Actually, if the minimum wage is increased to $9 per hour then by the time Hobbitt rolls off the assembly line the price is going to seem pretty darn good with the inflation. Gotta love the government and their silent inflation tax.

Costs go up, price goes up. What did we gain?

Competition

Doesn't competition generally drive prices down?

It will when things settle into place. It affects everything, quality will change as well.

That's what they taught you in school.

But in this case, Stern saw that they could effectively almost double the cost of their games.

How?

You have probably noticed that Burger King only opens new stores within a mile of McDonalds. Burger King lets McDonalds do the test marketing, the traffic pattern research, all the hard work in determining if a location is suitable - then they open their own restaurant right up the road.

By the same logic, Stern saw that collectors would pay $7500 for a pinball game and simply raised their prices to what the market had been proven to pay.

I bet Stern would never had guessed people would pay that much for a pinball, "LE" or not.

Agreed. As of this moment there is still no competition for Stern. In fact, until JJP releases pin number two I doubt Stern is going to be overly intimidated or feel at risk. Frankly, we should all hope JJP grows the market (home use and rout) making things easier on Stern.

The price wont settle or lower until enough pinheads refuse to pay $8K+ for a new pin. If they get enough buyers at $8K for a while then they will raise it to $8,500-$9000 until they see the highest price many pinheads that buy new pins will pay.

I would buy in at the current THLE pricepoint so long as it came with a SOLID delivery date for a 100% completed game (i.e. January 2014) and then my contract stated that for every month late the price reverted by $100.

5 months late = $500 off. 10 months late = $1000

lol, +1

+1

You mean Jan 2015 ?

Or as Jack would say what's 12 months here or there?

They put up a facebook post yesterday asking "what features you want in the hobbit"

I answered with "An affordable price"

They took the post down

Just wanted to say I have NO beef with the JJP model. They can run it any way they want. I am just stating an opinion of what would get me to plop down a non-refundable deposit now.

A hard deadline and a contract to hold them to their own deadline. I do not care what the date is, but I would want them to set it and hold to it. Basically, if I am going to commit a large sum of $ up front then that is the minimum of what I would require.

I'd prefer the game to be 6 months late if it gives them time to make it perfect. Don't rush it Look at all the recent Stern quality posts, and unfinished code posts. Stern is throwing them out the door as fast as possible..

Just because JJP set the price doesn't mean Stern had to follow.
Remember when Jack said he was going to do decals and then all the sudden Stern was doing decals.

If people want to overpay for their Stern games, let them. If people want incomplete games that never get finished let them buy them. I have learned my lesson and so will others.

We will see how JJP does with WOZ.

The beauty of the "model" is that you don't have to put down a deposit...you can wait and buy it when it is actually complete....either/or

Like I said...

I am just stating an opinion of what would get me to plop down a non-refundable deposit NOW.

Also, not so sure that I will have the full LE option available to me when the game is actually complete... If they have already sold 1000 of the 1500, it soulnds to me like they are well on there way to sell all 1500 LEs prior to release.

And I don't blame them.

Why wouldn't they, when people keep buying them?

Who said that they *had* to follow?

Of course they didn't have to. But you have to realize that they are in business. That means the goal is...<gasp>...PROFIT. When you see a new company pre-sell a new, unproven, unavailable pin for a lot more money than what you had been selling your LE models for and a lot of people buying it, doesn't it make sense that you would conclude that you could charge more for your product...which people could actually own within a month or two (pre-order) or immediately?

The problem is. Seems many don't learn there lesson. People keep suckering for the same stuff and will pay whatever to do so. We won't see change at this rate.

And if you guys don't think Jack is making 2k profit minimum off each game. You are fooling yourselves. Buying parts and stuff. Right now he's buying for 4 or 5 of his next games. Not just this one. His inventory will be set for awhile on all the main components. Better pricing that way, and you know your going to need it. Hence why the following games should be least the same price as first one was. Since the first is always your most expensive to make.

I don't blame JJP or Sterns for doing what they do. The Lemmings have allowed it.

You guys are hilarious. One minute your bitching the prices are too high and you want to take them down then the next minute your saying you can't blame them and it's alright.

If you can't blame them then you shouldn't care about there profit margins.
You guys do release you have to make a profit to stay in business these days right.

Yep I don't blame Stern at all, they're in it for the money only, moreso than JJP IMO.

I've met Jack, I've played WOZ, he seems to be catering to the home user more and making a quality game. So my first NIB will be a Hobbit LE...

Yes, it does.

You were going to sell your MM in the next few months. It's restored, as close to perfect as you can imagine. You were going to ask $10k for it.

Then you see that people are paying $15k for them. Sometimes even more.

Are you still going to sell yours for $10k?

Yup. Jack has shown that many pinball collectors are more than willing to pay double of what the going rare for NIB was. If Sterns wants to be the cheaper alternative. They don't have to be half as much, only couple $100. Tho, if they did keep the price back down close to where it used to be. I know they would sell twice as many as JJP. Can't tell me OPS can afford to put a $6500-8000 pin on route and make money on it. THey were struggling before at the $3400 shipped to your door price.

No pinball machine will EVER pull the Black Ops 2 crowd over to pinball!! That's what Adults/Kids are playing at home and pinball will never pull them back! Never! BO2 11 million copies sold in a WEEK!!! But the old LCD display will pull them back, better get the new LED display in your WOZ the LCD is old now.

The perceived quality of pin that JJP is producing is looking far superior to what Stern is now producing, so that comparison between an equal MM is not the same.

