I originally read the title as 'Color', and was going to answer 'Silver'. Or 'Metal', honestly.

Well, lots of talk has been made about who is coding what machine.

What isn't clear to me is who does the "rules design" for a machine. Is it the "designer" or the "coder"?

Because really, I don't think people care who actually wrote the code - they care about what the rule-set is. I would expect that the "designer" has a large amount of input into the rule-set, possibly even more than the programmer does (and it probably varies from game to game).

Unless your poll here is to determine who has the most efficient code and fewest number of bugs...

Depends on the designer/programmer team. In many cases the programmer does a lot of the rule design as well.

Seeing as I like all of these people and coding quality appears to be from more of a machine to machine basis - I'd like to cast my vote as 'Present'

My favorite games all appear to have been coded by Lyman, and the Keiths have stepped up in incredible ways the past year or two.

Lyman by far.

Keith games are great and a close second.

You forgot Larry Demar, Ted Estes

Lyman.

No Pfutz?

I can't really choose. I've always liked Lyman the best, but Dwight has really pulled a few gems out of his hat recently with the current codes of Star Wars, Game of Thrones, and Ghostbusters, and I love what Tanio has done with Deadpool. Meanwhile Naegele has killed it working with Elwin on Iron Maiden and Jurassic Park. Then there's Keith who's made some of the deepest codes out there with his work at Stern and Jersey Jack. All these guys are capable of doing amazing things if they have the desire and are given the time to do so, or if they choose to make the time. I'd just like to say good job to all of these guys and keep it up, as your efforts are appreciated.

I don't feel I'm versed enough to vote, but I'll say that Keith Johnson is my favorite personally. For the following reasons:

- Coded LotR and TSPP in the same year!? Considered two of the best overall code designs that exist.
- Magically made Elvis an interesting game. I couldn't give two craps about Elvis as a theme, but the game code is a whole lot of fun!
- What he's doing at Jersey Jack is simply unmatched at the moment, IMO.

What about this new guy Eric Priepke? I hear he's working on an awesome new project.

KEITH

Stern fcked up

Too bad he's @ JJP.

Wish he'd go to AP & take them to the next level.

meh

Why so? R&M coding so far has been very well integrated. The rules seem thought out and not just "shoot the flashing lights" or "shoot a thing 3 times to start a thing." There are considerations with scoring multipliers and dividers, dimension changes, and who knows what else? I'm looking forward to what Eric has up his sleeve.

Sounds great to me too, how that jumps ahead of of many coded games over a long period of time I don't understand.

Lol - I'm going to have to check with Sal the Stockbroker first...

Eric Hadley has been and will always be my favorite pinball coder, hands down.

No, it's just doesn't make a very good poll.
1. Lyman is well known/respected for being tops in the field, and has been that way for a long time.
2. The ambiguity of "coder" is not good for the poll, which leads to
3. The list is either padded for looks, or confusing at best
4. Vote for more than one why? People are just going to vote for the majority even more, further muddling the "results."

Steve Kordek

To me it's interesting to see different coding approaches from the different companies. From what was said in show seminars, it appears that at Stern there is a group discussion on direction, and then from there on it is pretty much up to a single coder/programmer for the main game code. At JJP, there seems to be a team approach from start to finish, with a lead coder but all the other coders contribute a lot, even Eric seems to get involved with advice. For the JJP deep code that has to be both good and probably a little difficult to coordinate, but they seem to be handling it just fine.

My point is that it seems like for Stern (and probably AP and Spooky also), you can pass judgement based on a game that their name is on. For JJP, there is a code team on each pin, so to judge JJP coders you would need to know which coder worked on which part of the code. Keith Johnson is their coding director and was also the lead on a few of their pins, but has a great supporting crew that work and grow on knowledge and technics together.

Short answer for the best coder (or coder team) to me is Lyman at Stern and Keith at JJP - that have coded the machines that I like the best - strictly code wise and nothing else.