You are assuming the sellers are eager or must sell so they will go down. If you read the whole post... you will see where I said scarcity will outpace the few desperate sellers.... thus keeping demand higher than supply. Even if this game is a complete toad... there will be some willing to have that moment in history.. and pay for it. The supply here is too tight to be a buyers market. The sellers wil just hold out

That's not my point. That's good for Stern, you are right - but im talking specifically about resale value down the line. I'm responding to those that think the SLE will hold its $15K value or even appreciate.

The point is, if someone is willing to pay the asking price then that is the price. Business 101.

Do you really think that someone dropping $15k on the SLE is remotely interested in the resale price down the line. I very much doubt it.

off course they are. this is pinball. 90 percent think they are not gonna lose a dime on this and the value of the game will even go up. if prices of huo pins collapses say good bye to these type of pins. trust me if you paid 15000 and knew the pin would depreciate down to 10000 after a year nobody would buy it.

I don't know a about you (until just now) but I don't think about resale value at all. When I buy one, I don't plan on moving it on. Doesn't always work out but that's the intention at the outset.

All models of the Batman 66 will drop in price shortly after their release. Stern is currently pushing the limits of pricing elasticity within pinball in an attempt to understand how to maximize profit going forward. I give them credit, they have finally grew a brain. We are all just suckers in a one manufacturer hobby. JJP blew it with "Dialed in my Grandmother", this could have been the year they took profit from Stern. Star Wars will have all you pinball pussies buying NIB hand over fist.

This is shocking if true. Even a pin with less than 100 plays is one thing....USED! I'd never expect to get back what I paid selling a used game. And I sure as hell am not gonna pay full price for a used game no matter how rare it's perceived to be.

I know we are talking apples and oranges here somewhat, but what did a NIB Monster Bash or TOTAN cost at the time it was manufactured? My point is, MB is advertised currently on this site for $9,000 and up. I guarantee you that is a USED game, yet the price has to be higher now even accounting for inflation than when it was new. (I could be wrong here - someone please correct me if so) I agree with you in principle thunder, but the fact is, pin values can whackily increase even when used. That being said, I realize you were talking about newer/used games instead of older classics, but who knows, maybe 66 will be the next generation's classic, the one they all want, selling for $25,000 to some techie living in New California (after the big quake breaks off and creates a new coastline! Yes, I own an Earthshaker).

It would suck to pay $15000 on a pin only to realize a month later that it sucked or did not suit your tastes in pinball machines. Imagine if that happened plus it turned out to be the consensus to not be a good playing/shooting game. The owner may end up being stuck with it because they couldn't stomach dumping it for a $6000 to $7000 loss. It is not fun having a boat anchor in your collection taking up the space where a fun game could be.

Actually higher prices started a long by time ago with woz and then other companies just followed

Wow, where'd we find this genius? Stunning insights.

Thanks for ignoring everything about this product, the buyers, and the sellers and making it as generically inapplicable as possible.

Why? The new movie was mediocre and the last THREE SW pinballs suck. Nobody is lining up to buy those games. This is a hobby of fools though, so you're probably right.

This is an amazing conversation about a product virtually no-one has seen or played! The most amazing part is how passionate folks are about other people's money! Seems a tad like misplaced compassion. The other amazing part are the wild guesses on the future of the industry, which should probably have their own dedicated thread. With a 100+ new posts since I last checked, I expected some new information had been released, but instead it's the same flock of folks arguing in thin air. Amazing!

Well I had to simplify it for you so you would understand.

Ya man, I aint buying anything that has not depreciated and only something I can physically inspect.

...time for an intermission...

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its worse outside the US with the exchange rate not so good. I was going for an SLE but the exchange rate moved in a way that just made it insane and a absolute loss in the future, not that concerns me (being a car nut!), but the value of it just wasn't there, thankfully my dealer made me see the sense it it too I'm looking forward to the LE though - and I think this game is going to rock.

Neil.

Has Stern said how many of the 80 SLEs are going overseas?

I'm pretty sure that people who can afford paying 15K on a more or less "unkown" pin (the only thing that matters - gameplay - is unknown) would have no problem to stomach a 6 or 7K loss.
Can't imagine anyone would spend savings money on pinball machines, toys are usually paid from excess petty cash.

It is "just" a used pin as long as it's in production, as soon as it is not available any more it becomes collectable and depending on demand it may start rising in price. Pinball machines are not products that become technically obsolete (like e.g. PCs or cellphones that will just not work any more with time moving on) and newer machines are not "better" than older ones. AFM still beats many later pins. LotR is still better than WWF by a mile even though it's 10 years older. The factor that sells and defines the demand for pins is "fun", not LEDs, LCD displays or PCB size.
Even during production it can happen that pins increase in value. Look at MET - when it was released it was (at least in Europe) approx. 2KEUR cheaper than it is today. If I'm looking for a MET I can decide to buy a new one for 6KEUR or a used one for 4,5KEUR that cost just below 4KEUR when it was bought a few years ago.

