The two games share identical geometry. I prefer the replay rule-set of Blue Note. Also, because Blue Note includes a free ball objective, it essentially possesses the add-a-ball feature of Rock Star.

Both titles are very low production games.
Cool overall art package on both titles, including on the cabinet art, which matches the musical theme.

So Ive had my first instance of someone siting the Banning auction as justifying their high price. I'm still trying to come up with a clever reply that won't offend the seller so much that they stop returning my emails. I am thinking my reply should be something along the lines of: "Good luck getting your price, has your machine had much coverage in the NY Times?"

Goodbye forever Banning. Just a very sad sight. .

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That 2nd pic from the top Is awesome. you may want to consider getting a picture photo done.

I have not really followed much about this auction or what is actually going on with it so could someone "fill me in". I know hammer prices were crazy but that is about all I know.

Is the auction over now or is there more coming? If there is more when does that happen? And stuff like that would be interesting to know.

At this point how many machines were sold? And anything else people "not in the know" might be curious about.

Sorry if this stuff has already been talked about but I don't feel like looking through thousands of post trying to find a couple answers.

Skip,

Check out the following website and scroll down to the bottom where you can see the list of machines that sold.

https://bid.captainsauctionwarehouse.com/m/view-auctions/live-sale/id/80

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And next session begins SEP 24 ,2021 - 3:00 PM PST.

Sure, Short answer - the auction continues this weekend, don't bother if you want any kind of deal, in fact, don't bother if you're not willing to throw stupid money at machines and pay 3-5x what the pins are really worth.

Not this weekend. The weekend after.

LTG : )

No interest in bidding or buying I just was curious what was happening next. It is always sad to see something like this happen - once machines get sold off from a huge collection that is one less place a mass of people can enjoy a bunch of machines all in one place. But life does go on!

$1700 for a Spin Out. I sold mine for $700. I've seen enough. Lmao.

"The Lost Arcade" streams on the Kanopy service, which is free from many libraries.

Ok not what I was originally thinking. I visited a guy that has been doing pin repair / restoration for years in the LA area and he's been contacted by two "winners" to go through their newly acquired pins from the auction. Both new owners were not avid pinheads, but were caught up in the fervor of the auction. As a MOP tech, I'm aware of the condition of both machines and I've been "under the hood " of each one. One was a decent buy, the other would have been my example of a pin that looks good on the outside, but I wouldn't want own it after looking at the inside (and it sold for $11,000).

Maybe all of the machines weren't won by whales or heading overseas. I was sitting behind the lot #1 winner on Friday, and the happy couple didn't strike me to be pinheads either. They just seemed to want something to sit in their game room as a "museum piece" that they could enjoy. Hats off to them.

In any case, although I won't be able to justify spending $ on pins I was really hoping to get after working for several weeks to develop spreadsheets using price levels, market value, game condition, etc to come up with a bid list (like most people), I've really enjoyed the comments / humor of everyone that has been contributing on this topic ... which really became more of a chat room last weekend.

Cheers to John Weeks for sharing his collection with all of us and providing so much entertainment ... whether intentional or not.

I’ve been to the museum for a couple of the events, and also went to John’s apartment in LB for OC pinball before he got Banning

It was really a surreal experience going each time, and so sad to see a So Cal treasure of a collection like that available to play get broken up.

Like most I am just boggled by the prices of the auction. I’ve been collecting for 25 years and thought I’d seen it all until this past weekend. Makes me weep a little over games I sold over the years, feel fortunate to still have a decent collection, and less than optimistic that I’ll buy future pins in this market climate.

I wonder if in addition to the immense coverage the event got, if people were bidding so high thinking it’s a charity auction because it was named a museum or non profit and purchases might be a tax write off. I’ve seen that happen at charity auctions before, but not to this extent with so many items consistently breaking records.

Anyways congratulations to John on the sales and best wishes with whatever your next endeavor is.

Whoops, thanks for correcting. In my head, every weekend is a pinball auction!

With the increased name recognition of Captain's as a place where people with more money than brains congregate, they might have to start doing auctions every weekend to keep up with an increased amount of consignment. I know I've thought about grabbing some arcade cabs off FB Marketplace and dropping them off right to Captain's

Maybe tell them that museum items often have a uniqueness or rare quality that cant be found on the street.

Thanks. Wasn't aware of that service, but I did manage to find it elsewhere. A very good documentary in fact, even though it's about video games (which never interested me at all), and barely mentions pinball. While the two communities may only have a slight degree of overlap, I'd say there is a real fellowship that can develop within each. This is an aspect of the hobby that I have really enjoyed, and it was well captured by "The Lost Arcade."

