Just got a replacement Dialed In LE after having one of the first ones off the line many months ago (which should be an example shown to all QC trainees on how not to do QC). This new one , despite being a low number, is one of the most recent LEs made.

Interesting to see the differences between the first ones and these.....

1 - SIM hole now has cliffy-style protector. Doesn't appear to shrink the hole in any way but have not played it yet to see for sure.
2 - Phone scoop hole now has mylar around it (Heard some had cliffy-protector....maybe they removed because it made the shot impossible?).
3 - Outhole now has mylar in front of it.
4 - QED guy now has blue target instead of a blue sticker on a red target.
5 - Post rubber on right of phone scoop is now full-length "bouncy" rubber like on left side (used to be a typical post rubber).
6 - Felt pads now included on legs.
7 - Left apron instruction card is already installed (had to install yourself, if you wanted, on older models)
8 - Different type of rubber used on most posts (older models used much thicker flakey rubber)
9 - Balls included now ship with dessicant packet, and as a result no longer arrive rusty and gross. The balls are your typical not-really-shiny carbon core balls.

Unfortunate similarities....

1 - Game still comes dusty and dirty and should be vacuumed before play (the actual playfield)
2 - Rubber issues. Someone actually installed HALF a post rubber on the right outlane post that has the double rubbers. How that got through QC...
3 - Mylar still being installed over the magnet core on theatre and drone area.

I don't know who mfgs CGC's playfields, but CGC's and JJP's are remarkably similar. They both chip very easily. This isn't a design issue....the exact same areas on MM that took thousands of plays to wear away have chipped on MMR at 50 plays in.

I've own several new Sterns and have never experienced any chipping. I will say their clear coats are noticeably thinner than CGC and JJPs, but chipping has never been an issue for me on Stern playfields.

I have restored two machines - a Dr. Dude and a TAF with PPG clear coat. They both have a nice thick layer, a bit thicker than what you might find on JJP/CGC, but nothing crazy. No chipping after hundreds of plays. Both games have several areas that would chip quite easily if they had the ceramic/whatever clear that JJP and CGC use.

So from my experience, this issue rests entirely with the clear coat being used, and despite environmental regulations, it is still possible to secure a clear coat product that does not chip so easily. Just because a playfield manufacturer chooses to go with a certain clear coat, does not mean it's the best one they could be using. None of the major pinball or playfield manufacturers are ISO-certified, so you will get inconsistent quality from game to game. Just the way it is.

I don't meant to claim that Stern never has had chipping. They've had big issues lately from what I read on here with playfields on many games. But at some point in the last 4 years they did know how to produce playfields that had proper paint. I also own Metallica but mine was made in 2014 and it's a quality playfield...3000+ plays and no chips or wear. It sucks that the same game can have such wild variations in quality.

I decided to play some games on my new DI with the factory 'cliffy' in the SIM hole. I played about 300 games on my original DI with no protector at all so I feel I have a good reference point.

I found that the shot from the upper right flipper is exactly the same. Their cliffy does not prevent any shots from going in that would have otherwise gone in with no protector at all.

The main difference seems to be slow roll-ins. While fast roll-ins (eg. off Bing Bang and left ticket standups) went in just as often as no protector, slower roll-ins tended to deviate at the lip of the way-too-thick factory protector. If I had to estimate, you'll lose 1 out of 5 SIM card shots with the factory protector vs. no protector.

I got nervous from people on here saying the shot was impossible to make with the factory protector on, and this is not true at all. But there is a small advantage in having no protector or presumably the thinner Cliffy protector.

On the other hand, the phone scoop seems to hold up pretty well with just the mylar around it. Makes sense based on how the damage to this hole actually occurs (using my older DI with 300+ long-length plays as a reference). I do not believe a metal protector is needed here.

Do you have photos of the mylar damaged at the phone scoop?

What TheLaw said. Can't go wrong with 60,000 point jackpots. I put up 944k on Chaos last night....loads of fun.

Not done. There are lots more things they want to do in terms of effects and tweaks.

I don't know anyone with a Pixel 1 that has gotten the app to work with it, myself included.

Anyone interested in a Mantis protector for the phone scoop that covers only the right side of the hole, leaving the remainder of the hole nice and open? In testing, it seems only the right side of the phone scoop hole gets damaged due to the way the shot is angled, so a full-coverage protector is not necessary. Was going to work on a prototype with Kerry @ Mantis if there was an interest.

