Not sure if this was ever asked, but I'll ask. There was a non-bleeped rom version for MM - is there an option to enable/disable this in MMR/MMRLE?

No.

LTG : )

I will have a MMR set up at the Winston-Salem NC auction this Sat for people to see play and touch. This is a sample and is a full working production standard edition. I am a factory authorized distributor and wanted many who have not been to recent shows and operators a chance to play this incredible pin. All standards are the classic stainless steel version and look like the original pins. 8k with a 1000 deposit.

Stop by the Dixie Classic Fairground and take a look. I still think it's incredible to get a new in box MM for 8k when they were so much higher a few years ago.

Thanks
Buddy

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Since you're showing off the inserts in those pics (and they seem to look ok)... can you guarantee your customers will get that quality and NOT a factory second like they have been shipping? Did PPS tell you they had finally gone through the iffy PF's?

I bring this up because if I were a customer looking at your pics and then I got yet another faded one I might be unhappy. In fact I'd be pretty upset.

I don't think you need to hype this machine to make sales. Just the confidence to tell the customer that they WILL get the same quality PF's MMr's originally shipped with.

Looks a lot nicer than the other ones. I guess they fixed the problem? But for how long?

Yeah since they knew this one would be on display maybe they found one of the earlier PF's to put in it I sure wouldn't want to take an 8k gamble knowing now there is no recourse if a faded one shows up at your door.

Kinda odd that this "display" model has decent PF like the earlier ones but that the last few owners that JUST received theirs report the "thin ink" problem is still there.

I'm impressed with these new owners being so impartial and openly pointing this out. If I had waited so long and paid 8k I'd probably be in denial. If it wasn't such a great title it wouldn't matter as much I suppose.

They wil actually be two there but one will be set up for a charity donation with all money going to The American Cancer Society. Its not just a one off to impress.

Good question, because if you buy it and the inserts exhibit poor print quality, you're stuck with it.

Why is it that the people who aren't getting an MMr seem to be the ones crying the loudest?

As it applies to all games, new or used, not just MMr:

Any time the backbox key is not screwed, taped, or hooked on the coin door/cashbox and missing, lift the playfield after game set up and secure it.
Then start using a large mag light (or halogen floodlight) and scrutinize the lower cabinet first.
Many times the loose key ends of magnetized to the center channel speaker, underneath the transformer, or trapped underneath the power switch/fuse box.
If it is not there, it then is usually lodged in a wire harness, cable sleeve tube, or rarely inside a game assembly.
This is particularly true if the game has been in storage for a long time in transport position, and moved.

Although this may seem like common sense...
When placing a game in storage, use a piece of packaging tape on the key to keep it in place, never separate the key from the machine, or eventually you are going to have to replace the lock and remove the torx screws to get it out on modern machines. Older machines you are going to have to drill.

Why on earth was this comment down voted? no one has had poorly printed inserts FIXED or replaced with good inserts. The vast majority of people who have installed their diffusers have said they are rubbish which is not surprising.

I didn't down vote it, but I think some people are tired of the insert issue derailing the unboxing thread. Especially when several threads already exist to discuss the inserts.

Pinball and pinside seem to attract crusty old men who dislike seeing other people who are happy. These people have plenty of time on their hands. Getting an MMR is indeed a good reason to be happy, and a thread about that topic is going to bring those people out in droves. For every one new owner posting about the joy of their game, you'll see many more posts bashing the game, from people who are not going to buy it.

"Can't allow those people to be happy about getting a new game, especially one as iconic as MM."

3 years ago I was looking at paying way more than 8k for a blown out heavily routed MM. Now I was able to buy a mint in the box remake, for less money. "Oh, but the shield inserts could be a little darker". Then I pull up photos of the playfield from the routed MM on my phone from 3 years ago... Man I dodged a bullet.

What do you expect when doughslingers posted pictures focusing on the inserts on what looks to be a Standard with improved insert ink, and the LEs still have not all been shipped?

Many old collectors have no issues with a new owner purchasing a new version of a classic game such as MM, but they simply do not post, but they do read, often, more than some realize.
They would prefer to allow the hobby to expand via knowledge, allowing enthusiasts and new collectors to learn how to maintain their games or direct not overpay for them.
They just got tired of beating their head into a brick wall in trying to explain things to people.
What observations I see in forums often enough are people that post out of envy, jealousy, fear of "loss of investment", or even narcissism.
I recently recall a comment (not on PinSide), where someone stated, "No one collected pinball machines before 1990".
That was an interesting conversation...

I agree this insert thing is getting way blown out of proportion. I have MMR LE #669 and love it, it's a blast to play. I don't give a rats ass that my inserts are a little faded......just the way they are. I still know what they say and my game plays great and I enjoy it.

You guys so don't care about the insert issue that you keep bringing it up.

