Oklahoma City, OK
Quoted from frolic:Boy, you really just nailed the whole "Pinball Conundrum". It is a market that has a history and continued legacy of valuing the art/aesthetics as a major part of the entire experience, and in weird ways the art can mask an entirely missing game (see Jpop).
P3 is definitely a potentially disruptive technology. I mean, it literally is, but there is a missing component of it that weighs heavily.
There was a lot of discussion of Alice Cooper's cabinet as well before the game was shown. People had a lot to talk about the cabinet. How the art "integrated" with the buttons. "Butter" cabinets. This excited people (traditional pinball people).
I wonder if Multimorphic should start demoing at Esports/gaming shows more. Try connecting with a new audience and see if they resonate there.
Like, for example there was a gaming show in my city last week. It had 12,000 attendance. It was all about Smash Bros, Call of Duty, and also indie gaming. No pinballs on site.
The price point is way too high for the esports demographic and truth be told, pinball just simply doesn't resonate with a large portion of those demographics either.
I don't know much about P3, I hope they succeed and accomplish what they've set out to accomplish, but I know it's a tough road ahead when a business is aniche within a niche with limited capital in order to make the product a viable option to an already crowded market. Personally if I had a business in that position, social media would be heavily leveraged every single day just documenting the process of creating this business and journey.
The lack of art was one thing my wife and I noticed over the weekend and last year as well. After playing a couple of games I asked her and a few friends what they'd be willing to pay for one of these without them knowing the price point. No one got higher than $5200. That being said, it's such a small sample size, but I'm curious to see what others think about the price point in relation to the package that is being presented at these shows.
