I think the point is you can talk up WOZ without trashing Stern. Personally I like what Stern does and no matter what the bling a fast fun table is far from looking like garbage when plays like a diamond
Now to me WOZ will be an amazing table. Slow but a methodical shot and rule game. Hopefully epic in this way and therefore a unique gem.

Thanks a lot for posting this. Any chance you also filmed Gary's talk?

JJP hasn't yet proven his business model. If JJP is around in 5 years, then I think Stern would be more prone to criticism for not evolving more during their time without competition. If the JJP model is unsustainable, then Gary will have been proven a correct steward of his business which has lasted all this time. I HOPE JJP succeeds, but I'm real nervous for him and the investment taken.

Exactly.

I agree and so far have found good things about both companies and their current titles.

95% of all new businesses fail in the first 5 years, so everybody has to be realistic.

Williams almost went under several times and they had decades of experience.

First, off the edge is a bit of hyperbole. But, whatever.

Next, I was lamenting the inability of people to understand that licensing exists, and that NO ONE can just make any previously made machine without dealing with licensing, patent and IP issues.

Third, you didn't ever see me post before JJP existed in early 2011. I have done the great brunt of my posting in the past 12-18 months around here.

Lastly, who the hell are you? And why should I care, again? JJP fanboys are such a detestable lot. Garbage? Really? And you defend that assertion - oh, just that it LOOKS like garbage - I see. I post less and more negatively because of this exact phenomenon. I come here to read how a machine that is a year late and doesn't exist, hasn't been played or even seen in final form, has had multiple issues with playability in the few instances it was brought into a public arena, and now is being released to maximize dealer investment is turning Stern and A-List B/W machines into worthless garbage. Ludicrous. JJP fanboys have gone tattletelling to Jack on members here, caused absurd legal threats to be thrown around the community - public and private, have done some detestable things in the name of protecting JJP's good name around here, and have personally caused me concern and grief in my personal life. Over a pinball machine that doesn't exist yet. You liked me before? Well, tough. I like the community as a whole less. Shame on us all, I guess. But those of you on the other side won't fess up to doing anything, so it doesn't matter.

gambit, take it private, the thread was on track and all you did was derail it. Please refrain from attacking in a thread. I know he made comments directed toward you but you were pretty negative and you have been involved with that stuff before. Simple PM them or simply let it go.

My point before was just like some of the others said, we can talk up one machine without trashing another.

Sit so well with who? The people spending stupid money for those titles? I could give a flying fig if their "investment" in a pinball machine didn't pan out.

Sign me up for nib AFM and MM!!

Would be interesting if JJP decides to reproduce some old B/W machines, however I don't think it would be as easy as pushing a button. A significant amount of cash and time needs to go into something like that and who would they be really be doing it for? Why do something that has already been done to appease the collector? The bottom line is how much money they will make by doing it? The only way I can see it working is if they take an old title and totally re-vamp it to use the new JJP platform. Most people would probably consider that a new game and not a re-make however.

Stick it, Abso. You are as bad as the rest of them, mod or not. You learn to be objective, or recuse yourself from commenting to me.

I was speaking rhetorically, thus simply postulating an argument. As I eluded to, for someone not already owning an AFM or MM then the chance of owning a nice, new one for around half the current value would be great (as you noted). I do not agree, though, that people who bought an AFM or MM at market value in the last few years would be so cavalier in their attitude about not being even able to get their money back if they sell (I am not even talking about making a profit).

For what it is worth, I do agree that one should buy reasonably (at market value) and enjoy their purchase, not just sit on it and hope it accrues in value (I play my pins).

I do not know, Gambit, that is a bit rough. For example, I could have bristled when you were, as I read it, in essence calling me ignorant for not being versed in IP and relative laws (why should I be an expert in this? I am a professor of biology and geology, not a barrister). Yet I elected to let it go. Perhaps, then, others have a point you may wish to consider (let us see if you just yell at me as well for this)...

