God, I cant wait for round 3...
Just wonder what that group or company will be called...

Listen, some of the SHILLS on here have been pumping this garbage up so they could sell out to some fool who would believe the BS

MUCH worse than what Jpop ever did

A F ing disgrace

that is untrue. I played a couple of games on it and it played great.

Yup, agreed and photos. Not sure why some people are lying about this? Wtf ROBT?

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and with a $6500 price tag, it's looking like the best viable option for those that want NIB.

Get yourself one Neo. Shill man is still around

Don't believe a word any of these SHILLS trying to take down unsuspecting MARKS and using Pinside and Facebook to do it.

This isn't Nigeria and don't fall for some horrendous Pinsider trying to take advantage of you

Rob wasn't lying. He posted that last night, after the Alien pins had gone down due to technical problems and had been removed from the vendor hall. They were back up and flipping today.

Didn't you play it?

yep, you and i rolled some pinballs down the hallway and called it Houdini, didn't we?

Meanwhile, the SHILL was there pumping and dumping

AP can try and distance themselves from Jpop, but Houdini can't distance itself from MG/RAZA/AIW. The problem I have with this John CERTAINLY used part of my money to develop the Houdini art project. AP can say they don't owe Zidware customers anything, but they do if we funded the Houdini project they are taking over.

Ya think? ....there's these Z's all over everything.

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Meme courtesy of Don from The Pinball Podcast poking fun at me for caring

http://midwestmagic.net/shop/item.aspx?itemid=13001

Image used on the upper right part of the playfield (skill shot?) was taken from a USPCC playing card deck. Not sure if this matters or not because I'm not going to delve into the legality of art copyright.

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Wow, nice post. The picture has possibly stolen artwork and the Zidware "Z" cutout in the same picture.

I don't think that was me. But i'm sure we played some games together. I didn't really talk much about houdini there.

You didn't like Alien? Personally, I thought it was pretty good. Finding jonsey mode made me smile. Especially the expressions on the cats face that show up on the screen.

FWIW, if you purchase officially licensed stuff and use it to create something new, you're generally OK to re-sell. Think about buying a jersey, framing it and re-selling it - that's fine. So, if that's a playing card from the deck it's fine. If it's a reproduction, no bueno.

I love Alien Neo Can't wait for that one

That's a surprise. The person with the beard in the middle I know. It's a countryman and a skilled pinball engineer. He also worked a few months with Heighway beginning of this year.

At least they hired a proper real existing technical pinball person for the technical side.

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Houdini was infuriating for me to see in person.

There's subways in the back with no diverter to drop in the ball (and just a ripoff of TOM's Vanish) A magnet is mounted at a right angle on the upper left with no way for the ball to reach it. The "loop jump" has a piece of acrylic meant to look like a mech and the ball wouldn't make it onto the metal rail anyway - and that rail leads to the right outlane?? The Water Chamber is just an acrylic piece of art and the CV ripoff rising pop bumper doesn't look to actually be there. There's no code, no boards just an Arduino running cycles on RGB lighting.

It's a prototype concept game made from production-level parts. Insulting to people making real things out of tape, cardboard and passion (like Nightmare Before Xmas) and a kick in the nuts to people owed MG/RAZA/AIW. (a lot of time and other people's money was spent making this fake game)

From what I saw and heard, John basically used this game to trick some unknowing foreigners into starting a business and now they're stuck with it. Joe Balcer was brought in to fix the game and make it playable. They're changing art, cabinet style, LCD position and creating new driver boards from scratch because (I assume) they've realized that stuff is owned by a dissolved company involved with a lawsuit. Basically distancing themselves from John as fast as possible.

In my opinion the MG's are being fulfilled mostly out of embarrassment. There's zero chance RAZA/AIW are ever made. Best AP can do is give those people a Houdini or massive discounts. I hope Joe can help them pull through.

I've lost any remaining shred of sympathy or hope for John. It's clear to me now he's gone way past incompetence and into deliberate deception.

That's all well and good. But did anybody shed light on what a real quickstep solenoid is?

Harry said he has been working with John for years, behind the scenes.
I felt bad for him after talking to him.

It does not change that Houdini is a farse and in aweful shape, plus being built 100% from the money stolen from previous owners. Complete mess.

