It was just a matter of time.
Regardless of our desire for decals what he was doing is illegal, even in England, europe.

So very, very sad to see Retro Refurbs go.

It's illegal pretty much anywhere in the world apart from China. I'm just amazed he got away with it for this long.

This is really a disservice to the community. Shooting ourselves in the foot once again

Silkscreen decals made from factory films is the way to go. They are out there, you just have to look for them and yea well, pay a bit more. Then do some more work to prep the cabinet the way it should be done. If you can't do it, hire a professional restorer that has done this before.

Maybe if he hadn't rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way and kept things under his hat a bit more he'd probably still be going.

Splashing it all over pinside, bad mouthing a competitor who had actually gone out of his way to get the license and trying to play the victim card when hit with DMCA violations was just a bad idea if you ask me.

But at the end of the day, he's made his money, deleted his Facebook and Pinside accounts and as he wasn't printing the decals on his own machines, he should be able to walk away scot free.

Who was the competitor? I've only been following the drama here the past couple days

and how lucky i am wrote yeaterday i need some of his work and bang nothing now

The guy wasnt even making or printing them. He was paying another guy in another country to make and print these.
All retro had was a website.
I know because i found that guy a couple years ago. When retro popped up i knew this wouldn't last long.

Its not illegal, its just frowned upon.

Thanks a lot Bin Laden...

Don't need to say what I think... a few people have done that already:
________________________________________________________

"There's a lot of ungrateful bastards on here!

Three options...

1. Be grateful that someone is reproducing the decals that YOU need. Buy them with gratitude and be thankful that they have been recreated. That they have taken the time and care to do the best they can to deliver YOU a quality product as close to the original as possible. One pixel out, one shade off or slightly larger.... Whatever. Question......(generalization) if you didn't buy these Radical decals from retro refurbs where would you have bought them from ? Are any available elsewhere ?

2. re create, re draw the decals and get them printed yourself. That way you have no one else to blame or heckle at.

3. SHUT THE FUCK UP AND DON'T BUY THEM IF YOU'RE NOT HAPPY WITH THEM ! do us a favour and leave your pinball in the state its in.

I'd personally prefer that you whingers do the latter. Make life better for the lot of us."
______________________________________________________________________

"Yep, sad indeed. It appears a source of hard to or impossible to get decals may have went the way of the dodo."

"So very, very sad to see Retro Refurbs go."
______________________________________________________________________

"sadly the actions of the few (gready) people have ruined it for the many. haters gona hate!"

"This is really a disservice to the community. Shooting ourselves in the foot once again"

Lame!!! Very glad I got my decals a few months ago at least. Illegal or frowned upon or whatever, it's really the decals that you can't get anywhere else that are so great to at least have available from someone. It's an extremely small market for those, hardly an issue for the license holders. And if someone licensed and sold the products then great.. but it's like PPS -- if you aren't losing sales because you aren't making a product available then give me a break. There are not thousands of people buying these things.

I know where beating a dead horse here.
But, why didnt the guy (retro) just go through the right channels, call Rick, pay the small fee and do this the right way?

Sad to see them gone.

I'm very happy with mine. Only reason i've not posted a review is because I planned to wait for the rebuild to be done so I could back up the review with some actual pictures. I've just fitted the lane return guides today so hopefully the rebuild will start to pick up pace now.

I don't think PPS holds any license for Data East products - maybe Stern?

In any case, the closure of RetroRefurbs is a shit sandwich served steaming hot - for all those that bitched and moaned - dinner is served.

Retro was a weird guy. Emails me asking for NOS time machine scans, then deletes the website and cuts off contact. odd.

Either way you look at it, it's a shame. I purchased his decals and never had an issue with them. Went on well, great colours and finish. We may have to go directly to the Croatian/Slovenian people who print them.

I'm guessing he had more issues than a few complaints on pinside which led to closing the shop. My intent was just to give an opinion about the quality of the product, and to let other ppl in the community know that if they had neon colors on their cab, these decals might not be for them. For what it's worth, I'll attach some pics for demonstration. Peace.

File 15-07-2017, 10.53.56.jpeg

File 15-07-2017, 10.53.15.jpeg

Please state facts and proof of this statement as I have never in my 50 years been charged, arrested been convicted of any crime personally or in business.

