The display on MMr was enough to turn me off when I played the game at Replay... the issues were very noticeable. I bet any color upgrade will include having to swap in a better graphics sub-system.. the question is what path they took.. so you could speculate on how it drives actual costs.

If they couldn't get just direct emulation working well... no way they'd get all that second layer of color working decently too on the same hardware.

I was told?? By who? Was this before or after the last time we were told the issues were fixed??

No, I was playing the production game from one of your distributors just three weeks ago at a major show.. and the display's refresh was very off-puting. If it's been addressed, it wasn't being shown at the show (to my satisfaction) and I've seen no postings from PPS here or on your forum mentioning any new software since then. Your reply was the first I've heard of another fix. Digging deeper now since you've said something, I see a post on your forum (just yesterday) where you say its been fixed... but there has been no upgrade made available yet. Sorry we don't all stalk your every post... I was describing my personal experience with the game from less than three weeks ago.

And as I recall... we were told the problems were fixed before as well.. and I can tell you in my opinion they were not. So here we go again with another promise that the issues are fixed... sorry, its going to take more than another promise before my opinion of the result changes.

these are embedded platforms with code written specific to the hardware necessary. The code has libraries of macros and drivers written to abstract higher level game code... but it doesn't make it independent. It's just for ease of programming. You'd still have to rewrite all the common libraries used, their drivers, etc.

This is embedded systems programming... not Carbon.

Sure they could - they could not license them to do the project. PPS may not be the driver - but they can still be the roadblock to things happening.

Stern would have nothing to gain from having others use SPIKE - it would only hurt them. The 'volume' advantage they'd get from another 1k units or whatever would be far overshadowed by the complexities of supporting 3rd parties and eroding any competitive advantage they have with the IP.

Stern wasn't sourcing the parts...
Stern wasn't the one staging the parts and Q&A'ing them...
Stern wasn't the one project managing the program...

What you had was Stern as the manufacturer who has a proven, STRICT, model on how to do production. CGC failed repeatedly to meet Stern's standard of 'ready' to get the games on the line. The 'slow' aspect can be because the monster isn't being fed...

Uhh.. no. Go find Keith's posts about why the Wheel of Fortune code was behind.. because when they switched boardsets there was lots of functionality that had to be rebuilt to drive the various things like the stepper motors, etc. Conceptually they haven't changed... but the devil is in the details.

Which in itself is a very significant differentiator and advantage. If you can build stuff faster and for less money than your competitors... that is an advantage. Being able to develop faster and with a cheaper BOM is very much an advantage.

A COGs improvement that can easily be wiped out in the much more expensive category of software development and support costs. Saving $2 a board due to volume improvements at 3k units is only 6k dollars. That's barely 3 weeks of developer costs in savings... which means when you need to staff documentation, QA, and support... in perpetuity... your little 6k in savings doesn't sound so great. Never mind making it even easier for competitors to get to market.

You have nice lofty goals... that don't map into actually running a business. This isn't crowdsourcing innovation here.

Because Gary runs a factory... a factory he needs to keep running to make any money. He doesn't make any money designing pinballs.. he only makes money building and selling them. While he builds games for other people, he enjoys the healthier margin his games get vs the competitors.. AND collects his fees for assembly.. AND keeps his factory churning. What Stern will take on in contracting won't be arbitrary... Gary won't build the games that will undermine him.

Good for you.. but software product management is very different from hardware or hw+sw production. I don't need to whip out my johnson to support my statements.. but if head up to the bay area.. find the world's largest networking company... and you'll find my fingerprints in their products. I also have experience in contract manufacturing and close ties with consultants and production managers in contract manufacturing.

No, but seasoned online folks can see right through people trying to hide under new accounts. The tells are always there... and in yours too.

You're basically saying I don't care about reality.. just give me what I want.

As a customer, you are not insultated from budgets... because you pay a price, which is tied to budgets, margins, and COGs.

The reason it wasn't sought before is because PPS wouldn't let people touch the original game assets. People knew it was off limits. Your only option was replacing it all...which normally meant new hardware too (see bop 2.0 and ccc- neither of which were licensed originally)

"... The Storm is over. Return to your homes..."