I CALL BULLSHIT! There is no way n hell that the clowns did not know about John and his continued scamming of this community. They are supposed to be business professionals. It's not hard to find the info on John anywhere on the web. Hell, it took less than 24 hours for someone to find all the dirt on Sabrina Wei. So for these clowns to jump up at the 2 minute warning and say, gosh fellows, we sure got hoodwinked by that jpop. But we are going to fix it all. Unless you gave jpop money. You will have to talk to John about that. From this point on, anyone that gives them the time of day or 1 red cent is s fucking Moran and is helping to rub salt into the wounds of all those affected by this. In short, wise up kids.

Thank you, Ben, for a dose of reality and confirmation of what we all suspected. Another pinball arts project for John, that he was paid for by a new patron.

Is there a link to the ap talk? They did a talk right? Curious where it came out that they were now trying to distance themselves from John? Also did someone from the lawsuit group mention that not all parties were going to be satisfied with an mg delivery? I'm confused about what happened at expo -- cointaker initially posted they were impressed but obviously no mg delivery for them are they still expecting one soon?

Ask a few of the shills here and the direct coordination to one of the AP characters Scott.

They are working together to pump this up. While dumping it at the same time.

Somebody, a foolish person, actually bought out with real $$$ a MG position from one of the shills. Wow factor!

Trying to read between the lines on how they got into this relationship without knowing how badly it would be received and I can only think of one thing. Harry (I think) said he had known John for ten years. Why do a background check, or even Google a guy you think you already know, and believe is "a good guy"?

So my guess is John told them as little of the Zidware saga as he felt was necessary, and they were satisfied that they knew the whole story rather than say 10% of it.

It was clear to me that they are indeed working to get past the Pop connection as quickly as possible and that that is why Joe was hired.

It's kind of a hard company to root for. The only reason I would is in hope that MG buyers do indeed finally get their games. If/when that happens AP will surely wash their hands if it and refer all RAZA/AIW/vendors questions to Zidware.

They claim Houdini is 75% done. I think they're overestimating by a good bit.

By about... 75%?

Joe was the one who said that it was 75% complete. I think he was talking about the layout. In their room he went on to describe it as a white wood with art and that they would have to change a number of the shots.

Whitewood with art. That is funny.

Anyway, they did not have it in a cabinet because the cabinet was Zidware and they wanted to sever that connection. But did anyone ask them about all of the Zidware "Z" cutouts in the metal underneath? If Houdini was "them and not John" how come assemblies developed with Zidware customer's money are what populate the underside of that playfield?

Joe specifically said it was 75% done or he wouldn't sign on based on the commitment of shipping games in 6 months.

Zidware is all over the Houdini machine. Anyone thinking this machine was not at least partially paid by the use of Zidware customers, is living in a fantasy world. This is from John and was always in the works far before AP came on the scene. John was talking to me about it years ago.

It's been reported that questions about RAZA, AIW, money owed to others, etc were all diverted to Zidware / John. They made it clear that John is just a consultant / contractor and that's where the relationship ends. Your earlier speculation about MG manufacture for services, or something along those lines seems likely. But I don't recall if they clearly came out and stood behind MG delivery. It sounds like a solid maybe to me.

I'll ask, since everyone is wondering. Any further contact with AP after their mysterious calls? We're wondering if there might have been and that might have something to do with their "reduced" unveil.

No, not really expecting an answer, but it had to be asked...

I have zero sympathy for American pinball. If you just Google John popadiuk, the first 2 links should tell you everything you need to know. Partnering blindly is a great way to sink a sub-company fast.

Joe is like the 10th guy to be convinced - on John's assurance - that a Zidware/Jpop game is 75% done. The 75%+ crew always ends up working for him/with him.

I think at least 75% of us know how this is going to work out.

Magic Girl was called "50% done" by experts when Pintasia had it last year. Houdini is nowhere near Magic Girl level of completion, especially now that they've made a 180 and won't be using Zidware anything and are starting from scratch.

People have been fooled once again by completed artwork (usually done in the final stage of the game) and shiny lights. Plus Houdini has all their ramps and stuff fabricated, which likely will all get tossed.

Not that it really matters, but just to correct the record nothing was pulled for technical problems, the Alien games were taken back to the private room because there was a media crew filming them and Andrew for a few hours. Gotta be careful with how rumors fly around at Expo.

Carry on with the pitchforks!

Maybe American Pinball finally talked to a lawyer? Better late than never.

John just sucks. He only consumes time and resources, make everyone else work harder, and adds no benefit to any operation. A company that gets involved with him is WORSE off than they were before.