The protector we'd design covers the exact area of the phone hole that gets damaged, which is the top surface of the right side of the hole. This would not be a typical in-hole Mantis protector.

PSA: Make sure you install mylar or a cliffy at the inlane drops. Because the wireforms drop the ball right on the switch, the wood on each side of the switch gets destroyed quite quickly. It will chip, and then make a black mark that will eventually get ingrained into the wood.

For the cleanest look, get a square piece of thicker mylar and put it right on the center of the inlane switch. Then cut out the open switch area. You won't even know it's there.

Has anyone done the BOB Sign + Spider Mod Combo?

Basically, remove the right part of the BOB sign, angle the main BOB sign to actually face the player. Then remove the spider from it's location blocking the left ramp sign and place it right above the spider stand up target. Last, fill in the hole in the ramp sign with the black plug you removed from the BOB sign.

Was going to do this last night but surprised I hadn't read about anyone else doing it yet. Is the spider problematic in that spot? Curious as to why it wasn't put there to begin with since it has nothing to do with the ramp.

I ended up removing the JJP protector for the SIM card hole and put some heavy duty mylar down. That JJP protector is so ridiculously thick it changes the game anywhere it's located. Because of it's thickness it also gets beat pretty bad and shows it....

Unlike 99% of the games out there, Dialed In requires cliffy-style protectors even for mild home use. So virtually every game in the wild will have one. Might as well play it w/o and down the road if you ever want to sell, throw a new one on there. Think about it...if the point of a cliffy is to protect the area so it remains nice looking....but you never ever actually see the area under it....what's the point really?

Anyway, with JP protector on, best I could do was 3 DIALED IN letters. One game after removing the protector, got all but one of the letters...closest I've gotten!

Guys don't do it. Don't turn SIM memory on. It will hurt the long term playability of your game. I too thought getting all the letters was impossible. Over time it gets easier as you learn the bounces and angles, etc. So glad I didn't turn the memory on.

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Working on it with Kerry right now. The SIM hole is much easier to protect because the edges that get nailed and chip have no bevel. The phone hole we are working on a typical Mantis in-hole protector that rises higher than normal - between the top of the hole and where the bevel ends on the right side. We have to see how high the protector needs to rise to protect that right side that gets damaged but also not affect the hole size. This one will take a bit more time. But they are coming.

I thought it was pretty clever that you JJP guys allow restarts on Ball 1 if the start button is held in rather than pushed (which would add a player). Good stuff. Now if you can just speed up the hold-flippers-to-skip-bonus.

Yup....Earthshaker, Tidal Wave, and Sinkholes seem to be the last tier of modes. Ironically, they are easier to complete than most others.

Regarding the city damage, I've been playing this game for 4+ months and have no idea if the city is supposed to get destroyed or supposed to be "saved" - am I the only one?

I experience this with the factory rubber. But it should be noted JJP changed their rubber material a few months after production began. The original rubber had virtually no bounce to it and the ball would just die after hitting the diverter and roll down off the mini playfield. The new rubber has much more bounce.

Anyone curious to the exact cause I've illustrated the issue. The top (ball stopping) part of the wireform on the "bad" ones is parallel or worse slightly further toward the player than the bottom (ball dropping) part. This causes the ball to ramp upwards and go flying. I've illustrated (poorly) the part that is angled in on the newer correct wireforms, which causes the ball to immediately collapse down through the hole. You'll see on his original direct overhead shot a few posts up how the top is clearly further towards the player than the bottom. This is the manufacturing error.

Fixing this is not a matter of just bending that thin piece I'm pointing the arrow at so the top is before the bottom, since these pieces are connected at other thicker points along the way. But if you have access to tools that allow you to make this happen, you'll have fixed the issue.

On proper wireforms, the ball should NOT bounce back at all when it hits the end of the wireform, it should immediately drop down.

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Well then I'll post the guide right now........

1) Lift your playfield all the way up.
2) Unscrew the 3 screws holding the theatre magnet assembly in place. Wiggle it a bit as you remove it, since it will be detaching from the mylar above the playfield.
3) Get an exacto knife and using the tip, from under the playfield carefully cut the hole out where the magnet was, being careful to get it all so when you put the magnet back, there isn't any resting on the magnet. It is easier to do this using the tip of the blade rather than sticking the whole blade through.
4) Place the magnet assembly back in place, and attach the 3 screws.
5) Stick your finger into the theatre area and press down the remaining mylar so it does not curl up or flake.

