I have done two playfield swaps with Mirco fields. First was a Marilyn Taxi, no problems what so ever, eventual buyer loved how it played and looked. 2nd was a Fish Tales. So far so good, Mirco has expanded the pre-drilled holes slightly based on feedback and the dimples for other things are nice and large which makes screwing into the wood easy. Ironically the WMS field I am replacing had pooling all along the left side of the boat ramp into the pop bumper nest. So that isn't a novel issue either. I'm thankful we have the parts. Are they perfect - nope. But way better than blown out games any day of the week.

It isn't every playfield. yes people have had issues and it sucks but I have installed 6 or so from Mirco and not had a problem with alignment, fitting in the cab, or clearcoat issues. Many of these playfields are now being used frequently in tournaments and on location with no issues.

All that seal meant was the game went through Nintendo's Lot check and was officially authorized to run on Nintendo systems. That process did not review the game for quality or bugs in any way. Lot Check confirmed compatibility on the target system, button usage standards, naming standards in the manual, and compliance with at the time Nintendo's rules on Religion, Sex, Violence and Drugs/Smoking/alcohol in games. It was there to try to get everyone publishing their games using nintendo's cartridge, ROM supplier, box manufacturer etc. See Tengen for games published outside of the "Nintendo Seal of Quality" and the subsequent law suit from nintendo to try and prevent game publishers from avoiding the lot check procedure and subsequently Nintendo getting their cut from manufacturing the game.

If you wanted your games' actual quality of game play reviewed and Nintendo's suggestions for improvement that was a separate paid process that would submit the game through NOA Mario Club and/or the early iteration of the Treehouse.

I think a lot of the reasons we see many more issues now than we did in the DiamondPlate era is the clearcoats are now too thick. Any clear is going to chip if struck repeatedly on edge (scoops, saucers, ball return troughs, etc.) Why not go back to the same thickness as DiamondPlate and see if things improve?

Patently false. Think of how large the testing departments would need to be to test several hundred games per year. Without violating my NDA I can't post the exact description of what lot check at Nintendo did, but I can guarantee you it did not involve bug testing each game that came through. Of course your publisher hopefully tested each game submitted to the extent you described above - unless you were LJN... Again the Nintendo seal of Quality served 2 purposes. 1) To verify that the software was compatible with the hardware and met certain functional and content guidelines. 2) To limit the number of 3rd party releases on the NES system to 5 titles to avoid what happened to Atari and the subsequent video game crash. The publishing limits were gradually relaxed over time to what you see now on the eShops.

Thinner clearcoats?

How many plays on the funhouse? - those insert pics looks like thousands with a rusty ball...