Premium here! Can. Not. Wait.

Fantastic!

Will be forever sad (for this reason and others) that I went through a “let’s melt stuff” phase when I was a kid, and that my collection of TMNT, Ghostbusters, Power Rangers, etc toys got caught in the crossfire :’(

I’ve seen a few sets of photos where the entire middle of the playfield, the vast majority of the field, is super dark, just like Jurassic Park. Noticing a strange lack of spotlights. Can anyone who owns one confirm that the playfield is again dark like JP? I am in for a TMNT Premium, so I won’t be able to see for myself until at least the end of August, if I’m lucky. Want to know if I should get some spotlights prepped.

For those who are awaiting Premiums: I, too, just got word from my distributor that Stern will be shipping them my TMNT Premium sometime tomorrow or Friday! Our wait is nearing its end!

its-happening (resized).png

Confirmed that Stern shipped my TMNT Premium to my distributor yesterday, with a current ETA of this Wednesday, Aug 19th.

We're almost there, Premiumers!

dozens (resized).jpg

What is this “GnR?” If it’s the next new Stern reveal, I’m quite intrigued!

Ah, gotcha! Thanks for clarifying

Nice work!

Is there not a ball save option you can add to the Lair release in the settings, similar to the ball save timer you can add for the Star Wars Tatooine/Mystery scoop? Draining from a Lair release is hot garbage, so hopefully there is a timer if that kind of drain is a possibility (it sounds like almost an expectation in this game)!

*Self-quote post accidentally*

Can confirm; we bought our first in May, and we have 3 now (once our TMNT Premium arrives!) with a deposit down on a 4th, and plans for more

It is the best sickness I’ve ever had!

#feelsbadman

sad_tom_TMNT (resized).jpg

#feelsreallybadman

angry (resized).jpg

Found out they would let me pick the game up from the freight company personally, so ffffffff waiting!

C460BA8B-0BFA-4D60-8DED-0C3D6600177F (resized).jpeg

Worry not, the game was on the “Truck this side only” side, sitting on its proper bottom.

Premium reporting in, and all appears well! Had some software bugs it seemed in the first couple of games (didn't register that TPMB had ended, didn't properly register that P1 had ended and switched to P2, that sort of thing), but have played for a while since and haven't noticed those issues yet again.

Playfield was built 6/29/2020, game was assembled 8/12/2020. Full art beneath star post in left outlane, with washer beneath. No pooling to note. No streaky/grainy "inkjet" artwork. I haven't taken the PF apart to look at the rail behind the van, but looking through the glass, I don't see any wear or scratches, whether before or after playing all evening. Glider, pizza, and van all seem to be functioning properly. I don't hear any grinding from the pizza, though I do have other sounds going in the arcade (the other pinball machines, the Arcade1Up cabinets, the TV playing the 90s X-Men or 80s TMNT, a barcade playlist, etc.), so it's possible that it's making the noise and we just can't hear it yet.

This game is fast and mean, and the scores feel depressingly low (whether you do "well" or not), but we're having a blast with it, and really look forward to learning the ruleset and how this table plays. I'm definitely in the camp of "I hope the scores get adjusted to feel more rewarding," but to be fair, I am comparing against Star Wars and Jurassic Park, which have much higher scoring than this game. The high thus far tonight is a 13m game, with a few 4-8m games peppered in, but the majority are probably sub-1, which...well, we don't know how to handle the speed and penalties for bricking on this table yet

A fantastic addition to the collection, which is growing at an alarming rate, with no signs of slowing down!

F3AB598C-F4C0-4FA4-8C36-71557BCE6891 (resized).jpeg

77F846CE-CBA8-48B0-870B-DD14558EEF8E (resized).jpeg

C12E3EF7-4E2E-4C05-AD7C-F28D3A1D6A5F (resized).jpeg

5BE00E11-D4EB-44CD-A958-9F26D17D14E3 (resized).jpeg

BC33495C-26A8-42BC-90F1-7A64EDF1097A (resized).jpeg

1B0FC2F2-33DA-461F-A8A7-A4B2ECBF48DA (resized).jpeg

9DD817E6-AE7F-4A13-82F1-451D03BB8DB9 (resized).jpeg

61C45299-CEBF-4927-AB2A-6A660A253D89 (resized).jpeg

TMNT Premium makes a fine addition to the lineup! Added the few mods that I had on-hand today, and put up the first GC score of 22m. Onward and upward!

082C6377-DB35-4739-9873-3E613E464F9E (resized).jpeg

E56A6CFC-4F97-4960-9DD9-2F8CFCF09262 (resized).jpeg

E9281193-A210-47EB-964B-9EFBAF7AEFB8 (resized).jpeg

E44AB74B-4C2D-4E40-9EB1-358648A86546 (resized).jpeg

E621ADFC-89A7-45AA-B163-B50F1DC97B62 (resized).jpeg

67FA844D-ED40-448D-9345-B7E1DE34785A (resized).jpeg

Man, I love this game, but BOY HOWDY is it a drain monster! And I thought Star Wars was brutal, woof!

