It's interesting that the Mythbusters guys decided to go unlicensed with "Experts of Dangerous." It seems like a move that someone would make after having problems dealing with a previous license, doesn't it? (I really hope they change the name of that pin...)

I think this might be an indication that people will be getting a game called "The Predatory Alien" or "Attack of the Predators." They are probably trying to think of how they can still get a cool game to their customers with a knockoff predator-like theme without breaking the law. If this is the case, they would be using this extra time to plan their damage control.

My best guess is that the buyers are going to get a pin, but it will be a predator knockoff. Better than nothing. If it is a great pin, it would go a long way to appeasing the true predator fans that were sold the game under false pretenses.

I wouldn't have even really felt the need to comment on this at all, as I was just watching the story unfold as a casual observer; but a few things rubbed me the wrong way about Kevin's post.

a) He stressed "open" and "honest" while giving little actual information of value, and avoiding the primary concern(s) altogether of the status of the license.
b) He attempts to invoke sympathy rather than directly addressing specific concerns
c) He uses a divide and conquer tactic by implying that the "non-buyers" have forced him away from pinside, and so they are the ones responsible for the "buyers" discomfort.
d) He blames pinside for having unrealistic demands for information and communication, when it is his own customers who are trying for weeks or even months to contact him directly and then coming to pinside to try to find somebody who knows how to contact them when it proves impossible. Or maybe to get some actual information from somebody "in the know."
e) He openly admits that he will continue to ignore phone calls and e-mails.
f) The picture he chose to post had no likenesses of predator in them. Maybe it's parts for Experts of Dangerous, who knows. (I doubt it, but you get the point).

There is plenty more that rubs me the wrong way. He makes excuses, he points fingers, he doesn't take care of his customers, he doesn't keep good relations with the community that allows this dream of his to become a reality. So I guess the reason I couldn't help from putting my 25 cents in is that I feel sorry for the customers. It's like watching an abusive relationship. He has all the power, and the customers have too much invested in the relationship now to just walk away. I don't know how he could possibly have any customers for EoD.

My hope is that in his first update for the buyers he will clear up what exactly is happening with the license. I'm fine with it if he just wants to communicate directly with the buyers and say screw everybody else. It doesn't seem necessary, but fine - maybe Skit-B can say a lot more in private communications than in a public forum. Makes sense. As long as the buyers are happy, IDGAF. But the only reason there is an "army of haters" on pinside is that even non-buyers care about what happens to the buyers. Because they are our community members getting treated badly, and that could be any one of us on a different day and a different pin.

LoLed.

That's great news!

Yeah Skit-B responded in the other thread. Congrats everybody, you can finally relax.

The licensor probably doesn't want someone designing a game, talking about it all over the internet and then the product never gets made (for whatever reason). It makes the brand look like a flop, which is damaging. So they just tell the license holder to keep quiet until the product is ready to ship. Stern seems to do the same thing but we don't notice because they don't need to get pre-orders to finance their projects.

Yeah, someone was saying skitb didn't get the full promotional license because the pins were already sold out so they didn't need to advertise.

JJP is selling unlimited hobbits so they need to advertise. I have no idea on the specifics, but they would have 2 differently structured license agreements.

I was thinking that, AMH for example had some issues fixed after some of the earlier games shipped.

And you would have to be insane to hand over any money for Experts of Dangerous before it's ready to ship.

AKA their BOM has gone up due to inflation so they will make less in the end.

Pretty sure a 2 per week conservative estimate is fine to assume for now. Maybe they speed it up to 3 or 4 after doing it for a while. Either way, the back half of buyers are looking at more than a year for certain. Wouldn't get too excited.

That guy was born to preorder! I appreciate the enthusiasm!

Which will start becoming relevant in about 6 months :p

I like how after 4 years everybody always asks for 2 more weeks, haha. Same is happening on Jpop thread. Then people talk about how much they're going to pitchfork "in 2 weeks." Then they realize that it takes actual effort to go do something. Then they give up.

