Nice to see a small amount of communication. I hope they've looked at the bug report threads that have all the known bugs laid out nicely:

GHOSTBUSTERS Bugs
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/ghostbusters-v113-bugs-and-features

KISS Bugs
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/kiss-130-bugs-and-wishlist

...so we can get as complete a fix as possible, especially for "Final" updates like Ghostbusters and KISS. The last KISS update only handled a few bugs, leaving over 10 long-ago documented bugs.

And I sure hope Batman'66 has a lot more than Major Villain Cliffhangers to show for almost 5 months of waiting in very unfinished Alpha mode.

Heh, for sure. I had a fantasy that they would update the game to take into account what's happened in the last few seasons. That clearly ain't happening.

At least half those will get some love, but pretty sure WWE is done.

They don't comment on code long dead and buried in the graveyard.

If the source or parts of it are truly lost, then there's no point at all for them to even mention it since they can't do anything about it. I'm sure it's a time period they'd all rather forget.

Well, Gomez didn't say it, so there's a chance this will work out as a regular thing. After many BS promises that didn't pan out, Gomez's word is mud in my book. I'll give this Sharpe kid a chance. Seems like he's trying, and he watched his Dad help keep pinball going, so maybe he learned a thing or two.

It's not the size of the carrot, but what you do with it.

Not quite golden until they go back to whatever supplier uses better/harder playfield wood exclusively and return to denser cabinet wood.

THEN we're golden.

Well I just realized that since House Martell, House Tyrell, and the Wall are basically done now, the pin can't really follow the current series anyway. It will remain more of an "inspired by" kind of thing going forward. But some new clips and modes would be nice.

They need to make it work in color on spike, first. All they have running spike so far is sigma displays.

They've been malnourished for a long time. AWOL is to be expected.

Pretty much a big fat zero in the anticipated information column.

Maybe Something else about the Iron Maiden Prem/LE. A tease. Anything? A new streaming date since they didn't save the last one for anyone who couldn't watch it live? A few morsels of specific things that will be fixed/added to the code for other games that all have bugs yet to be addressed. Surely SOME of them are already fixed and they can mention it?

Exactly. You understand. You really do.

The most important detail is Iron Maiden Pro confirmed to be the version the band plays most.

Well, one is a Lonnie production, so that's a given. No dur-prise there

It would be nice to get another update with some newer video and modes reflecting the story advances, but I'd be happy to just have the bugs fixed.

You clearly never had a game that played like a beta like Batman'66, GotG, or X-Men. The first two weren't EVEN Beta level.

KISS isn't anywhere close to a beta. It plays fine. Fix the bugs, polish the game, make Rock City wizard mode not so bare-bones and it will be fine.

Hopefully they fix the KISS bugs Aerosmith inherited.

Then you are extremely forgiving. The initial release of GotG was a light and sound box, and that's about it. It was BARELY a beta, and the few clips it had were overused and Cherry Bomb music got old really fast. Better than the initial release of Batman'66 (and the first 6 months after that), but only just.

The POINT is, KISS is nowhere NEAR any of those pins, so anyone calling the code beta is a moron or a hater.

Wrong. Choosing a city changes the callouts. That's all they were meant to do. People (including me) would like them to do more, but they DO something now. It sounds like you played the game a few times and aren't really in a position to evaluate the completion level of the code (hint: it's nearly complete and has been for a long time).

If you're not a good enough player to evaluate the code by seeing all (or even most of) the modes, then saying the code is "beta" is a little ridiculous. That's all I'm saying. KISS code is not anywhere close to beta. You are wrong. It's not rude to point that out.

There are quite a few bugs (15, plus some issues that aren't bugs but should be addressed) in the KISS bug thread for 1.30:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/kiss-130-bugs-and-wishlist

The Deuce bug you mentioned, the one where you can play a different song than the game says you're playing (and earning the shots for) - which also carried forward to Aerosmith when they copied the code. They also have those big KISS round inserts mid-PF that aren't used so far. It also doesn't have a real Skill Shot, which is crazy.

