I'm sick. I'm getting the LE. Somehow, someway, I will have the LE . I don't care if it plummets to worthless, the game looks like it's a winner to me .

I think this Star Wars will blow away the DE one ... so we are in total disagreement.

Having said that, I don't know why people get all worked up when people criticize a pinball machine. If you're right, bozos like me will take a bath cash wise and will make feeble attempts to justify owning a pile of trash. If you're wrong, then I'll have a great pinball machine light years ahead of any Star Wars themed pin out there. I haven't seen you post anything that would warrant a ban. Talk about thin skinned people out there ...

I guess people are too enthralled with owning these things as "investments" and not as they toys that they are .

I'm like that 99% of the time. I missed out on Tron LE due to my bias against anything photoshopped on a playfield and the overall look of the machine in pictures. I don't want to make that mistake this time around.

I'm in a position where I can mitigate some of the risk buying this sight unseen ... I can put it out in a very safe location (i.e. work) and earn some cash to offset what I'm probably going to be spending. I'd probably*not* risk buying one like this if it weren't for that particular "feature" .

Same here ... and same here

I hate Star Wars. They keep blowing up the Enterprise and Commander Koenig has no idea what in the hell he is doing on the moon.

I finally got to play SW pro three times yesterday. I will not be canceling my LE. I know I am going to love this game over the long haul . It's got the blend of speed and flow I love (I'm a huge Steve Ritchie fan ... there's bias there ... but this pin is a *perfect* mix of speed, flow, and difficulty). Moreover, it's not like any other pin I own. It actually compliments Star Trek quite well.

I think people that are disappointed with the overall aesthetics of the game have completely valid arguments. While I don't think it's as cheap as the Spiderman "The Pin" (that criticism was quite harsh ), it certainly feels like something is missing from the playfield. I think the wire ramps on the Premium/LE are going to help that feeling somewhat.

Still, there's something still missing ... three "specifics" of the old trilogy that didn't seem to be captured well were Bespin, Jabba, and Dagobah. Jabba can certainly be covered by Tatooine and I'm sure there's going to be more Yoda than what we've seen on the LCD, but I think it would have been cool to have Bespin be represented by the pop bumpers and have each bumper hit represent some gas mined (or something like that). Doing that, they could have had the back panel split between the Star Destroyer and other space combat stuff on the left and Bespin art on the right (maybe have a Bespin toy mounted over the pop bumpers?).

I know a few of the missions take place on Bespin, but Cloud City would look so cool somewhere on the pin .

I don't think the artwork is anywhere near as bad as people made it out to be. When I saw it in real life, I was happy. I know it sounds trite, but the pictures don't do it justice. It doesn't look cheap at all ... just sparse (I'm almost wondering if Stern has a lineup of toys to add to the game ... that will torque me off if that's the case).

Just my $0.02.

I FINALLY picked up an LE. This game has come a long way from the early software days. It's frigging hard too (I know, play better ). I played a friend's premium about six months ago and was hooked.

This is going to be the first pin I've owned that I actually want to mod up. I blame each and every one of you on this thread for that. You are all evil!!!

One final note, Stern blew it with the topper for this game. Jagoffs. Does anyone make a surround/background for the topper by chance? I think it'd look really cool with a background that looks like the ones that were part of that figure display platform thing they made back in the 70s .

Also, does anyone know if the remnants of that "topper projector" feature still exists in the current software. I'm curious to see if there is a way to possibly hook up a pico projector to R2D2.

For situations like this, I'd use silicone paste instead of grease. Grease is organic and breaks down over time. It tends to become a nasty solid.

Silicone paste will last almost forever .

I first started to use this stuff on brake caliper pins on my cars ... it's frigging awesome.

In terms of pinball, I recently used it sparingly on a flipper button that seemed to have a bit more friction that the other ... it worked great after that. I like to add a *tiny* dab of it on spinners too. And I mean "tiny" ... lubricants in pinball machines are a big no-no (using them on flippers is idiotic ... all of that coil dust + any kind of lubricant will create a sludge that you'll be cursing for years ). It's also great for things like gears in motors. It takes a LOT longer for it to break down compared to regular grease.

Again, don't go piling this stuff onto drop targets! Use little dabs on the head of something like a toothpick, apply it to the drop target, and use a smaller paintbrush to cover the surface you wish to cover. A little bit of this stuff goes a very long way. You'll also find other uses for it once you are addicted to it . Just *never* use it on flippers or coils (that's common pinball knowledge though).

https://www.amazon.com/3M-08946-Clear-Silicone-Paste/dp/B005RNEH5O/ref=sr_1_3

Isn't Stern doing a run of SW Comic Premiums early next year?