Yeah I'd be jumping ship

Kevin should sell the company to Stern or JJP and they just put this license into mass production with a re-design.

Presumably there are a bunch of parts, cabinets and the bank account with all the pre-order cash.

There is also presumably some kind of license deal with Fox, albeit not a good one?

They could buy the business for a nominal $1 from Kevin just to get him out of it and work with the licensor to put out a good product for mass production, rather than the limited 250 run. It would restore confidence in the project and possibly stop a run on the bank, not to mention if people heard JJP or Stern was picking it up there could be a ton more buyers for a powerful license like predator.

Yes because everybody always triples their money when they buy a stock.

It probably depends on whether he was operating under limited liability or not. I'm no expert but I think there would definitely have to be a bankruptcy involved to get out of returning the funds in full.

I don't think anybody is assuming the money is all spent, he would have some left to actually go to production. Legal help could get what is left back into the hands of the buyers ASAP so more isn't lost. It's a % recovery vs. total loss.

Here is a post from SkitB from the locked thread. Sorry for formatting issues, I couldn't quote it here. This is SkitB (Kevin) responding to some posts (3 months ago).
Stuff in quotation marks is from SkitB

BoozeMarlin said:

He didn't make any mention or use of the word Predator

"Predator."

YKpinballer said:

if he included a sentence that said "The game will look great and meet everybody's expectations with no surprises like a re-theme or whatever people have been talking about." that he would be in breach of his contract?

"I wasn't aware that the rumors had reached that point. A re-theme? Really? Sure, YKpinballer, I think you've said it best already, so I'll just make your words my own:
The game will look great and meet everybody's expectations with no surprises like a re-theme or whatever people have been talking about."

Whridlsoncestood said:

40 balls. So 10 games.

"Somebody did their homework "

SadSack said:

Nothing has changed and that pile of parts proves nothing. A bunch of gunnas, a half apology and a few bulk bags of PF parts is less than required to quell thinking people.
Apparently the thought of actually sharing the specific difficulties encountered is "unhealthy".
The first rule of the Predator: "Never mention the Predator." The only thing missing was the pitch for mythbusters deposits. Apparently the run on the bank finally got his attention.

"This is exactly why it is unhealthy for me to regularly check in here. I can understand if you personally don't feel satiated by what was posted above, but "that pile of parts" certainly does prove more than "nothing," and there has obviously never been any mention of deposits for anything related to the mythbusters or their upcoming game. An open forum is no place for any person of any level of public scrutiny, as I can assure you that all of these types of jabs, however unfounded they are, are certainly felt and taken on a very personal level. At the very least, this post did bring up an issue that I feel needs to be addressed directly.
We have been working very closely with PayPal for a long time to make sure that every penny that goes through us is well-protected and secure. They have been extremely helpful and have developed a strong personal rapport with us that affords us the luxury of open and direct communication in any and all situations. With the security of all funds being absolutely paramount in ANY foreseeable case, there are processes that must be followed and while they can take a bit of time to work with, the end result is that even if we were to literally die or encounter a license issue or disappear to Venezuela or whatever other rumors there may be, we do so without risking a cent of your money."

However, knowing that Kevin is a liar, this is not overly believable and especially begs the question, with what money is he buying the materials and running the company then? The claims don't really add up to me...

I'm pretty sure he's just joking, but who knows if he gave somebody else the idea...

Wow... why am I not surprised the only things you ask for are tentative dates for maybe getting answers? Then you wait the 2 weeks or month and the answers don't come and then what? Oh yeah, that's where we are at.

lowepg has the questions we all need answered. And they should be answered in no uncertain terms immediately.

If he wasn't lying and scamming, he would have definitely posted in this thread by now. Something useful, not a long winded dance around the issues.

I'm thinking his job was at the yacht club...

I think calling the cops to report this fraud is justified, he has had plenty of time to explain himself and refused. Who knows he could be packing his bags for Canada right now. *if he is innocent he can answer the charges.