People keep asking why non-NIB-buyers even care for Sterns price increases: Because those price increases directly influence the secondary market prices and the overall price level in the market!

Regarding BM66 SLE, even though I agree with most thoughts abut the price being crazy and I would never support this pricing model, I do understand that this market is a collectors market. Decisions are not rational and based on technical specs or regular consumer market mechanics, they are based mainly on emotions and perception of collector value. Due to this I do expect the SLE to hold it's value quite well.
Also, if Stern keeps up it's pace with price increases, 15K for any pinball machine will feel like a bargain 10 years from now...

I get your point, but then the maket and not you will decide which machines you will buy in future - not a desirable situation either.
If you insist on only buying below new price you'll be stuck with pins like WWE, Mustang or KISS, which is not necessarily a bad thing if you love those. Personally I don't care if a pin costs less or more than NIB, I only care about fun.

If you would take value, which you are obviously focusing on, into account the ones that trade over historic NIB prices are the ones that will most likely hold their value or rise over time. The ones that trade below NIB prices are far more likely to go on depreciating since the demand just doesn't seem to be there. Decide for yourself which is the smarter move. Or just do what I do and buy what you enjoy...

Bottom line is that you will not change the market and how it works, no matter how mindless or illogical this market may seem to you.

SLE will probably settle a small bit above the LE I'm thinking $9-10k

Lots of folks don't care about the limitless and won't see any value above a LE or a pimped out premium.

Lots of folks would rather have let's say a BM pre and a Star Wars pre than a single BM SLE pin, I don't think demand will be anywhere near $15k

Sure there are lots of deep pockets but probably they will drop in for the Star Wars SLE while the typical buyer will be satisfied with LE or premium.

A lot of the SLE is hype / fluff, wait a year and this thread will be on page two with XM or ST thread most days mark it down.

As this has come back to my wheelhouse of bitching about the SLE price, heck there are probably 80 or maybe a few more who will pay that much. But Stern really screwed the SLE buyers by going up to close to the limit of number of people who care a bit about the SLE. There's no indication that many more people want $15K Stern pin, I'm sure if there was a huge demand we'd have seen 166 SLE pins.

80 is not some hallowed number it's a number Stern could sell. Then they made up some BS marketing spin that it was 30 + 50. Why not 30 years of Stern plus 50 years of BM plus 86 the year Stern began 1986 (?) 30 + 50 + 86 that's just as good a reason as they're giving for 80 units. It's just they probably didn't find another 86 people *smart enough* to cough up for the foil edition.

So in order for someone to think they'll be worth more seems to assume there were a lot more big pocket buyers who are crying they missed out. But guess what if they did, then they got a LE they're not going to want to sell that plus add $5000 to get a SLE which is essentially the same exact pin with different cabinet art foil.

Plus as I've said if there is another SLE like Star Wars (etc..) people would far rather get that hype pin than last years old news.

I just saw the best looking LOTR and beat looking Tron pro both for sale in the $7-8k price range. I mean top of the top for these games. Either one is as good as BM 66. But I could buy both of those for $15-16k. There is nothing special about BM66 except it's the flavor of the month, it's this months GB LE it's this months TH SE.

If it does turn out to be a milestone pin like LOTR than Stern will be able to sell a lot of premium pins.

We don't even know if the early pins will be issue prone like ACDC cloudy window issue so likely waiting will be no worse than getting the absolute first pin off the assembly line.

For the prices Stern is charging for Batman, the machine better not have any issues.

Are the premiums going to be built in January? I assume they will ship near the end of January? Looking forward to playing it somewhere...

I wouldn't like a pin with major art being covered by ramp flap. Maybe Stern fixes this (?) but it's totally bush league in the first place like misspelled words on GB. Did any misspelled GB games go out? I think it's far worse than misspelled word (It's like the scene from Platoon where King spells dear as dere and he said it don't matter his girl don't read too good neither).

But art covered by a ramp flap should never have seen the light of day. I'd lmao if the early pins were delivered with screwed up art and later pins were corrected.

Stern should be embarrassed at Catwoman head covered by ramp flap and they should have the new fixed pictures up on Facebook like yesterday. Also it's likely a small matter of a computer fix to drag the Catwomam image down an inch or so.