But you're comparing two different kinds of money... the $8000 is gross revenue that was to cover the entire cost of the game and overhead (so your margin is much smaller on those dollars). While the $200k is additional revenue at much higher margin because it is only covering any unexpected overages (labor, contracting, etc) of the color upgrade.

Does anyone really think the PPS/CGC relationship will last 10 more games? At this point, game #2 is suspect IMO.

or simply shitty execution. The second hand stuff we are hearing is appauling IMO.. and that comes from someone with past experience running large scale product development.

When you scope a project and plan for it to take 18months and you plan it will cost you X dollars in overhead and people you set your price and margin targets with that in mind. When the project takes 3x as long as planned, that destroys those previous calculations and margins disappear. When you are that far down the road, you just keep pressing ahead to get to having something to sell just so you lose LESS money instead losing everything.

When you have an actual business, with people, buildings, utilities, etc time is expensive, and why projects that are so late are devastating to the business plan. Delays cause cash crunches and they destroy margins.

PPS really had no choice but to continue.. and the way things have gone.. I wouldn't be shocked to find out that PPS had no say at all in the project continuing or not once they got the game approved by Williams. With what we've seen externall, the agreement sounds pretty stacked in CGC's favor in terms of lack of performance clauses or controls. And PPS may have tied themselves up with offers like giving options to CGC for subsequent games to justify the initial platform buildout.

It's not enough in business to just make money.. you need to consider the efficiency of that profit and the rate of return. Is $200/game (artificial number) enough for PPS if it takes 3 years and burning your brand down to get it?

Businesses step away from products and markets all the time when they decide 'its just not worth it'.. because the upsides just aren't worth the down.. or aren't efficient uses of the time/money.

Given the chance.. I can't fathom how PPS would be happy with how the project ran.. and given the tone, it doesn't sound like things have changed much either. Their hands may simply be tied.

Net sum.. maybe? Is that figure based on anything beyond assumption of greed on PPS or scaling out previous royalty rumors from other licensees?

I would expect the deal to be something much lower per unit, but with a minimum threshold guaranteed and probably provisions like having to buy stuff from PPS so PPS gets some garuntees. Remember CGC was the one taking all the risk here... they developed the platform, they apparently procured all the parts, they worked the deal with stern, etc. PPS is just the license broker and the product wouldn't be on the market if CGC didn't do all that stuff. The advantage was in CGC's favor for negotiating.

This isn't PPS taxing a product like they might with a mod maker or parts creator... this is CGC creating a business that otherwise didn't exist and having to put up a lot of capital to do it.

Originally I would have thought it might be some sort of profit share model.. but that doesn't really seem real given the way the parties talk about each other and the project.

The new electronics (and hardware) wasn't the only development.. CGC was responsible for spinning up entire new production.. which ultimately they punted on and just looked to contract to Stern. But that move had to be supported by the cost structure rolled into the existing price. They didn't have the option of collecting another 10% from everyone when they decided to contract it out. There would have been a hefty portion of the target sales price allocated to startup costs.

And I wouldn't draw a linear line between what PPS is charging on individual items vs a manufacturered pinball with a partner. It's not like all arrangements are the same, nor do licensing agreements work on a linear fashion across entirely different product lines. They don't just say 20% off the top, $5 minimum per item and apply that universally. Different segments are approached differently.

I know people like to paint PPS the devil for having the nerve to tax people to use the IP PPS paid for.. but that's just life when you use other people's work. At least PPS used the rights to keep driving new development and not just become some royalty machine that did nothing but that.

PPS gets a lot more out of this than just a royalty check.. and CGC would know that. The negotations here would have been vastly different than some stand-alone replacement part or mod.

My .02c (plus .04c royalty )

It was never promised as included for free. Rick was speaking optimistically, but never promised it outright. It was at best him saying what he wanted the deal to be.. but as we know later, he doesn't have a say really beyond being the licensing agent and giving a up/down vote.

Anyone who has worked in a warehouse area is used to that black grime. Its like a dust that is real gritty. Not sure if it originates with the equipment or materials.. but its pretty common. And you'll see it on shrinkwrapped items, etc

Oh I agree that the business should be planning to AVOID the containmenation of the product.. but just commenting on where the risk is coming from and the source material itself is not unusual.

Software work trains are often combined like this.. making it even more work to go backwards to release work added later, etc.

