patents yes, fees are fees. As far as lawyers, you'd be surprised what clients will take as payment, it's not always money.
Also John is one of the most frugal people I've met. While I won't deny rent isn't free (he probably could have developed a lot of this at home), and this timeline is ridiculous, don't think he's spending money like water.

Him running out of money is the nicest explanation for the stories of vendors not getting paid and refunds not being given out to those who ask. If he's sitting on cash and purposely stiffing people, that is a whole other issue.

If he's frugal AND has run out of cash, then that validates the concerns that the open-ended timeline is burning money, even if the lawyer is a pinhead doing it for fun, all those patents take time (which will cost money in a lot of ways).

Also doesn't address what will need to happen for John to defend the patents.

Vendor(s), believe it's just GLM at the moment saying he is owed money.
How much money? That's my question to GLM, if he wants to do the public route that fine but give us an amount.
Rather than try and have to defend his patent works before they're released he went the conservative approach and just didn't show them.
If you take the tour I'm sure he'll show you some neat stuff.

I've been contacted privately by others.

Okay I can't comment on that then

Do you believe all the cases are legitimate?
Cause I'm not even sure GLM's case is legitimate.

I don't think it's fair to ask glm about how much money his is owed. He's giving u some insight and he's got a great reputation. I think the info he's giving is more then enough. He doesn't have to air out dirty laundry.

The only answers when it comes to money u will get is how many more spots he has to bump up to get the game done. At that point u will know how much money is gone or left in the project

It's just odd way to go about posting is all...
You're upset and say you say you're owed money and post on a blog multiple times.
Great but don't tease let us know... Believe me if his posts held weight I would have inquired.

Note: I've used GLM products before and they helped me out. I'm not speaking about his products but rather his posts.

Funny the number I've seen is under 25 but you already knew that

Well, all I know for certain is I am a concerned customer.

There was also the reports of him looking for outside investors. If he was sitting on cash that would be unnecessary.

I'm going to state that I completely understand how he ran out of money, and that the project was more than he expected, and he's always chose to make a quality product ultimately for us. All of that can be true and can be dealt with.

The big issue here is the communication. That has nothing to do with patents. If he can change his business MO, he can still turn this around.

Most people are guessing the money on the first 21 games is about gone...so if he bumps it into the 40-50 game range like some people in the know say he's going to.. Then u know he needs another 400k+ to finish making them

I was not an original MG buyer, so I don't know what it feels like to have put my money at risk years ago only to see some people come in at the end and pick one up.

But I have to say, producing extra MGs may very well be the solution to avoid disaster here.

-Pays for BOM of all machines produced
-MGs hit the streets and the world gets to see them
-Boosts confidence of raza and alice buyers to see a game done and out the door.

Without that extra ~$400k from 25 MGs, where does the money come from to pay for production? There doesn't seem to be another way out of this.

So we guess fiction to facts now?
Wonder what his bank account looked like before he started?

I mean the rent on that building can't be too much
Especially since he's only had the expansion in for a few months

Or to at least to continue operating the way he has for another two years until it comes up again.

Exactly.......JPOP doesn't need anymore creativity or any more cheerleaders, what he needs is a Boss and a business mind, i.e. Forecasts, budgets, timelines, deadlines, money and an army to put these together.

Personally it wouldn't bother me at all if the number gets up to 50...but that's just me.
I don't speak for the other folks

I think it's more like 150-200. 50 only gets your R&D covered and that's being optimistic. The bulk of the cost is manufacturing the game.......Hence why Gary loves to say, "We are a pinball manufacturer". In the end that is where the costs are.

That's just ridiculous made up numbers bro.

I think what Gary said was that "Ultimately Stern is a manufacturing company" (to paraphrase)

I don't know man... I would think even more, but really I guess it's more based on the price per unit than the number of units.

That's also assuming anyone else would want to get involved at this point as well, which is ludicrous.

Where is Cousin Eddie when you need him?

I am assuming $16,000, which was the original price. Crazy how little people understand about business, i.e., labor, overhead, margins, materials and manufacturing. 150 units at 16,000 is only $2.4 million? We are 3 years into this project? How much do you think John is paying himself and others that are working for him? Do you know how much programmers bill an hour? Art work is cheap compared to programmers. The code alone on this machine will exhaust some serious funds. In the end his margins will be lower because of his small production run and the fact he has to outsource everything. Do you think that his first game will be without issues????

Hope he remembered to get Gary Sterns cable disconnected so he can't watch Mars Attacks!

Can you tell us how he responded? Your post does not convey much hope that you think he will address any of the concerns that have been put before him by his customers. At any rate, I would imagine that if he had any intention of correcting this, he would have done so by now.

John is quickly losing what little credibility he has left with the shenanigans he has been playing, as of late. I don't think he is taking any of this as serious as he should.

I'm agreeing with you, but saying that even 150-200 may not be enough, and unlikely he's getting even a handful to sign up to more now anyway. Seriously, $16k for a MG now??? Who the F is that stupid at this point - flat out! Not to mention all the pissed off original people, despite a few that might agree with it just to get it done, that will not be the consensus for all I'm betting.

It's hard to imagine anyone new signing up to ride the Titanic as it's sinking into the sea.

