If I'm not mistaken, the exchange rate when pre-orders were first being taken back in January of 2014 was 0.735, so $8500 = 6163 euros.

Today the exchange rate is 0.918, so $10,000 = 9180 euros.

That seems like a huge price increase to me.

Looks to be plenty of room to move games at a lower price in the US while maintaining the same profit margins they are getting for games sold in Europe.

Please correct me if I'm way off base here.

True, but wasn't that also the case when they set the original price that equaled 6163 euros.

Even if the original price didn't take shipping from Europe to the US into consideration, I think by expo 2014 they had announced the machines would be shipping from the US. The price was still the same and the exchange rate was around 0.8, so $8500 = 6800 euros at that time.

It's hard to see many sales in the US at that price as I would guess the hardcore TBL fans are already in on the pre-order. Are there a lot of TBL fans in Europe?

If they knock it out of the park they may generate some sales, though it will likely depend on what other games are available when it hits the streets.

Maybe $9995 is just the MSRP?

What!! Where are the photos of the assembly line filled with busy workers and partially assembled games? How dare they start without properly informing us!