It really bothers me with Stern's track record of not fixing issues like XMLE Wolverine position, they just take the easiest way out, arm in the way just shave off the bottom, claws in the way of the ramp just reposition the toy so it's blocking a major shot. No big deal. Stern's motto should be we cut corners so you can get the games quicker (you're welcome).

I really wanted to get in on that 30 years Stern book but the whole kickstarter idea kinda left a sour taste in my mouth. Not to mention all the other crap Stern has been pulling the last year. The least they can do is show some damn gameplay at this point.

The Catwoman art under the flap is unfortunate, but I don't think it's THAT big of an issue. The real issue is that they photoshop collaged the playfield. Yes, it's using some very nice hand-drawn art, but that art wasn't drawn with a playfield as its canvas. It was art laid upon a playfield in same sort of collage effect as we've seen from Stern outside of Ghostbusters and Metallica. The major bummer is that such a fantastic artist was not used to their full potential. The art doesn't have the same sort of cohesive flow to it across the playfield as you see on GB or Metallica. I'm sure that Aerosmith's playfield art will make that even more obvious.

Fantastic art, just not used to its full potential, for sure. And maybe it's just the pictures, but it all looks oversaturated. Batman '66 is colorful, but it seems like it's overly bright. I would need to see that in person, however. Some games look way different in person than they do in pictures.

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Nah, it looks that way in person too.

I really hope for the $15K SLE owners they get that book thrown in as a thank you to those people.. maybe even a blumpkin from Gary Stern himself

HA HA wake up, its Stern!

A gift from Stern?!

Aaaaand .... with no new info or play video, we are back to drivel posts on price, resale value and art.

I made a custom card to replace the stern instuction card. Signed by Gomez, Franchi, Lyman, and Kamikow at expo. Now I just need a machine to put it in.

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People don't pay more for prototype games because they are more fun.. they don't pay top dollar for games that never made production because they are more fun then games that went to production.

Your simplification skips over people pay for unique or special points in pinball. The only question is if this game will hold any uniqueness or perceived desire.. or if Stern dillutes it so bad the special-ness wears off.

Yep, the conversation always drifts back to that, which I'm exhausted of reading, as it's been beaten to death already, over and over. Still, it's Sterns fault for not changing the narrative with some positive update, game play video, etc. Expo was two months ago, Stern can almost develop an entirely new game that fast.

It is exciting when I see this thread has bunch of new posts... until I read them. Maybe the title should be changed to "Batman 66 by Stern NO new info."

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Which must be why sample Dirty Harrys with a drop target cost more than production models, eh?

We need someone to do another video tour of the Stern factory to get an idea on progress. Does the Stern factory shut down around the Holidays?

Talked to a Distro today about another issue and asked about the Batman66. I was told they are making Overseas versions over the next couple of weeks, with no expectation for the US versions to ship until well after the 1st of the year. Don't know for a fact.....just what they told me.

I also heard from my distro here in Florida not to expect receiving the game this year (LE version).

Left Mike ( Automated) a message tonight. I'm not bailing, but hoping he's been given some better info this time. Think Stern should give their customers something a bit more solid, so we have something to go on. Light the thing up and flip a bit...doesn't have to be perfect....or show us completed games ready for shipment....it would be appreciated....

This is actually my first NIB from Stern....actually flipped WOZ before bought NIB ( saw the potential), and flipped Alien at Expo ( again, potential is definitely there)...anyway....

It shouldnt take them that long to make 320 machines. I thought they could make a 1 or 2 hundred per week?

The overseas thing would add up, I was asked for remainder of balance yesterday, didn't see the email until this morning but unless I see some gameplay video or new images (with the catwoman art issue fixed) I'm out Stern can think again if they think they are getting 10k without showing me a thing and as for Jody he can blow me, how hard is it to answer a simple question on Facebook about the catwoman art!

Please inform us of gameplay. And if Julie Newmar has been properly represented.

That would be full-blast, which never happens....more like half of that. Also, they have a bunch of other pins they are producing, and I am sure a lot of those are rush jobs for Xmas. Batman66 is likely left to a few of the more seasoned assemblers (if they are smart), so my guess is that they are probably doing 20 a week or so, if that

I guess that gives lyman more time to work on the code.

So besides the mini bat signal and the hot wheels vehicles has anyone come up with some cool mod ideas?

Just four BM66s a day? With a new factory they have been in for what 18 months? I don't mind waiting but the way Stern operates and manages its business, from the outside looking in, is sad. Who the hell is running the operation? Stern has people wanting to spend outrageous money but cant produce, over and over again, to meet reasonable demand. Sounds as history is repeating itself as how Bally got in the game, back in the day, if I recall correctly.

If Stern or JJP or CGC PPS could produce machines in a timely manner, made in America, Life would be better for all of us.