The entire process should take 5 minutes.

If you have the JJP protector installed, the shot is much harder to hit and very hard to get roll-ins. With the Cliffy-brand installed, shots from the flipper are no different than no protector, and roll-ins are about 80% of what you'd get w/o it. No protector of course is how Pat designed the game so I play with no protector.

I can make the SIM shot from the upper right flipper about 50% of the time. It's really just the timing of where the ball is on the flipper. About 2/3 down is where the sweet spot is. I've made the shot several times in a row by accident trying to hit the Big Bang instead. I wish it was like TAF where simply holding the upper flipper would result in a hit to Big Bang/Cousin It. But I digress.

The playfield scratch situation is the result of two things:

1) The carbon balls JJP includes with the game are naturally soft. All carbon balls are soft and nick/pit easily. So this will be an issue with ANY game where carbon balls are used. Carbon balls are soft, but way harder than the clear. So when they pit and scratch they then do the same to the playfield. I recommend doing anything possible to be able to use Chrome balls in your games. This mostly includes sticking a Pinbits protector in the trough to prevent stuck balls from magnetism. Chrome balls are much harder than carbon balls and take much longer to become damaging to the playfield.

2) Mirco playfields have a poor paint process. Not only do they chip easier but they wear faster than any other pf I've worked with including CGCs new stuff (not great but better than Mirco), classic Diamond Plate and PPG clear I've used in restores.

While you can't do much about #2 on JJP games, you can help the situation by using super shiny chrome balls like the Ball Baron Ninja or Titan's premium chrome balls.

Just got in Mantis's prototype phone scoop protector. You're going to love it when it's done. Very high quality and no covering of the playfield art, but fully protects the hole. Hopefully 1-2 weeks out.

Mantis protector for the phone scoop is ready. Pics tonight, hopefully on sale next week.

Here is the Mantis phone scoop protector. Designed to protect the sides that get hammered in normal gameplay. This is Mantis's first winged protector design.

Front viewBack view

I haven't installed it yet (doing tonight) but it screws in (two screws, but one should do - it fits tight) under the front of the scoop - you'd make the hole yourself. Shouldn't cause any cosmetic concerns - the view is blocked by the scoop so nobody would ever see the hole, even if you removed the protector.

I was wondering when Cliffy's marketing guy was going to show up. LMAO.

FYI Mantis solutions are for people who don't want a metal square around the top of the hole (i.e. factory look) and want a solution that never degrades over time. Cliffy's are for people who want an easy install and don't mind replacing the unit after a thousand or so plays. Each serves their purpose. No need to start drama over it man. We all know you love Cliffy's. It's cool.

Alright guys, here are the pics of the new Mantis phone scoop protector installed. I had to do a bit of testing, so apologies for the delay in getting these up. The top of the wings rest flush with the playfield so they will not affect roll-ins.

<rant> Before I installed this I began the first test as my game already was, with no protector. The sound suddenly went out. Became intermittent on/off before dying completely for apparent no reason. Opened the PC, plugged/unplugged audio wires, checked all the connections, nothing I could do. So now I have to deal with that. I'll tell you, from a quality standpoint, this game is crap. I've owned two of these now and I've had more issues with them in 10 months than I've had with the 9 other games I've owned/own combined over 20 years. </rant>

Anyway....

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We (Kerry@Mantis and I) wanted to see how it did rejection-wise against other protectors:

I'm a pretty good player and I can generally make the shot dead on 90% of the time.

I took 50 shots at the scoop, all set up the same way with no protector, the factory "thick" cliffy that came with it, and the Mantis protector.

No Scoop - 42 out of 50
Mantis - 36 out of 50
Factory Cliffy - 24 out of 50

I did request actual Cliffys a long time ago but he never responded so couldn't test them here. When taking the shots, I could pretty much tell when the protectors were blocking it out or if I just missed a hair. Obviously if you hit it dead center, you are going to make it no matter what, but when you're off just a millimeter or so is when the protector comes into play. I felt like the Mantis rarely rejected the ball and when it did it was a shot that might not have been made w/o a protector either. The Factory Cliffy seemed to change the trajectory a tad and the ball had to be more spot on to fall in most of the time. Roll-ins were very rare during normal play with that protector on. The Mantis and no-protector performed the same on roll-ins. Not a scientific test but as a player I don't feel the Mantis noticeably affected typical play.

