Kind of just got the industry standard response. Sounds like he sent the money to Haggis and did not hold funds. But also sounds like an order was already in place and allocated, which I'd assume there was some sort of deal of "x number of games taken, agreed to sell, or company promotion" with exclusivity rights being granted. Typically how those work.

Screenshot_20240212_084014_Message+ (resized).jpg

As an aside, in further conversation, if Haggis closed up shop then a refund would be completed from FlipnOut.

Now. If you get caught up in the $10k purchase after paid invoice...and Haggis doesn't deliver and you end up like one of these other guys in the thread with $10k wrapped up in a game, that's supposed to be manufactured, was paid for, and never shows up for delivery...At what point does FnO refund you for not meeting expectations?

And who uses this Ironwood for PF's? Oh right.... no one.

Lost in the weeds, and avoiding the real question......

Eye on the prize: debunk my contention that Haggis has an strategically unsustainable business and production model driven by their chosen manufacturing location.

You may not want it to be true, but it is.
Next.

Why did you need to make a new account d0n?

Carry on fellas, I'm sure you'll crack the case any day. Till then crack open more Fosters

I disagree that is the main factor.
What is the bill of materials.
Is a sheet of plywood that much more in AU as anywhere else.
It could possibly put an initial delay on orders, but once they got a stock of materials, is the cost of materials even significant versus the labor to assemble.

Their model was very clear:

Take deposits on games.
But also sell very many series tickets **
Use that initial money to seed their operation, and ramp to XX games produced a month.
By the time game 2 comes along, their cost of selling the games is now enough to cover operations.
They are doing reruns of games, so there is no large cost of artists, designers, etc..

If they fail I would contend, the inability to sell the series tickets, limited their ability to build out operations to produce games fast enough..

I'm pretty sure it's just Damien in a huge warehouse at this point building them one at a time. Probably has to travel overseas by boat to chop down the trees in order to press the plywood, too, at the rate that they pump out games.

Agreed, plus loss of consumer faith due to multiple lies, mistruths, and miscalculations, unlikable and low IQ shills trying to cause misdirection, lack of resale value already well established, Concerns over customer support and machine issues which are well documented at this point, and quite simply a plethora of better and more reliable options currently available.

No, it's still important... the wood is the substrate, and what everything mounts oo as well.

Plus, we have local owners here where the plastic layer delaminated from the wood and they wouldn't lay flat together

Why do you have to tell lies?

I only argue with those who poke me. There's scores of sensible, funny and friendly people on here i have never had a cross word with and count as mates.

I'm here to learn and have fun. If i'm left alone i'm just fucking fine.

Plastic layer delaminated ? The plastic layer is separate / floating.. If you want to get into problems with that, i mean tnuts would be kinda nice to hold the posts in place..

Regardless - the location of business I argue is not any real factor here.
The model itself is, and needing ## or even ### series ticket holders..

What a weird argument for moving your company and abandoning your own economy.

Trees.

Funny, I sell both American and French Oak to the distilling industry here.

To correct another wild fallacy that's being sprouted, Australia is 18% desert.

You haven't got a clue what you are talking about.

.. But it is 18% desert ..

It is also 82% not desert. Australia is huge.. There being a desert there is a non-factor. Just means that there is a wide variety of habitat..

Whatever, USA is 10% desert, and an additional 15% arctic..

Looks like a desert to me.....

Australia_satellite_plane (resized).jpg

I'm learning a lot about biomes now

pasted_image (resized).png

Haggis first licensed game will be Biodome?

You think we don't know our own country and you know better just cause you googled a pic??
You're just proving your own ignorance!!
Ohh and BTW, it's called the red heart NOT because it's all desert (which it's NOT) it's because of the soil colour...but of course you already knew that cause you know our country much better than we do

Maybe one of you guys in Australia are going to have to take a pic out your backdoor in order to prove it to the rest of Pinside that Australia isn't all desert.

LOL well there sure ain't any fkn desert where i am..google Lakes Entrance, Victoria

Still a pathetic argument for abandoning your own economy.

