Try tucking your chin in for the picture and if that doesn't work, try jutting it out next time (chin foreward, forehead slightly back). One of those two will usually get you a hat and/or patch.

Yeah, good points. I think JJP wants to focus on building games similar to Wonka in terms of slightly lower build costs and releasing two games a year.

i have been waiting for the code update just so i can finish wizard mode. i rarely play the machine anymore cause there is no wizard mode. Bolted to the floor, i don't know anymore.

That is the missing piece to me. There really isn’t that one awesome shot like killing Smaug, there isn’t the tough but attainable end epic adventure like LOTR. It is just solid pinball with a theme that for me was just ok. Don’t get me wrong, it is a masterpiece. But not sure I won’t eventually part with it.

Haven't posted regarding my game for a good while.

I started following the POTC thread way back in fall 2018. I read about the fixes, made sure to know what I was getting into, then decided to jump in and purchase around February 2019.

I got my game in March, waited for my Cliffys to arrive, then started to read about playfield issues.

Over the course of the past year, I've waited to gather as many protective parts, Cliffys, starposts, mylar rings, etc, and finally went in last night to finish up with mods, protective star posts, and the updated Cliffys.

I have only 100 games played on my POTC.

Last night upon first inspection, I found dimples scattered around the lower third of the game, the kind I expected on a routed game, with 1000's of games played on it monthly.

When taking apart the sling under the Pearl, a giant ring was under the star post, two other smaller ones under the regular posts. Later I found large ripples under the washer for the guiderail, then even an indentation under the metal rail right next to the Pearl VUK.

I know this isn't new info, I prior replaced the sling posts, seeing rippling there, as well as had a tear near the shooter lane. But I guess for me, I felt I staved playing my game, for nearly a year now, and felt I was doing so to prolong my game for decades to come.

Last night felt pretty heart breaking frankly, to realize nothing I can do to protect my favorite game of the last three decades, will help alter the complete state of fuckdom that this playfield has placed this entire game into.

It's just disheartening, disgusting, and saddening. And it all comes back to this cursed playfield, that all of us Pirates owners have to deal with.

Nothing much else to do at this point. This entire time I could have been playing daily. Instead I chose to find as many bandaids as possible, to place on a gaping wound, across an entire bleeding body.

This fucking sucks.

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That does suck. One thing you could do is you know... have it cleared properly like many of us do with our favorite games

Horrible

Did you contact JJP to get your "free" play field

Back in June, after my tear. No updates on that front.

I think last night I came to realization, no matter what I do, this entire game, wherever anything was basically screwed, bolted, nutted down, there will be damage. Just feels like it's a wreck, no matter what I've tried. I hate a late run game too, end of January.

I honestly have to think most games are akin to my example. That when you start looking under rocks, there'll be worms to find. Ooey, gooey, mushy ones at that.

For basically a brand new game, this feels tarnished.

Read the Yelobird thread on repairing clear coat pooling. A number if not most POTC playfields are no different than yours when posts/guides are removed and looked at closely. You can fix it up to look fine and prevent further damage by “ironing” down the pooling and applying Mylar.

Not saying it’s right that anyone should Have to do this repair but having done close to 40 Playfields now from various brands I have yet to have a single person come back to say the solution didn’t work or came back. Just did a Wonka last week took less then 15 minutes and the damage was completely gone. Solution fits under the sucks to Have to do it but it sucks worse to simply be bothered by it forever and watch your game get worse. But that’s just me.

Hello fellow Pirates! Check out what I did with Scott’s awesome galaxy plastic! I drilled a few holes, did the cut out for the star map connection and bam! They match perfectly and I kept the original parts in the game. I even painted the screw heads! Awesome job Scott!

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Folk still keep gossip about Pirates coming back. If Jack put out a statement saying the company has banned more of it ever for all time, as part of the bylaws, people would still say bullocks it's just about when the company gets dissolved but it's coming back

Great news, iepinball is streaming 1.02 beta code.

IEPinball (@troz) streaming v1.02 beta code right now on Twitch. Some very cool new stuff!