This is a fun mod!

The framing is nice and helps each turtle pop, though I agree that the green framing and green weapons so close together muddles things a bit. Wonder if other colors would work; what about framing each turtle with their respective color? Would that be too messy looking?

Audits here currently are:

Total plays: 207
Left drains: 132 (29%)
Center drains: 253 (55%)
Right drains: 73 (16%)

I am set at 6.5 degrees pitch, leveled left to right. Controlling the ball in this game is key, but that's rather tricky to do because things move so quickly and come back to you so aggressively, whether via a bricked shot or just from the natural flow of the game. It doesn't help that, even with the plumb bob on the lowest setting, the game is still hyper sensitive to tilt warnings/tilt, which makes slap saving (which frequently need to be big slaps) dangerous, and of course, the outlanes don't really allow for juggling and spitting the ball back out. If it reaches the outlane, and it's GOING to reach the outlane, then RIP.

It doesn't help that I'm really stubborn, and am very reluctant to do things that aren't "how the game was meant to be played," i.e. adding a double post, or a band on the outlane, or a bouncy knob on the outlane wall, etc. I feel bad enough altering any settings, like ball save timer increases, or changing Replays to Extra Balls. I feel like it invalidates my play if I change things, because I'm not "actually playing the game," if that makes sense. I know those settings are there for people to use as they like, but I dunno. I'm a Dark Souls player, and a software engineer, if that gives you any insight into my "I will continue to ram my head into this wall until I break through, rather than go around it" type of personality...which is exhausting!

Ahhh that makes sense! Sorry, haven't 3D printed before, but that makes total sense Maybe black framing around each turtle, so there is something raised for players to paint, without adding complexity to color swapping during the print? I'd definitely be interested in painting some frames

What pitch is everyone playing the game at?

I have it set at the default 6.5 degrees right now, and I've heard anecdotally from at least one other player that they tried it steeper and it didn't seem to help. That said, the normal battle cry is "6.8-7 degrees" for a bunch of other games, citing that it results in fewer outlane missiles, potentially easier trapping, etc. Curious what everyone is playing at, and what results you've achieved through experimentation! Leveling these tables is obnoxious and difficult for me thus far, so I don't typically do a ton of adjustment after the initial setup; maybe I just don't quite understand something about the way these factory levelers are supposed to work, if it's meant to be an easy process?

Almost got to Final Battle last night; was in Episode 7 of 8. Walked away with 45m score. That said, boy was it some work, not the least of which was juggling the ball desperately trying to keep it from flying straight to the outlanes. Wondering if pitch might help make the table a little more manageable in that regard.

Man, welcome to the club! This game kicks my ass, but at least it looks fantastic while doing it

All of a sudden, the Donatello and Raphael lights on the turtle select over the shooter lane are always on. Has anyone else had this problem? I don’t see anything touching externally that would make both LEDs have a constant connection, so I’m wondering if maybe it could be a software bug somehow?

My machine has also been restarting itself today, a few times, though I’m not able to reliably reproduce the steps yet. It seems to happen when I reset back to attract mode, try to start a fresh game, and then instead of being able to select a turtle, it just auto-chooses (I think Leo), the pizza spinner runs like crazy, then the game restarts itself.

Maybe related? Not sure how I could check for a software bug, outside of hoping Stern would reply? I don’t have an older version of the TMNT software, apparently, and Stern doesn’t offer archived versions as far as I could see (maybe upon request?), so I can’t do what I wanted to do to try and debug, which was the reload an older version of software and then come back to v1.21.

I cleared my SD card, re-downloaded a fresh SD image from Stern for v1.21, put it on the SD card and reinstalled on the machine, and the issue of Donatello and Raphael being constantly lit is still present. Seems something I can't update from a simple reinstall, at least of the same version. Must be something that has to happen at the node level, which is more of a bummer. I don't know if reverting to an older version of code would even reformat the node boards; I imagine once they're updated with later firmware, they stay put. Perhaps it'll require another update to the node boards, or the ability to somehow wipe so that the latest can be reapplied?

Will reach out to Stern, I suppose =/

I have tried a fresh v1.21 image on both the stock Stern card, as well as one that I've purchased from the store and have been running on, and there is no difference.

The brand of the SD card is the same as the stock Stern, incidentally, though it’s a larger card (16GB over the stock 8GB) - Adata brand.

Can you explain the swapping node boards and dip switches thing? I’m new to debugging pinball machines That said, I have taken a multimeter to the pins that correspond to Donnie and Raph’s turtle select LEDs on node 8, and verified that they are both indeed (obviously) receiving a constant 5-6v. I tried unplugging the Serial In plug from node 8, but that didn’t do anything either.

Forgive my ignorance, but that is still a bit of a foreign language to me I have located the dip switches on node boards 8 and 9, as well as found what their addresses are in the manual, but I’m still not sure what the “swapping” portion refers to. It sounds like a separate and larger act than flicking the switches on the dips to make 8 addressed as 9 and 9 addressed as 8, but without having taken part in this conversation before, I couldn’t say.

