You should drink more.

Which preorders are you still in on, Iceman?

It's like an interest free loan with no due date.

The 5 Stages of Pinball Pre-Order Grief

1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance

Congrats man, you're through the woods.

This has always been my opinion. Too much risk for too little reward.

Gotta give kudos to Spooky.

They needed to prove they could do what they promise
All but one started from scratch with not much more than an idea and a blank piece of paper
In the days of Bally , Williams and Gottlieb, machines evolved, they did not just trow out the old system and introduce the new

These guys are all using new technology
They would have been smarter fitting an old game with new tech. Thus working out the bugs and also be able to work on the operating system

But I think the days of a preorder , years in advance , are numbered

You forgot PPS. I'm waiting for an MMr and TH. MMr is only 6 months off and I'm sure I'll get my TH before the movie comes out next week

Hopely JJP has there production issues ironed out but I still do not expect that game before spring if I'm lucky. No doubt we are all better off not preordering anything. There's no benefit to it and by the time you get your game there is often something new announced or released that you want more. Or better yet spend that 8-9K on used games now and enjoy them for 1-2 years while these games are being made and promises are being broken. You don't have to get pissed at the nonsense and instead have new games to play. You can always get the games later on the used market and 95% of the time at a nice discount off the new price. Let the preorder people deal with the wait and the NIB issues.

I'm going to try my best to stick to this, time will tell if I cave and preorder again.

This is no disrespect to you at all, Iceman. Just my thoughts:

It should HAVE NEVER come to people pre-ordering with their wallets. That is a total load of crap. To come to this community, our community, present your plan, get people all fired up and offer them their "dream theme" pin, take YEARS to get these things designed, created, built, and shipped out the door - total suckage. Some of them have been especially bad to come here and roast the fires, collect the money, and then effectively turn their back on the community they took the money from.

And before any of them come back at me about how "I know nothing. I'm not on the inside; I don't see all the trouble this is " - you obviously don't see the trouble and toil these people get put through. You took their money and promised them a product - nut up and PRODUCE IT, or get lost.

The sheer audacity of people in pinball to ask others to pay so much for a pre-order. If this was to be done in, oh I don't know, ANY OTHER hobby, the customer would tell you to "flip off".

Now, on the flip side of this coin, I sure hope soon people start doing what Iceman is doing by wising up and pulling the plug on this behavior. The only reason these "new guys" keep doing this is they know they can get away with it.

This will basically be my standard reply to anybody from now on.

I think manufacturers should start sending out machines and let us pay when we are ready.

Yeah, hear that Spooky Pinball! NONE of them can keep a timeline...

Wait a minute, Spooky is shipping right now, and is on the timeline they promised. Hunh.

Let me rebut this statement with a song.

I'm with ya Ice. About time pinball makers shoulder the burden of producing a product THEN selling it. Humans been doin' it this way for thousands of years.

NO MORE CHEATING! FIND OTHER SOURCES OF INCOME TO PRODUCE.

Hi, I'm Rick, and I'm a previous preorderer.

You really should move DP from the "soon to be" to the "timeline abusers" category. BOP 2.0 is close to a year behind. EU kits are shipping now though at least.

I'm with you though. I'm done with pre-orders. I've come to the realization that no game is a life or death thing. yeah, I may want something and miss out but then I guess it just wasn't meant to be then. I'll survive.

I'm still in on my "last" preorder, but hanging by a thread. For me the silence is deafening.

I can't see the incentive to refuse to provide estimated production dates. We all get it. Delays are sometimes inevitable. The disappointment for missing a target date is far easier to digest than saying nothing at all.

Once pinball became popular again and prices went up the GREED set in and the douchebaggery hit an all time high.
I am out for now but may be back once the ship comes back down to earth.

Is this based on personal experience?

The preorder model will kill itself. It doesn't need help. A few more bad timelines and maybe a company failure or two and it will be done. Personally I wouldnt preorder from anyone that hasnt produced something yet. I'd buy another pin from Jack because he delivered. Plus he has a perfect storm brewing to make me want to buy another (Hi Pat!). But that is about it. I'll buy from Gary if he makes a game I want and like. But why should I trust some guy in a garage with my money? I'll wait to see the result first.

I don't disagree with any of this, but...I am going to point this out simply because I know that Nordman leaving Heighway is what precipitated Ice posting this thread...Heighway Pinball has not required any pre-order funds in order to produce their pins. My understanding is that if not a single pre-order was made, they would still have the financial means to make these pins. At least the first batch or so, then using the funds from those sales to continue making more pins.

Really I think the whole point to Iceman's post is that it really just isn't worth pre-ordering a pin the vast majority of the time, despite the few perks that may be offered for doing so.

Nah TBL, but it's not that different from Predator. Their email requesting the next payment should be soon. I'm waiting to see if anything at all regarding communication has changed before making a decision.

It would be just fantastic if they would say something about production and quit treating us like a necessary evil. We're totally on the same side.

