Just saw a YouTube video last night where someone had access to a log of all the ships from China coming into port at Long Beach, CA.

Looks like around 600 units or so of both Marvel and Star Wars pinball arrived in port on Friday, 2/5.

Will probably take a bit of time (couple weeks?) to clear Customs, and then make it out to the distributors like GameStop and BestBuy.

So, another delay, but things should start happening soon....

Later,
EV

Just received an email from GameStop that the new shipping ETA for my Marvel 1up is March 9th.

We shall see.....

Later,
EV

New update.....

Initial order page said that GameStop would not charge your credit card until game was ready to ship within one week.

CC charge went pending yesterday, 2/23. So that would put delivery date next Tuesday, 3/2.

Time to start porch watching!

Later,
EV

I check Best But every couple days.
Still cant pre-order Attack from Mars version.

Preorders were done earlier in the month, sold out in a few hours. I hesitated and they were gone, had one in my cart and it became invalid.

I missed that boat too.

In this market i wonder how much i could sell my attack from mars arcade1up sealed?

Is this not going to be available to the masses?

Eventually.
The preorder sold out in 30 seconds and no new date of next one.

I did see one listed on ebay for 1200 but i think they took it down bc u cant sell a preorder spot.

ah, ok. So if someone just can't stand waiting, they can bend over and pay through the nose...

Yup... this is how supply and demand works.

Btw i didnt say i was selling...just speculating.

Look what just showed up at my (garage) door!!!

Unboxing photos to follow later tonight....

Later,
EV

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Noice! Interested in ur take on it.

Probably 20k.

Should post it at that just for the hilarity of setting off pinside.

Please let us know thank you for being the guinea pig.

So far, so good. Thing is very well packaged, but interestingly, packed and shipped with the LCD screen side down. The use the underside of the cabinet to store the box containing all the backbox pieces, but I would have had the LCD side in the middle of the container....

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Hows the nudge and lag?

So, finally got the thing all put together. Very much like an IKEA item (even with dowel pins!). It's not super beefy construction, but feels solid enough. Here are a couple of comparison photos next to my GOTG Pro...

Later,
EV

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Coo

Looks awesome

Impressive. Did you put the guards around the flipper buttons? Or did it come that way? Either way, smart.

Need video man and review.

Got billed 2/25, and now showing delivery for 3/3 . Marvel Pinball model.

Very cool to see these showing up. Reasonably priced pinball machine for the home. Lots of trade offs obviously but at this price point you will never see a real pinball that is easy to set up and ready go. I think they are going to sell a ton.

Hope arcade 1up can eventually get those screens to 1080p. And a bit bigger... maybe even have deluxe version and charge just a bit more.

Anyone that had not played zen games on their iPad is really missing out. They are really fun.

Looking forward to see what their next FX app that is coming soon is going to do.

Look forward to the reviews

A few more pics for height comparison;

As you can see, the lockdown bar and flipper button are a touch *higher* on the Arcade 1up. But look past, and you can see how flat the screen angle is compared to a normal Stern. This pic is with the noses of the pins even.

For reference, my wife here is 5'6".
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The mylar around the flipper button came pre-installed. Good thinking on their part.

Poorer thinking on their part is I don't think they realize how nitpicky some of us pinheads can be. While they protected the art at the buttons, they neglected to consider protecting at the legs.

The legs are roughly the same size as normal pin legs, but the metal is noticeably thinner. Also, the edges and not as rounded off as the could be, and that is just screaming for leg protectors.

Since they have the offset bolt holes going into each face, you really can't add nice thick leg protectors like usual. I just trimmed a couple of layers of electrical tape on the back of the leg and hope for the best.

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How does it play tho? Any button lag? Are the graphics smooth? Etc.

To be candid....annoying.

Those folks on YouTube that have early reviews that claim this thing is lag-less have obviously not spent much time around real pins.

The main issue is that there is a tiny bit of visual lag between when you hit the button and when the flipper moves, and then a tiny bit more to when the solenoid fires.

Most annoying part is there is no menu capability to adjust the delay. So, you get what you get.

I found it to be less distracting and easier to make my shots if I turned the solenoids off. But in that case, you're turning off part of what you paid for.