Moderators this is outrageous claim about somebody.

http://www.pinballinfo.com/community/threads/retro-refurbs.34964/page-3#post-216393

I'm currently away on a relaxing weekend break, but will post an update next week. There are no legal issues, and I still enjoy giving PPS the finger, but this was my own descision to quit.

Anyone who made an order is safe, everything will be sent.

It'd also raise the price on anything from $180 to $300 if you add rick into the situation.

No, the cheap assholes are guys like me who would prefer to spend $225 for a set of decals instead of $450 for a set of licensed ones....

But why does the prce need to be so high?

Because they have a lock on the market and can get stupid money for them.

Hence why so many people are upset at RR closing up shop. The market couldn't bear $450 prices, so competition showed up. This is why there's no such thing as a "free market," friends.

For those who simply could not buy decals for their game anywhere other than RR this sucks. They dont have the option to buy from the licence holders. I wonder though if RR only offered merchandise that was not available elsewhere if there would have been as much noise. RR also offered decals that are readily available through Planetary which kinda deflates that whole 'supplying the need where license holder won't' arguement. Noone seems to care about people reproducing their own plastic sets when they couldnt find them anywhere else... but of course none of these people would ever make more than one set and sell em to someone else who needed em because they don't own the rights!!!

Retro was doing both available and non available ones but doesn't matter -- rick has shut down many people that popped up trying to sell licensed items that pps did not make available

Even overseas?

I get the whole license thing but the way I look at it is. If I own the game and pay someone else to make new cab decals to restore the game I own this shouldn't be a problem. I have one set of cab decals from them that they made using pictures of my game. I own the game so should be able to have whoever I want to remake the decals. This is truly a sad day for pinball.

Local vinyl sign printers can do the same for you. They just need a decent sample. They can photo, perfect, print.
Wont be any cheaper, tho... but they will do it.

Yeah -- there was someone briefly selling the shadow rings (or was it purba daggers?) that popped up somewhere in Europe -- didn't last long. There was talk of "we are working on those" per usual.. it took a loooong time but I guess to pps credit they did finally start selling them

I don't think Rick gave a crap about anything other than bally Williams and capcom stuff, why he stopped it all who knows

Hate on Rick all you want but when someone is a rights holder they are obligated to protect those rights or they could lose them. I feel bad about RR and all and I hope that wherever these were made starts marketing themselves.

PP is still 1000% better than when the rights were held in Australia.

A lot of modern Stern stuff (and DE) is becoming unavailable since Stern only focuses on new machines.

Has anyone heard from Pete since then?

Done and done!

This is re-goddamn-diculous!!! I used Retro Refurbs on my AFM restoration and the product was awesome. Some of us don't give a shit about licenses and just want to restore our machines the most economic way possible. I don't understand this holier than thou bullshit about licensed decals. WHO CARES? Is some attorney going to come beat my door down and demand that they confiscate my machines because I used printed stickers that were created without the license holders approval on a 25 year old image? umm....no..

Arcademojo said something important up there....if you OWN the machine and want to refurbish it with new stickers I don't see how there is any issue no matter where you get the art...how far does this go?! Lets say you have an old HULK machine and decide to hand-paint the cabinet as part of your restoration are you now committing a crime because you are not paying Marvel licensing fees? give me a break

This is so sad that we had this great resource in RR and now its over.

Removed

Most are with you 100% on this matter... including me...

I'm also way fucking pissed with all those grumpy fuckers (you know who you are) that came here (and to other threads) talking shit about RR.

RR website seems to be back online for now.

In the US at least, this is not accurate. A trademark needs to be protected, like if I started up a kitchen utensil company called "planetary pinball" then PPS would and could send a cease and desist to stop using the trademark. This isn't how licenses work. You can own a license and not do a thing for as long as you want. This doesn't mean people can just start using the stuff you've licensed, but you are not obligated to do jack

100% agree!

100% agree !

Pete.... you here ?

Contact him through the website, I'd think.

The RR website must be back up & running because a friend bought a translite from him yesterday

Yay!

Yep. Just checked out the website and its up and running.

Awesomesauce.

Is this a order while you can before it's too late?