Sorry, this was not meant as a Cliffy vs. Mantis post. It was a Mantis post + here's how easy the shot is to make with various states of protection I have access to. If Cliffy responded to me when I emailed him to buy his, I'd have included it. Whether or not his protectors are great, he doesn't make it easy to buy them.

But I'm not doing the Android vs. iPhone thing here. The two styles of protectors are much different and they serve totally different preferences. Buy whichever one you prefer. I'm very happy with the way the Mantis version turned out and if I wasn't I would have told Kerry as much.

About the the whole referring to protectors that resemble Cliffys as Cliffys - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalator#Loss_of_trademark_rights

Kleenex is going through the same thing now....so they do this:

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Kind of funny but I guess it's what you have to do these days.

The Mantis phone scoop protector is now shipping.....

$20 - https://mantispinball.com/product/dialed-in-phone-scoop-protector/

Holy sh*t. First batch is sold out. Underestimated demand, apparently. He's still taking orders but expect about a week or so before shipment. Also, for anyone asking (myself included) - SIM card hole protector is in development. Shouldn't be more than a month out.

A lot of scoop/hole damage starts from the inside of the hole and works its way to the top. The Dialed In phone scoop fits this criteria. The damage to the hole is caused by the ball striking the inside right portion of the hole. Both the Cliffy's and the Mantis protectors will protect the hole; it's a matter of preference. Cliffy's are easier to install but thinner and will look damaged/worn over time, Mantis protectors are more robust and attach to the underside of the playfield, but as a result take more time to install.

Me personally, and this is just my opinion, Cliffy's are ideal and the only real choice if the hole already shows wear/damage. For example, the ST:TNG neutral zone - a Cliffy is really the best choice there. But for a new game, Cliffy's to me don't make sense. You're covering over an area you want to protect but with the Cliffy there you will never ever see that area you protecting, so what's the point then? Just my opinion but I'd never keep a Cliffy anywhere on a new game if there is alternate protection available that does the same job without covering the playfield - and that could be something as simple as mylar. Hope that explains it a little.

Yes, good call. For DI, the Cliffy's are free so that's an incentive to go that route. But it really took an hour to install? I thought the Mantis would be more difficult because you have to remove the phone scoop under the playfield, but it only took 10 mins. What do you have to remove to install the phone Cliffy?

Anyone have a foolproof way to get service from JJP? My sound started randomly cutting out a few weeks back. I contacted support and Frank responded within 24 hours to check the front headphone jack connection. Long story short, narrowed it down to the little board that drives the front headphone connector...

There's a cable that connects to it (similar to front audio panel connector on a PC). Disconnecting this fixed the issue which means it had an intermittent connection. Well...I unplug the cable and take a look at the connector....all the pins are oxidized/rusted out! The two screws that hold it to the cabinet are all rusty. WTF? How this got through QC is anyone's guess. But I responded to Frank letting him know what I found and asked for a replacement since this was a very obvious oversight and should not have been put in the machine. A week later and two follow-ups, crickets.

It's tough for me to call them during business hours as I'm on the road often and don't have my info on hand. Was hoping a ticket would be good enough. Their ticket system is a whole different matter...terrible interface, only respond button also closes the ticket. So I've been responding to his email which also goes to the ticket. They are getting the responses because they show in the ticket....

This has been my experience all of the 4 times I've contacted JJP support. Immediate response to check the obvious stuff and then if that doesn't work and it might lead to a [gasp!] warranty replacement, they vanish. If something might cost them money, they hide apparently. Well it certainly will cost them money. How much will POTC sell for? $9k?

Thanks guys, I'll try to find some time to call.

Did you get one already? Cool. Please def report this to Kerry at Mantis. Should be exactly flush. If you find the back end raises up and isn't flush with the surface, simply bend the mounting tab further down just a tad using plyers and reinstall. This will force the back end down when mounted.

Had to share this....my 3 year old loves playing pinball but can't yet move past just spamming the flippers non-stop. I let him play my DILE all the time. He has his own little $19 Star Wars pinball (you know, the same design licensed to about 500 themes over the years). Today he's playing and tells me:

"My pinball doesn't have fans. And it doesn't have a man that moves back and forth. It has no lights." I couldn't stop laughing hearing him refer to the drones as "fans". LOL (BTW ever run the drones with the glass off? They produce an enormous amount of wind for their size!)

