down if they break and cant b fixed

Seriously? What the heck? I went back about 8 pages in this thread and I don't see anything about that. Did the new owners tank?

https://www.thegazette.co.uk/notice/3015879

Link for Notice above for PC.

You were going to sell the game because you reached All Out War? Do you normally sell games as soon as you get the wizard mode? (This is a real question, I'm not being snarky.)

I drained this thread 9 months ago - so sorry to those who were lied to, strung along and stolen from. Hope the assets get auctioned off and people who paid early recoup something.

Lol! I do. I played the hell out of that game. Loved it! It was the only game I played for quite awhile.
Is that weird? Does anybody do this?
I don't keep machines for years like some collectors. Not my style.

So how did you find it?

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Heh, I'm the exact opposite of you. I make double sure that I love a game, buy a good copy of it, and then never sell it...

At any rate, I'm glad you've loved the game!

K-man

Will you hang around and continue on?

I'm actually trying to be more like you are with your games. I seem to be that way with the older Williams games that are based solely on a high score. But some of the newer games that are mode based are more like an adventure and I don't really play for score. I play to complete it. The code on this game is one of the best I've played. Great ride. I wish All Out War was a little more explosive but still was cool. Overall, fantastic game.

I'm not going anywhere!

Thanks, appreciate that, so glad it gave you tons of fun!

I'm sorry to read all this everyone. This was the one pin a I was really watching closely and considering buying new, but really hoped for a second hand sale. It had so much going for it that I liked, not just the awesome theme. It's funny that some simple things kept me away; sort of like a really realistic phishing them I almost fell for as a treasurer of a professional organization when I got a realistic email from our president to send a check. I never liked how they never had enough information on their website. Sounds silly, but I was always reluctant combined with the things I read. I remember some calling Andrew out for past failures, and thought water under the bridge. Turns out you really nee to check these people out, whether Skit-B, Jpop, or DP. People can't be trusted.

Not weird at all. I've had several games that once I got to the wizard mode, I didn't even care if I beat it because I was already so sick of playing the thing. That's why I don't go for mode based games anymore. Too much like video games.

And most of them left due to Andys management. I've got a few stories about it myself but there's no point at twisting the knife at this point. I'm sure people who are owed money/machines aren't going to feel any better reading about just how incompetent Andy was behind the scenes.

Fingers crossed for the ex-HP employees, as others have said they are great people, very passionate about what they do and the main reason why Aliens turned out to be such a great table.

I got moderated twice, attacked, and chastised for saying this would happen and calling out the typical fanboys that just fanned this whole shit show up and dragged people down the drain on this deal......and look what happened lol. The writing could not have been more clearly written that this was coming. Really learned a lot on here dealing with pinballers, different thinking completely. Expected a lot more cynical types with the types of cash being tossed around in this hobby.....