My biggest gripe is Rock City final Wizard mode is super bare-bones. Nothing special about it at all, and it's not easy to get to. Feels like a KISS Army Multiball Part II. That boring. It needs a serious amount of attention, but honestly most people haven't even SEEN the mode yet, so complaining about for most is silly.

But even if it never got a code update (and I hope the final one is SUBSTANTIAL) it would still be a fine game as-is. It is WAY more balanced than Aerosmith, which is essentially a close cousin based on the same code and layout. I'd be more pissed about the lack of updates to Aerosmith which needs them much more critically.

I was just thinking today that Rime of the Ancient Mariner is Iron Maiden's Black Diamond because they're both the hardest modes. NO ONE picks Black Diamond to play until late in the game because it's so hard. I use the glitch to select Black Diamond music with Deuce objectives.

Pfft. The way Stern treated Keith back then, I don't blame him. And Gary did the license for the machine. He shouldn't license things he doesn't like. They did the best version of Pinball WoF, but it's still not a great pin because some themes shouldn't be pins.

I wasn't big on the theme, but I kind of liked the game straight out of the box (I had a NIB when they were cheap) because of the EM-style chime sounds - then they gimped them and made it sound a whole lot less like an EM. Also, the poor attempts at moron voices (I think it was "keith's" character?) got grating after a while. I will say that with the flipper gap set up like it was and the outlanes, it changed my play enough that I couldn't mix it up with other pins because I found myself doing things that worked in WoF but were bad on virtually any other pins.

How about we make some "Justice for WoF" T-shirts and wear them to shows where Gary will be. It's a longshot, but if Stern still has the code, let an apprentice look at it and at least zip up the obvious stuff.

Why did the EM chime effects get cut back in later updates? I liked the nostalgic sounds of the machine with the launch code, but it seems to have gotten worse over time with the mix being changed with no way to bring the chimes back up in the mix.

The PRO Ghostbusters DOES suck. but the slimer is hardly the main toy for the Premium. I'd say the magna-slings are, then the more mobile slimer, then the subway ramp. One of the most feature packed recent Sterns. Flipper gap is the main downside.

Depends on how you define "sold."

Except that there was prior art that would have eventually invalidated it.

Ever. The most unfinished Stern hot garbage in their modern history.

Second time was more successful than the first...eventually. But to be fair, there was a lot more to work with.

Let's just hope it comes before that Wheel of Fortune update.

The way gomez was talking at expo it sounds like it's put off until Spring/Summer next year.

Getting a little late in the day, Central time. When do they usually post this?

Wow, a lot of marketing text with almost nothing of substance this time.

So:
happened already
happened already
ok
ok
ok

Not really much of substance. Zero Iron Maiden code update information, even though there's quite a list of bugs remaining. They need to also call out Game of Thrones code by name because that has some serious bugs that haven't been addressed since release literally years ago.

Pike. Down the pike.

Don't care about Guardians of the Galaxy. It sucks.

Game of Thrones, I care about. It's been ignored since release and has some pretty large bugs that need fixing.

Oh, right, after saying they were working on a fix for the broken Martell orbits due to their shoddy diverter design/testing, they pushed out a marginal software update so they could include this gem and wash their hands of the issue:

" - Added Adjustment to disable orbiting from left to right. This will be ON by
default on the LE/PREMIUM. All left orbit balls will go to the pop
bumpers by design."

"Broken by design" - how could I have forgotten THAT whopper!

But yeah, the it's been ignored since about 4 months after the Prem/LEs shipped, going on 2.5 years now, and it has some pretty large bugs that need fixing. Zero mention in any of the SotU.

Pfft, if you were paying attention you'd know that's no reach at all.

And 2.5 years with no significant updates and at least one major game bug and lots of middling bugs remaining is the definition of ignored.

Maybe trying to get away from the machine before the Trudeau child porn case concludes? It looks like he has a Plea coming up next week.

