Why wouldn't they just upload to youtube where it can be streamed instead of having to download each one to watch? Weird...

Nailed it.

People are indeed kidding themselves if they think otherwise.

Wow, what a couple of years being on this forum can do to a man's eye. I see a pretty game with some nice plastics and ramps. Everything else is pretty standard. I won't say there won't be people who will pay money for the exclusivity, I'm saying I don't see a whole lot of pinball magic in "Magic Girl".

Yeah I believe it. And I'm happy for every person that gets one as they PAID for this thing with blood, sweat and anxiety. To go from thinking their money was down the toilet to now this... gotta feel sweet.

Bigly

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadium_Events

The most valuable NES game is exactly the same as "World Class Track Meet" which was an uber-common pack in with the Power Pad.

But Stadium Events says something different on the box, cart and title screen, so it's $35k more expensive.

Im sitting looking at all my pop art from the 60's and 70's looks pretty colorful

warhol_marilyn (resized).jpg

The question still remains... can the ball make the upper ramp shots yet?

Yeah I can find you some girlie pink and purple art from EVERY era if you like it so much

I can see a flood of people trying to trade their TBL spots for a MG now. lol

Ice you know me I really don't care how well it plays obviously hoping for everyone's sake it is decent but at the end of the day it got done and some of those who suffered are getting something. He says onto Raza but I think I'm flushing that money down the drain

This phenomenon spilled over into and subsequently ruined Neo Geo AES collecting for me. Once carts started trading for pinball prices, why even bother. I'd rather have pinball.

If its worth as much as these please do pm me if you want to send to my residence!

I hope not Bill, I was actually for the first time in a long time having a little hope that RAZA might actually get built

image (resized).png

Game looks awesome but its all about how its plays otherwise it's a light show.

He actually says he is moving onto Raza but Sean you know as well as I do that's another 3 years away if at all. Will keep my fingers crossed for you buddy

I figure I'll be in Assisted Living at best before he ever finishes my RAZA. Maybe I can share the joy with my fellow residents at that point.

How far along was RAZA?

It looked like a thematic mess, he kept retooling it until it lost all identity, much like Michael Jackson's face.

AIW (though just a foamcore) seemed like a much more interesting concept and far more in his wheelhouse. Maybe he could move all orders into that?

I never liked Warhol but his most valuable pieces weren't pink and purple (to stay on point).

I get the feeling you don't like MY personal reaction to the color scheme of that "game" (if it plays)

My reaction to it was not designed to offend you btw... but it is what it is.

When I bought CV NIB on closeout I didn't love that scheme either. In fact it still looks like an eyesore in my home... but at $1700 new you couldn't pass it up.

What a crazy story... the fact that this game is going to see the light of day. Congrats to all of the owners. I hope the game far exceeds your expectations!

I was very vocal moving AIW up and even forgetting RAZA as it was a legal nightmare with patent and IP infringements everywhere. It would be smart for AP to take the foam core and make it real. The layout was superb the art was over the top and it was just real. This would satisfy all Ben.

Thanks Bill & congrats to all you MG guys! Its been a long time coming, I am glad to see that you will finally get your games.

Fuck AES! MVS 4 LIFE!

Agreed! I would gladly swap over to AIW from RAZA.

Those videos, or lack of, is exactly how John always obfuscated things in the past. There is
No way this thing plays half way decent.

Back in 2011 people were BEGGING for a zombie themed game, offering up their firstborn... So one can see why John picked that theme ($$$) but...

John clearly didn't understand the zombie horror genre at all. Thus all the clowns, lasers, aliens... he was throwing things at a wall and hoping Jeremy could make them stick.

AIW would be a much better fit for his style. Trippy, crazy, mad.... as a hatter! It would be a theme unlike anything current in pinball, and also have huge "wife approval" appeal.

It's not just RAZA, a fair amount of AIW pre-orders were taken as well. So why not make the BEST game you can to help all your customers, instead of a half-ass one that will delay the much better concept?

Sometimes the best creative expression is to bin an idea and start over. When people won't do that (ahem Predator playfield) that's when you should be worried.

Sending out a pile of crap that falls apart won't help Houdini sales. For AP sake it should at least be built well. My guess is this pin will be the equivalent of having a hot girlfriend with a horrible personality

Doesnt that sum up all Jpop games?