Basically at this point.. the record is clear.. CGC is going to do things at their pace, with their screwups rolled in, and no one is changing that. No should be holding their breath

Until I see this magic LCD fix.. I wouldn't tell anyone to buy the title. The screen is just awful.

I canceled my order (thank god). I have other locals with the game, as well as people with originals still. I've played it enough to not recommend it in its current state.

Issues like the inserts, screen, etc are not dial-in, or tweaking issues I would normally accept with any game. These are issues you can not simply fix yourself or via 3rd party mods. The game just doesn't justify the price imo and as for it being #1... I think that image is going to change over the coming years as the current generation of games are soaked in.

Funny... Thought these were CCG products.. Ha

"CGC indicated that the kits would be completed in next week or two"

It's like freaking Groundhog Day.... Over and over again

The idea that because the hw is there things should be free is naive. This product is not just about the hw

Let's be real.... Even if CGC gave it away for free as goodwill because of how the project went... When they went to offer the upgrade as a paid option on the next title everyone would still be screaming bloody murder on why it's not free like mmr was...

People are selfish and largely can't look at these things objectivity.

The product cgc is offering now is NOT the product anyone bought mmr with... Or even knew about. The redone high Rez art is something they came up with long after we all bought in. It is NOT what Rick was (inadequately) trying to clear up when the question of color was brought up.

Cgc did not offer the product most people were expecting... And instead *only* offered a premium upgrade instead of offering what people thought they were owed PLUS the premium option.

So I can understand that people would be put off by not being offered what Rick screwed up by putting into play....

But the 'it's already there' or 'it's just software' arguments are just rediculous. Prices are not just about physical hardware costs... And every rational person knows this. But we apply selective thinking here to support our anger... All while playing double standard, Else everyone should be crying a river over those crazy priced mods being sold.

It's there because you release it there for simplicity... It doesn't make someone entitled to it.

This is not some new concept... It's done everywhere. People are just trying to support their anger with selective thinking.

Paying for feature unlocks... Somehow a new concept in the pinside universe. *facepalm*

When running on common pcs... A bit more difficult to do when running on a less common setup your usual hackers don't care about. Most bypasses are hacking the software and it's checks, not actually emulating the security.

You are categorically 100% wrong here.

By the way... Since apparently most people seem ignorant of this concept... Your windows pc has been doing this since Windows vista. Microsoft's 'anytime upgrade' is the same concept.

Most pieces of shareware... Are exactly the same.

And the list goes on and on..

With any authority

Let's not forget this entire part of the saga started before Rick made it known he really had no control over cgc's commercial choices with the game.

That muddied up a lot of things... Even up and through the coin mech scandal. It wasn't until delivery schedules went to total hell that Rick finally collApsed and separated himself in the public's eyes.

Uhhh... Nice way to distort things. The windows10 upgrade program is its own beast and for very different reasons. And no, that is no the anytime upgrades.

Prove it

You arent going to find a generic 'defeats all dongles of this type' binary to run on your beagle board on some torrent. Or find some generic 'load this on a usb key' and run any locked app.

Defeats of popular ones like ilok require running software on the client machine... Which makes it app and platform dependent.

Baloney. You don't even know what their protection is... And your going on how everything has been defeated... Yet won't even acknowledge the significant differences between how the defeats have been done and the significance of what that means to implement them.

I'm a freaking EE whose been doing software product development for the worlds largest networking company... I'm not some dolt.

You don't necessarily need to break encryption to defeat it or a license check... That's why it's done so frequently with commercial software. Cracking dvd was a great example of strong encryption that was defeated through finding sloppy mistakes.
Edit: but I can see your point about just making it hard being applicable as well. But here the end user has almost full access to the system.. Which reduces a lot of barriers

I have confidence the check will be defeated over time... Mainly due to my lack of confidence in cgc

It was never part of the budget at the start. It's why they had no answers for years

To be part of the budget... That would assume you know you intend on doing it.

Color dots was not part of the initial launch plan. It's why it wasn't advertised as a feature (included or not). It's why Rick had no answers to its inclusion in the project or not when asked. It's why they had no answers at all until they got around to deciding what to do... And then decided to go bigger as a value added feature to be sold.

