Quoted from pintechev:You’re wrong about no R&D, coding and art. They have a new board set, their own code to run it, new art in higer resolution than the original. They invested heavily in that.
The R&D for the crappy boardset happened with MMr and most of that was 'borrowed' from elsewhere. Nothing new for AFMr. They emulated the code, used the original art as concept, and the investment is minimal at best. You honestly are fooling yourself and buying into their marketing hype and desired perception if you really think they spend more than 20% of what it would take to create a completely new game.
Dont get me wrong, i am very happy for all the people with the money that are chomping at the bit to buy these remakes. Like I said, they feed a niche of people that only want nostalgia but have not idea how to work on a machine themselves. In a home environment the quality does not matter as they get a fraction of the plays in a year that a game does on route. From what I have seen they just dont hold up in the long run on route and the boardset is of concern.
Nah, up till now anyone with a little desire to learn could pick up a soldering iron and a DMM and get to work. That is no longer the case with this surface mount stuff. The whole difference here is that the new stuff is being built with planned failure rate and an exhorbant cost to repair. You have to remember that when solidstate came around, the manfacturers offered classes and tech skill on how to work on them. I am still waiting to get my invite for learning how to troubleshoot and fix this new technology... (I dont think it will ever happen since that is not the business model).
My only real gripe on the remakes is that they are charging WAY TOO MUCH. It costs them a fraction to R&D and build these, they are being built in a comparable facility to Stern, and yet they are charging at least a 2k premium that is ONLY for the nostalgia factor on the ill-percieved idea that they will hold the value of the original (they wont in the long run). I truly think that if they drop 1 dud and people just wait to buy for a few months, that you will see a price shift.
Make no mistake, they are attempting to suck money out of the hobby as quick as they possibly can while the getting is good. In the long term this brings more instability to the hobby.