Wow wow wow!

https://www.twitch.tv/iepinball

I only saw Marty being played tonight. Marty now spawns gold like it's going out of style! YUGE amounts but only in single point value coins. Typical well played and LONG Karl DeAngelo game.

For those interested: Karl to stream again this coming Fri evening on Twitch and feature other characters' new benefits.

Mine looked pretty good until I pulled up the Tortuga scoop and found paint lifting. Starting to think that there is no such thing as a perfect one if carefully inspected. The one I looked at a couple of weeks ago in Portland, huo billed as “immaculate,” had tons of issues. Here’s what I found under the scoop. Cliffy covered things nicely though. This got me a replacement playfield, at least that’s what Jack said, but still waiting. My approach was just to play it and have fun, but it’s worth looking in order to have a replacement.

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I had to be up at 4 am so didn’t get to watch much. Did he mention anything about the final wizard mode being in game or any bug fixes?

I loved the CE over the LE due to obvious reasons, wish I would have bought 2, sold one and not had much $ into the game....Crazy prices, but that CE with the Topper, no Johnny Depp and side art just looked Awesome.

Oh Well....I heard that it was too difficult too build and costly and they won't make them again....

LE owner, and I would never sell mine, but it would be nice if they did make them again as to guarantee parts will always be available.

I didn't catch any info on these in what I saw.

Noticed this AM that Skipnatty/Buffalo Pinball also has a beta code stream recorded on Twitch. Jersey Jack was in chat too so more good info available there.

Not yet.

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Once licensing expires I don’t see them renewing with Disney, especially with the Depp issues.

Any chance for a brief summary of code updates? Is it just character tweaks, or are there any base game changes?

Does anyone have a list they could share of the beta code changes?

Characters, some bug fixes, you can switch characters after 20 pirate target hits, motion detection attract mode call outs, (wifi updates maybe), and they said this is just some of the changes for the next update.

So attract mode callouts but no pirate jingle?

Some rendering changes for chapters, added light show intro for stranger tides, arr frenzy can be played more than 2 times...

Sounds like some great polish! Good to hear that more is coming along with the super wizard mode.

Best day EVER!

Your on! But loser donates the $$ to Pinside.

Link is here if you want to see the video: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/540288858

Holy crap that is a lot of stuff! I like the idea of changing characters. This game is never going away!

That can definitely change your strategy, even competitively.

Lmao so minor changes took 9 months. Maybe next year we will get a final wizard mode

Edit* Love the downvotes. Keep em coming. Nothing I saw was anywhere close to a major update. Still no final wizard mode that was supposed to be in an update 9 months ago. Some better chapter start graphics you know because the 480p stuff they had wasn’t very good to look at. I’ll say the attract mode call outs are the most exciting thing and that should have been done long ago

Struggling to light just one of the one of the thin lights ( 5 of ) over the multiball square lights at the bottom near the flippers. Do I need to just get 5 x chapters of a certain colour, or do I have to also qualify ie get all the characters in one chapter x 5 ???

It just wasn't in the build they gave the beta testers. It's probably there in the code update, but the beta testers weren't given access to it. It's going to take a hell of a lot of setup to get to and even light the wizard mode, so they are probably testing that in house with cheat settings to start Break The Curse at game start for instance so they don't have to go through all that setup each time to test that mode.

If your giving out software for a beta test it should include all features (of said beta). This would create a situation where your beta testers say everything looks good then they push out update with other features as well that break the features the out of house guys said was good. The final wizard mode should include a little bit of everything. Or at least some reference to the 5 chapters. So the out of house guys say that the “normal stuff” looks good. The in house guys test the wizard mode and are happy but when you put them together a bunch of bugs pop up. Happens all the tome with software but is why developers allow you to run beta code. Bugs arenot found when you have 3 special people testing something. Bugs are found through brute force of thousands of users stress testing a program. You can also look at game developers. They give their game away for free months before release for stress testing and bug reporting to everyone (normally only for a few days). This gives them hundred of thousands instances to check code and fix anything major/minor. If new code is only in a few people’s hands you can believe there will be bugs some possibly game changing

They are likely still completing the final wizard mode code and doing their initial tests and tweaking. Last spring they had to put this update development on hold for other priorities set by management. In other words, providing complete code to Wonka and #6 (GNR). It appears that most of what beta testers are playing with is code made before that break. Most people will never reach the final wizard mode, so this gives more time for finding code exploits and bugs that they can tweak. They have told the beta testers that there are many more updates coming for us to test - likely primarily for wifi update stress testing.

