Can we get an update on the status of FAST and their efforts with John?

I've never been to John's studio, but I've heard it's huge and full of cool gear. CNC machines etc. I'd say your ball park for tools and equipment is probably low.

Why wait? MGC is coming up...

Yeah I wanted to use an absolute minimum. And if using that minimum assumes he's buying everything at garage sales and liquidation auctions still makes things look bad, the true situation is much worse.

I don't think the FAST thing is going to happen.

That's a boatload of LEDs for a few prototype games.

At one point, Zidware was buying production quantity parts for both MG and RAZA. That's about the point in time where the trouble started.

I think if John shows up at any major show before giving the people who have money into the games any real time frame update on when you will be seeing your games, he is asking for a confrontation in a public setting. One that will most likely not be pretty.

If he does show with out any update, especially to advertise his company or games, dude has waaaaaaay bigger balls than I have. I'd be worried that if I had over a million dollars of peoples money and I had not delivered the goods that said money had purchased that I'd all of a sudden find Chris Tucker standing over me doing this.....

You had grabbed my spot after I bailed. I remember your posts talking about getting out after the hurricane. I didn't realize that you never got a refund. That's bad enough, but even worse under those circumstances.

I'm guessing that most owners don't want to see a run on the bank. Yet, behind the scenes, quietly, I bet a lot of owners have requested a refund. Undoubtedly without a response. So chances are that a run on the bank has already occurred.

How long ago was that?

This is the only conclusion.

Strikes me as an opportunity for one or both to raise the needed capital. Set up a dunking both and make it $5 a throw, or go for the big money and set up a boxing ring and let folks take swings at them for $50 for two minutes. Bet there would be a long line.

Not my impression that Jpop is budget conscious as far as equipment, etc.

While the $100K seems high, the $1500/month seems low. Four 10x10 storage lockers in Chicago run me a $1000 month (with limited power, etc.) and that is cheap by Chicago standards.

I think there's still hope that there is a big pile of cash because JPOP has the kook factor that breaks the norm.. I.e., the Scrooge McDuck angle i personally feel is still viable. The first story of not paying a helper on MG I heard when BHZA was announced. So either he was out of money way back then, OR this is just his MO. The whole putting the translate away at expo cause people got cameras out was the biggest flag for me that the guy has some serious issues.

Some people eventually see what others see.

You just can't believe everything you hear and see from pinball manufacturers, IMHO.

Around May, 2013.

Sucks to hear cointaker got left in the wind.
I do want them to release the Spinz flashers for sale they and Jpop developed.
I'd order about 20-30 of them.

Damn this post about the cash and vendors looks amazingly similar to a PM from last night.
I'm really glad/relieved you posted this though.
Most of you probably don't know that this cointaker news isn't new to everybody. Nothing has been publicly said about it out of politeness concerning airing others dirty laundry. More specifically, publicly talking about Chris' business.
I think now we need full disclosure, to show everybody what a piece of shit John is, whether he has any cash left or not. And I don't want to hear any crap about oh John is so sensitive, we have to walk on egg shells around him. That's part of the problem that got us where we are today.

I know he never intentionally set out to rip people off, but at this point it really doesn't matter if he had. I've seen so many scams from my dealings on high end video games and let me tell you guys he has been following the playbook to a T. Lie, stall, always talk in circles so your lies don't come back to bite you in the ass, rinse and repeat.
In every situation I have seen, it takes a group of people getting together to compare stories to start getting the truth out there, which is what has finally started to take place.
I've been in the same frame of mind as ykpinballer. None of this has financially added up for a long time.
How ironic how John was going to usher in a new era of pinball and as it turns out he has been more detrimental to pinball and the community than anything ever before.

I can't think of how to say this without being really dickish, so just excuse my bluntness:

I think a lot (most?) of people kind of expected this one to fail. It was just too mad scientist, too weirdly limited, too expensive, too shrouded in secrecy.

I don't think a failure at this point, if that's indeed what we've reached, is really as big a disaster as what's going on with Skit-B and Predator. I mean, it sucks for everyone who paid Jpop for sure, but I don't see him dragging down boutique pinball. Just maybe the segment that's about hugely expensive and very limited projects.

Kevin's lies and deceit are much more evil. Larger scope, more modest goals, it was "pinball for the people", and now it looks like it's going down in flames, and badly.

I'd argue that's the more painful blow, in the bigger picture.

Either way, trusting these models where you pay up years ahead of time is hopefully a thing of the past, it's just a recipe for tears. If you want to build a pin, then do it, on your dime. Don't sell anyone anything until that at least is done.

