It probably powered up fine like that at the factory. My house doesn’t even have a ground wire in the junction boxes or outlets despite having three prong outlets. I don’t think it would blow anything here, just not work.

I would send Stern an email about it for sure. If I were a manufacturing person I’d want to know how that was possible.

Thinking about the switched wires from a manufacturing standpoint:
It would not surprise me to hear you are the first person to report this problem. Under most conditions (including those on Stern's factory floor apparently) the game will power up normally and show no apparent issues. Most customers wouldn't even notice anything wrong under those conditions so there would be no problem for them to report.

This sounds like something to add to a manual checklist both when the power supply is installed and again before the speaker panel and translite are installed.

You're missing out. Kevin and Nick are both pretty fun to listen to. Well worth checking them out if you like pinball content.