There needs to be a MAJOR change otherwise I do think you will see him going bankrupt in the near future. No one else will get involved, and *if* the money is dry, the project will be as dead as the horses being daily beaten here, along with everyone's vested interests.

Sad but true.

nothin

Exactly! On top of the ridiculous cash outlay, how long would anyone getting in at this point have to wait for games beyond #50. Another unknown is John's production capacity. I'd be willing to bet that if he could start production on MG today customer 51 wouldn't see there game for at least another two years.

I think John is working towards the goal that if he delivers a AAA game, everything that happened before then will become forgotten and forgiven. That might be true, but it could have been done different along the way.

Do you really believe this? If I were in on MG, and then I got MG and it was awesome, MAYBE. However, I'm in on RAZA. If he delivers an awesome MG, frankly that won't make me feel much different about my game. Good for the MG people, but I think it took RAZA and extra MG to even think MG could get finished (still might not). He has to make 3-5 times as many RAZA and he's not as far along. How is he going to fund those? Not to mention he'll be so tied up with the production aspect of MG that he probably won't have much time to spend worrying about RAZA. So, if he doesn't go bankrupt, it might be 10 years before I know if I'll see RAZA or not.

Not that I'd take this ride with Jpop again, but if I do get RAZA and it's awesome, then it'll probably be water under the bridge for me. But hey, I was in the original BBB group, so this isn't my first rocky pre-order ride. That said, I'm not anticipating this turns out as well for me as BBB did.

I believe he believes this.

I won't be pre-ordering again because this experience has sucked and is not fun. If that means I can't own a jpop game because they'll never just be available to buy after I can view and play a finished game, then I'll live. But no more pre-order fantasies.

I think John is handling things terribly at the moment, his communication could not be worse! That said my guess is that he is getting close to revealing MG to the world and when he does most of this will be forgotten (like when Stern screws us on code and then the masses line up to buy the next new game over and over). Everything is riding on MG at the moment! show an awesome game and a plan to get it built and I think he can salvage this situation.

We should take bets on whether the public sees it at expo. Nothing about this process has gone quick.

Understood. I was more responding to PDX who is clearly a cheerleader. It is very possible that JPOP would need to lower his price to get more buyers on board, which would require that he lower the price for everyone. How much of the $16,000 have buyers put down???? What a disaster.......

Well no, he's being optimistic, which you can't fault him for. We all want this to work, but you're going to get different opposing beliefs and positions on how to best deal with it from people directly in.

Although I don't believe in doing it, I'm gunna have to put you on ignore for a bit as your chicken little "sky is falling" posts are completely unhelpful! Maybe you can find an ambulance to chase around in your home town today.

^^ denial is obvious. "Put anyone on ignore who does not say I am getting my game."

In fact, concretehardt is an anti-chicken little. The sky is never falling:

Really Sack? After 2700 posts on this thread and going on 2 years of waiting for my game believe me when i say my head is not buried in the sand. It's just that repetitive posts saying the same negative shit over and over make me weary! That said I have enjoyed Darknights posts on other subjects so, DK I'm taking off ignore and as for you sad sack I can honestly say I have never enjoyed even 1 of your posts so.... you can take Dk's place on ignore.

Don't worry, I am done. I have said what I have to say. I wish you guys the best with this, I really do, there is no bigger fan of JPOP's past work than me. See you next year when I will once again put on my "dickhead" cape and "douche bag" cowl on just to stir up shit and hopefully spark some thought on this unresolved issue.

Instead of having the I told u so attitude why don't u tell us owners what we can do if we want our money back? If there is an easy solution please let me know. I have records of multiple emails, phone calls requesting a refund. I have not yet spent money on trying to get my money back. Even if this pin came out tomm I wouldn't want it I'm trying to buy a house and need the cash. Thanks for any help you can provide.

Fly down to the shop. Find the most expensive thing not bolted down and walk out with it. Maybe a 3 d printer would get u started toward some money back

Maybe if u had some of your own $$ invested u would take this more seriously and stop making jabs at us owners. Your posts seem very antagonistic and non helpful Again just looking for helpful info thanks!

I thought he was an owner?

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Yes he hasn't read back in the thread... But at this point if I got nothing back from thw investment it won't hurt me like the poor guy who needs his money back above. I got my money back on raza when it was still a option. My partial Mg money maybe will come through.. Maybe not.

By the way... I've stated many times how amazing the stuff he's shown so far is. And how when it's done it will blow many other games away... I just dislike his handling of his investors. He needs to do away with how's he's handled this and start fresh. Stop being a scared little girl of the other companies

With so many lawyers on this board I find it hard to believe no one has found a way to get their money back. File a lawsuit if you have to, surely one of the people claiming to be a lawyer on this board could do this.

I hope everyone gets their money back somehow or the game they paid for someday.

I'm willing to pay a fee to get help with this. PM me. Thanks! I will also sell my spot for 5500. I have 6250 on deposit willing to take a 750 hit

I dunno, maybe the lawyers are smart enough to know when filing a lawsuit *isn't* the answer to getting a refund?

It could have a domino effect.

<EDIT-DELETE>

F it. I'm trying not to get sucked back into Pinside drama.

_{Post edited by Mr68: Reason stated in post.}

I feel you, it's like he's not aware that we have lives and bills etc..

If he had made a game, we could sell it. But absent a physical game (it don't look like we will have one anytime soon) than I think he should be more open to refund on request.