I stopped for gas on the way home last night, and the station I pulled in at had premium for $4.40/ gallon! I kept driving and found it for $4.25 at the next station, luckily before I ran out.

All set....discuss!

What's your Proof? Where? Sure you're not on the "KooLAid" I.V.? More sales hype sounds like. Get back to us when you actually get a game and it runs for a period of time. Other than actual burn in no one knows!! Or maybe they do? Word is Star Trek will be the new Stern platform!! Hum?? Wonder if Stern is going to use "ground breaking" LED display??

Up here it's 3.66. Everything in IL is overpriced.

Well said I digress.

They say Jersey has the best gas prices in the country....

And, they still offer full service if I am correct. I'll never forget the looks I got when I pulled in to a station there once and started pumping my own gas.

I'll you my Avatar LE. Waits for exejet tiraid.

We'll find out how good of quality it is in a few years....

Even if that were true for arguments sake, the difference in price was still big enough that it easily allowed Stern to start charging more (despite the "perceived quality" of JJP). And that's the entire point.

Stern released Avatar LE at $5500 MAP (about $5200 street) a month *before* Jack announced WOZ at $6500. The gap wasn't that huge.

Then came TRS LE and Transformers LE at $5800 street, but the real jump came with AC/DC LE, X-Men LE and Avengers LE, which all seem to be in the $6900-$7000 range.

You forgot Tron LE at $5300.00 pre-order.

So $1200-1300 difference between Avatar LE and Tron LE to WoZ at the early $6500.00 price (which then went to $7k and $7500.00, which would make the difference up to $2300.00). That's a significant difference, even if you don't want to use the word "huge".

I agree, the real jump on the Stern prices first came with AC/DC LE's.

If they do, they're strangely quiet.

I can verify that the WOZ quality is very high. Still they are a new company and it is pinball, so expect problems. When I have played the machine, it feels slightly above what a A+ pristine Twilight Zone feels and looks like. And it has better lighting.

Stern added a ton of high quality clearcoat to the XMen LE playfields compared to Tron LE and AC/DC LE. So they have responded. I have not heard anything about the quality of the Avengers playfields one way or another.

I was hoping JJP would find merit in the above model as he seems fond of pre-pay. Many projects are done in this manner it is just highly unusual for a serious company to sell their product this way.
For JJP to expect payments to be strictly made according to a date without taking any commitment as to the state of progress of the game is absurd. JJP is set up now from your 7 MILLION dollars, working on another game before delivery of the one you paid for in full....how many months ago?
What is more absurd is that after the disastrous delays with WOZ some people have signed up again for one of a 1500 run of the Hobbit (at 1500 I am not comfortable considering this a limited edition) with an additional 1k spike in cost over WOZ and all without having received their WOZ yet. WOW.
I understood the higher cost of the $6500 WOZ was for the best of everything. If Stern did not crank their pricing up (they learned they could from JJP) I doubt Jack would have raised the Hobbit 1k.
Thanks for the Stern price hike too JJP, but let's have our completed WOZ before your price spike.

I must say, The Brain's avatar, rules!!!

Have I heard all this somewhere before? It sounds strangely familiar.

Yeah I am disappointed with JJP! I would like to see them take more responsibility for their product and not happy to see any efforts with another project until WOZ is shipped and we have a good feel for his product before being pressured into the next one. Sorry if I offended I do wish JJP the best.

I disagree, the machine as far as we can tell is waiting on code. If the guys working code were working a new project, that would be bad. The rest of the crew better be working on the next project if they are complete with their part on WOZ.

That is like cars, as soon as the designers clear the car from their board, they better be designing the next one, let the guys in the proper place do their job. No need to watch.

Everybody keeps telling Jack that pre order is odd. That is not true, if you want a high end item like certain cars that are hot items coming, you better get money to a dealer to get you one or you are out of luck. There have been several models like that. When the 2005 Ford GT came out, you had to fork out big premiums to get one unless you got in early and had one on order.

Anything worth getting is worth waiting for. You can preorder and get in now or you can get one when they come out, but it will be worth waiting for either way.

You made some good points. I don't think it was a wise move to take pre orders before the release of WOZ. I also don't agree with a price spike and the pressure of another pre order before we all get an opportunity to try our finished product. The pre order payment plan could be made more fair.
The Ford GT required a deposit to hold one and the rest of the funds were due upon delivery.

even on that preorder. I bet the value of it dropped as soon as you drove it off the lot. If you want to look at pins like new cars. NIB is worth half as soon as you open the box. That's the way it used to be in the pin universe. Not quite half, but you were losing money once the game was pulled out and you cut the binding strap.

I'll get crapped on for this I'm sure, but I think innovation in this field is a bit overrated. Sure you can add features, make things more efficient, but major innovation does change what pinball is.

Take P3 for example. I think it's an interesting idea. I might even buy one one day. But I think it's different from the pinball I've grown to love. It wouldn't be something that forced me to give up older machines. It's a different game to me. Pinball has always been a mechanical game at its core.

I guess my point is that I'm cool if Stern or whoever comes up with new features that make the game better. But I don't know how much I'd want them to change pinball. I still like the mechanical aspects of it. I hope machines get better, but I don't feel like I need a company to completely revolutionize the game and alter it dramatically.

I don't think you'll find that many people opposed to this particular criticism. I've always thought it was a stupid idea to cannibalize sales of one machine by announcing the "next best thing" while you still want to sell "the current best thing". In this case it's compounded by not even having your "current best thing" shipping yet! There's a reason Stern refuses to comment on a new machine until just before it's ready (although they also have the absolute worst secret-keeping department in this regard).