I would expect we'll be fine for a few years. If you compare this rise in pinball with the resurrection in the mid 80's with space shuttle and high speed, then again in the mid 90's with TAF and the rise of the other manufacturers like Sega and Capcom, both bubbles lasted about 5 years and died for 5 years. The difference in the late 90's/2000's was the death of the arcades as well which prolonged the downturn beyond 'normal' and it lasted until, I would say, 2010-11 ish? It wasn't until after Tron that I recall NIB prices pulling a steep upward climb.

If you apply the roughly 5 year 'boom' cycle to it, we're looking good until 2015-2016. I expect we will see pricing become more competitive by mid 2015, and by end of 2016 I would expect we will lose at least one of the big manufacturers (Stern, JJP, PPS) not necessarily to failure, just to less money in the market.

Where I think there will be money available is for any of the really high quality small-run machines. People making 1-50 machines based on very popular layouts or themes (along the lines of the Matrix machine, but maybe/maybe not licensed - think JPop or Predator type games) will probably still sell for a big dollar amount as the rarity and uniqueness will offset the cost for the right person.

I think from a hobbiest persepctive the 'sell 1 to buy 1' mentality exists in all niches. Cars, boats, snowmobiles, RC, pinball, etc... the number of people that have dozens of pinballs are few much like people who collect dozens of cars. And they don't usually sell any because they have the space and funds for it, but all these hobbys still exist today despite ebbs and flows in the market.

10-20-30 years ago the market was operators, and the focus was making money thru the general public. Today's sustainable market is the hobbiest/collector segment which I don't see fading away if the bubble bursts... in fact it would potentially grow thru the secondary market. I personally have no intention of ever leaving the hobby, and I'll always be interested in the next NIB purchase, but I doubt 5k pro models will sell in the quantities they are today as I will be looking at used machines for my deals.

I still do think a 100-200 machine run of something like big lebowski or spaceballs would always fetch a premium though due to the hobbiest appeal. Like all the Sideshow collectable and First 4 Figures stuff - limit the quantities and deliver a product a select few REALLY like and you can charge a premium regardless of how popular the overall industry is at the time.