guys ... I'm not really going to get 'into it' on this discussion, but here are a few late night comments:

- We always said we would not be directly building machines but we always said we will do what we can to enable the building of them, the timing last year when we started on this was right.
- Prices on MM's was staying very high and getting higher, so it was even more right to get try to get the pieces together to do this now. We had been trying to get a formula to move on something since acquiring the license, but we had other priorities (parts, etc).
- The license requires that the game look and play like original - no 'remake' will be identical - especially internally, whether it be ROHS, or chips not available, or just plain bad design that you have the opportunity to fix, so I think any remake would not have satisfied the 'exactness' requirement of some - so this decision got a little easier to do it the way we are doing it.
- We really do want to see these games in the hands of everyone that previously could not find one or buy one at a 'reasonable' price. So, for MM the price could have been higher given the astronomical prices that the game gets, but we just felt that this was the right price for the game, as well as obviously there is a bunch of startup and development cost - primarily with the electronics.
- We're just trying to do what we do, to get parts and enable games that leverage the license that we have, which we WMS/BLY created alot (not all) of the greatest games, and just want to continue and get the MM done.
- I'm sure there will be a few twists and turns along the way, so I'm sure some will delight in this, but it's part of getting things done, we're not really worried about that ... and if the project were to fall apart for any reason, we are doing what we can do to keep the customer getting stuck with the tab.
- Making repro 'stuff' is not simple, I think if anyone that has not tried to do so would, you would be amazed by the complexity of trying to get things right, even with prints, samples, etc. Progress would never happen if mistakes were not made ...
- Anyways, it's a really unique time that pinball has seen the resurgence that it has, so it's really nice to see some positive comments ..

I'm sure anything I say will be pulled in all directions. We know most of the details from the 'bad' situations with people holding money, etc. We are pulling in all of the deposits which we have in one bank account. We are also working with a well capitalized company. In addition, we are intent on keeping any of our distributors aligned on the deposits, the retail price (as best we can influence that), etc. That is what was meant.

And why on earth would that be a good thing ... that would insure that nothing happens as committments for parts, etc happens in waves, so we go spend $1M and if the project lags by a week because a supplier provides a part that is made wrong and it delays things, then we just throw the money and just cancel the project ... I don't think there is a sour taste in many's mouths and if there is then they are better off purchasing in the secondary market after it is built and then the sour taste will not be there. If people want to go along with this product we are by no means forcing them to do so.

also, we are trying to underpromise and overdeliver as opposed to the other way around

Technically the world may end, technically anything can happen. I think anyone trying to get something done is not really focused on the negative scenarios, so it's not really constructive.

I'm pretty agressive and impatient about getting things done, I think this is probably the quality that people can appreciate ...

What was said was the deposit is fully refundable up thru WMS approval at which time the parts would be started to be converting into games. Additionally it was stated that if the project were to be cancelled for any reason that people would get their deposits back. I think again, if you are unhappy with any aspect I'd much prefer that instead of trying to engineer how we run this project that you simply ignore it ...