This is the same company that thought they'd build it all in house.... Then couldn't get stern to start production after multiple attempts because their funnel was so screwed up... The same company that couldn't even get organized enough to address the simple coin mech issue.

And you're going with the evil mastermind conspiracy angle that they knew all along they were going to do high rez dots, budgeted for it from the start, then hid it from Rick, then even after all their disasters... Had a feature that was already paid for... And still decided to charge $200 for it?

You are mental.

Maybe they thought they'd do something in the future... But budgeted as part of the initial build?? Even if they did, all prior plans probably got thrown away when they were over a year later and had to contract out all assembly.

The budget was blown long long ago. Any project that is over its schedule by more than 4x... And people are fighting about what was included initially?? Haha

There is a reason cgc were being penny pinchers way back at the coin mech saga... And it wasn't about production line complexity

Wholeheartedly agree there (lack of computer skills)... But once someone bundles it up enough... The lay will be helped along

I just don't see the main hacker groups helping tackle this challenge unless vy chance one happens to have a mmr

I bet we'd find custom speech was always part of the st plan. Just done later for production or scheduling issues.

The extra met songs - who knows. Someone bug Borg at expo.

You seem to rewrite history to whatever you think you want anyways.

Colorized dots was not part of the expo announcement and that's what most of us le buyers went on. Only later did Rick later add in what he thought the potentials were for color dots to be added.

It's highly unlikely to be some dip package... Mainly because there isn't a space and it's meant to be field upgradable.

It can just plug into the existing jab port, serial bus, or even an molex.

My wager is on usb or the serial bus

Contingency is not the same thing as budgeted. Contingency by definition is for unexpected expenses or variations. And contingency would have already been stretched by the two year delay and complete change in manufacturing.

On the coin mechs I bet CCG didn't include them in the bom from the start... Knowing they were selling to home buyers... And I bet Rick just didn't even know (not thinking to check prior) and got caught with his pants down after the fact.
Cries for advertising that or not and trying to compare that with the color dots is just being facetious. Coin mechs are simple interchangeable commercial parts of a game (like a power cable). Color dots are a huge marketable industry differentiating feature.

Because the LAUNCH is history and was a public event.... And color dots, and or reworked art, we're not part of it. Even after expo, Rick explicitly said the game would be monochrome.

He alluded to future plans for color (when asked about colordmd) but there were no answers at the time.. Only stating
"Next up would be the colorization, which will be done and just working on the approach for the art and the timing, etc ..."

If it were to be part of the initial product release... It wouldn't be 'next' and timing would at least have a deadline.

The problem was at the time, everyone though Rick was in the drivers seat, and were taking the optimistic view from his comments... Instead of what he was actually saying.

Color display is the largest differentiator in the industry right now. It's the most expensive mainstream bolt on mod in the hobby. You don't think they would have wanted to make a point about that at the launch event??? Or in the months afterwards? They held onto this info for two years for what, In your opinion?

Let's not forget, when asked Rick said the game had to look and play original for the IP angles at the time as well... Criticizing projects that had altered games...Noting wms was not happy about it.

If high res art was already in the plan and budgeted... Don't you think Rick would have answered differently?

From Rick...

2. I believe I understood you to say that Williams condition to doing this was it had to be an exact replica to sign off. Can you confirm?
- It has to look and play as original (as in 'look' the same +/- some minor variations due to either Copyright / Trademark requirements, or possibly some variations such as trim color, etc. It already looks similar.
3. If number 2 is accurate, what items were allowed to be deviated from the original to the new and why?
- I think i answered that above ... possibly other little things,but not much.

Redoing all the art in the game's display doesn't fall under 'other little things'

They aren't going to advertise the inclusion of the single most expensive bolt on mod in the hobby?? They advertised the gam to be an exact look and play copy of the original with build quality upgrades. Inclusion of colordmd features or redone art would have been MAJOR features and represented significant value to the purchase.

They were not, and for Almost two years!!! No specifics were available.

Note, even Doug from CGC said Rick was in the dark on the details of it, and the work was funded by CGC
From aug 2015

you think that large of an item was always in the per game fiscal model and Rick just.... Missed it?

It's all right in the original MMR thread.

A lcd was in the spec.... color lcds are more commodity than single color in that size

It's called 'addressing all the possible outcomes' and showing even if true... It still doesn't get to where you think it is.