Thanks for clarifying ... I often feel like I am the only one that likes the original art and doesn't care for the comic version ... I'm not right in the head though .

I completely understand your point of view . The original SW art has a "sort-of hand drawn over photo" feel to it though and I prefer the font used on the playfield. To each their own though ... I am not criticizing anything. I used to automatically dismiss anything that looked "Photoshopped" ... that meant that I missed out on a Tron Premium back when they were announced ... man was I pissed when I played it for the first time . I learned to not be such a bigot when it comes to pinball artwork .

I tend to marvel at the engineering of some of the unique features in games. The Rudy head in Funhouse was some amazing work. While it looks so simple, it takes some amazing talent to make something like that work reliably at a relatively low cost. The hyperloop in SW (and HS2 for that matter) is another slick piece of engineering. That kind of stuff is art to me too .

That's always a bonus ... and absolutely nothing wrong with liking that feature .

I seem to recall one of the versions of SW having an option to "disable topper projector" or something along those lines. It was removed in a later firmware update. Does anyone know what else this topper was supposed to do before it was stripped down to the bare minimum? It almost looks like there were supposed to be 4 light features in the front of the topper too.

Many people trashed the artwork and lack of toys. The software wasn't all that hot at first too.

My biggest complaint with it involves the LE ... there was *nothing* added to the LE except for garbage, flat black powder coat and armor that features white cardboard behind the cutouts. Oh, I forgot, they threw in the other translites. No side blades, no invisiglass, no improved audio system ... there was virtually nothing added over the premium!

Still, I had to have an LE because I am a moron . I managed to get a used one when they dipped in price about a year after release ... it basically cost me what a NIB Premium would have cost. There is no way I was going to pay over $8K for the LE when it was released though . That'd be different today of course, but not back then.

I still find it pathetic that they stripped the LE version of something like Star Wars ... they claimed that Disney charged too much for the license, but why skimp on the LEs? It shouldn't have cost Stern that much to just add frigging invisiglass, side blades, and maybe a shooter rod to the LE, but they felt comfortable enough to release it as-is. I guess they knew it was going to sell out without the extra crap.

Oh well, the most important thing is that the pin now kicks ass and it one of the best . I can't get enough of it . Mastering the multiplier has been a lot of fun .

Is there a separate audio track for the asteroid field? I'd *love* to change that to play the asteroid field music from ESB.

Odd ... mine died recently too. In my case, the 5V regulator died. It's kind of a bitch to replace too since the underside of the chip is soldered directly to the board as are its legs (they do this so that copper planes on the PCB can act as a heatsink).

I say "it's a bitch to replace" in that if one doesn't have much experience removing surface mount devices, it's easy to rip up the pads when you're removing the chip due to applying excessive heat. I'm *OK* with surface mount repairs and even I had to add a couple of wires to work around screwing up two pads.

Anyway, there are LEDs on the Node 9 board that will give you a hint as to what is wrong. If you don't see any of these LEDs lit, then the 5V regulator is dead. Someone with decent surface mount repair skills can fix, and the part itself doesn't seem to be too big of a problem to find. Since I am only "OK" at repairing this stuff, I can't offer to repair it for you since there's still a risk I will make things worse (if it didn't have that pad on the bottom of the chip, I know I could do the repair perfectly ... I hope you understand ).

I wish I could figure out what was taxing the regulator to cause it to die ... if you can, let me know if you have no LEDs on your node 9 board ... two of us having this problem is a coincidence ... if anyone else has the problem, there might be something in the design that's screwed up.

That's what I used. You have to be careful with the temperature and the time you hold the hot air over the component. I have removed/replaced several components this way w/o hurting the board (not just on pinball machines). The only reason the voltage regulator is a bit more tricky is due to the large pad under the component that is soldered to the board (along with the 8 pins).

The hot plate is a great idea ... much safer if you're not comfortable with the air gun ... I simply don't have one .

I just bought one ... thanks for the pointer!!!!

This was probably removed due to the Creature Cantina theme ... they probably wanted more money to license that.

Just curious, is the video that was supposed to be displayed by the topper still in the software at all? Rumor had it that R2D2 was supposed to be able to display a video using the stuff they eventually used on Stranger Things ... I seem to recall earlier software having a setting to enable/disable "topper video" or something like that.

Because Stern cut the cost to produce the machine to a dead minimum. Even the LE doesn't have the typical LE apron. This isn't a "bash Stern" comment to be clear ... from what I heard, the licenses for Star Wars and GotG cost them a fortune ... the fact that Star Wars is basically AC/DC's layout and GotG is Metallica's layout is evidence of this (saves design time).