Pinball is hard.

Supply chain issues, very large back order list for existing titles, partially shut down factories - take your pick.

There's the components shortage, and also that current games are selling as well as they can.

Stern, JJP, Deeproot, have a huge backlog of games to deliver. Unless they had a limited time license that forced them to release on a certain date, they've got no reason to announce another one. Not sure where spooky is in their rock and morty build but until they get near to the finish line I doubt you'll see anything from them either. Plus they're renovating and expanding their factory right now.

June

Lol JAWS was the code name for Jurassic Park. Godzilla was basically confirmed by someone at Stern, can’t remember who, as blatantly as one can without pissing off the PR team.
Hello Kitty would be an awesome theme and MLP could be a good one, Hasbro has a pretty awesome R&D team so if they worked with the manufacturer it would probably be pretty snappy.
I’d love to see some bright and colorful games in that “bubblegum pop” style
Sick of Japan getting all the good stuff!!

Right now however, many of the manufacturers are making 5x more money than last year doing nothing differently. Why push out a new game when your market has exponentially increased?

Pinball is a little pond with some goldfish, and covid happened and now it’s like someone dumped a ton of carp into the same size pond. They’re focused on dumping more of the same bait to satiate these hungry fish, why bother coming up with some new flashy bait?

Hello kitty is 'New flashy bait?

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Dwight Sullivan, coder

I'd say we get a Stern announcement mid May with June release. Hopefully Godzilla.

Clearly you haven’t kept up with Sanrio. Aggretsuko is one of their latest creations and she’s badass. It’s all about a cute red panda who hates her office job so she sings death metal karaoke. It would probably do extremely well like Rick & Morty, even though when it was speculated and not released yet tons of out-of-touch dudes were saying it was a shit theme and wouldn’t do well

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Never heard of Sanrio. Death Metal Karaoke, I like it. Just watched a little of this and its doubtful I'm gonna watch anymore but yeah I could see it as a pin theme. Not sure about Hello Kitty however, then again I can't believe I'm even thinking about it. Damn u

Sanrio is the Japanese company that owns Hello Kitty, Aggretsuko and a TON of other stuff you’d never think of. They work their way into your mind!!

Yeah that's why I'm staying away. Baby Metal has me confused enough, I enjoy the music, metal choreography, and I get a little excited so.......

And I'd say next two weeks...sometime before May.

Back to the topic: other than Stern, there’s pretty much nobody actually with any titles in development that we know of?

Is RAZA off the table for its 2030 release date??

You left out Chicago Gaming , rumored to be CCr

Backlogs

I think in a few months we will be happy with new stuff from AP, Stern, and CGC

NIB pricing will become "reasonable " even at the msrp these days .

Aggretsuko could be a great title! I'd pump some coins into it for sure!

They could even double dip. Same layout + rules, different art package. One for hello kitty, one for aggretsuko.

That would be nice.

You really begin to realize how much we all depend upon stern cranking out multiple games a year when they haven’t released one by April.

Without Stern, this hobby and forum would be close to dead in the water when it comes to discussing (and buying) new games.

You forgot one :

Chicago Gaming Company - PTC

LTG : )

Hopefully not.

Hopefully not godzilla or hopefully not mid may?
If its Godzilla then I must ask Why?

I've been waiting on warranty CPU for 3 weeks. They say their out of stock, so I'd assume components aren't super easy to come by right now.

There are plenty of pins in various stages of development. JJP has at least two, CGC two, American at least one, and Spooky two. Plus Stern. There's plenty going on, but it's going to be slow going into 2022 because of the remnants of the Pandemic and the widespread supply chain issues it caused across the board that will take a long time to smooth over.

All of the above

they knew Pinside was going to be down for a few days, and no company can survive without pinsiders opinions

one of the above is rumored to make an actual first HIP HOP themed pin soon...stay tuned...

How about Haggis Pinball - shipping their first game this week according to them?

Then you have Dutch, Pinball Brothers (Alien), Homepin (Porsche and ??).

Probably a LOT more going on behind closed doors than we all realise.

Beastie Boys is the only one of that genre I have even a passing interest in. I can see a million ways that can go very wrong, though.

There always is.

Then a really good movie license.

Because they licensed it to screw Spooky.

I'd like to see some of the companies like Stern and JJP catch up on their backorders before releasing new titles. Lots of people waiting.

Yes, exactly as some of those titles are pushed until September.

This is correct. There’s a MASSIVE chip shortage right now. Could be the reason for delays. It’s even causing a new car shortage:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/04/intel-nvidia-tsmc-execs-agree-chip-shortage-could-last-into-2023/

People are still waiting for AIQ toppers, and also AIQ PRe's to be sent!Also I hear the R&M BSE fans are still trying to get that pin to play correctly, with all the bugs to work out!! AND,here in Cali,not many shows to go to, too check out the new releases!!!

I think material prices have alot to do with it. With all the money being pumped right now, prices are skyrocketing on some things and I think some of the manufacturers are hoping for things to calm down a bit. Prime example:

See the photo below? That is the cheapest piece of wood available from Home Depot right now. 4x8 foot. Think about it... how much should that single piece of lumber cost?

It was $70.

With prices for things like cabinets (presumably) doubling and chips in short supply, I think part of the hold up in manufacture and release has to do simply with material availability.

I think we will get our first release from Stern in the next 3 weeks (by 8 May). But it will be accompanied by a stiff price increase ($6500 for a pro?). I think some of the delay is so the code can be a little more polished and so they can think of ways to make the price increase more palatable (rushed development of online play).

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Read this notice from my local bike shop to get an idea of what may be going on in the pinball industry: https://shop.bushtukah.com/articles/bike-shortage-march-2021-pg3407.htm

Jesus man I hope Pros don't shoot up to $6500! I just bought my SW Pro for $5650 NIB! Well I bought it last August and just got it 3/31...

Yeah, it could play their "music."

Hey, I just realized that Skit-B has announced as many pins as anyone else this year to date!

the younger crowd is getting a lot of experience everyday we play pinball with our kids and their friends at home.So they still enjoy the same titles as the rest of us.my kids and their friends still love metallica,led zep and the Beatles too music wise and pinball wise and spiderman still gets played as much as when new.

Who cares. Actually I'm happy cause so far with the exception of the Rick and Morty code I haven't really liked anything Spooky.

JJP is not rerunning POTC period. JJP has only produced 6 titles in 10 years so don't expect anything new from them for a long while. Same for Spooky and the other smaller manufacturers. They don't exactly crank out multiple titles a year. Stern released their last game late last years so that is only 4-5 months. They have a huge backlog so no reason to rush any new game out.

The nice thing for me would be to know what it is at least. Cause if its something I have no interest in I could grab something else. Even a used pin till the next must have NIB. I'm holding out for Godzilla. Some people are saying that's not the next release. No one knows
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Best make sure you don’t try and sell yours at a profit then - or at least only a profit that is acceptable to the pinside profit gods!

Go buy a piece of cabinet grade plywood. It is nuts man.