No one plans contingencies that reflect the project running 5x over. You tell the idiot their plan clearly has no confidence if they can't narrow it down more. Planning for 5x delays and project lengths means severely overcharging to cover that expense UP FRONT. Again, this is the team that couldn't even manage deadlines within a two week window... And your arguing they accurately forecasted all of this, and intentionally told their customers and business partner a date that was so low in confidence they had PLANNED for a 5x run Over?

Does.not.compute.

And there is no revenue stream to draw from... They took a bunch of money, not some recurring sales stream.

The clowns didn't just go dark for two years. They were spending time, capital, and opex for over 3yeras on a project that was supposed to be generating revenue 6months after announcement. You think stern just lets them keep all kinds of materials over there for free?? Ha

You conveniently mis quotes that are many months apart.

When asked, Rick said the game was monochrome with selectable colors when asked if colordmd could be used.

He stated
"DMD Animations will be original currently are monochrome - although with a simple setting you can change the 'color' of the monochrome on the LCD to a bunch of colors (8 I think?). Next up would be the colorization, which will be done and just working on the approach for the art and the timing, etc ..."

You nicely chopped off the monochrome and undecided parts of his post.

The next statement you quoted was nearly 6 MONTHS later than the first... And they still didn't have answers.

It proves what I was saying... He didn't have the answers, and as we know now with hindsight, he was only relaying his desires for the project... And cgc had not even included him on the real details of the evolving color display option.

Answer this... You've said how trivial this work is... And you believe they are masterminds that have properly budgeted for a project that ran many multiples over in length...

Yet it still took them more than 10 months to get this trivial work done. Resolve that one....

The writing was on the wall from Doug himself...

The use of 'eventual option' and 'option'there should tell you all you needed to know. When he goes on about the quality of the work done, how many frames were done, and tells you he still doesn't know how much it will be.... You can be certain 'this is just a support release that will be free' was not his train of thought. This clearly was a value add feature... The question was only how much to charge and how to control it.

not according to labnick and wolfmarsh

Certainly not the 'buy it now before its gone!!' rush... but the demand for those titles is still pretty good. And CGC *SHOULD* have a leg up in time to develop, and if they can continue using Stern's manufacturing, have a reasonable means to get the games to market. Maybe they only build 300-500 of a title.. but if they play their cards right, it could be possible that it's 'enough' to bring titles to manufacturing profitably given their 'platform', contract manufacturing, and lack of R&D needed given they are 'reusing' designs.

I don't see an endless inventory of these games just waiting to be bought where distributors just buy 3-5 at a time based on recent sales. The economies of scale still work against that.. but PPS at least has an inside line having the parts business that would want inventory too.

The thing that remains untested in the market is... can someone sell the same title for many years? Stern came close with LOTR... but the market is pretty different now. Curious how that will play out...

You need to execute the code... Not just have it. I'm not sure how far the code runs with just the beagle board alone...

Remember... This will likely be about defeating a check system.... Not necessarily about decryption

I'm sure the $6 was killer for you..

Including it in the upgrade is just a courtesy to avoid issues.. especially when someone is paying so much for software.

I mean.. if you want to overpay for things that's more of a personal thing. Can't help you there... It should have only cost you ~$6-10 for SD adaptor and 16gig card

https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-Digital-16GB-microSDHC-SDC10G2/dp/B0162YQEIE/ref=sr_1_31
or
https://www.amazon.com/Transcend-MicroSDHC-Class10-Adapter-TS16GUSDU1E/dp/B00CBD0XSI/ref=sr_1_13
or
https://www.amazon.com/Silicon-Power-MicroSDHC-Class10-SP016GBSTHBU1V20SP/dp/B00TDBLTWK/ref=sr_1_9

Or those who need a local store
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-16gb-microsd-class-10-uhs-1-memory-card-orange/5334001.p?id=1219120323731&skuId=5334001

And if you really can't read an SD card... which everything has for ages now due to digital cameras... a usb to SD adaptor is like $8.50 at best buy

But you could drive down the street to best buy and pay $8...
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/store-locator/80226

But I'm a know it all... can't expect people to just ask if they don't know... or use the internet.

Just wait till everyone gets all upset because they are paying shipping on a 'software upgrade' from CGC because of the included card!