In any case, the whole discussion is a figment of pinstalkers imagination. It didn't happen, it's not going to happen, and we've seen what the results of what moving an aussie pinball business offshore means.

It's one man's crazy fantasy.

I'll repeat... "and they wouldn't lay flat together"

Point pressure to pull things together only works around that spot... if you have two things that aren't perfectly flat or mounts aren't aligned... it's not pretty... especially for a pinball game you want to have a uniform surface for.

The 'we made it all ourselves' angle is both a blessing and curse for the haggis games.

For the context of this discussion - if you were building these somewhere else, would it really have to be the same? Either way... that's the path they took and we still don't see consistent production output years later :/

You also said de-laminated.. Which means there is a material with multiple layers, glued together, and one of the layers glue gave way and peeled / separated.. Sort of suggesting de-lamination caused separation, as opposed to warping of one of the layers. Or if you meant the top poly was wearing, like iif a shiney layer delaminated..

In any case are there reports of this anywhere, ive not seen that on these threads at all.. Im not even sure one could even tell on this game, the poly is so thick, if there were some warping of the ply, its not going to affect gameplay, and only those looking intently from top are even going to be able to tell ...

Loose posts however, because of no T-Nuts - were a major annoyance for me..

This won't be the first time that I state for the record that I don't like this Haggis plastic top playfield design at all and I would have much preferred a traditional plywood playfield with clear coat. I would take the minimal dimples on a single level game any day given the option. The time, energy, materials and effort that went into this design were wasted IN MY OPINION.

Years ago I started making my own playfield protectors for old EMs out of poly-carbonate sheets. I didn't mind stripping an entire EM playfield, so I figured I would cover the whole playfield rather than cutting the protector around all the posts and assemblies and letting the protector float as the commercially available ones were. So I just punched holes anywhere a screw came through. I laid the protector flat and populated the playfield. Each post or item on the playfield applied a "point pressure" to hold the protector down. Boy did I get a surprise when I powered the game up and started playing. At first it was all great, but as the game heated up the protector rose up in the center of the playfield to the point where there was literally an inch of separation! The ball had to roll up and over a hill to cross the open portions of the playfield!!

Turns out there is this thing that I had forgotten about since college called coefficient of thermal expansion. Wood expands much slower than poly carbonate when heated! That is why the commercially available playfield protects always have been and always will be floating! That is also why the Hardtops are glued down completely (and I would recommend 100% LEDS in any game that has a Hardtop).

Yeah guys, some places aren't better suited than others for certain types of manufacturing. Its not just a simple fact that anyone with a braincell count in the teens could figure out. Its all about not abandoning your economy, be damned economic sense! Now if you'll excuse me, I gotta get down to the Holden dealership and buy a brand new car!

Cargument.

It's a fantasy.

They are manufactured in Australia. That is all.

Yes, its a cause for concern. Objectively. Good on them for attempting it, I hope it works out, but to act like its a meaningless point is hysterically wrong. As you mentioned with PB, I'm sure its difficult for them too. Lots of added expenses and I'm sure sourcing issues at times too. Its probably orders of magnitude easier for them than Haggis though. Australia is facing massive manufacturing issues and no misplaced sense of patriotism is going to change that fact.

But that did not happen with the material Haggis used. Even with the electronics in the cabinet as opposed to the head. And it got really really warm inside of Fathom. Further they covered the thermal expansion issues somewhere I recall. Where they said the posts were not supposed to be too tight to allow for the expansion to happen. In any case I think they took that into account when choosing this, which maybe innovative or a gimmick.

There are other reasons I do not care for this, especially in a higher use/played environment.

And if I end up opting to take the centaur, I do wonder if a more standard full plywood playfield is still an option. On their original order pages (Celts and Fathom), there was a stated build time option for this, that may of disappeared or may not longer be offered public..

I think on Celts you had the option of hybrid playfield or traditional. Fathom was just their hybrid

Guys, I hate to interrupt our geography lesson here.

I find it very curious. There are stating to be two types of people posting in here: You have people nervous or concerned about the way Haggis is running business, and then you have Australians. There seems to be very little overlap.

