I'm curious about the necessity of getting rid of 'old votes.' Now without anybody getting all bent, let's just say that Pat Lawlor or Steve Ritchie died. And let's say they had each gone through and rated 300 games on Pinside over the years. Dead or alive, their opinion about a game matters. By eliminating votes from Pinsiders that are no longer active, for whatever reason, you could be eliminating votes from very good pinball people.

I appreciate the changes, and I appreciate all of the hard work and all of the thought that went into this. Please do not take my comment as a criticism, because it's not meant to be critical. It's just a thought.

When I rate a machine, and I'm rating sound, etc., I'm rating it based on my knowledge of the technology that was available when that machine was built. I'm not comparing it to today's technology. So my overall rating of an '8' is based on machines from that era, not comparing them to machines that are made now. And some of what's being made now does not compare favorably quality-wise with machines that were built 30+ years ago (proof? scroll through a few pages of Pinside and all of the complaints about Stern machines).

That's just the way I do it. Take The Black Knight, for example. I think I gave it a very high rating for sound. When the machine was built, it was innovative, and there wasn't anything (or much) like it. To give it a low rating for sound wouldn't be right, because in that era, it was the best there was.