I wouldn't even pay him a negative wage.

Is that where he pays you for the privilege of working with you?

Or is that paying him to stay away?

The latter might be useful!

I don't know how anybody even takes this seriously, showing up with a lit playfield kinda like JPOP showing up with some empty cabinets I would run not walk away from this. This would be like Kevin Kulek designing a new game for another company and people trying to justify that, what a joke.

Stop sugar coating it Ben...speak your mind

You're quoting the wrong Dude. I don't believe that one bit. I was correcting someone who was trying to give AP wiggle room by saying what he "thought" Joe meant.

There is no need to run, just don't spend a dime with these clowns until they have an inventory of machines ready to deliver. Only run if you find yourself tempted to open your wallets or swipe your cards for deposits.

I think AP knows they couldn't ask for a wooden nickel up front.

He's a talented artist (as long as you are in the market for pink and purple magic-themed art) but the guy clearly needs to be on the short leash of a strong manager. This whole "art first" approach to pinball production is clearly not the way to go no matter how many times he's tried it. It's like designing a car and starting with the upholstery.

The Houdini that Ben described, is exactly the kind of stuff we were throwing together on the MG that went to the NW show last summer. Those Houdini round headed screws to hold the ramp (the left one screwed in at an angle) instead of flat screws, the subways to nowhere, the mechs slapped on with no room in criss-cross ramps for a ball to make it through - those were the kinds of things pdxmoney and I were dealing with on MG

MG was a mess. Hell, the monitor brackets were too long, the PF wouldn't go all the way in and under the monitor!!!! I "solved" that one - we reversed and flipped the brackets, gained 3 inches and the PF fit - but that's a non-engineer coming in at the 23rd hour to fix the PF not fitting below the screen!! Too many examples to list - but random rivets and other screws put in "wherever", "I'll worry about putting the Liger motor in later, I want that to spin eventually", "I guess we have to move that back plastic to the get PF in all the way" - WTF? Part of the reason I helped at all was to see what was possible (or not) and at least get the game out of the lab and into the light of day

So, all that to say I'm not shocked at all by Ben's findings on Houdini - all so familiar to when I was putting in random screws on MG - its so sad and stomach churning.

I guess the good news is that Houdini got out of the lab quickly. The feedback was quick and harsh, but at least AP already hired Joe based on what they saw - at least Houdini is out there now. Dhaval had no intention of going to Expo when I talked to him 8 weeks ago. I told him he better show up, if he announces anything before the show, he has to make it to the show.

When I visited AP in August, and talked to DHaval in the parking lot, pre-scott, pre-Joe (perhaps only Dhaval at that time??), DV told me he knew about Jpop or "had heard of his troubles in the past" - so have no doubts that AP knew exactly what John was (and wasn't). DV may have been naive about what Jpop showed him on MG, and whether it was playable. It would take no time at all for Joe or Ben, or likely any of us, to take one look at Houdini (running a script of blinking lights on an arduino ?!) and know it wasn't anything near a prototype.

Unless Jpop did a ton of reworking on MG, including inventing the mechs that had yet to be made (but there were CAD models in his PC), within the past months since June 2015 - the MG that Dhavani has in his hands, probably can't be produced - Chris@Cointaker or the Mr68 may have more details of how far it is along. But I've helped assemble that 50% box of somewhat flipping parts and mostly? done code - and there was a lot of engineering left to go (I mean really - the clearance of crossing ramps was blocking balls?).

But based on the Pinball Magazine's J Joosten podcast and the Expo interviews - can we expect to see any MG by year end, let alone all of them?

I'm so sorry for all the people screwed by this - don't mean to bring up bad memories of the MG reveal last year - I do agree that there is now a better than 0% change as compared to August, but the Expo reveal was not encouraging. Having some capital and some bodies on board is much better than just a few weeks ago - however, its hard to put this at more than a 1% chance yet.

Cointaker, GLM or Mr68 - hopefully got something better than what we've seen, heard or was shared at Expo.

Obligatory reminder that Jpop doesn't do any of the art for his machines.

You have to wonder how much further back AP is because of John. If they were/are truly passionate about pinball and really wanted to enter this business, how much better would it have been without him.

I can't get away from the suspicion they are in the business today because John convinced them there was easy money here, and he had all this "near complete" work that they could flip for easy returns, even with his taint. Now they've been pulled into his river of shit along with everyone else John has screwed over. Expo certainly didn't convince me otherwise.