I'm in. But I'm going to have a decision to make once we know how much of the movies (characters, quotes, voices?) are actually in the game. Is this game just a bug hunt?

I'm in.

I'm totally interested, but need to see more before putting down a deposit.

Will have to see a little more before I commit, but dream theme for me, Aliens is an all time favorite.

I was told they will announce a distributor here very soon and when that happens I'll likely be putting down a deposit subject to a little more information from Heighway.

It will be interesting to see who asks for their Alien refund first… to fund the next 'greatest' title. You Pinside guys are silly… in the head.

I've got Full Throttle coming, so I'm waiting for that first, but I expect to get most new heighway playfields if they are priced right.

I'm shocked people would put down money on game 2 when game 1 hasn't shipped yet.

You're not new to Pinside, are you?

I'm in, dream theme and wasn't going to take a chance losing out on an LE. Just have to fill out that form but money sent.

That's why I'm surprised.

I've seen this happen over and over again.

We're can I preorder?

NOPE, not until Full Throttle is delivered to all first!

Love the license but no one gets my cash until I see what the game is all about. Now that I have seen TBL, I am seriously considering it. My problem is that something from my lineup that I conceived and put together over the last 13 years in the hobby will have to go. I always struggle with that aspect.

I dove in. Andrew is building games as we speak. He just expanded his factory and Full Throttle is fun, fast and very solidly built. His presentation at EXPO was great. I am in for Full Throttle LE#3, Alien LE#3 and I would buy one of those Bacardi pinballs if I could. If you did not catch his presentation, he made 251 Bacardi games that look kinda like a Joust where you are playing H2H. 140 of them will be in the USA for some kind of tournament and 110 in Europe. I will be keeping my eyes open to check one of those out.

In!

They mostly come at night.....mostly

How could they cut the power, man? They're animals!

This whole pre-order phenomenon is getting old. Why not call it what it is....Bank Rolling! Seriously, thats all you are doing is helping fund a company that can't fund themselves?!? Who takes all the risk? Doesn't seem to make sense to me

You still don't understand what you're dealing with, do you? Perfect organism. Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility.

Andrew wants $1500 only until your game is made to secure your spot. Balance due week of shipping. The $1500 is fully refundable. Not very unreasonable.

I went LE for the led Ramps and shaker motor.

If you lemmings stop pre-ordering games, maybe a pin will be produced with complete code and the promised features. At this point, what is the incentive for a manufacturer to produce a quality product when their consumers froth at the mouth and lay down thousands of dollars for products that aren't even past the conceptual stage.

It might even slow the ridiculous price inflation. Demand drives price and if people keep throwing money at ANYONE who says they are going to make a pin, there is no reason for real world economics to take hold here.

Hudson, c'mere! Come HERE!

I'm not sure how I feel about being called a Lemming, but aside from that:

1) Some of the "boutique" manufacturers have to have a preorder commitment to estimate demand and properly prepare to make games (parts, etc...).
2) Andrew (Heighway) is asking for a refundable deposit with the balance due the week of manufacture of your game.
3) The incentive to make games is sustainability. I am not aware of any pinball manufacturer getting rich on their first game. The have to put out quality if they want to sell more games and eventually make a profit.

By Stern (may be).
And Stern only.
Because the other ones, especially the Boutique pins, would simply not exist. And this is where the innovation is!

The other difference for me was having games that were playable even in an early state. Heighway, TBL and Wooly were all better than Xmen the day I received it.
So yeah it a lot easier to order these games for me.
And yes they are just better!

Copying a tier level system and increasing the prices on games are two weird definitions of "innovation" (Heighway is partially doing this and definitely not the only ones doing it)

Is Full Throttle even out yet?

_{Post edited by NewPinOwner: needed to clarify a tiny bit}

Really torn about going to next years expo. So much fun but saving up 24k sucks : )

I'd be in if I had the dough.

Yeah....but isn't it great having these types of problems....

I would totally be in on this... but the current pricing of new games has me sitting on the side lines.

If they capture the dark mood and the atmosphere of the movies... and get it in the game... then this is going to be a winner!

Yes but the base game is 6 and it opens the door to new tables at under 4. Thats damn good right there!

True. I'll be keeping a close eye on this game and platform as a whole.

