I'm not too worried about the Stern playfields going forward. They took their lumps in 2016 for some mistakes, and I don't think they'll want to go through that again. 100% perfect yield is impossible, but they're surely going to be doing a better job now than in the past at weeding out those "seconds" from the assembly line. I do have concerns about overall build quality with the cost cutting, but that's probably more of an operator's concern than a home buyer's issue.

From people who have Aerosmith in their hands, they say that the clearcoat is noticeably improved over what Batman or Ghostbusters had. Hopefully future games on the line (even previously released games) all look as good.

While there's still good reason to be vigilant, I think that the panic stage is most likely over.

There is no way to know if this will happen to AS or any other pin for that matter but my guess is no. If I were you I would sit back and wait till people start buying them and see if they start having problems or not. I personally wouldn't be afraid to buy an AS right now if I wanted one but just give it a little time and see what is going on with them.

Oh boy, you are probably going to get slammed hard for this post and get called names and all sorts of things. You probably just lost all of your credibility because of this post. You must be a stern fanboy and in the stern army right?

I'm a four-star general in the Stern Army.

Ok theres one, I'll give you that one although if that playfield doesn't get any worse I personally could live with it. Remember, you're never going to see 100% perfect playfields ever but lets see what happens to AS from here out.

I would up vote that comment twice if I could!

Guys, I have a playfield with ghosting and chipping on it. It's an LE and I have every reason to be pissed off about it. I kind of am. There are also lots of other things that have played a factor in my "Stern boycott," but I don't have any problem pointing out what they're doing right or where I think they're sincerely trying to improve. I might be wrong, but I hope I'm not, but I think the playfield issues are behind us.

The Aerosmith promo video having a ghosted insert is just really poor luck, but we also don't know if that was a prototype that could have been ran during the "trouble months" or if they specifically pulled that playfield for their test machine because it did have a bad insert. Yeah, it looks bad in a promo video, but it's hard to connect that to them still having playfield problems.

People are still ordering games. I really hope that issues are fixed. From what I've been told by people who are actually in the know, playfield problems should be a thing of the past (for the most part, nobody is perfect).

They should have called it the "Stern Glee Club"...

That was a great on-air decision too.

Stern has quality and playfield issues. Dutch isn't moving any machines. Spooky has only limited supply. heighway has alien but not in quantities, what a Renaissance of pinball.

Playfield arrived today with date stamp Feb 01. Looks perfect out of box and yes the replacement LE playfield was signed. One lane switch needs to be fixed but other than that it's good to go. Going to install Cliffy and plastic plastic protectors before I play any games. I'll keep peeps updated if I run into problems with this new one.

Nevermind.

Stern is still the only company that can churn out games at a fast rate.

I am sure they will sort out the p/f issues.

But, losing confidence in the coding department.

Fancy Aerosmith pro but too risky buying it until code complete as it's not Lyman on it.

Or wait until Iron Maiden and hope Lyman gets given that one

Their coding department has not changed much, maybe even gotten better more recently. If every pin has to be coded super awesome then wait until every pin has been out for a while. Not even Lyman hits every one out of the park. That isn't going to change. There are so many good pins out there I'd be happy to wait. OTOH, it's nice to get the new pins and play them. If it doesn't work out sell it with what usually is not a big loss (especially compared to the real world) and try again. A middle option is to trust remakes, Lyman, Keith and sometimes Dwight pins (from the big manufacturers). Lots of people do it each of these ways.

Temper expectations. Seems so many people want or expect epic coding now-a-days.

Will do

Right after Stern tempers their epic pricing on fully featured premiums.

I'm with you on price. But price is a separate discussion . Coding won't significantly change with Stern or whomever at any potential (or expected) price adjustment (as we've already seen ).

Is coding really that terribly bad though? I know Batman is just God awful, but what else is? I was always under the impression that Kiss was a disaster but right now as we speak you got guys talking about how the Kiss code is pretty good and only need minor work done to it. What games other than BM66 are so bad? Im not saying there arent any, im just asking.

Kiss is bad if you own it, if you're a casual player and don't get to involved with rules it's a great shooter. Once you start noticing the missing features and missing call outs that could litterelly be cut and pasted from the bin files already in the code but are not implemented in the game, then you get annoyed

Come now who-dey, you've been apart of our GOT kicks ass thread. The game is in dire need of bug fixes, sound queues, and polish. Yes, GOT needs code. Got code?

Aerosmith is bad but it's new so I give it a pass, and it is good for out of the gate code.....oh wait, given stern history and non-Lyman games not getting proper follow up code updates, you can probably go ahead and add Aerosmith to this list in a few months when it's still suffering.

I don't know enough about GB to comment, but it has good art so it must not need anymore code updates.

BM66.....good thing they overpriced these. I just hope Lyman nails it out of the park SOON.....so he can go work on something more meaningful.

Yea, stern code still suffers. Not much has changed from the day of $6200 premiums to $6800 premiums. But, they put out the best themes with the quickest turn around, so really - who needs code?

Don't know how B66 got lumped in with Ghostbusters playfield issues. I've got both - GB is crap and B66 is perfect. My B66 pf & clear is every bit as good as the AS I've seen in person. And both are leagues ahead of GB. As usual B66 is the whipping boy for all things bad at Stern.

The three B66 playfields I've seen were all the same as Ghostbusters in appearance.

Yeah I know Eskaybee but I fall into that average or casual player group that Capguntrooper is talking about. I dont even come close to knowing and understanding the rules of these games like alot of you guys on here. I can't even wrap my head around some of the things that you guys talk about sometimes, its true and im not too embarrassed to admit it.