Too bad about the inserts.

I really don't think it is. CGC has been making playfields for years, they should have it down. From other peoples posts, the company line seems to be that there is "10x as much light" in these inserts which creates this problem, but when Metallik shoved a 4 SMD LED under his white inserts, the ink is still opaque as it should be. This is a mistake, and it sucks that their general stance is that it's "within tolerances" when the only thing that should be tolerable is opaque, like they've generally done in the past -- rather than admitting its a mistake and working to not have it happen going forward.

I was going to get one, but opted for a GBLE instead after seeing how CGC/PPS dropped the ball with the issue.

I bought both. GBLE will sit next to MMr.

They did admit it was a mistake at first.....but then they decided we were mistaken and those that are not happy with their tolerances should just take a big F&^kin sheet of tone down to diffuse the situation.

I am more angry about their lack of customer service and bullshit communication than am I am about my inserts.

I am happy with the game over all, but what if I need customer service in a couple of years? I can't even get a reply from them now.....PPS says talk to CGC and CGC don't answer.

That's not pinball, that's bullshit.

I have a standard on order. If I get a playfield with faded/transparent inserts, and that's the only issue, I'm going to be disappointed, but will still enjoy the game and probably be more happy than upset with my purchase.

What is more troubling than the faded inserts is CGC apparent lack of any customer service and communication skills whatsoever. Mistakes get made in the manufacturing sector all the time - anything from a rubber band to a 300 million dollar passenger jet can have quality control issues. It's the response to these issues that determines whether the company is going to stick around in the long term or not.

If CGC would just say "Hey, a batch of playfields were produced with less ink on inserts than others. We are really sorry about this. We hope you still enjoy your game and as a token of appreciation for our customers, those customers that have documented issues with the inserts will get the upcoming colorization upgrade for free", it would result in a ton of goodwill and ultimately cost CGC nothing.

With CGC's inability to respond to any customer service issue is what is really worrying me about my game. What if one of the boards fails in a year or two? Am I going to have a $8k brick? Will it take me 6 months to have them respond to a trouble ticket? Ultimately, if they don't pick up their customer service game, this will be my first and last purchase from them.

Totally agree

Well said and without profanity - thank you. I feel exactly the same. CGC due to delays and sub par playfields should simply throw a bone to the affected buyers and communicate the issues. If they offered me free color for the sub par playfield I would be fine with it. Instead, they will offer to sell me a diffuser which does nothing to address the problem or compensate.

Love the game otherwise, but will be my last one from them unless they admit to the quality of the playfield ink and give some compensation for it. The claim that the LEDs are too bright is laughable - especially when the exact same LEDs are in the earlier MMrs and they have no insert issues. It is a shame.

I was "in" on day one for the MMRLE and hung in there waiting for over two years. Wanting a MM, I tried to remain positive with this project, but the way CGC/PPS has handled the slingshot damage, sound quality/software bugs, the vagueness of the full-color LCD software "upgrade" price, etc wore me down. The final nail was thin/unreadable playfield insert ink QC issue that, in my opinion, was not addressed correctly for an 8k + shipping pinball machine. I got back my 1k preorder deposit and I'm out, but I still follow and wish that CGC/PPS will do the "right thing" with MMR and any other future titles that they may pursue.

Cheers,
~Steveo

Back to the 'unboxing'... I'm waiting on a standard, anyone have a standard shipping right now?

No but I'm waiting on my Black LE.

MMR LE or standard could ship this week, or could ship this year or sometime over the next couple of years?

Honestly, I think that if every owner had the light ink, we'd all have a much easier time swallowing the issue. But when you see a picture of someone's playfield that has what appear to be dark inserts, it's kind of hard not to be a little upset that you're a loser in the "lottery" of these games.

If you’ve read about the production stages of MMR (GAP’s review mentions it), you’ll learn about how they went through several prototype versions of the playfield in order to get the color to EXACTLY replicate the original. It’s not like these guys were trying to ballpark it. Their goal was exact duplication - not cheap replication. Plus, the agreement with WMS is that the machine both plays and looks exactly like the original. For this reason, I find it very hard to believe that an insert error like this occurred under the trained eyes of people who used an original playfield as a reference. If it was there initially, I’m 99% certain that they would have caught it.

My theory, which other people have mentioned before, is that something went wrong with the black ink during the middle of production. Since it was never caught or brought to anyone’s attention until production was completed, it was too late to go back and fix.

So the most economical solution would be to continue shipping out the existing stock of playfields, create a half-assed repair to calm dissatisfied customers down, and just continue business as usual. What are the consequences? Well, not much as you can see. No one has attempted to return their game. No one has done a chargeback. And to my knowledge, no one has taken any actions beyond complaining on the forums and proclaiming that they will not be purchasing Game #2 *Gasp*. CGC and PPS (who have carefully distanced themselves from taking blame) aren't going to do anything else, because based on the way people are reacting, they really don’t need to.

