Quoted from Aurich:

I know this is gonna sound nitpicky, but as an artist this stuff is important to me. What Stern needs to do is up their print quality. Look at the screened art on a Williams/Bally slingshot plastic, then look at the art on a Metallica slingshot. JJP gets this, even if they're kind of annoying about it (the recent clear coated vs decal crap).
Pinball has always been a commercial enterprise, but the modern Sterns just lack the same feeling of the old ones to me primarily because of the crappy Photoshopped art and poor print quality. It's just cheap and tacky feeling.
I'm really learning to appreciate Sterns because of the modern rules, they're typically deeper which is great for home use, you feel like you have more to do and so the fun lasts longer. And the powdercoating has gotten nice, I love the finish on my Star Trek Premium. But as objects to appreciate they don't really carry quite the same weight as the eras where hand drawn art was the standard, even for licensed movie properties.