Plus if you're into conspiracy theories... how's this for a scam: raise $750k cash for a company, hire a family member as a lawyer, get in all kinds of legal trouble deliberately, drag on legal proceedings for a few years while said lawyer sucks money from the company (they can bill whatever they want, I have seen 10-20k per month and that's probably cheap in the USA), company goes bankrupt. Whoops, sorry guys, skit-b has no money left because of legal trouble. All the money is gone. To my mom.

Add: go to prison for white collar crime for 6 months plus house arrest as punishment.

was just going to say the same thing tee hee

Actually, if you are aware of a crime that has been committed you don't have to be the victim to make a complaint that starts an investigation. In fact, that would make it really hard for murders to ever be investigated.

Actually, all you have to do is show that he SAID he had a license to build Predator pinball machines when he didn't and he used that lie to take your money.

No, he has to prove that he has the license he claimed he had when selling the machines for preorder dollars.

I'm guessing there's not much chance of this until Kevin comes and tells people WHAT wheels are in motion. Hearing random people with god knows what connection to the project saying "don't worry, something's being done, it's being handled, great news is coming, blah blah blah" is about... oh... the past year or so of this project. It doesn't help.

Allow me to translate:

Kevin chats with Aaron about how toxic pinside is.

Kevin gives zero 'fudges' about what is happening on pinside, and hasn't changed what he's doing despite the shitstorm

Don't try to contact Kevin, he isn't going to talk to you anyway

Since Kevin's my friend, I'm going to overlook his fraudulent activity and back him up

Kevin hasn't decided whether to tell all you guys the truth or not. He also hasn't decided whether he will give anybody refunds.

Kevin sent me to pinside to tell you he isn't coming whether you like it or not and give you a big middle finger. Hopefully all you customers will go quiet for a few more weeks now.

Thanks Aaron, thought i'd help you out as I am educated in bullshitting 101.

Challenge accepted, Aaron.

I was worried Kevin was lying about his license and funding wasn't going to come in for my pet project
if that was true

I found out he had no license quite some time ago

Kevin had to try to score a license after I called him on it

Given the licensing and other issues I gave him my opinion on whether it was still possible to complete the project

Kevin knows he lost all of his support which may cause him to pull the plug.

Kevin had correspondence describing what normal people can do with the predator IP without a license. He did not secure a license.

There is no formal agreement with FOX

While I am his de facto spokesperson, please don't associate me with his failures, (even though I held back the same information as he did.)

Hey, this kind of business is all very normal. Kevin is just like all other entrepreneurs that fail. Try not to focus on the "lying" part, just feel bad for him, his business failed!

I will not relay negative information or anything that compromises SkitB.

I know everything that is going on with the business now

It is beyond saving

There, i think the situation is out in the open now. Thanks for your help.

Yes. And in multiple posts he has stated point blank there is no issue with "the license" even though one never existed.

And pinside owes a pretty big pinside apology to the people who went to FOX trying to verify it.

i think it's in the skitb updates thread

"Don't question this project! Don't question Kevin! All you people trying to ruin the project are the worst scum!" Also paraphrasing but that's basically what we take issue with... A "devoted to the end" attitude that loudly pronounces all people who think and question to be enemies. Sounds like politics...

In my eyes, this is a clear case of fraud. He has quite a few people defending him, mostly good people who want to believe the best. (i.e. kevin is a nice guy so he would never knowingly hurt people).

Fact is, he knew he didn't have a license.
He claimed he had a license to collect $5k off of 250 people.
He pissed away the past year getting virtually no progress on production while sending misleading e-mails to avoid accountability.
He cost FOX money paying lawyers
He disappeared from the public forum to avoid accountability
He damaged the reputations of a few people in our community who defended him with false and misleading information
He concealed the truth of the matter from everybody even though they had business and personal investment in his projects
He lied about contacting people by e-mail to address their concerns and refund requests

Stop defending this guy. He needs to be held accountable and he needs to crawl out of his hole to do it, not send minions out to battle the flames.