Please no more sober posting for you! But yeah welcome to the "reformed pinball preorder addict" club. It takes awhile to realize that you can still get the game even if you don't fund every pinball company in existence.

Pins should be sold like vacuum cleaners - 30-day in-home free trial, money back if you're not satisfied. Order by Friday, and we'll throw in a free fish tank full of zombie heads.

i was in on the woz pre order but fired jjp when they wanted money for the hobbit when woz wasn't even in production yet. when jjp announced a price increase on the hobbit during the expo debacle this year i actually laughed.

i am still in on tbl but that can change as well if things go the way of bop 2.0
as for pricing, it is getting pretty comical as well from all the players except spooky. 9000 for a hobbit le, se xlse or whatever is bordering on insulting, same with stern with the watered down pro version of a regular game.

at least jjp#3 won't be pre order and thankfully stern doesn't need to hold his hand out for money until it's built.

we supported the pre order model and continue to buy nib pins at dumb dumb prices so we have ourselves to blame. heck pps is even selling le numbers for 300$ and people try to legitimatize and rationalize this ridiculous practice.

it gets easier and easier to not support these greedy companies...

I'm tracking with you. RobT. Here's my one question:

Is their policy the same case with Alien...? That's the one thing that makes me a lil' nervous.

http://heighwaypinball.com/?page_id=1248

I wish HP success, I truly do. It just kills me to see people being dragged through broken promises for years. Our community needs these companies to follow through.

Dec 17th is going to be very, very interesting, and I do hope everything works out there (JPop). If it doesn't, I think we will see something of a revolution amongst this community and acceptance towards the pre-pay model.

Done with pre orders?
Sober?!?

Now I've seen everything

Here's some boobs to cheer you up

image-360.jpg

you have gone above and beyond to support the hobby, and specifically, the new companies with your financial support, and in turn they consistently lie about deadlines and consistently raise prices to the now 9000 price point because of your good will.

perhaps the day of reckoning is not far off for them, chocking on their own greed.

i fully support profits but i know when i'm getting home-runned, and it seems to get worse all the time.

The only reckoning will be buyers that still have down payments after everybody else has pulled out and bankruptcy sets in. It will be a sad day indeed.

Hey , what the hell ? I've never pre-ordered anything .

Yep. You don't want to be one of the guys standing when the music stops. Bad juju indeed.

I know I'll get toasted for saying this but this is the reason why Stern is the only REAL pin maker in the world today. Flame on....

Yeah, right!!!

Some of you guys talk a good game up until something is released that you've always wanted and then you're back to the stupid preorder scam.

I think it could be alleviated by simply being realistic and keeping your investors meaning us who pre-order well informed and in the loop. For the most part we are a fair and understanding group. Anyway just be true and we would be supportive, that's how a good business should operate. Happy to invest, just want to know how my investment is coming along. I am thankful to have Stern at least pushing out a couple pins a year, whether you like the games or not reliability at least is present, quality control suffers but tough to get everything you want. Lets be thankful that pinball's are still being made and the more companies the better. Ice is right in saying if these smaller companies don't clean up their act, Bye Bye.

i agree, and am guilty as charged with tbl. what has changed is the retention of these pre orders before the machines hit the street. we all know how long woz took but the retention was there for jjp because we wanted a competitor to stern. but since the prices have been climbing so much people expect more and when they don't see it they pull out pretty fast (hobbit after expo). same will happen with tbl if delays start and will continue if hobbit turns into woz 2.0 with the delays. nordman leaving heighway will have the same effect.

i pledge this will be my last pre order.

That would be awesome if he could. I'd much rather get the game when my excitement is highest.

got a RAZA on preorder, will never preorder again. too many pins out there to enjoy instead of tying up cash.

Times like these I dont feel so bad I can only afford the lower priced "B" titles. I know exactly what I am getting into with my next planned purchase of Rollergames.

rollergames is a fun pin. great shots.

And no waiting for code updates!

Oh snap can I preorder a set of those?

So i have never done a pre-order, but have been reading a few threads on the subject. As an outsider looking in, I noticed that alot of this started after the unveiling of TH? I know people were and are pissed at WOZ taking forever, but that pin at least came out very well, from what I have heard. Only seen pics of WOZ. but after seeing TH, I honestly thought it was still a bare prototype version. I couldn't believe that they said it was mostly finished for the most part. As a LOTR fan of the books and movies, I was waiting to see what this looked like before possibly buying. Now after seeing it, I am highly disappointed. Thats alot of $$$$ for an, IMO, bland looking playfield. For that amount of money, I was expecting a PF that rivaled LOTR. I waa expecting that playfield to be loaded with everything! If I had to chose, I will stick with LOTR.

Just the word pre-order makes no sense. You can order something that will arrive later. That I understand. You can pay now and get it later, that makes sense too.

But to pre-order sounds like a ritual of some sort that you do before you are going to go through a lot of unnecessary torture.