It's not being sold yet. All we got was an announcement of the product and pricing... not actual availability yet.

I pointed out the adaptor and card options in an earlier post saying even if you DIDN'T have a SD card, there was the option. If you don't have a SD reader device in 2016... you may want to reprioritize your entertainment purchases verse complaining about having to buy a $8 adaptor. They've been on most devices for years now (again.. driven by digital camera use). Even my tower, which I built all the way back in 2008 and still use today... has a multireader in it.

Your personal situation is what we call a corner case. And even at $24, vs the $17, or $6 you could have spent... will serve you in the future, since somehow you could not use any portable storage card that has been in use for the last decade

Again... tit for tat over $9. There is a trend forming here... buckle up for when Bay Area charges you shipping for that new order! That extra $5-6 is probably worth 3-5 more posts about it... at a minimum.

But.. But... a company didn't cater to ME individually!!! I'm never buying from CGC again!

Excuses that would make sense if it were simply a 'free' update they needed to do, but were dragging their feet. But this is something they had to pay someone to create, and are waiting to collect lots (probably 100k+) in revenue.

If its so trivial.. and you are going to get 100+k in money for doing it... things aren't lining up.

Sure... but that's not really what the posts were about. Others were saying how this work is so trivial and could have been hammered out by monkees in no time flat.. and as you say, these are selfish, money grubbing guys... yet it takes them 10+months to satisfy their own need??

The point is, the job isn't as some were painting it to be.

I've believed all along this will be a value added feature... and fully expected them to charge a large amount for it. So no surprise to me... especially once they teased the art rework. It was a slam dunk at that point that this would be a paid option. The only question was 'when, and how much'. At least we have one of those answers now

Hence the Plus at the end of my number

I doubt they will get 100% attach rate... and I doubt they'll really sell a ton of standards. That's why my number was basically 50% attach rate on LEs plus whatever sales on standards or greater than 50% attach on LEs. I didn't need to be aggressive with my estimate to make the point

Your statement glosses over the problems with the WMS/BLY licensing that haunted the hobby for a decade+. It wasn't until Rick consolidated the licensing rights under PPS that the idea of someone building a WMS/BLY pin was really viable. Even the Austrialian attempt was loaded with problems trying to work around constraints.

And as for Stern.. such an undertaking would mean sourcing stuff at much higher costs than their own designs. They'd be paying higher costs to source parts or license the designs, then pay royalties, etc. They'd lose economies of scale, they'd increase their costs, and tell the world that 15 year old designs are better than they can came up with today.

There are certainly lots of justifiable reasons for them NOT to do it.. would it been worth it to do it anyways? I guess we'll never know.

The majority of the delta can be mapped to the way they handled communications and customer relations.

Everyone knew WoZ was a project from a startup and trying to be the world's best game.. people were buying not just WoZ, but the idea of JJP and what they'd do... it's a bit of support+passion thing. While people were being let down at parts of the project, Jack tried to keep customers whole. If you remove much of the drama around JJP as a business and it's survival... WoZ is not that drama-laden.

MMR on the other hand was advertised from the start to be 'identical', and promised to be done quickly based on everything already being queued up. They made big promises, set expectations... and when those were broken... they were abysmal in how they handled it. Instead of winning empathy and grace.. they started creating hostile customers. The credibility and types of answers people were getting caused people to be upset, rather than forgiving.

It's a classic example of 'over promising, under delivering'... plus someone acting as an individual in how they do things, instead of acting like a business who took a higher stand. That wasn't helped by the amount of beratement some were allowed to drone on about here on pinside.

Neither color dots NOR high res art were part of the initial offer - stop repeating these complete lies.
Original flyer..
mmr_(resized).jpg

I mean.. you YOURSELF acknowledged the lack of ColorDMD styled Dots in the original MMR thread when Rick said it was monochrome and you follow up asking if it would be possible to get them in a software update. If it were part of the promised features... that question would have been answered by the launch. But they were not part of the launch - some just don't want to accept it because it undermines their case.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/mmr-pps-and-overall-update-official-pps-oct-21-2013/page/3#post-1196421

And everything after that was Rick being non-commital about what the color upgrade would be for buyers. It was not part of launch, nor ever committed to buyers as included.