I just pick up bits and pieces from you guys and learn a little here and there, and sometimes you guys get so deep into the rules that it makes me scratch my head. Im ok with that though because that helps me enjoy my games longer, because im always learning. For me, GOT seems like it has great rules , because I just dont know it like you do and im obviously not as good of a player as you either. I havent even been to the Iron Throne yet on GOT, and I may never get there for all I know. I consider myself a decent player, but the iron throne isnt easy to achieve.

I think Capguntrooper nailed it. Most players just dont see these games in the same way as the really good players do. I learn alot from people like you on here for sure, but sometimes im kinda glad that I don't understand some of the things that you guys are taking about even if I am trying to reach that point. I love pinball and its my main hobby now, but i just havent studied the rule sets hard enough to put myself on that level yet. When i use to race cars, i was at that level because its all i thought about 24/7, but i just havent put myself there with pinball yet, even though i do love it alot. Anyway I'm rambling, not sure if any of that makes sense to you but I think it probably does.

Ghosting and chipped clear?

When you find that you are playing your pins less or get bored try studying the rule sets and accomplishing some of the higher wizard modes. It is then, you will start noticing the bugs and missing features of a game and even have suggestions of your own for code improvement. I mean look at all us GOT LE/PREM owners, we raised such a stink on hardware faults with the machine, Stern rewrote the code to accommodate hardware defects. The fastest way to get Stern to do code on a machine, point out hardware defects or topper issues I.E. KISS.

Screen Shot 2017-03-11 at 05.14.44 (resized).png

The last sentence of your post is why I'm done, for now, with Stern.

I love Ghostbusters but I won't drop nearly $7k on a premium that doesn't have substantial code updates being released. Ghostbusters has a lot of cool features but they will never reach their potential if the code isn't deep enough.

Theme alone, no matter how much I like it, won't get me to spend $7k. I rather spend another $1k-2k and get a Dialed In that I know will be loaded up and have deep and unique code with substantial updates that don't take 6 months to a year (or longer) to come out.

and at least you won't be afraid of no ghosts....

supposing ARE YOU A GOD ? is the big wizard mode, that means GB should have almost 1 more update...

and even if game is OK right now, it could be much (much) better
because lots of proposals have been made here already, and some seems very good ideas, only if Dwight wants/can make it that way of course

"players" needs code
even more for a home game

Aerosmith code is bad? This isn't good as I was under the impression that it was code complete because of the Stern release delay. Would love to here more about the problems with this code if you could expand on it.

I got a shipment notification from UPS from Stern Pinball. Looks like things are happening, BUT the shipment weight says only 10 pounds. Am I getting an empty box? If so, I'm going to be really irritated.

Sounds like an unpopulated playfield. That'd cheese me really off...

I don't want to temper your expectations, but it could be a gallon of clear and a paint brush.

LMFAO!

My PDI single glass weighed this much:

23 lbs / 10.43 kgs

A play field should be much more no?

Not if the playfield is made out of fiberboard.

Yup. That's the weight of the empty box they send out.

I don't want an empty box. I don't trust Stern to be timely in returning a new playfield back, leaving me with an empty cab for weeks or maybe even months. I also want to see the playfield I'm getting before I send my old one back. I don't want to have some playfield with a covered up build date show up after I've sent my playfield back. By sending out an empty box, they spend more (3 shipments rather than 2), they make the process take longer, and they put additional inconvenience on the customer. Super lame.

did your distributor not tell you how the replacement program works? Almost everybody has reported that stern sends you an empty box, you put your populated play field in it, ship it back, stern uses the hardware from your pf to populate the new pf, then ships it back. How do I know this and you don't with me having no pony in the race and you being in the program? or are you playing dumb for drama?

People have received fully populated playfields. It's been completely hit and miss with how Stern has handled this. People have received empty boxes, populated playfields, jars of clear with a $0.02 brush, or just a notification that they won't be getting a new playfield. It's like spinning the Wheel of Fortune where only one section is good.

So why are you complaining?
Sounds like you are getting a brand new populated playfield, better than some as you previously mentioned.

Well, first of all, everybody affected should have been taken care of. That's obvious.

But honestly, it comes down to trust with Stern. I want to see my replacement. I want to see the build date on it. We've seen replacements that have erased build dates, and we've seen issues in some of the earlier replacements. I want to see a playfield show up here that has a recent manufacture date, and I want to feel good about the swap. This game was $8,000. It's not like I'm exchanging a pair of pants that I bought online.

And why are some people getting new playfields upfront? Why are others forced to wait and are given an empty shipping box? Sending back an empty box just means more waiting, but now I can't even play the game (sorry league, no GBLE for a while).

Sounds like you have a lot of wants that others are not being offered.
As far as i have seen empty box comes first.
I guess you could throw the PF in the back of your car and take a drive to stern and get what you want .

Ok, then you haven't kept up fully. That's fine, but don't criticize people who have a right to be upset by a company's terrible quality control and cost cutting on premium-priced products. With all the time I've already spent fixing out-of-the-box issues (it was really messed up and definitely left the factory untested), I think I have justification to be bugged by being asked to wait an indeterminate amount of time when the game won't be playable.

As a collector I didn't find the turn around time of two weeks to be that bad. I could see operators getting a bit ticked about losing money during that down time though.

I would be fine with that. I'm just...skeptical. But if it goes that way, I'll be happy to express my pleasant surprise.

I have kept up and I don't believe there has been a single case that someone received a populated playfield first. If so please link to the post.

I'm not going to dig, but I know of at least two. In case it was shared privately, I'm not going to name names. Since the whole thing started happening I've had a lot of private and public conversations about the whole thing. Pretty sure at least one person that got their playfield first before sending the old one back shared it publicly, however.

Actually I have kept up.
I get that you are TOTALLY frustrated
At this point what other choice do you have , really.