Later,
EV

I'll post a more lengthy review when I have some time tonight, but here's the short version;

HIGHS
- Zen/FX tables are fully ported over. All the ball tricks/moving characters/etc. are there.
- The small 3/4 scale actually works well. Yeah, it would be nice to have a slightly bigger screen, but overall, it IS fun to play.
- Really good looking machine. Art quality fits right inline with modern Sterns
- Sound system is quite good for the size.
- Graphics at 720p seem fine. Nice and smooth.

LOWS
- the aforementioned flipper lag is annoying.
- trim part quality needs a bit of help. Rough edges on lockdown bar, plunger handle, and legs
- Big dead space inbetween end of screen and lockdown bar. Makes it look like this was designed for a 27" monitor, and then they cheaped out to 24" at the last minute.

OVERALL
- Not bad, especially for the price, but at the end of the day, there's nothing like the real thing!

Later,
EV

Some felt protectors might be a good option here? Easy to blow an extra hole through the felt. Might be a good quick business opportunity to get something made up for these.

Thanks for the review. It's a bummer to hear there is flipper lag. The manufacturers must learn that poor performance wont fly.

I received my Star Wars 2 days ago

I agree with what EchoVictor is saying. Before release, people were saying : there is no lag. There is a lag and I guess you will have to live with. Of course having the real thing next to it makes us way more critical and you cannot compare the feeling of a real pinball vs virtual. But for the price and the fun factor (keep in mind i'm a huge star wars fan and my 2 young sons are too) it's still a pretty good deal.

I will post pictures later tonight

The Star Wars

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Bummer.
Looks good but thats not whats important.

Flipper lag? I'm out.

OK...have some time to organize my thoughts....

ASSEMBLY
All the lower cabinet needs is the legs bolted on. All the main assembly effort is putting together the backbox. Everything is pretty straightforward to build...very much like an item from IKEA. One little gripe is the holes for the dowels are drilled a little too deep, so when you go to assemble the other end of the joint, you only have about a 1/8" nub of dowel sticking out to guide you. Otherwise, all the joints go together pretty easily and simply. Having an electric screwdriver makes this process go much easier.

PART QUALITY
The cabinet and artwork is really nice. Bright, vivid colors on the sides of the cab and the backbox side panels. One thing I might have changed is to bring the background "starfield" look around the front of the cab. It's just plain black with the Marvel and Arcade 1up logos. The translite is direct printed onto a piece of plexi, but it still looks good.

As I mentioned above, my only gripe is some of the tactile surface edges are a bit rough. While I can forgive the edges of the legs being that way at this price point, it's not excusable on the corners of the lockdown bar where your fingers rest. In addition, be VERY careful if you ever take that bar off, as there are two Philips head screws on the ends that hold it in place. On mine, one of the screw heads is nice and smooth, but the other is a bit rough, as though it had been re-torqued at some point and the "+" part stripped a little.

Also, the corners of the shooter rod metal housing are quite pointy. Since you need to use that button underneath to select a game (or even do some actions during a game - looking at you Thor), it can rub you a little wrong if you go for it quickly. I'm actually giving serious consideration to re-locating that button to the left where a traditional Start button would be. Also some plastic flashing around the shooter knob itself is still present. Clean up your injection molding die seams, guys.

SOFTWARE/GAMEPLAY
Here's where my major complaint in the game lies. Yes, there IS flipper lag. It's more noticeable on games I know like X-Men and Fantastic Four, and less on games I don't know. However, at the end of the day, making your shots is all about timing, and it definitely takes getting used to the delay before you can start really hitting what you're aiming at. As I mentioned above, there's even bigger delay from the button push to the solenoid firing. I really wish there was a menu setting where you could manually change the delay. But since there is not, you just have to get used to it. It's a bit less distracting if you turn off the solenoids, but then you're killing one of the main selling features of the game. "Seamless"? I don't think so. Meh.

The graphics look pretty good so far. I haven't noticed any glitches or other hang-ups. Everything seems to run pretty smoothly, except for the aforementioned flipper lag. Oh, one item that's kind of funky....the "DMD" screen has the single color dots from the original FX games, but it almost looks like there's a slightly bigger gap between the top half of the pixels and the bottom half. Makes it look like a tiny black line is running through the display, and I don't remember seeing that artifact on my Xbox.