Surely everyone realizes that multiple pin producing companies will be good for the overall good of the game. As long as they continue to produce high quality entertaining games, they will only increase the demand and eventually could lead to new business models popping up on pin/arcades...

So on that note, are there any updates on when JJP may start producing and shipping?

I have a history with this guy, and he knows all about what I mean. I grow frustrated when over and over and over we see the same threads and conversations, suggesting that " __________ company should build MM/AFM/MB/CC, etc.... again", talk about the ramifications and hurdles, and how almost impossible it would be, talk about Wayne/Rick/Gene, and put it to bed.

Ignorance is merely the absence of knowledge. But I don't need knowledge of IP and patent law to know that Chevrolet can't start making defunct Ford designs. Or that Stern or JJP can't just fire up the line and produce MM or MB or any other existing title, without stepping on someone's toes. If you consider this explanation yelling, then we have simple differences in conversational issues.

sure, i understand. i wasn't trying to criticize your point...but more the idea that people might ge bent out of shape. And i think the answer to that really is, who the hell cares? With some exceptions, I highly doubt that ANYONE who can drop $10K+ on a MM needs to be felt sorry for financially.

The shortsighted view here isn't taking into account that these machines already exist. There are at least 2500, maybe as many as 3500+ MMs in private collections right now. A lot of those have been restored and changed hands multiple times as the market has exploded. That said, a lot of would-be MM buyers already have one. Any pinball manufacturer that want to re-run a machine, does so already in the hole. Would JJP sell quite a few MM's (even if they could buy up the rights)? Sure. But how many more machines would they sell of another theme? If you are looking at the next best option, as any profitable manufacurer always has to do, in this case, the next best option always sells more and makes more money.

This idea worked for BBB, merely because there were so few BBBs produced vs. those that wanted a BBB in their gameroom. And because Gene was limited to a small number, based on parts availablity. Same goes for Kingpin. Maybe CC could draw enough interest, but I have my doubts there, as there are still hundreds of them out there. JJP isn't looking to sell 500 of any one title. They want to sell 5000, 10,000, etc.... Can't get there with thousands of machine in existence already.

Plus, for those suggesting that JJP reproducing MM would crash the value of original MMs, tell me what Gene's reproducing BBB did to the value of the original BBB build.

Everyone is entitle to their opinions. No harm in folks wishing. That said, time will tell. geezzz

My opinion is that you should drive all 11 of your machines to my house and give them to me for Christmas this year. Am I entitled to my opinion? Of course. Are you going to tell me why my opinion isn't particularly valid? Probably. Can I wait and wish and hope that you gift me all of your collection? Yep. But I can wish in one hand and crap in the other, and time will tell which is going to get filled first.

Good point, but that was a very limited run.

Because arguing over this is pointless and will change nothing. And as for my collection, that's a wish not an opinion, but anything can be had for a price.

Well, if JJP can manage to sell 10,000 MMs NIB - hypothetically - and there are 3000 original Williams MMs out there in private collection, and of those 1500 or so are collector quality.......I think that the originals are always worth more. Repros are never the more valuable in any hobby, and pinball would be no different. I don't care if they get re-run or not. I own an original, and would rather have an original than a repro.

No worries, as I do not consider this yelling nor did I before with my comment.

In regards specifically to IP and relevant law, I agree with your assertion about becoming more versed which is actually why I asked to begin with (well before your comment) so that I can hear a little more on the issue. If/when time would permit, it always a good idea to pick up solid resourced material to read on a subject one has interest in (in this case IP) as sometimes just looking at an issue logically will not work since there might be specifics to the region/country that have to be taken into consideration (nuance can be tough for the laymen).

Essentially, all there is to know is that Gene bought a bunch of parts and a few patents from B/W.

Wayne in Australia found his way into more parts and licensing rights - including the rights of 98% of MM parts, and the right to reproduce MM and other machines.

Planetary Pinball bought Wayne's B/W catalog, rights and parts repro rights a couple years back. They left Wayne only with the rights to reproduce MM, if he ever actually got them done. Planetary is subject to the 3rd party licensing rights and limitation of the original themes, however. For example, even though Planetary holds the rights to MB, they had to go to Universal and negotiate a new deal to reproduce parts and art that displayed Universal Monsters, as the original deal with Universal from B/W had lapsed.