You can buy the carbon steel balls from Ball Baron. They are about as shiny as you can get for a carbon core ball. But they aren't nearly as shiny or as durable as the Ninja. What I do is just use the Ninja balls on Dialed In and when they become slightly magnetized (enough to notice but not really affecting much) - usually after 100 games, I toss them in a game with no magnets. Impacts destroy magnetism so after 25 games or so in the non-magnet machine the balls no longer have any magnetism.

My man, do you think it's fair to claim people are making up stories that Dialed In is rough on carbon balls (as are many machines), but at the same time promote conjecture that magnetized balls make the metal parts of the game magnetic - which to my knowledge has never been documented?

Dialed In is rough on balls. It has a lot more metal areas to hit (eg. upper right flipper to QED guy is a solid thud into a narrow metal bracket) and very active pops so it's reasonable as to why this happens.

It's only the part of the mylar that is directly on the magnet core that you should remove....not the whole mylar in the magnet area.

Or you could just unscrew the shooter rod assembly, move it where you want, and screw it back. 2 minute job. Should never ever need to bend the playfield hangers.

Both Mirco (who makes the DI playfields) and CGC (MMR, AFMR) are using a totally different clear coat mixture/process than Stern and older WMS games use. The result is a playfield that is shinier and has a thicker clear coat, but one that chips and scratches very easily. Mirco in particular uses a ceramic clear coat that they claim is the hardest around, but seems irrelevant because it shows scratches and chips far more visibly than other playfields. Mirco has come on here and attempted to defend this with "some people don't know what they're talking about" but you don't need to be an expert in playfield painting to know crap clear coating when you see it. Though to that respect, I've worked with Sterns, CGC, and JJP games. I've restored countless WMS games. None of my restores or WMS games have chips or scratches....in fact my TAF with 600 plays after a proper clear coating with PPG shows no signs that it's even been played. My MMR has 460 plays and the outhole is chipping. Inexcusable. I've never seen a Stern with chipping (though like older WMS games, some can have insert lifting) or scratching like that. It's all about proper surface prep and using the right clear coat. These guys haven't figured out yet, but I hope they do for the overall benefit of everyone buying these games, myself included.

In short, it's not you. It's the manufacturers not giving a care about the durability of their playfields.

The chipping isn't simply due to the sharp edges at the SIM hole lane. The whole clear coat is very fragile and chips easily. You should never have to cliffy an outhole that's 2/3 the way up the playfield when used in a home environment. But that's how it is with DI. If you don't protect the phone hole, it will look like sh*t after less than 500 plays.

DI recovered from a boot issue today. I was impressed. I let my 3-year old son play DI yesterday and I assume when he turned it off he probably flipped the switch a few times. Since DI uses writable storage I figured some files must have been corrupted when I turned it on and got some Ubuntu boot menu.

Let it sit. Nothing happened. Rebooted. Same thing. Rebooted again, waited, it went through some process and then finally booted up. Subsequent reboots worked as normal. Not sure what happened but glad DI has a mechanism to recover from this.

Unrelated....is it me or do DI's flippers seem softer than other machines? All of my Stern's have lightening fast, super responsive flippers. My WMS games a close 2nd. My MMR a close 3rd. But DI seems to suffer from random fading even during single ball play, and much more prominently as the ball gets to the end of the flipper, making orbit shots hard to hit since the power seems to vary each shot. The flipper strength is set plenty powerful enough as the ball goes up the left and right ramps without issue. But the orbits, especially the left one shot from right flipper seems to vary in power every shot. Am I losing my mind or does anyone else experience this?

HA! Yeah, not even close. Can only guess people saying that have never played a Stern. If I play DI and then play Metallica it feels like the flippers in MET are powered by rockets.

Thanks for confirming what I suspected. There must be an issue with the voltage regulator that controls the coil power. I say this because sometimes the kickback punches the sh*t out of the ball and sometimes it barely makes it half way up the playfield. Same with the phone scoop. I set it lower so it would stop hitting the ramp rail, and 90% of the time it kicks out perfectly. The other 10% is barely makes it out of the hole. I imagine the flipper(s) suffer from the same randomness.

WOW....something must be wrong with your game. My left flipper is on default and even dribblers make it up the right ramp. Right flipper is one notch up from default....all shots are fine but left orbit shot fades hard. Turning the flipper strength up won't help because it will make every other shot too powerful. This is my 2nd DI and they both felt the same way.