By “swapping” those nodes, do you mean to physically swap all connections from one board to the other? So, unplug all connections from both nodes, dismount both PCBs, mount node 8 where 9 was and vice versa, then reconnect everything but now on the other physical board, ie whatever was plugged into CN2 on node 8 will now plug into the CN2 spot on node 9, etc?

Clarification for an earlier post, after looking at the manual and getting another look under the table:

Here, I’m referring to having checked pins on CN3 of node extension board 8c corresponding to LED20 and LED19.

Thank you for the clarification! Figured it would be prudent to make sure I understood the intention before doing all of that. I appreciate the help!

Made the swap, including updating the dip switches, and the problem stays the same. So, seemingly, it has nothing to do with node 8 itself, but possibly one of the downstream boards, or something in the code?

As far as the code angle goes, I’m wondering if there is some combination of things that I could’ve done, inputs in quick succession perhaps, to scramble something and assign some variable in the code somehow, otherwise agreed: If it were an inherent thing to this version, it would a) be more widespread, and b) likely have happened sooner.

But yeah, for now, seems somehow, for some reason, those circuits are remaining closed, somewhere in one of the downstream boards...hopefully Stern will get back to my email before too long (the KICKERS number isn’t operating right now), and even more hopefully, the likely necessary board replacement will be gratis!

Fingers crossed I get the same outcome here! Thank you for sharing

How do you guys typically print these out? Any special/particular cardstock? Do you take them somewhere to get printed, or do you do it yourself on a standard home printer?

Is anybody else insanely frustrated by this game? I have tried multiple pitches, slingshot strengths, etc, and it doesn’t make a difference. Drain drain drain drain drain. Rocket shots straight out, or bouncing in the outlanes, doesn’t matter. Drain drain drain drain drain. No problem controlling the ball on my Star Wars or Jurassic Park, but this one feels like a joke with how impossible ball control seems. I have put tons of games up, with plenty of time on any given new setting to see if it makes a difference, and can’t seem to find anything fair feeling or consistent. I can’t be the only one...I hope. Are others experiencing this? How are you coping? Is anyone able to actually consistently make improvements on their gameplay when the game’s geometry seems so insanely and aggressively stacked against them?

Deleted.

Just gonna keep banging my head against this damn game!

Thus far, I don’t seem to be able to backhand the left ramp on my game, even setting the pitch below 6.5, at least not from a cradle position :/ Right ramp is able to be backhanded, though. Maybe I need to increase the flipper strength or something. Would LOVE to be able to backhand that ramp. Would also love to reliably get into the NPP from the left flipper, as that is the flipper that the game puts the ball on 90% of the time, and post passes don’t seem to be a thing on this table.

Pizza toppings are randomly organized and placed at the beginning of any given game, you cycle through them by hitting either of the two pizza targets on the playfield (one to the right of the center ramp, one to the right of the pizza parlor/beneath-the-van shot), and you lock them in in groupings of 2-2-1, with three subsequent ball locks in the pizza parlor/beneath-the-van shot. It will lock in the far right two toppings on your first ball lock, then the next two, then the final topping gets locked in when you enter the multiball with the third and final ball lock.

The jackpot shots in the NPPMB are the center loop and the Lair, as far as I've seen, maybe also the center ramp at times? Not 100% sure. I believe you light the jackpots by defeating the required number of Foot Clan members, which are the blue shots (you may also have other shots that spot Foot defeats depending on what toppings you locked in, and you may also have jackpots lit via toppings).

As far as jackpots for the TPMB, I know the Lair is one, but not sure if the center loop/ramp are available there, as well. In fact, I'm entirely unsure of what the hell is going on in TPMB in general! Very confused by that MB.

Hopefully/likely someone else will chime in to expand on this

The Half Shell Challenge is a great, if small, addition to the game! I wish it had a bit more to it, and that it was something accessible in the main game, but it’s a welcome extra fun little thing to do for sure! Thank you to Dwight and team!

And I agree with the sentiment about having the ability now (if a precarious one) to technically and strategically select episodes, that is huge!

Hello! About to rejoin the TMNT club; had a Premium at release, traded it away almost a year later, and now a couple years after that, we’re trading back into one (NIB). Excited to be back!

I’ll be reading as much of the thread as I can, but there are juuuust a few more pages here than there were when we left it in 2021 hah, so to that end, I’m wondering if anyone who’s been active can summarize the current state of TMNT?

What are the hot topics for the game these days? I gather there are two great looking options for alternate video code (1987 code and an April upgrade) and that the 1987 code can run with IC, but the April code - maybe not yet? Or not with latest code v1.57?

Any major problems seem to be going on with newer builds, things to keep an eye out for? Any sort of service bulletins or fixes to reach out for?

Any glaring code issues remain unaddressed, despite code updates?

If there’s anything you think would be worth knowing and paying attention to, I’m all ears! Please and thank you