I'm in as long as I eventually get a reply back from Heighway.
Even my stapler at work has me excited about the game...
Stapler.JPG

Boy do I owe an apology to all the guy's who seemed way to enthusiastic about TBL, which is one of their dream theme's and really isn't for me so I wasn't in on the love fest and yeah it does look good but I will be loving this pin from dusk till dawn, unless its total crap which I doubt then prepare for some serious love fest action. I feel something inside that even TWD didn't have the power to cause, all I'm seeing are those beacons flashing and hearing the tracker sfx,this is a dream theme for me and I'm nude right now, is that wrong?

Can I at least see artwork first?

It's not wrong...unless both of your nipples are equally sore.

Is this you on your new avatar?? Scary...

These deposits pay for FT to be made.

As a Full Throttle buyer, I've only paid a deposit myself, I still have to pay for the bulk of the machine, so he still has a lot of FT money coming once he is making machines.

This is different from say, Woz, where pre-orders had paid in full years earlier, and that money was consumed already when it came time to production.

You forgot to put in the poll {are you kidding me}way to early to be writhing checks.

And you know this how?

You dont think that maybe Andy had a bunch of start-up investors pump the money in to take FT to market?

Also, seeing as the Aliens deposits is quite a recent event, how did these deposits pay for over 2 years of development, putting together a fairly impressive factory, and taking a fully functional FT out to the US and then another to France for these pinball/trade shows?? Do you also think Andy got the Aliens license for free?

The deposits right now just show that there's a confirmed market for the Aliens title, maybe that puts Heighway pinball in a stronger position with their backers.. Also, this isnt quite the same as taking practically full payment up front on a machine that then doesnt get produced for a year or two...

I can see exactly why you'd say something like this, bearing in mind the events of the last couple of years with certain other title(s), and if heighway had been taking large deposits a year ago for something way off of being produced you'd have a very valid point.

Fact is there are obviously people with money backing this project, and as hard as a start-up in the technology sector is (As with any start-up, its soul-destroyingly difficult - believe me I know from my own businesses!), this company is not structured to rely solely on deposits for its survival - what it does rely on is showing the capability to get sales and thereby maybe increase investors confidence in the enterprise, hypothetically..

If you knew the kind of figures it takes to get this far I think you'd be surprised.

I've really appreciated the fact that Heighway WASN'T a crowd funded company, he was traditionally funded, the particulars we don't know, but it doesn't really matter.

It gave me a lot of confidence in the company, knowing there is a proper business plan somewhere that was good enough to get real money to get this going, not just passing the hat around.

I'm sure the deposits for Alien have more to do with the timing with expo, capitalizing on that one event, more than anything else or needing the money. If expo was scheduled a couple of months later, we'd likely not hear anything about Alien until then.

Again, If you were not at EXPO, check out Jared's Vid of the seminar and Heighway's interview. Andrew already manufactured 251 custom pinball machines for Bacardi this year. He is waiting on final parts and will be pumping out Full Throttles next month. I played the game (FT)! Code is 85% complete. It is fun and fast.

Somebody also mentioned lack of innovation. Once again, check out the videos. Tons of great innovation coming out of this company.

I am a believer!

That Heighway interview has had 500+ views already.... not bad for a guerrilla iphone interview.

Alien #112
Predator #112

Im sure you could pre-order Circe's Animal House in 2012.

Exactly, the Aliens announcement at Expo was clearly made because it was/is the BIGGEST possible platform to the BIGGEST potential consumer market that Heighway Pinball was attending anytime soon. And lets be honest, the publicity from announcing such a huge license has brought more attention to the company and their other title which is about to be released, Full Throttle.

The Aliens license was signed and sealed a while ago, a number of people have sat on this info for quite a long time, and even the Bacardi machine run was right back at the beginning of the year, but for various reasons this info couldn't be shared in the public domain - so whilst a lot of people just viewed Heighway as a boutique small-run type affair that probably wouldn't get past title 1, a number of us have known for a while what was going on and just bided our time.

Amusement machines have been produced and shipped out of the fully fitted/staffed factory, major license holders have been spoken to and deals have been done, and others are in the pipeline, big-name designers (Such as Nordman) are onboard, and FT is about to start being produced and sold pretty imminently. Heighway have designed their own boardsets and are integrating different technologies into their pins, which are currently not considered 'industry standard'.

All of the above was NOT funded by some sort of pipedream that involved taking full up front payments from customers a year or two years in advance.

You know, I shouldnt say this but Im going to anyway, Andy first announcing Aliens overseas and also not being able to attend a particular UK show recently seems to have led to some of our own (British) countrymen getting a little bit put out, the few UK posters on here (And other forums/groups) seem to be proportionally the more negative ones and I just don't get it - your getting a UK Pinball manufacturer, thats a bit of a result surely??