Will have a minty one for sale within a couple weeks.

A couple of adjustments that will drastically improve the enjoyment of the game:

1) Change SIM card setting to carry over ball-to-ball
2) Change Add-a-ball to start with "Add" already completed (only two shots needed).
3) Allow 2 kickbacks to be stacked.

The game by design is very difficult, even for good players. It can be frustrating and I've found especially new players are turned off by the harshness of it even though it looks like an inviting game (same thing happens with my Dr. Dude....artwork makes it look so inviting and then players discover it's a tougher game than it looks). I run a league of all newbies (the goal being to introduce non-players to the world of pinball) and the first 5 weeks of the league, DILE was set at factory settings. People hated being assigned Dialed In in league play. After I made the above changes and didn't tell anyone, sentiment completely changed about the game.

You're welcome to disagree. Everyone has their thing. I'd like to think I'm a pretty good player. After 200 plays, my entire high score table consists of scores over 6 million on factory settings. But even high score games I found to be more frustrating than enjoyable. I don't trust that DI's factory settings were well thought out and tested to be an optimal balance of fun/challenging. The scoring is unbalanced and the most important shot in the game is an extremely difficult side flipper shot that relies often on luck. That's not a challenge to me, that's frustrating. The right scoop shot on Metallica is what one would call a challenging shot...but you can make it every time if you have the timing right. Good luck with that on the SIM shot.

If you already have the kickback lit, and you spell BOB again (which normally lights the kickback), under factory settings, the kickback is unaffected. With stacking turned on, it would add another kickback so that when you use the one you have, it will then re-lite it because you had another one stacked. You can set how many it will stack. 2 is reasonable. You could change the inlane post too but that will prevent too many drains vs. allowing stacking.

On average it takes more than 3.....due to a really awful design decision, the phone cannot detect a shot to it of a ball is already in there from the SIM or BOB hole. So it's common to hit the phone 4-6 times during multiball before you're actually credited for 3 shots. This is the main reason I changed it to 2 shots required instead of 3 on mine....because in all likelihood you made 3 shots anyway.

Phew! That was a lot of work. 45 mins. 26x SIM multiplier by end of game (which I'm not sure how as I only collected 12 or 13 SIM cards).

On another note, game is still mint and will be up for sale soon (just looking to try something different).

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Yes, except SIM cards carry over ball to ball. Though in this game it wouldn't have mattered - I had D-I-A-L-E-D spelled on ball 1. I just changed that setting last week too, and of course as soon as I change it I'm able to do it w/o needing it carrying over. Previous high was 6.4 million on all default settings.

Was such an efficient game in turns of completing modes and BOB multiballs that after getting Showdown, I had 4 modes left to go for Armageddon. Usually it's the other way around!

JJP originally had the side flipper power set at like 20 or something. After they realized it was destroying the SIM card hole with hard hit balls, they began lowering it by default to 16 or so. It makes the side ramp but it doesn't blast up it like it does on TAF. Often it barely makes it. If you have the SIM cliffy, crank it up. You're not cheating, it's the way they originally wanted it anyway.

BOB multiballs will award a SIM light if you accomplish the "goal" - I had completed 6 of 7 modes and 2 of 3 BOB multiballs when I spelled D-I-A-L-E-D-I-N.

Yes - Scuba guy only requires the side ramp. Similar to Worm Hole in ST:TNG, the other shots increase the value.

Acid Rain only requires left ramp shots. Pop bumpers increase the value to a certain point.

They need to if they want to keep selling machines. $9K and the game has lots of design flaws and defects - if they don't stand behind the game who is going to buy the next one?

So the trap door on Fun House was breaking after a few hundred plays? Those things took thousands of plays to break, if they did at all. All steel is not the same, my friend.

I don't think the rules of Emoji Mania make sense to anyone. Owned the game for a year. Still have no idea what the goal is to accumulate the most points in that mode.

The code in this game is not deep. It's typical Pat Lawlor, which unfortunately is the same exact formula he's used for 25 years: Do thing, start mode, complete mode, with multiball sideshow. TAF and DI are practically the same rules.

TAF = Hit bear kick ramp to light mode
DI = Hit QED guy to light mode

TAF = Hit chair to start mode
DI = Hit phone to start mode

TAF = Complete all modes to start Tour the Mansion
DI = Complete all modes to start LITZ....er, Armageddon

DI adds in the SIM cards to extend the difficulty and longitivity of the game. But difficulty and deep code are not the same thing. Deep code? TSPP, Walking Dead, Iron Maiden, even Metallica is much deeper.