You have a good memory RobT.

http://www.pinball.com.au/special-products/steve-ritchie-interview-part-1/

I think the comments in this interview apply more than ever.
edit:
STEVE: Oh, World Cup. World Cup was taken over.
MARK: It wasn’t a bad pin, it’s still all right, actually we still operate it.
STEVE: In the end it turned out to be pretty Ok, but in the beginning it was handled by a newbie. The game designer was a stubborn newbie, and it had to be taken over by someone else.

I think you are forgetting a lot of JPop's lies as well. They are a similar stripe, but Kevin was promising something in a tempting price range so may have gotten more people who can't afford to lose the money.

I think that is the difference between the 2. Look at how many predator buyers were buying their first nib. I won't be happy losing my money but there is a difference in buyers between the 2 projects.

I'm not taking your comment as dickish, so no worries there. In fact I would normally agree with you about this project failing except I, like others have said, felt this would be the project to succeed due to John's prior experience.
As for the secrecy part. It wasn't supposed to be that way for the owners! Part of the sales pitch was that we would be part of the entire process every step of the way.
Normally I would have never considered doing a pre-order. This was supposed to be my "one and done" NIB purchase. I bet on the wrong horse, which really adds insult to injury for me because I'm the type of person that rarely even buys lotto tickets.
I didn't even take the Skit-B game into consideration because honestly I had no idea what was going on in that camp. I'm to wrapped up in my misery over this to even want to read more bad news for the people in on Predator. I made my own assumption a while ago that they didn't have the rights to produce what they have been showing, but never really knew if it was a correct assumption.
This whole fiasco has definitely left me bitter, even if I would get my game or preferably a refund. Others have also said the same and I'm sure the Predator people feel equally the same. It doesn't matter to me if it's 17 grand or 500 bucks, it's too much money to piss away.

The problem is people not understanding the reality of his experience.

His best games were made as a designer with a full fledged support team, computer hardware, parts, musicians, programmers - and a full fledged manufacturing factory.

Without that infrastructure, he has never proven he was capable of making a pinball machine....post Williams he had Zizzle games and a shitty iPhone app. Plus, the economics of the project never made sense. He took advantage of pinheads throwing money around during "Rare Pinball Fever" (MM, MB, AFM, BBB, TronLE, ACDC BIBLE, etc) without any realistic manufacturing gameplan.

Don't worry, I'm sure his lawyer will show up any day now and tell everyone that everything is fine.

Buffalo grove is high in general, city isn't much better. Streamwood is remarkably cheap ($1.16/sq ft). here's one for $1600/month nearby Zidware for 1400 sq feet (granted JPOP's warehouse may be twice this size), even at $3k/month that's still only $36k/year in rent.
http://www.loopnet.com/xNet/MainSite/Listing/Profile/Profile.aspx?LID=18997593&LinkCode=31653&FromPPPP=true

And that there's a waiting list!!!

My storage units are in west Loop, not BG.

Not sure that listing is typical of that area, not that it matters. John probably has 5 times that amount of space -- again, not that it really matters.

Big time Ditto's !!!! dead on !! this is exactly how I feel

Exactly! So with his experience he should, should mind you, know what he needed to get outsourced, hire people to do for him, etc.
Also according to what he has told us, he does have a manufacturing game plan. It's just nobody added in the nutball factor and the probable cash burn.

We got 5000 wanna be comedians on this forum but that right there got a good laugh out of me.

Edit: Better add kudos for this one too.

After the expo fiasco with the empty cabinets, he wrote a letter to everyone and mentioned his difficulties concerning "others in the business".

I once theorized that it might be Stern playing hardball, but I now see that Popaduik has a bad reputation which spread through word of mouth, and that he is too delusional to see that he is his own worst enemy.

And I quote him (from last October):

"Pinball unfortunately is a “cut-throat” business for those behind the curtain. I have been threatened, stolen from and otherwise been hindered at many junctures from others in the business. My lawyer and I are amazed."

Yep, all his problems are caused by other people.

I personally don't see a huge difference in scale between 250 predators and 125-50-ish JPOP Games. Sure, JPOP's are more expensive, and thus has presumably a wealthier client list, but either company failing will be pretty devastating, and any one failing greatly increases the likelihood of the other to fail. I don't think it's a coincidence that after Kevin released his "Not the license I thought I had" letter and that thread turned 100X more pessimistic, that the recent optimism in this thread almost completely evaporated at the same time. You can't let a rabbit shit in your cocoa puffs and still expect to enjoy your breakfast (Eddie Schtulman excluded).

This Hobby is a closed ecosystem. You burn 125 or 250 buyers, that has repercussions throughout the entire hobby. You can't just burn up a million dollars of pinball pre-order money playing pretend pinball manufacturer and not cause lasting harm. How many other projects and companies will now suffer because no one wants to trust an indie anymore, even if they do finance development on their own dime? Will other pre-order projects that might make it experience a run on the bank after this? How many people will get fed up with this hobby and take their disposable income to some other hobby?

