I would not say SM as it was in 2007 is a premium machine by today’s standards. Aerosmith Pro makes a 2007 SM look a bit dated. If you had a time machine and brought an Aerosmith Pro back to 2007 it would outsell SM.

Still, you are right about Stern appearing to be cutting corners, I was comparing a first run Metallica pro’s cabinet to a Aerosmith cabinet and it seems like the wood they are using now is a far lower quality on the under carriage, it’s seems like it is some sort of partical board to me.

Stern needs to lower prices. Hopefully competition eventually brings this result.

Sterns playfield issues were far more widespread than just GOT. SMVE and GB had even more reports than GOT for defective playfields and Stern was far behind assemble deadlines for QC in 2016 and into 2017 to even produce the games with the defective playfields they were able to produce. Stern does seem to have the playfield ghosting issue in hand now.

What I’m more concerned with on the newer Sterns are the boards. A lot of people who work on boards are scared of the Spike 2 boards and this scares me because the replacement board price is high once your game is out of warranty.

Color RGB lighting vs incandestine bulbs as well. The LCD display vs the DMD is a big deal too. A stock SM from 2007 looks rather dim next to an Aerosmith Pro.

Also, I think the inflation rate for manufacturing has been greater than the 3% annual rate we all assume is the inflation rate and Stern has moved into a larger (presumably more expensive) factory while finally shelling out bucks on good artwork; still I’m not challenging you that the price increases have far outstripped inflation while material cost cutting measures (moving the darn power switch!!!) seem to reign supreme.

More on topic, someone bought a game from an operator that had the leger of the operator from the 70’s through the 90’s on it with NIB prices. I can’t recall who it was but maybe he will see this thread and post that list again for us.