Full disclosure: I own DILE. But I recommend buying used if you do, because the game has not held its value over the year or so it's been in production.

Let me elaborate on MET for a moment, then you may understand my definition better.....

DI - Activate modes, complete them, get SIM cards - which is really the ONLY way to get very high scores, via the multiplier. There's a multiball but scoring is not high for the work involved.

Metallica - Collect 4 different elements, then complete Crank It Up modes for high scoring. Every Crank It Up has about 5 levels you can complete - extremely difficult but fun. Complete final Crank It Up for add-a-ball style mode with jackpot shooting and super high scores. Also has Seek and Destroy mode by completing hurry ups, which can be very lucrative. Also has Blackened mode by completing guitar picks, which can be quite lucrative. Also has 4 different multiballs, two can be stacked at a time leading to higher jackpots and increased gains towards Crank It Up.

I consider a deep game one that is a) Very difficult to master all aspects, but fun along the way. b) Has multiple ways to score large amounts of points. DI simply does not have this. It's modes and SIM cards, that's it.

I'm really hoping they actually implement the Pepper's Ghost effect at the Theater properly. What should be a really neat effect where you appear to 'hit' the item on the screen is ruined by the fact that the backlight on the playfield is left off during screen effects. No idea why they did it this way. If you go into Operator Settings, the JJP logo will appear on the Theater with the proper Pepper's Ghost effect, if you're not sure of the difference.

Can we compromise and get an operator setting to change it ourselves?

The flippers on DI are quite problematic with random strength variance - the left orbit shot exasperates this issue because it puts the most resistance on the flipper bat. Flipper strength needs to be drastically increased and even then the flipper still exhibits the strength randomness. Whatever JJP uses to control the pulse modulation of the coil is not reliable. It's made the game a lot less fun for sure. There are no mechanical issues with my flippers. It's just the way the game is - I've had two copies and both flip the same.

Don't be a Pinside cliche, man. Just because you don't notice an issue with the flipper strength doesn't mean others don't notice the issue. Read this thread for god's sake. I've owned two DIs. Same varying flipper strength with each in the right flipper. Before you post implying that people are liars, which is what you've done here, take a step back, sit in time-out for a moment, and realize that your Dialed In copy is not representative of all the others.

Man, is this manual enormous and high quality.

Two suggestions I hope made it into the 2.0 code.....

1) Operator control of whether the theatre playfield backlight is on or off when showing items on theatre. On = Pinball 2000 style where ball 'hits' item on the screen. Off = How it is now where ball goes under item on screen.

2) Rocket-style launch animation (an ode to TZ) on theatre screen when ball is kicked out of skill shot slot.

Can anyone PM me a link? I requested access, no response. Much appreciated.

Installed 1.61 today. Yup, game slows down and falls way behind if you accomplish too much at once. Animations start looking like when you want to play that hot new PC game with the settings turned all the way up but you're running a Radeon R7 from 3 years ago. 10 frames per second FTW!

I removed the Bluetooth dongle. Made no difference. In related news, after the update the game reports that the Bluetooth Dongle is missing - even when its there. Rebooted, etc. No dice. Not that it ever served a purpose anyway, but now I get the test report msg at every boot for that.

The early batch has the rubber. Now uses sleeves. Somewhere after #150 or so they made the change.

IMO it's a huge waste of money. Nobody ever examines the cabinet art and if they do they sure as hell aren't going to discern the difference unless they get up close - especially if it's in the middle of a collection.

14.4 million. 13 SIM cards. Breezed through Showdown. Haven't played it much since. Was hoping they'd expand the code a bit.

Interesting...I'm looking to sell my DILE and looking for a TWD Premium so there's that.....just you're a bit far.

Maybe we could find a delivery guy to cut a deal on the swap? Never tried that before but who knows.

Contact JJP and request a new wireform. They had a ton of these left ramp return wireforms that were manufactured defective with the top of the end stopper being parallel to the bottom. It should be angled further in. The plastic cover is ugly, it's a hack, and you have no reason to accept that as a fix for a $9k machine. That's like your new car's headlight not working and instead of replacing it, they give you a flashlight to stick on top of it. Don't accept the idiotic cover. That's BS.