I played Predator at Expo. The problem is that I didn't have any actual fun playing it.

I don't know what you guys were smoking, but three weeks ago you posted a video where you had clear ramps on the game. You showed up at expo with OPAQUE BLACK ramps on the game.

WHAT were you guys smoking? The NUMBER ONE COMPLAINT against AC/DC is that people can't see what's going on around the right inlane, and you guys cover not only the inlanes but most of the outlanes ON BOTH SIDES!??!!?? HORRENDOUSLY BAD presentation -- put me off the game pretty hard.

It flat out DOESN'T MATTER that the clear ramps looked like crap. The point is THEY WERE CLEAR. Going with the completely black ramps meant that ANYTHING that went ANYWHERE NEAR either the inlane or outlane on either side was COMPLETELY unsaveable. You turned a game of pinball into a game of pachinko. If I WANTED to play pachinko, I'D BE PLAYING PACHINKO!

Throwing James under the bus for your incompetence/ignorance on ramp making was also very poor form as well. You would be perfectly fine saying "we wanted to have X but it didn't work out", but throwing James under the bus by name for something that wasn't his problem but a problem of your making isn't cool. James is a highly valued member of the pinball community! His product has helped me save many of my games! Not cool in the least!

Clean up your act guys -- your expo showing was low class on multiple fronts. If you're going to be in business making pinball machines, act like you're IN BUSINESS. That means you don't talk crap about your suppliers with every Tom, Dick, and Harry that walks up to the booth. (EVEN IF they deserve it, which in this case they didn't.) Being in business means that you take your lumps and go with the playable ramps even if they look like melted soda bottles. Being in business means acting like professionals, not like two guys who escaped their garage. It's entirely OK to be two guys who escaped their garage (look at Dennis & Greg!) -- just don't ACT like it.

That's like saying that you know the wheels are going to be round instead of square so what's the problem? The problem is that as shown the game was nearly unplayable. I played it once and was so put off by them that I didn't even push start for a second. Next day I decided to give the game a second shake and after two games was still so put off I muttered "this is horseshit" underneath my breath and walked away, shaking my head. Talking with other people many had the same reaction. If it wasn't a new game that nobody had seen or played before it would quickly have found itself idle.

I guess if you don't ever play your games you might not see the problem. Try it on your own games and see how fun it is. Tape a folder over the left inlane and outlane area, and do the same thing with the right inlane and outlane, then play a game. Fun? Nope.

Would I rather see the ramps unhittable or rather see the inlanes? Good question, but there's absolutely NO REASON I should have to make this choice. If those clear ramps were as unhittable as you claim (and I'm not so sure that's true), then you saw off the bottom third of the black ramps and glue the bottom third of the clear ramps on them. That'll fix the problem (by the time the ball gets to the clear section it's pretty much headed straight down and can be handled by anything) without throwing blinders over 33% of the critical lower playfield. It was a work in progress -- it can be ugly, but it CANNOT be dysfunctional. That's why no art doesn't rate a mention as it doesn't affect game play. Throwing blinders over the in/out lanes affects EVERY ball played on that game in a drastically negative way. You just can't do that and expect people to take you seriously.

And yes, I DO feel very smart that I disregarded the pinside hype ("suckers!") and avoided buying one of these after playing it at expo, thank you very much. Predator needs to get MILES better before it's worth much of anything except to those who like looking at their games rather than playing them.

As for the Jack/WoZ comparisons, this isn't a WoZ thread. Stay on topic.

Complaints about game play are now being labeled trolling because they don't agree with the hive mind. Pinside hits a new low.