Looking to see how many MG are on the sale listings of Mr Pinball and Pinside in about 6 months. Probably not going to be a "keeper" in 1 spot too long.

Welcome back Kim!

Really an amazing week.

Detailed blank playfield pictures!

http://www.hsapinball.com/HSA_PINBALL/hsa071516magicgirl.html

Check out what it did to his waistline.

Just listened to a couple of eerie podcasts from this K person and what a waste. This person claims to be the reason why GnR put out Chinese Democracy, bought a Hell Cat, purchased a Magic Girl spot, speaks ill of pinball companies, tells other people what to do with their health and money regarding pinball, and wants others to get the mods to allow him back on pinside? This person has got to be going through menopause, midlife crisses, or both? Best to you if you are reading this, but I do not subscribe to your fake pinball news. The only saving grace is the guests that are interesting and have done something in the pinball industry.

Yeah but he's building the ultimate arcade.

You can tell that MG is more meant to be looked at than actually played. Look at the deformed rabbits placed RIGHT next to each flipper at the inlane. Just when you need to see the ball returning to the flipper to judge it's speed, etc... there's a huge rabbit decoration blocking the player's view. There's a reason you don't put a hunk of plastic right before the ball returns to the flipper.

And so MANY delicate unsupported plastics littered all over the PF. Looks kinda neat but lets hope this thing doesn't generate any airballs or you're going to need some backup plastic sets. Maybe it will use the low power coils he used on CV.

That's if it plays at all... I didn't realize out of 4 or 5 "gameplay" videos there was NO gameplay. Vintage Jpop indeed.

For some reason he seems to want us to know his slingshots work though... in fact they KEEP working long after the ball is gone lol

Maybe I missed the point of that?

So i guess you didn't see any with mine or zombieyeti name on then.... Talk about rubbing salt in the wound.. (jpop that is)

MG 50k by x-mas

You've got that the WRONG WAY ROUND. If the game has the switches and mechs installed that were coded then it'll play fine. Please remember i worked on this game for 2 years and built up a lot of code often before mechs/features were finalised because everything was so slow to materialise.....

The game is going to need some updates most likely, and that's something that could happen if i had a game, but i don't so...

Also, there's the small matter of being owed $11K still, nearly loosing everything in the process, selling half my pinball collection, and getting shafted by Jpop on a number of agreements........

Just seeing the attract mode screen in the picture with him standing next to it, is building my rage again...

The magnetic jet bumper is the one on the lower rhs near the skill shot, mystery target and right hand outlanes. The premise as coded by me was a jet bumper type operation using a magnet under the playfield that is activated by the 'hare' character in the game at certain points to disrupt and cause havoc. This was a concept jointly developed by myself and jPop.

I came up the idea of having a jet bumper cap floating above the area, so it gives the player a hint as to what the feature might be. You'll see a cap mounted on a plastic sticking out in the playfield there.

This is just 1 of the many concepts and features that were jointly developed during my 2 years there. There is much depth to the design, as we had many, many discussions and meetings to thrash out these ideas.

Poppy looks tired..
I would've given up 2 years ago.
Got to give him credit for that.

IMG_3041 (resized).PNG

Who decided that the only people due a game are the people who sent in cash? Those who spent an enormous amount of time working on MG would still be getting only pennies on the dollar IF they actually got a MG in the end. If it was, in fact, John's decision to leave out those who worked tirelessly on his games, well, that speaks volumes for his character. There are some who feel that John is losing his mind. In one of his lucid moments he said to me, "I have got to get these games out. Or I better get out. Like to Mexico." Joking or not, he knew how bad things were in that moment. But not a day later he would be aloof and confused. Just the kind of person you love telling you all the time, "Now Aaron, pinball is different..." when you would challenge them on business and operational basics.

We only wasted some time, postage and gas in our efforts to try and help John. To be crystal clear, I absolutely do not feel like we are owed anything at all. But when I see all this MG activity and none of it includes games going towards fulfilling commitments to those who actually did the work, well it just pisses me off.