Well... if you want them to also include the hardware platform and display as well

This reworking of art was new ground for PPS - a topic they had kept suppressed before.

Rick's post about that being 'the goal' - is not a commitment. 2) What they ultimately decided to do, is not what was being discussed at the time (ColorDMD style color dots).

Truth of the matter is.. the product they are selling now you were not promised as part of the game. Those are the hard facts. They communicated horribly on the topic, but that doesn't change what they said, nor what they are selling now.

A very small # of people...certainly not the vocal zealots we see repeating these lies. The magic, conflicting, non-commital post from Rick was 5+ months AFTER the majority of people put their deposits on their LEs at launch.

Exactly - what they are selling now is not what was discussed back in 2013/14. The only thing Rick was committing to was there would be a color upgrade.. people took their own liberties beyond that and are all upset now that their distortions didn't hold up. Of course at that time, we also thought Rick was in charge

Don't disagree - but still doesn't change that what you were saying wasn't true.

I believe he took note of your comment that said
"both CGC's and ColorDMD's solution are add-ons that simply read the data stream sent to the original DMD."

Where you definitively claim how the CGC solution works... (and possibly inferring crossing into how ColorDMD does things) vs the idea of having the high res art native in the ROM and simply changing which art is sent to the display.

Even if CGC's is a downstream switch in data.. instead of changing what the main rom calls.. its likely it would be able to work much differently than ColorDMD since it doesn't sit on the DMD controller bus and a different graphics driver has already been created in the CGC platform.

Not true. Because one is emulating the DMD controller, while the other is external and downstream of it.

Since in a platform like CGC's you are emulating all the hardware, and the DMD controller is its own block.. you can intercept commands TO the DMD controller instead of data sent FROM the DMD Controller to the display. ColorDMD's system is based entirely on working DOWNSTREAM of the display controller.. to interpret the output and replace it. That is not the only way to do things.. especially when you are not constrained to be external to the platform.

ColorDMD's patent is based on interpreting the output from the DMD controller...
http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=20120190440.PGNR.

"10. A method for providing upgraded graphics to an electronic device having an early generation display, the method comprising the steps of: receiving electronic graphical data suitable for the early generation display from the electronic device; defining frames from the electronic graphical data; generating a tag for each of the frames; matching the generated tag to a set of preprogrammed tags; and outputting output graphical data based on the matched preprogrammed tags to the later generation display. "

If you simply changed the display ROMs of a game... you would not be afoul of ColorDMD's patent (but PPS would be after you). If you changed the DMD Controller out for something else... you would not be afoul of ColorDMD's patent (and is a likely direction for a platform like CGC's).

There is more than one way to do this.. especially when all the code and hardware are at your disposal. ColorDMD is designed to be an external bolt-on that operates independently of the original code... CGC doesn't have those constraints (nor would any emulator.. sans copyright/IP issues).

There is certainly complexity in how the display frame is being constructed.. and that seems to be part of the difficulty in getting some games colorized. The resulting frame is constructed from multiple elements which may be behaving very differently. I think that's why the current ColorDMD "styled" stuff works on palettes instead of individual dots per say.. as you can work a bit more independent of the actual dynamic payload.

It boils down to how much of the system are you going to reuse vs replace. When its all software, there is a lot more potential for swapping modules in and out.

Yes, but then you'd also be directly in the crosshairs of ColorDMD's patent.

I'd lol if we found out the price of this upgrade was so high because of royalty payments to ColorDMD.. everyone screaming bloody PPS/CGC.. when it could be for other reasons

I think he was confusing trademark and patents. Or crossing the doctrine of laches and defense against damages... and the actual validity/ownership of the patent. As you say, it doesn't undermine the patent itself.. but inaction can make it harder to recover against past activities. In trademark, lack of enforcement can lead to loss of registration/control as well. But your statement is correct

PinMAME... who don't even mention what license or restrictions their project was published under from what I can see. They should be covered under GNU by their use of MAME source which for 0.76 which pinmame's material claims.. was GNU v2

I've not looked at the cgc distributions to see what's in there or not. Sitting here working all weekend due to other people's lack of planning

No - that's them including the license (as they should) for one of the components PinMAME includes from other authors

The /ext directory is their collection of external libraries they bundle into the solution for use.