Months and years from now we can look at the heartbeat of this thread and see when the auction took place.

People often laughed at me getting into the hobby privately over 30 years ago. Often quoting, it was wasteful, childish, or other similiar sort type of adjectives.

LTG remembers perspectives of the discussions via "outsiders" from the early 1990s on RPG. Different age and mindset.

Today, I would never be able to afford what I own.
Times have changed and we have already moved beyond a common person being able to own a large collection, let alone a new game. Events will not stop until the next full economic recession which even with the pandamic did not occur.

Presently negotiating with a consignment broker for sales.
Games will not be auctioned, but advertised locally.

It has been memorable.
Good time to sell and move on.

I shall miss you my friend. I hope in some way you stay active.

LTG : )

I am retaining my extensive pinball artwork collection of NOS backglasses, translites, prototype sketches, and design diagrams. This allows much less space required.

I do assist with reproductions when no other reliable sources are available. I just don't participate directly in the hobby anymore.

Pretty much agree with all you said here. No way I could have built up my collection at today’s prices. “Back in the day” I was buying more than 10 SYS11s for way less than the price of the 1x Banning Bad Cats. Lol!

Indeed - good time to cash it all up while the market is hot.

Enlist an auction company with online bidding, create some FOMO with some clever marketing, and stand back and watch the fun.

rd

A few more pics from my visit yesterday.
For posterity.

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Pretty soon we'll be doing hearse tours through the outback to bring these Aussie and Kiwi pins back home.

Yep!

Total reversal.

Funny - most of the pins I’ve bought from the States between 2013 and say 2018, I could freight them back to LA and sell them for a profit. Lol!

I remember buying a very nice Nine Ball for $1700 at TPF in 2016 - at the time $1700 was top price! But I was there, exchange rate was really good, and I already had other pins shipping back … so back it came. It’d probably fetch $5k USD in Texas these days.

rd

A new currency reference......"Banning coin". Is that real money, or are we talking Banning coin?

Don't be snarky, just share your perspective in plain language. The world has a surplus of snark and a deficit of earnest communication.

Another "stupid question" for you guys "in the know". What happened to force the sale of this collection? Was their building sold or something? Why couldn't machines just stay in building they are being sold out of? Looks like a nice place!

Call Captains in a couple weeks. I'm sure he would fly back and auction collection.
I have a good source that a few arcades nation wide have already called.

See post 29 in this thread.

To those who have posted along the lines of "This is the new normal, get used to it": I don't think so, but I guess we shall see. From my point of view, it is not a matter of what one could possibly stretch to and still afford to purchase. Had I bought any of these pins from the auction that required paying 3X to 5X actual, maximum, justifiable prices, I would have felt like an idiot, and it would have haunted me for years. That is not a function of the size of one's bank account . . . unless you have so much $$$$$ that it ceases to hold any meaning. (But maybe not even THEN.)

And then if you and everyone else paid 3X to 5X, nobody's wallet would allow them to buy as many - meaning that there will be more unsold machines.

THANKS!

We all cash out some day. I have about 10 more years and then I'll really shrink the collection down. Still need something to do though once I retire.

Hey there, it's good to see you XTBKX. I know the impatient newbie horde gave you a lot of shit but I always enjoyed your posts and the history and perspective you shared... I've missed those insights quite a bit. Sorry to hear you're winding down but at least you got to enjoy the heyday. Anyway, I hope you'll at least be around to drop knowledge or even well-reasoned opinion from time to time... some of us do appreciate that more than the latest "add my fart to the breeze" redundant / overactive hot topic thread

This thread is so different than the warehouse find thread from last year. There's a lot less racoon poop for one. I can't wait to see how this goes a couple weeks from now when people actually received what they bought and see the condition for HEP prices.

The money will be banked by then and the guy is basically out of the community so not like he has a reputation to uphold. They will probably be huge buyers' remorse and complaining, but will he care? No.

Not that he necessarily should either. These buyers are making their own "interesting" decisions and choosing to do so with little inspection.

...and even more people will be happy with their purchase and won't have buyer's remorse.

Yes, I was implying there'd be some of each overall.

Any progress on your Ted Zale book? I'm looking forward to reading it.

[Query for longtime Pinsiders, re other big auctions & "elite" auctions]

What thread was that ?

I haven't been a member here as long as many of you, but I recall that there was some huge auction in Tulsa, in 2018.