Gene still has a few patents, and there is confusion and disagreement as to what rights, if any, he has to reproduce parts. Gene has reproduced PFs for B/W titles in the past, and has been challenged for doing so recently. Gene continues to promise more PFs being produced in the future, but there is a reason that he hasn't run anything new (or at least marketed them if he has), lately.

JJP has been licensed by Planetary to reproduce some B/W parts for use on JJP machines, and for sale.

Or not.

Stern has often said that there is only enough of a market to sustain a single company, and if another company entered the marketplace, only one company would survive.

Assuming Gary is telling the truth:

Jack's company gets a foothold and survives the 5 year new business curse. This takes the barely profitable Stern into the red. Stern's backers decide their money could be earning more elsewhere and liquidates Stern.

The pin public looses interest in Jack's next few games; Sound of Music, Mary Poppins, and La Cage aux Folles. Jack leaves pinball for the greener pastures of gambling devices and coin pushers.

You lost me right here...barely profitable, haaaaaaaahahahahahahahaaa! Stern is making money hand over fist with their stripped BOMs and doubled prices!!! Gary has laughed all the way to the bank at each new release. He just wants to continue the pinball making monopoly so he can keep raping buyers. With competition comes a choice for the consumer, which means adjust quality and/or price changes to stay in business. Everyone benefits (well, except Gary).

The likelyhood of JJP putting out old titles is slim. That said, I would buy them if the price point was right. Would rather see new unlicsened / original theme tables (see no movies, bands or superheros)

Got any proof of that statement?

Do you have a copy of their Tax return?

Stern is now run by an investment team. The money to hire that stable of top notch talent did not come from under Gary's mattress.

that was been said in an whole different "darker" pinball environment.. were stern has serious problems of keeping his own pinball business alive..

they were enforced to produce videogames from other companies along the lines, to keep the factory up and running. they did what they had to do back in that time.. and they succeeded to sustain in the business. Nice Job Gary.. i can remember all those Stern Bashers on RPG..

well those bashers are not been that rough anymore, i even think they have been pretty much all gone,. why? Stern earned their respect up by just being in the pinball business all that time, even when the economics were very rough, and offcourse by building up their own Pinball Quality during the course of the years that they are in business!

The World was cold back there.. when Gary told those lines in the above quotes..

but that is the past right now,cause pinball is back and is pretty healhty, they are of the Intensive Care.. sort of speak

as we have got 2 Serious Pinball Manufacturers at this time..

and an couple of pinball projects along,. the aftersale parts and mods market is pretty booming,.

pinball meeted new technology these days. think about the storm of LED's which we can put inside our games for instance

Plus there is an whole group of people, who tries to make cool Modifications..

like we have seen on TRON 'Arcade Cab Mod' By Eli or custom made toppers..

All of the Above wouldnt happen as it does so big right now if the Pinball World was indeed Cold as Gary told Jack when he just entered the Pin manufacturer club.

that is what im saying and we are definently in a pinball rise, and only god knows how far it will goes, i personally pray for an booming pinball explosion and see pinball back in the operator landscape as it was used to be.. i would love to enter an local pub, like i was used to when i was an kid.. and play some mean pinball among strangers, and get applauded by them for my good play i had so much fun back there.. pinball maded my childhood one of the best i could ever had

1 little story of mine about pins in the wild..

is that i mostly literally came back home with more cash in my pocket as a kid, then before i entered the pub, just by selling out my credit winnings to other fellow pinball players,.

anyway back to the subject.. once again, my opinion is there is definently room for other pinball manufacturers then just Stern anno 2012.

He said it during the release of Transformers, so it was not that long ago.

I'd love there to be 10 pinball manufacturers, all making money.

But I fear just like the crash of the Muscle Car market, this irrational exuberance may end - hope not too soon.

OPs are telling me that AC/DC is actually making real money; more than any game in over a decade. Thank you Steve Richie!

