Quoted from TigerLaw:

Exactly this. I do not want to feel like I have to buy a $2,000 topper to complete the home owner experience. I currently feel that way. It absolutely cheapens the experience of owning the just the game.
I wonder why Stern made the decision to have the least numerous of the three models be the one that color matched.

Quoted from Cobray:

You appear to be easily amused LMAO. Flashing led light, and a ship projected from an LCD onto a screen with no real showing of what anything does. But here we go, Must have EVEN IF IT'S $2K!!!
I'd bet you're a JJP trasher too, that would round it out. But you embody where everything is right now with accepting the ridiculous.
I hope each and every person that validates Sterns $2K price on this eats it BIG TIME. Because like everyone buying it is claiming NOW, it's worth it!!! Let's see how those buying view it if they indeed are not making money on the topper like they think they will be. Let's see if those are really being honest on not caring about the price... when the value drops out afterwards.
I mean, Mando Premiums sit as low as you can get on the market for any Stern Premium over the past several years so... the topper has a lot of work to "make the game" or take it to it's potential.

Quoted from Cobray:

I am easily amused, but what I pay for said amusement gives me an expectation of value.. I can't just pay anything "just to be amused".
If I watch a free movie on a plane and it entertains me, I can live with the fact it was a bad movie and move on. If I was forced to pay $2000 for the movie and it was the only way they would let me have the flight and the normal price of that flight was $500 on previous flights, I'd be upset. See how that works?

Quoted from Cobray:

I am easily amused, but what I pay for said amusement gives me an expectation of value.. I can't just pay anything "just to be amused".
If I watch a free movie on a plane and it entertains me, I can live with the fact it was a bad movie and move on. If I was forced to pay $2000 for the movie and it was the only way they would let me have the flight and the normal price of that flight was $500 on previous flights, I'd be upset. See how that works?

Quoted from Indypin:

Here's another scenario.
Stern Pros jack up in price, selling for $12,000 bucks. LE's and Premiums are now only sold to rich basketball players. In order to even think about getting one you hope to get drafted in the top 3 picks. JJP follows notice and their machines are now double that price, with you having to play like Bo Jackson and do (2) sports in order to put a deposit down on a machine.
People get tired of spending wads of money on basically toys and quits buying pinball machine and it's useless "additions" to it.
Stern's sales go down, the market crashes and Stern has to lay off people and close their business. The other companies follow suit and now we have no more pinball machines to buy.
Pinsiders get tired of playing the same games over and over, causing some to turn over the tables and look back on the old threads of pinside deciding to get a gang together to put flaming bags of feces on their front porch of other pinsiders, ringing the doorbell and screaming as they're running away "that's what you get for over-paying for things I told you not to buy".
The world spirals out of control. Dogs and chickens begin to live with each other and reproduce. The rooster now wakes me up every morning at 4:00 am barking like a dog.
I lay awake at night thinking about this, wondering what time that damn rooster is going to wake me up. I now spend my hard earned money on the robotic hawk that shoots lasers out of his eye to kill that damn rooster and for my therapist (she doesn't know I'm on here, so please don't say nothing)

Quoted from JStoltz:

Am bummed that the topper seems to be gatekeeping some gameplay features to topper owners only.

Quoted from JStoltz:

Funny—but that’s always been the case for indoor pools. It’s a new(ish) concept for pinball code, which is why it’s ‘frustrating.’ The status quo for code updates has largely been “everyone gets them,” and now that seems to be changing.
Again, you don’t see me screaming that I “deserve” a topper. I’m just *frustrated* that we now seem to be crossing a “paid content” threshold.
Note: Would have been nice if the feature matrix at launch communicated that there would be content that required a topper to access, then there wouldn’t be this perception of content being withheld.

Quoted from JStoltz:

Agree. I am making the point that this is an emerging trend that is upsetting (sorry to keep using the phrase) the status quo.

I personally agree that the code is great, but would add that Stern has established this cadence of release and code updates that (maybe informally or unofficially) tells their buyers that they can expect a few code updates after release. These tend to fix bugs and balance gameplay, but they also sometimes complete features that were not completed. In some cases things are added that were not specified in a feature matrix or even identified on a playfield insert. Quick example since my collection is small and Mando is my only NIB purchase: Dank Farrik Multiball.
Again, this is an unwritten, undocumented, and unprotected expectation held by many Stern buyers. I think Stern is partially responsible for creating that expectation, and buyers (as Chuck pointed out) are also taking on some risk by thinking that's guaranteed in some way (it isn't). I'm not saying Stern owes anyone the code updates or content additions, I'm making the point that topper-locked content was *bound* to irk people by upsetting the status quo. When you add on the ~2x or so price increase on the topper, that only raises the tension and frustration.
I guess a point I'm trying to make is that 1) Stern should have seen this coming (and maybe they did, I'm sure they had some internal discussions about this before they reached the decision to do what they did) and 2) This is a deviation from the norm w.r.t. game code, and in my opinion a rightful cause for debate. I don't think it's reasonable to tell people to "quit their whining" because I think this is a legit reasonable concern (more so than the price of the topper, imo).

Kinda rude, man.

I see the point you're trying to make with the video game comparison, but I still argue that that's not what THIS industry is like. Video games don't regularly get released with 60-70% code and then gradually updated over the next 6 months to reach what the software lead considers (informally) to be "feature complete." I don't think this analogy captures the nuance of this industry, like someone pointed out a few pages back.
At what point does Stern potentially realize that any game content not on the instruction card could be monetized and packaged with a high dollar accessory? A year ago I would have said "no way," but now I'm less sure.

Again, I don't think this analogy is very effective (and I'm not one of the people saying Stern is "greedy", either). When you go to see a movie they're not releasing new cuts of the movie every couple months for the next several months. You don't get to an action scene and see a placeholder card that says "Coming in a future release."

Quoted from CrazyLevi:

So, long story short, it's gonna be another bullshit mode or two that nobody needs but it comes with topper and the DLC freakout brigade gets to circle jerk about it.
It's like nobody remembers "Goat Mode" with the JP Topper.
Seems like Stern is never gonna bother investing the resources or time needed to make a "topper mode" that anybody is truly gonna give a shit about so I'd stop worrying about it folks.
It's a $2,000 topper. Buy it or don't. There is no apocalypse, slap in the face, or destruction of hobby.