People that include pinmame would also have to respect those licenses as it relates to that code, etc..

Wow... Get informed before grabbing your pitchforks people. It was to be sold through Pps from rick's first post on announcing it

And all of a sudden people are shocked by international shipping fees?? Wtf people

I called it pages ago when I said wait till people start Bitcoin over shipping charges... So predictable. And people wonder why vendors run from pinside...

Except your facts about some MMR owner... do not apply to the context of teekee

Why don't you just give up this charade of being a new user already and go away dupe account?

You can order it... still a promise on when they will ship it.

3 weeks to program PIC chips and print some labels?

Did they forget how many games they've built and had a hard time forecasting how many kits to build??? Pretty sad. It's not like building ahead means sinking tens of thousands into inventory. Under building here seems like another project management blunder by CGC.

This response is so fitting in so many ways...

- Too busy to build product to fulfill back orders - Check
- Too busy to deliver on promises made ages ago - Check
- Don't give a @%$ about missing deadlines - Check
- Can't give accurate estimates - Check
- Can't forecast - Check
- Still don't see any of the above as a problem - CHECK!

CGC winning again in 2016

The point is it doesn't NEED to sell quickly AND you know the exact size of the market because its only applicable to YOUR GAME. It's a simple PIC that has very low production and stocking costs. You'll have spend more time and money making small batches, managing them, and shipping them than your sunk cost of having the inventory sitting.

What is your total addressable market right now? Like 500+ games? They are selling this at $200+ and can't take the *risk* of sinking $5000 into inventory and instead need to build to order with 10-15 day leadtimes??? It's penny wise, pound foolish.

This comedy just has no end to it.

Suckers are going to ignore the tells over and over. Then cry woe is me when the problem repeats itself on the next game.

The guy just basically said "we have more important things to do then fill your orders...". How any business (outside some emergency) says that to its customer base is mind blowing and just reiterates why the next time will be just as @$%@$'d up as the first time was.

...

All look same... CGC is just a company setup by the same Churchill people to be their gaming business. It's separate in legalities only.

And in this case it's PPS is the vendor/reseller.. CGC is just the manufacturer.

Crash, that is a great breakdown.. but some of the comments (like about outlines, shadow box, etc).. couldn't some of these choices be intentional for readability?

I think the example of the Catapult Slam score is an example.. where the text can at times bleed into the art behind it. Choices like different backgrounds or outlines can help with problems like that. Especially when text is changing frequently (like the hurry up countdowns). Same thing with the peasant revolt 2 screenshot (and the outline castle vs art).

I appreciate the effort that went into that post.. but I gotta say watching the video vs the disection... I don't agree with most of the picking.

Like your post? Go back to just down voting everything.

The work that matters here is how the product is consumed in real time... If the detail is only visible in freeze frame, then it's of less significance. That's a reality, not simply discrediting concerns. Go back under your rock

Are people really arguing what legally must be put on the customs forms?? FFS

The 'ship it to a friend, and have them ship it to me' is NOT a way around customs and duties or impacting the declared value at all for duties and taxes. Who bought it is meaningless (except if trying to import as gifts, personal exemptions, etc -- not the topic here). Its the common trick used by people who are trying to AVOID the taxes because the personal mailing will be handled differently and they can try to pass things off as used goods vs new goods. It does not change the actual obligated value of the item regarding taxes and duties. The issue with commercial invoices is they will specify the actual value as paid - making it basically impossible to argue (as if you could anyway) the value should be less.

Lying on the customs declarations would lead to the vendor's packages being intercepted and ultimately impact their ability to sell into country.

Shipping things as an individual you have less at risk and worst case the receiver needs to pay the higher fees. Your USB stick example is more about 'what you can get away with' vs legal definition. If you shipped a $5000 piece of software in it's retail box.. its going to be identified as the $5000 piece of software. If you took the software, burned it to a DVD, labeled it 'home movies' and mailed it... technically it's still worth $5000.. but your shipping agent told you to mark it as zero value because they know customs isn't going to bother investigating a single DVD or USB key by looking what content is there, trying to figure out what it is. You would sneak under the radar.

But if you were a business, and shipped a palette full of DVDs all labeled 'home movies' and zero value... the scrutiny is going to be different.

Resistance is futile...

oh no... It's FUSE-gate!