I had no idea Jeremy (zombie yeti) even existed until he showed up on Pinside. I thought John was the artist. Why? Because he was signing the artwork like it was his while he was at the NW Pinball Show. Instead of using readily available pinball controllers, he decided getting a controller made for him made sense because he didn't like that pricing seemed too high (thinking he should get high volume pricing for game runs of <20?). He would talk about ideas which you shared with him as if they were his own (I had to stop him more than once and make sure he understood that repeating an idea in his own words did not make it his idea, too) and he hated being called on his distortion of fact. John always had someone to blame for something. He was petty and foolish.

John claimed that he wanted to mentor and teach the making of pinball to a new generation of pinball designers. What I learned from John Popadiuk was that the work of a pinball game designer is only a fraction of what it takes to make and sell a pinball game. Without a solid team, resources, infrastructure and someone actually running the business, you are just noodling away endlessly towards whoknowswhat. Running a business and leading and inspiring a team isn't easy and it certainly doesn't just happen as a bi-product of a bunch of talented, passionate people working together. John spent more time and energy trying to control everyone he worked with than he ever did teaching or mentoring in any meaningful way. It was this approach to leadership that had John burning through designers, artists, animators, engineers, programmers, and more. Instead, he could have stood back and had a killer team knocking out some pretty amazing pinball. But John couldn't get out of his own way and let great people do great work together.

I want nothing more than for those who are owed games and money from John to be made whole, if at all possible. But the legacy of John Popadiuk will be that of someone who preyed upon the goodwill of many kind, enthusiastic and supportive people in a selfish manner unmatched by anyone I have ever interacted with on even a semi-business level. I will remember John as someone who used people and who snatched away pinball money that could have been spent on the pinball creations from other companies. Saddest of all, for some, John turned playing pinball into a sad reminder of being taken advantage of by someone they once admired.

That's enough.

Aaron
FAST Pinball

I like the part where half of the videos return a "file not found - 404 (error)" error
for the sake of the 20 people getting one, I hope their machines run a little better than the website does

Disagree. Credit goes to the eleven people that stepped up and have an active lawsuit against Jpop. Without that he'd be sitting in his office right now re-designing rainbows.

Looks great. But I would not put too many games on it. The video of the misfiring slingshot is strange.

My bet is this is the first plastic to break.

MGRing (resized).jpg

I really hope the game plays as good as it looks for those that have $$ invested.

Once design choice I don't understand is the LCD on the playfield.
Looks like some of it gets blocked, is there supposed to be some integration with gameplay, is that why it's there?

People keep giving WAY TOO much leaway to this. Do you actually expect these to play worth 2 shits? Honestly, to be collectible in the pinball world we have seen a game needs to atleast play reasonably well right out of the gates and hold up over time.

In just the handful of photos we can see all sorts of indicators that these are just thrown together to stay off conviction and legal matters. Hell, just the fact that you have huge clear inserts with no jeweling and you can already see insert edges shows the poor quality and how quickly this box of lights will fall apart if you actually play it.

There are numerous other things I see that are suspect (still everyone glossing over that odd pop bumper) in design and playability.

Sure, some other rare games that play less than stellar are collectible, but those games have at least held up well over many years of play (BBB) and have another important aspect of collectibility... time and in cases decades of time since when they were built.

I am guessing these games will rarely be seen or played anywhere. The reason being that owners will not want them in public for people to see how poorly they are constructed and lack of playability. The only way to flip or resell will be to keep them hidden away to add to the mytic and wonder. Then the limited # will keep them desirable. It actually becomes a self preservation thing among owners that will continue to keep them hidden and hence try to keep the value high. Hell, we are already seeing some of the over inflating with some people saying Chris bought his for 24k just to try and make it see like that is a realistic value (if one moron paid that as an investment to flip then it must be a good price, lol). Then we hear from others that Chis paid 20k and others have said he actually paid less than original cost.

Lets be honest. There are quite a few original owners that will try to flip these as quick as possible for as much money as possible. The new owners will hide them away to be rarely seen and resell them at a later date.

If a BBB in pristine condition with tons of extras is not selling for 20k, then you have pretty much seen the ceiling on the high end collectible market for pinball machine. That game is actually considered fun by many and playable by most. It also has a positive story and much better history.

I just hope at elast one owner opts to bring the game out in the public eye for play. I am sure at least one will and then the rest better scramble to sell quickly, lol. Not a whole lot of meat on the 13k investment for the past 4 years.