I can tell you the Pro at Jenkinsons wasn't making much prior to Sandy.

You made money and the location/operator didn't.

That pub still have pins ?

LTG : )

well i made some money out of it yeah,.

we are just talking about an couple of dollars in earning lloyd,

which was nothing in comparison to what the OP/Pubowner cashed in for their own pockets by having the pins.. but i had an smaller hand back there too, so i was pretty happy about my little earnings

plus i gave the money back towards pinball and thus the operator.. as the little bucks i earned, i spended it again to keep playing on other locations with other pins ''which was in most cases the same operator in the area i live in" so the operator didnt loosed any money on me actually.

plus it is nowadays an fortune 500 company, which manufacturers and operates Gamblingmachines and Touchvid games in the wild nowadays, so i dont feel any remorse about that..

then there is another story and also little 'secretly from my part' as i was an kid,. it was in the NON Euro money times.. we had an different currency back there.. the so called 'kwartjes' en 'guldens' has been called the coins for.

the Mechanical Coinslot Trick i have thought out and exploited on my own as i was an little ten year old kid back in the heyday of pinball 90's era with mostly empty pockets, but an very big appetite for pinball.. i pretty much accidently come up with it, as i was playing around throwing in quarters as i really wanted to let those pins work for my quarter instead of an dollar.. and at 1 time it just worked, i was surprised by it.. but maded me think about the exploit factor, if it can accidently happen, it can also be done on purpose right..

anyway the trick didnt work on electronical coin acceptators thou..only the mechanical ones

to trick about it back then with the coin mechanisms .. is to basically get an full credit play for the cost of an quarter which was offcourse an big deal for an little and youngh pinaholic like i was

i accomplished that by pushing the quarter (in dutch it was been called kwartje) coin with my thumb very hard on the downside of the mechanical coin slot, and what it did was basically flying/shooting the coin into the coinmechanism so hard that it sometimes accepted my quarter.. as an full dollar ' guilder in dutch' and give me full credit which it really shouldnt..

there was an catch as it sometimes flies so hard inside that mech..

that the coinswitch didnt had the time to register.. those were losses.. but that was the risk of it but still it was only a quarter to lose lol

And if it just didnt accepted the quarter it just spitted it back to the coin return to give it another shot.

in most cases it worked near the tenth coin attempt..and became very good at it as i pretty much mastered that exploit

ive often burned the upper layer of my thumb skin by trying so much.. but hey it was for an good cause which is a lot of pinballlll play

great and exciting times those were,And i pretty much grew up with pinball i have seen funhouse getting out of the box on the location and T2 and several others.. i will never forget those moments.

i should make my own thread about this.. now im spoiling this thread.. im sorry :$.. i will stop

Looks like Stern is making pins that are doing well. Here is a thread where an operator says X-men made close to a thousand bucks for October and he has a coin box full of quarters.

Here is the link: http://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/best-earning-stern-or-williams-to-date-guess-which-one

I realize that it all depends on location, location, location, but it doesn't seem like a bad ROI in today's world where location pinball is drying up. I also realize those earnings pale to other type of coin op and doesn't mean the return to the glory days. I'm just glad to hear operators doing well.

That's great for pinball!

So, so true. I loved when posturing for a threat came my way. Truth prevailed. I just wonder which sucka$$ fanboy tattled on me.

my apologies, guess I'm just a nobody with less karma than you, that knows NOTHING, doesn't own as many A-list pins as you, and will never own a grail MM like you.

I'm also someone that can't wait for WOZ to actually exist on location, and I guess i'm a little bit excited about it.

sorry again. let the rants continue

By the way... has anyone else noticed that this thread is titled with "Kevin" instead of "Keith"?

With this subject I think more about those who have dedicated their job/life to building Hi-end restorations for a living. I own a hi-end MM refurb, really not bothered if I make a mint or not...just love the game. If prices fall then the "art" of that part of the hobby will likely take a nose dive for the worse. Hate to see talent leave the hobby because of hi-volume competition. Just my 2 cents...