A surprise GoT code fix/extra features mention would be welcome. It definitely needs some love, at least for the bugs.

Massive amount of high score bugs, too. It will make up scores and award champion scores when you weren't close to earning it.

If they can carve out like 15 pixels at the bottom of the screen for a row of tiny scores, it would be a big improvement.

Your link is broken. Fixed it...

https://sternpinball.com/2019/03/05/stern-of-the-union-address-march-2019/

Which is terrible news for Munsters owners, if true.

Deadpool not selling is past tense. Shockingly, once the code improved substantially, sales picked up. It's very hard to find a HUOPrem/LE for sale now, and people are buying NIB Pros and Premiums almost daily here now.

Beatles? Dud. Munsters? Yep, dud. One is a victim to pricing and marketing disaster, and the other is all about terrible, almost non-existent code.

Too early to call anything on BK, IMO. At least it looks more produced than Munsters.

Stop putting off ALL updates for some not-coming "giant" Ghostbusters update. Just put out a maintenance release NOW that just fixes the TONS of bugs in Ghostbusters. It has WAY more bugs than Game of Thrones (which has its fair share). If they spent just a few DAYS on it, they could fix and test most or all of the main bugs in Ghostbusters and quiet some of the grumbling.

They did that - last year with Iron Maiden. Of course that was essentially a reskinned, modified Archer design. Internally developed Stern pins are all subject to massive homogenization, which is why there's a sameness to them for the most part.

Why Stern hasn't gone after the Nightmare Before Christmas homebrew, I'll never know. Most of the design work is already done and it shoots well from all reports.

That's not even the lowest I've heard NIB Beatles Golds being dumped for. If Stern ever wants to make the remaining 900 and something golds to get to their stated 1964 unit run, the price will have to be in the $6000 area. But I really think they're going to just move on and try to forget about it.

The Beatles store still has Golds listed for $10k. They haven't found a sucker to buy one since the end of November 2018. So much for Beatles fans buying anything. These are the same people that are crazy enough to buy a $2k all white phonograph (that sold out). Not interested in a Beatles pin.

Well they don't have any Diamonds left and only a handful of Platinums for the next run to bribe distributors to take the golds. Lacking that incentive, pretty sure they'll drop the price if they're making more. There's no shortage of golds in the market now, so making more with the intention of selling at $8k is crazy.

Seems to be. Iron Maiden we got has this to a lesser extent. I sent a pic to Chas and got a shrug. Beatles DOES seem to be worse, though. I've seen some worse than yours.

But it's not a Stern-only thing as jjPotC has similar clear (or maybe adhesion) issues.

Pretty sure it's more to do with the prep and clearing of the playfields (and cure time). The stupid part is, at least in the case of Stern, they get it pretty good, and then lose it again. It has to be because of multiple suppliers and one is a turd. I can't believe they haven't canned that one yet. They have to know who it is...

Mirco has said Stern is not a customer.

Thre's a spotlight on Mark Guidarelli who is doing the Spike platform low-level software. Wasn't Lonnie doing that? I know some of the system bugs I found were attributed to his system code. Is he not doing that anymore?

Yeah, that's WEIRD. Down the Road Brewery closed in Aug 2019 when its founder died suddenly (at only 46), so they've been out of business for almost 3 years now. The space was sold almost exactly a year later, in 2020, to another brewery.

https://www.boston.com/food/beer/2020/08/06/aeronaut-down-the-road-everett-brewery/

Seems like Stern would check with their "winners" before posting it.

But the fake brewery award was really too much. Now they just make stuff up to fill the newsletter? C'mon.

Not really. I was just wondering what brewery got screwed out of an award last month so Stern could give it to a long-closed brewery that didn't even like modern Sterns when it existed.

They started out pretty strong then it just devolved into a by rote recitation of stern army locations and code we already knew about. They *could* make it informative and interesting, but that would take someone in charge who cared about the content. They clearly do not have that.