Those who use grounds that it doesn't affect gameplay must see things differently than other victims - myself included. If your playfield's color was all mucked up, if you had a damaged siderail, or a faulty translite, would you also write these problems off since they don't affect gameplay? I doubt it. The inserts provide players with objectives that they are working towards. In my opinion, that's kind of a big deal, both from a gameplay and a cosmetic perspective. If they look a little light? Okay. But if they are so light that when lit, you can't even read what they say, then that's pretty firm grounds for what I consider to be a defect.

Although unlike some of you guys, I had absolutely no problems communicating with CGC. They responded to my ticket, are sending me a siderail to replace my chipped one, and were originally going to send me a diffuser until Rick finally responded to my e-mail asking for one. I've actually had a more difficult time with his responses than I have had with CGC.

Realistically, nothing in these games are going to be perfect. If I look hard, I can see that my "Shoot Again" insert isn't dead center between the flippers. In fact, I'm pretty sure the entire playfield art kind of veers toward the left. But no one, other than myself, would ever notice this. But when you have what I consider to be a legitimate issue that affects both the gameplay and the cosmetic look of your game in a negative way, I feel that customers have every right to voice their complaints.

This. Those of us who don't have MMR might be interested in ???R down the road, but if all you MMR buyers let PPS/CGC get away with shipping shit without any fight, they have no reason to improve either their product OR customer service. This helps no one except PPS and CGC and sets an awful precedent for future games from this company.

How surprising

It will hurt them also. I won't buy another title unless they admit the ink problem on my MMr. I won't gripe and complain, but I will just add another Stern to the collection instead.

Yep, that's all you can do for the most part. Voice your displeasure without buying another game from them. But I can see it now, when the next "r" comes out that people want, there going to buy regardless. So begins the cycle.

Yeah, reality is the fact that people will fork over cash for new machines regardless of the faults. Like I said, MMR overall is very nice and I am happy with it when considering the big picture. My concern is that going forward it may not be supported correctly due to less than honest assessment of the inserts. I think most owners would be happy with a small concession for the insert problem and the ones that will not take a concession would be happy with a refund. If CGC would do this I believe they could restore their credibility.

We shall see.

I will have an unboxing event tomorrow at 824 State Street in Bristol TN at Noon if anyone local wants to check it out in person.

I feel your pain. MMr gold through JJP...... waiting..... still waiting.....

The CGC ship sailed already for many of us because of lack of responsiveness. The way a company responds to complaints on quality control issues means a lot to me.

My mmr is fine .....but I can already see the Pinside for sale ads some day with distinctions bet inserts that are ok and those with diffusers....

^ This. MMRs with proper inserts will command a premium seeing how they are fewer than 200 of them and next to nobody (at least judging by the posts here) with defective inserts are bothering to ask for a proper playfield. And you should be.

If I bought a brand new car and the cool "Type S" logo on the shifter was all smeared off, and (hypothetically) the only way to replace it was to replace the whole car....you can bet your bottom dollar I'd ask for exactly that. But here's the thing...car companies get it...every single one of them would OFFER to replace the car to make me happy. They wouldn't tell me "Here's a Type S sticker you can slap on there." It isn't being a crybaby guys. You paid your money for a proper product, you deserve a proper product.

The problem with this argument is that you either inspect before buying or inspect before signing upon delivery

Man, a lot of posts in 24 hours! At any rate, Lloyd helped get the non functioning Trolls squared away. Powered off the game, tapped on the adjacent driver boards and fired up the MMR, and presto... working Trolls. Looks like manufacturing goo residue may have interfered with the initial electrical connections. Having a blast playing, and suddenly realized I didn't post the solution for others to see in this thread. Back to playing. Can't. Stop. Playing...

P.S. - Yes the inserts are a bit light and I'll look into getting a diffuser kit, but that concern fades significantly after pressing the start button.

Where did you get that number? The first hint of light ink came around at 300 and not every machine since then has an issue.

Nor does every owner post here.

Serial numbers didn't run in order. Most of the playfield run has the ink issue. Run a poll if you don't believe me. If you count Standard editions, 90% of the playfields shipped are defective with the ink issue.

90% of them. Wow........☹️

Wait, so now it's 100 good ones? Lol...you're obviously making stuff up at this point.

How do you have a correct poll?
Someone without the game can take the poll.

Are you getting a MMR?

Not too good with Math or too rushed to comment and didn't read what I wrote? Doesn't matter. If you don't have anything to contribute, just stay on the sidelines.

--

Yes, I'm getting an MMR. Still waiting for my own defective playfield LE from JJP.

Just a reminder but staying on the sidelines, suppressing speech, and burying heads in the sand was how people got into the Shit-B and JPlop messes.