You can believe what you want; I have a hard time believing any op only cleans his games out once a month, and then goes and posts a picture of this fact on the internet.

As a former small time video op that would have been the furthest thing from my mind...

i personally do not want anyone to remake any existing title. they are all great but have been done. lets see something new. and someone please have the balls and brains to release an original,non licenced title.

this is the first ive seen or heard of this. very serious if true. gambit,can you provide proof of this? i would be very interested in seeing it.

Gambit, telling anyone (but especially one of the moderators) to 'stick it' leads to a (temporary) ban from the site. It's really simple, these guys help run this site in their spare time and I will not tolerate you or anyone badmouthing them. If you have a problem with one of the mods you can PM me and I will look into it. This is not up for discussion, I'm protective of "my" moderators because without them, this site would not run as smoothly as it does.

This wouldn't surprise me at all. Those companies read these forums too. Spreading disinformation about any company could lead to them suing you for slander or whatever the legal term is. The question is how far they are willing to take it, but you must realize that you are definitely not free on the internet (go ask these two tourists) Now, I haven't witnessed this personally (although the Pinside has received its fair share of legal threads) but I do know that some companies have been going after people hurting their name, and I must say I cannot disagree with them protecting their business.

Ah, back on topic! I couldn't agree more. It's time for something new, fresh, exciting! I would dig Wizard Blocks (or another pin2k concept) as it looked so promising, but the stuff we're seeing now from some of the new manufacturers is maybe even better: An lcd in the backbox? In the playfield? Or what about the player stats features of the new Predator? Full RGB led GI in WOZ? Take it to the next level, don't turn back - that's what I hope for. And doing it with an unlicensed title would be even better

Don't get me wrong, I still like playing the latest Stern games, but their latest games simply don't blow my socks off. They're fun games, entertaining and all, but not eye-popping, hair-raising or spine-tingling.

Mrproof, the answer to your question to me is yes.

Robin, do what you please. I have discussed this issue with other mods. You have a bully of a mod on your team. You might not like hearing that, but you do. If a new rule need to be written and you want to circumvent the ban vote system, of which I have none, then carry on.

Gambit, I was not asking you to challenge me, I was only reminding you that the mods are here for you too, doing this as a voluntary task and keeping the site free of spam, porn and other crap. Without them this forum would not run. So if anyone goes against them in their moderating role that is something I really don't enjoy seeing. Yes, I can circumvent the ban vote system and send someone off if I feel the need to do so but this privilege is normally only reserved to spammers.

Look, I don't wanna sound harsh, all I'm asking for is for everyone to respect the site rules and the moderators. If you feel the mods are doing something bad, something which has nothing to do with the site rules (i.e. using their moderator powers in wrong ways) then you can PM me and I promise to take your complaint serious. Telling a moderator to stick it is just not acceptable.

A dozen years ago Williams dumped me for a high roller in Vegas, so should I live in the past
or get on with my life? I love my Williams pins but last weekend at the SPF I had a blast playing Spiderman and Tron, they where a couple of the best pins there, so I don't understand the Stern bashing. Would we really prefer 12 years of zero pinball manufacturing? I wish JJP the best, there was excitement when they brought WOZ into the room and I enjoyed playing it, but it's not my kind of theme. If WOZ turns into a beautiful swan in 2014, is it necessary to stomp on peoples hopes because of the patents required? Last Saturday I asked Gary Stern if the end of the ACDC run could be Van Halen's and his reply was "they are what they are".So I figure the answer is, Hey, it's only pinball pal, BLEH!

i love pinball. yes, i know we all do. i like stern games.im very excited to play woz.i cant wait to see what the other new teams are coming up with. its all pinball and all good. if i put 2 years of my life into a project just to have the people im doing it for bash it and me i would have an axe to grind with them as well. i think those that continue to bash every new stern and or jjp have a choice. you can create a game that non pin heads will play,that pinheads will enjoy,that will make money on route and home buyers will want and can afford. or you can take your ball and go home and stop your whining.