I agree with you, I think no new company going forward will be able to get away with the interest free financing afforded to these early boutiques, and I think that is a good thing. But in a scenario where JPOP implodes and SkitB's games somehow get made, I don't think the hobby is better off because only a supposedly richer customer base gets burned.

This is why I bet on Zidware. I didn't know about John's bad reputation, if it was bad back then, and I figured he would know better than most how much is involved in making a pinball machine.

John really presented a polished sales/owners package. NDAs, schedules, big contract. This wasn't at all like Predator sending money to a paypal account in the ether somewhere.

I definitely bought into his Williams pedigree, which he was puffing out for full effect. There was the promo/concept video which even that was nice.

I can honestly say I had not considered for 1 second that I might never get my game. The only thing I was worried about was the NOW OR NEVER option, that if I didn't buy in I'd lose my chance (at a price I'd be willing to pay).

I talked to John, he told me his MG prototypes were almost done and he'd have those finished by Spring '13. I knew MG was a key factor, there is no RAZA without MG, but he convinced me that everything was on course.

I can't remember when, but after a while the blog continued to show stuff that was "concept", he was still exploring ideas when things should be final. Then the original release date of Q4 2013 came and went and we never even had a machine to look at.

I had followed WOZ, and as delayed as it was, Jack was out there at shows, people were playing it, it was getting mixed reviews at the time from being so early but at least there was a machine.

Today we still don't even have that.

Reminds me of quote: "The common denominator in all your failed relationships is you". Its supposed to be a joke

I dont think stern or other boogy men give a shit what john is doing.. Any slights against him are in his head.. He's probably confusing intent to harm him with lack of accommodation/patience

And he had somebody setting deadlines and making sure shit got done in a timely manner.

I know that Churchill has a contract with Stern, and they can't do business with other companies because of it. But that's not an excuse, there are dozens of cabinet makers out there, and I don't see charlie or Jersey Jack having issues getting cabinets and shipping pins.

Cabinets seem to be the one thing he's got under control.

The one thing he doesn't have is a final hardware/software system. But I guess it was the programmer's fault for leaving him, had nothing to do with John (not paying him), all part of the conspiracy.

I think they were generally more realistic in terms of their game - DMD, no plastic ramps, lots of stock parts, etc. Gave themselves deadlines & stuck to them. They had a flippable whitewood before they got to art. They didn't spend years on art. And...BEN! Ben not just a mad scientist in his head - he's incredibly productive and multi-talented....and he'd already built a few games on his own.

There are probably some more reasons they pulled it off- but those are the ones off the top of my head.

To be clear I wasn't saying "welp, the rich people can afford it, lol!"

I just meant that John's vision was always a bit pie in the sky. Very few people could make the pitch he was and get away with it.

Skit-B though kind of represented "obtainable" pinball. The whole homebrew, anyone could do this if they just try thing. Not crazy expensive, and a bit of a model that seemed more realistic.

It's not a good thing that either would fail. But I feel like Skit-B's failure could have a bigger impact on the future of boutique pinball.

Frankly I'd rather that both projects somehow made it, and that at the very least people were able to get most of their money back. But it feels like we're reaching a tipping point there.

Not sure if I agree with that.

How is Kevin, who is nothing more than a pinball hobbyist like the rest of us on this forum, failing at making and delivering a sub $5k pinball machine out of his garage, more of a negative impact on the future of boutique pinball vs a very well known pinball designer, who made some of the highest ranked pins ever while working for B/W and has a high level of pinball experience and cashed in on his reputation by asking $18k and $10k also failing?

Seems to me that logic would have said Kevin would be much less likely to be able to come through than JPop.

Yep, especially when you combine them. Both high end and low end "boutiques" failing is bad for the hobby. Throw in a sprinkling of TBL license issues, and a tipping point has probably been reached. Hell, might as well add the difficulty that JJP has had getting pins out the door in a timely manner as well. Or PPS for that matter.

I hear that making pinball machines is hard.

In this world, some dudes are "get it done" guys, and the majority are not.

Simple as that.

Some people will work 7 days a week to get to the end goal ... Most would rather go fishing.

Sounds like JPOP pulls the hours (so he says) but without any direction, no end goal will ever be met.

rd

Lol!! And great tasting beer it was too.

Look, I don't want to be the guy who says "told ya" but even two years back, the reality of the skitB guys making 100s of pinball machines in their spare time in a basement just wasn't a reality. There was no way that was ever going to happen. Same with JPOP, I don't know the guy but the reality of a really fussy, anal retentive guy somehow pumping a heap of machines out of a unit somewhere wasn't overly likely to happen either.

Hopefully (I mean that sincerely) they do get made, but they'll need to be made by Stern, JJP or Spooky if anyone is ever getting one delivered.

rd.