I think that giving us wifi beta testers a perk like this (maybe to keep us interested) is a great thing for them to do. No one that is testing is complaining that they didn't give us the final wizard. We'll help them out with what they want us to test. That's what we signed up and volunteered for. And it's a helluva lot of fun!

Back to doing my part

Well I mean its fine that you will never get to the final wizard mode, but I will. I have been withing a few shots more than once. I'm not a beta tester but I have tested glass off what happens when you complete that 5th wiz mode. Nothing and at that point there is nothing to do. I had 1500 plays when .99 came out and have almost 2k on current update with very little play past couple months at least. Is what I'm really hearing is we are going to have to wait a lot longer for something that was promised months ago for a feature that we did not ask for. When #6 is announced at or around TPF that will be their concentration. No one that is testing is complaining out not having the final wizard mode is because they get to play with the (imo lackluster) new features (for who knows how long). Btw how exactly are you stress testing wifi with only a few users? Did all 10 of you download at once?

When this exceeds the 3+ years that it took to deliver the Ghostbusters wizard mode LISTED ON THE RULE CARD since day one, you will have every right to complain.

Whining about something missing you can only get to with the glass off is a little extra.

ok enough is enough. For all you that keep assuming I cannot do this. I will have 5 Wizard modes completed in 1 game by Sunday. Not sure how its hard to understand losing interest when ive been 2 chapters and 1 wizard mode away and know what lies beyond. Is there any special rules you would like to impose? Ive said before send me the streaming equipment and I will attempt to stream (live in country so internet isnt the greatest) this game for you. If not ill have a picture by Sunday.

*Edit Anybody know the first time they said game would be feature complete at launch?

Did you try this method? Thanks much for bringing that thread and suggestion up!

I read the full four pages of that thread, thank you so much for all your input there, by the way!

So things seem pretty solid for this method, even months down the road?

I did place mylar over the sling areas, under the posts. Is there an easy way to remove that, to try this technique under those posts? (Along with several others I didn't mylar.) I know in the past I've seen people use an aerosol type of freezing spray.

Yes, I did it on numerous posts and under some guides across the playfield and it came out nearly perfect. It’s surprisingly easy and effective. The clear readily softens and flattens down. From my experience and everything else I’ve read, it also further cures the clear preventing the pooling from returning. Not sure installing mylar over the repaired areas is necessary (unless there is already chipping) but can't hurt. If you don’t address the pooling, it will eventually crack and chip.

When this exceeds the 3+ years that it took to deliver the Ghostbusters wizard mode LISTED ON THE RULE CARD since day one, you will have every right to complain.

This is not a hard concept to grasp for most people.

People have “every right to complain” about the length of time between updates whenever they feel like it’s been unreasonably long, not just when you give them the green light to do it. If you think comparing the length of time between POTC updates to one of the worst examples out there (Ghostbusters) is the measuring stick then that’s fine for you. But others aren’t required to use that as their barometer and can decide for themselves.

Also this isn’t about just the final wizard mode. Saying there’s no reason to complain about the lack of updates because most people won’t get to the wizard mode completely ignores the fact that there are plenty of things to fix & tweak without including the wizard mode. And the current wizard modes could use a lot of polish. And again, if you want to compare POTC code status now to the relative completeness of code on other machines that’s fine for you, but I (and I’m guessing at least some other people also) can look at it differently without needing to get your clearance.

Fact is it’s been almost 9 months of no update AND no communication by JJP. I think it’s pretty reasonable to think that’s not good regardless of what the situation has been with other games.