Maybe someone who knows can answer this. There was a guy who traveled around the country buying up select pins for occasional, upper-echelon auctions. A lot of the pins he would auction were rare, or supposedly elite specimens -- at (then) commensurate pricing. For these auctions, he published a (near-Sotheby's ?) catalog that puts to shame the vague, useless, one-sentence boiler-plate line rubber-stamped at CAW. It had full descriptions of history (if known), the condition, with at least a few pretty good photos. WHO was that ? Is he still operating, or has he gone through a "Slick Chick drain", not to be seen again ?
I think I must have a couple of those catalog pages somewhere, saved as PDF, but at the moment have no idea where. Some time later, I recalled a couple posts stating that his descriptions could in some cases be overly generous as to condition. But I don't think that was due to any deliberate chicanery. His auctions gave the impression of being a class act.

[Addendum: Trying to find some record of this, I started going through a lot of old emails. I'm sure I must have been on his mailing list, but so far nothing. Then I checked a master database of the files from a bunch of old computers. The one hit I came up with was Morphy Auctions. The file was dated 2014. I'm thinking that was likely the one. Still active ?]

One other thing to add: I'd be very skeptical that ANY of the SoCal dealers bought anything from this auction, due to the additional markup they would have to impose in order to turn a profit. I mean, WHAT is the adjective that captures "beyond insane" ?

Or is it used games selling at premiums driving up new prices? You know when Stern sees their used games are selling for more-than-new another price increase will likely come soon. Same with JJP. GnR LE gets priced up in the used market? Let's add another $1,000!

Kind of a chicken-and-egg thing, which came first? It doesn't matter anymore, it's in full effect both ways now! How long can this resonating cycle continue?

I do find one thing about all the price indignance amusing though: didn't we do this?

Let's promote the hobby! Let's put on shows and publicize them. Let's put our machines on location for more to enjoy. Let's hold and promote tournaments. Let's introduce our friends to pinball!

Now it's a grand success and everyone's pissed! LOL... What exactly was our goal, ha?

The most entertaining thing at the live auction was the interaction between the Captain and the "pinball aficionado" David (Miner? Moore? Is he a pinsider?).

Captain often interjected comments when David was speaking, often to the point of annoyance and David couldn't finish his sentences. The funniest one was when Space Station came up, and he says "One of the three from the space series". Captain starts throwing out ridiculous titles that obviously have little relation to Space Station. You see the fake smiles on Dave's face covering up the pain from Captain's cluelessness. He seems smart and makes some funny comments too, but for someone who owns pins he doesn't seem like much of a pinhead.

I could see Dave struggling to know how to respond, and I finally shouted out "Space Shuttle!". He was grateful, ha. I think the other one he probably had in mind was "Pin*Bot" but didn't come to me 'til a few minutes later.

They could raise the price or just raise the number of LEs they make, both with the same result. Might even be better, an extra $1,000 per game vs. an extra 50 games at $10,000 a pop.

I guess "less is more" though, less parts and less manhours. I'm not really sure if the whole "limited run" thing does to the pinball community to what it does to other communities though. Well, when LEs were actually something you could buy rather than being sold out before sale. Does anybody really care how "rare" a brand new game is in this community? I'm surprised they don't produce as many as they can. Only thing they have to lose is the resale value, but why would Stern care about that? Seems like they would prefer it actually too.

I felt so sorry for that Space Station - forlorn amongst it siblings it clearly had major issues (not booting and not even GI) and then when Captain asked what was unique about it, they couldn't even remember Condition Green or the unique Timed Bonus Ball.

AND IT STILL SOLD FOR $3600 WTF

Did a pinsider buy Transporter? I think that was a good deal at $4,000. That one was in particularly clean shape and looked very low play.

I was slightly negatively biased about game condition after the first day. That was mostly Data East and Segas and those were mostly below average, but there were also some better-than-average condition machines too, and a few gems, like Transporter.

The shitty online pictures work both ways: hide how bad a game is, but much more rarely also how good a game is. You really need someone on the ground there if you're interested in a machine to tell you the true story.

Transporter was the only machine I bid on and lost it by $500. I am pretty bummed. The machine was spotless. We museum techs have a huge advantage, we know ever single machine like the back of our hands.

The cab was planked pretty badly. Playfield was alright and plastic buildings were in good shape. I was interested in this title, but it passed my limit.

Can't speak to others, but mine has always been to buy cheap pinball games, stay off the radar and under the limelight, and be able to have a fun hobby that isn't overrun with rich people buying up everything. But I know that's not how the world works. *#^&%%@& internet.....