To our Australian friends, you simply must know that the rest of the world is pretty damn nervous about the state of Haggis and where much of their hard earned money has been for months and months. I would hope you'd look at this through a more objective lens.

We are all in the same boat. Just some are looking towards land and some are curled up on the deck crying.

Just because someone doesn't bleat it doesn't mean they aren't concerned.

I'm sure many Australians interested in Pinball, aware of Haggis and that read Pinside share some or all of the concerns posted in this thread in relation to Haggis Pinball. Some of us have received our Fathom Mermaids some time back, whilst some of us are still waiting. However, not all of them choose to post here, some can't be bothered with dodging the grenades.

Some of the assumptions made about Australia in recent posted are hilarious and very inaccurate, most appear to be based on stereotypical insights, some outdated by decades. I'll never forget the first time I visited the USA and was asked by a few people I spoke with, do you know the Crocodile Hunter. Or those that were amazed we had our own currency, or that we didn't watch the Fox network, being the fountain of truth. Whilst my comments in this paragraph are also stereotypical, I hope it's a mirror image for some that seem to think we all throw shrimps on the barbie, drink fosters and chase kangaroos.

I can sympathize given what most people assume about the greater Detroit metro area.

And don't forget, ya'll have an Outback at every corner lol

The bloomin onion is the national dish

It's a beautiful game, wonderfully done, it'

Actually, legally, we are not.

It's amusing how every single "don't worry" or gaslighting post that everything is OK/normal happens to be from someone from Australia. Coincidence? You decide.

This actually sounds like fun.

I’ve seen the game in question with the huge bow in the play field, from the plastic top, or whatever separating from the wood.

Just because it doesn’t get talked about on pinside, doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen lol

As I mentioned previously you make false statements. Then you turn it around to a business model issue.And it really shows your ignorance.

Does anyone have a link? Would be nice to know potential issues.

Why aren’t we talking more about this? What a delicious treat. I have no idea if it’s Australian but whoever devised it is a mad genius.

I have also seen and played on a game with a playfield that had bubbled in the middle. It isn’t a one off you’re talking about.
Edit: It wasn’t mine.

Aussies, are you going to let Kaneda talk that way about Haggis and Damian?! Attack!

https://www.facebook.com/KanedaPinballPodcast/videos/237245956137033

Not even Damian wants to deliver a statement about all this. The "Aussies" you're speaking to are just more consumers and enthusiasts caught in the middle. Those that should be making statements...simply aren't.

Disagree. Several Aussies on here have attacked anyone that asked simple questions or showed any concern. Gold1 even attacked an owner selling a Mermaid, chastising them as a "Flipper", etc. This was a customer and someone who actually supported Haggis.. and THEY were the bad one, while absolving every single issue or concern about Haggis and Damian as "OK".

Screenshot 2024-02-12 at 11.45.31?PM (resized).png

You aren't wrong about a select few, but you are unfairly generalizing the rest of the Australians just caught in crossfire with your statement.

I think, semantics aside, the community would just prefer to hear direct from the horse's mouth at this point. The question is "When will we?" Or even "Will we?"

^
I came here to give everyone an update and....wow!

Could I have already made a video and blasted or "called them out" as you say? Yes. I could have easily thrown a tantrum, brought up questions, and demand they answer me. But, I understand they don't owe ME anything. They technically don't have to tell me or anyone....anything. Now on the other hand I do understand they do owe those that have submitted deposits though. Which is why I have in fact reached out to Damian and urged him to give everyone an update. I'm not saying I provoked it, but he plans to release an update "later this week". What this update will be - I don't know. We shall see how it goes. I hope this info gives some of you ease of mind (for now).

georgia - You're better than that. I bid you good day, sir!

Looking at the Pinside Mermaid Fathom machine details I read that 91 Pinsiders own the machine, 105 on other pinsiders wishlists and 5 at locations.Clearly machines have been made.Can one assume that there are a good number of non pinsiders that also own the machine?Or do we think there are 105 fully paid Pinsiders that are waiting for their machine to arrive?For the detractors out there perhaps contact all the wishlisters as they are listed to find out.

I paid in full last November still waiting