Otherwise, everything else is ported over almost perfectly from the Zen/FX stuff. One thing I noticed is that some of the video modes will only take up a portion of the screen (Baxter Building in FF), while others (Serpent in Fear Itself) take up the whole screen. One cool detail is that when you play a multi-player game, the color of the DMD changes for each player. For example, on X-Men, Player one was amber dots, and Player 2 was yellow dots. Kinda cool, but to be candid, I've been spoiled by ColorDMD and would have liked to see those dots fully colorized.

OVERALL IMPRESSION
Let's be real folks. For $550 bucks, you're not going to get top of the line stuff. For what it is, I think they did a pretty good job. I'd have much preferred them to maybe have the screen a bit bigger at 27", but I understand they have to keep tight reins on the BOM somewhere. I like the overall 3/4 scale package, as it reminds you that this is not a real pinball, and really can't be held to the same standards. The main word my wife and I use to describe this little guy sitting next to our other real pins is "cute". I just wish they would have dialed in the flippers a bit better. Because ultimately, that's what makes or breaks your game.

FINAL GRADE
B.....minus
(come see me after class 1up, I know you can do better!)

Later,
EV

Great review! Thx

Ps any chance u could do a top down of the flippers and ur hands hitting the buttons to see how bad the lag is?

I’ll stick with my iPad for video pinball.

A1up Star Wars machine looks cool as a show piece but for virtual pinball playing doesnt even come close to playing Visual Pinball X tables on a vp machine the size of a real pinball cab. i get that of the price range you won't get much. the AtGames machine will have capability to hook up a Pc to play the VpX tables as well. i think A1up could do way better too along with Atgames. they should have looked in to virtual pinball builders and hobbyists and did it up right. I plan on waiting it out and see if AtGames and A1up come out with newer releases of the machines with more and better modifications. would have been nice if they had differnt pinball packages like a basic model and high end models. bigger screens etc. different price points $600 up to $2,000 . iam in the virtual hobby and have a custom built machine and will be going on my next custom build of a machine to replicate the newer Stern machines. that would have been great if Stern got In the game and came out with a virtual pin to play all the classic Stern tables. but with VPX you can play those awesome tables like AcDc ect. heres a pic of my machine. IMG_20150409_213901_288 (resized).jpg
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I spent about $3k building a virtual machine years ago and couldn’t get the flipper lag low enough to make me happy, so I’m not surprised that this has some issues. Thanks for the review.

I ordered months ago. But I think I may cancel now while I still can due to reports of flipper lag.

For those of you that have the machines already is there input for software updates, adding games? And would a software update fix the lag?

For those of you that have VP machines already can the flipper lag be reduced to unnoticeable? Or is that just the drawback of VP pins, some of the commentary on this above seem mixed on this.

Thanks, I too am looking forward to trying out the attack from mars machine. It will likely be in my daughters room with her other "arcade" items (mini claw machine that plays the ringling brothers circus theme on loop, don't ever buy one if you like your sanity) so I'm not too worried about perfect performance.

Appreciate the advice, but I am virulently anti-FaceBorg.

Know of any other ways to get in contact with their team? I am a Quality Engineer by trade, and would love to talk with their QC team...

Thanks,
EV

not sure what hardware the A1up is using . to run their software. with the visual Pinball X software flipper lag can be due to number of things. could be video card, processor, etc.. on the VPX software there are settings you can change to improve lag if your having issues. isnt there any settings with the A1up software on the machine?

Nope. No settings for the flippers. There is a calibration option for the plunger.
This tells me there could be an option for the flippers if A1Up wanted to...

Later,
EV

I would be willing to bet that the hardware is the reason for the flipper delay, not a software optimization issue that could be corrected by a setting. Arcade 1up has said that they worked hard on flipper delay and the play experience so I don’t feel it’s a “if they wanted too” issue, at least with the current hardware they chose for cost savings. I’m sure they realized they could improve it with better hardware but chose not too.

Flipper lag is non-existent in a VP machine with appropriate hardware (newer nVidia video card and i5 processor/8gb ram) videorunning VPX. It was real before with older versions of VP and older nVidea/ATI video cards.

it's all about GPU, CPU and screen. Need to get a monitor not tv. I used to have one (4k, etc). No flipper lag.

Now I play vr vpx. A whole diff level. No lag at all, gorgeous and with a pinsim controller with feedback, it's amazing.

I would pay 5 or 6k if someone would build one that has no lag... i would have to play it first tho.
Any leads within 2 hours of louisville?