The game has some hardcore fans here on Pinside, no doubt. But they tend to be vocal, there is a reason it has a small production and isn't even in the top 30.

I think the reason for the low production is poor sales based on the game not being very popular.

In what context? Maybe if it was selling to collectors but not OPS, but my understanding of IM was that it flopped sales wise across the board.

However, if it's such a good game that was just a victim of the recession, why isn't it in the top 30? It wasn't the low production, there are a bunch of low production games in the top 30.

The main slam on the game was the magnets and randomness, the pinheads didn't like it because they thought there wasn't a lot of skill (at the time). Your best argument is probably with all the new people in the hobby tastes have changed.

But it's still low in the rankings.

No. Not just that. Overall features, IPDB rating (#76), Pinside rating (#31), overall sales.

Features, sales, rankings. Hey, I like plenty of "bad" games (no, I'm not saying IM is bad), I love Police Force and Twister. But I'm not going to run around and try and convince people they're good games because I like it.

IM is a perfectly fine game. Peaked at #23 on Pinside, #76 on IPDB.

I don't believe it was unfairly criticized. You think it was slammed because of cost cutting, I think the main reason it was slammed was because of the large amounts of randomness. It's plenty fun, but there are other plenty fun games out there with more features etc that are better.

But, things have changed. People don't seem to mind the randomness, or maybe have accepted it, I'm not sure. At $6K or whatever IM sells for, I think bang for your buck, it's a horrible game.

In a row of pins that I'm playing, it's plenty fun for a while.

If you feel this is a waste of time, feel free to just move one, we won't mind

Sure. Ratings are far from the sole deciding factor.