Disclaimer: I am a big fan of JJP and I sold my Woz especially to get this machine: A truly limted version of WoZ. My monkey worked always great (and I had every version of WoZ there is) and I was just waiting on this presentation to be able to order.
But just like with Pirates they are going backwards. Taking out the monkey. Of course an animation on the screen is more reliable than a mechanical toy. But that for me is just the thing. Pinball is not on the screen, it is on the playfield. I look enough at screens already all day.
Just as with the rings and the chest not closing on POTC, this is just something they cannot do. If Jack came out and said: it is too expensive I would respect that much more. Now he just blames the engineers that they cannot engineer a magnet that goes up and down an axl. If that is the truth, maybe their engineers should look at a 3d printer because that is all a 3d printer does. I do not buy that story. And an opening and closing a chest, come on guys, like that has never been done before...
I get the feeling that Jack does not care so much anymore as he used too. I remember him from the times that I met him as a very enthousiastic guy that had passion for what he was doing. Trying to make better games than Stern in every way possible. I still like the machines very much but I will not be getting this "new and improved" version.