Well in any case, he better refund all that money before FOX can get their hands on it.

Well then people better get lawyers to send demand letters for their refunds before he spends it in federal court.

Very good point, but he seems to have mysteriously disappeared as well.

Yeah but it sets a precedent on who has claims on his cash assets.

Kevin needs to tell people where their money is and why they are not getting it back. Aaron should be screaming at him to get on pinside and say something.

He claimed something that can't possibly be true, which is that all of the money he's received are safe and accounted for because of his deal with Paypal. That none of the buyers have even risked a dime.

read page 70

So he just took all mention of predator off the internet and wouldn't mention the name of the game in his e-mails for no reason, then for a year dodges the issue and didn't even think to look into it until 2 weeks ago. what "you believe" is beyond insane.

Plus he NEVER SAT DOWN WITH FOX. He has NO formal deal signed. How can somebody "naively" think he has everything in order when there is NO DEAL??? He didn't have "less of a deal than he thought" there is NO formal deal signed AT ALL. Stop pretending this is something you can easily overlook!

Oh yeah, if you didn't believe them then why didn't you call fox and verify for yourself? instead, shrouded in complete ignorance you shouted them down and called them evil bastards.

You are worse than them because you were wrong. You defended criminal activity over the truth. You implied that anyone who believed there was no license was an idiot and that they should get out of the thread.

I hate shouting into an abyss so I definitely need to add you to my ignore list to save my sanity.

We already did hear from Aaron. He is directly involved and by his own words knows everything that is happening in this project. Maybe you missed it. Go read page 70.

That he never had a license to build predator is not a theory.

He already said Kevin basically had a letter describing the terms of fair use for people who do not have a license.

That denial crap isn't going to fly anymore. Aaron said straight up that Kevin showed him the "license" he was talking about, and it was not in any way shape or form a license deal for manufacturing pinball machines. It was just information on how any person with no signed deal could use the likeness of predator.

If you are saying Aaron was flat out lying, then say that. Don't say "nobody knows," because that's bull plain and simple.

Actually, denial of facts doesn't require me to spin it. It either exists or it doesn't.

Yes, I object to your assertion that none of us know what is going on. I think you're just wrong.

Read page 70. You are denying facts again.

I did not twist your words. These ARE your words.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-official-pinside-skit-b-predator-discussion/page/70#post-2324905

Lets be real here, Kevin has been caught lying repeatedly and the proof is all over pinside. That anonymous email is very credible. If you want to try to explain it away as a lone nut case, you've got some pretty big blinders on.

Yeah, I just listened to it. Pretty crazy.

It is interesting to see the people who attack those who are bringing the truth out into the open as "the bad guys." Strange psychological reaction.

Haha, I'm starting to quesiton if they were ever on board.

How much predator $ are invested in EOD?

Aaron, for one.

He didn't pull it off, there have been people telling you what's been going on for years and you chose to ignore it.

I'm curious as to why you don't consider Aaron involved, as he is very much "inside," is a major part of EOD, is Kevin's close friend, and said himself that he has been given up to date information about the predator project and the licensing issues. He is directly advising as per his own words. Your judgement is based on Aaron being "out since 2013" so... obviously your judgement is based on something that is completely untrue?

OHHH you are talking about the wrong Aaron, that's why you're confused. Aaron from FAST Pinball is the one who gave us the information. Not former partner Aaron.

No, the Aaron who told us there is no license is Aaron of FAST pinball, he is Kevin's close confidante and knows exactly what is going on. It is not the former partner who left the project. Keeping that in mind, re-read what he says on page 70 and you will see that there is no room for false hope here.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-official-pinside-skit-b-predator-discussion/page/70#post-2324905

It's funny how none of the people who look at the evidence and are interested in finding the truth of the situation have asked me that question. But basically everybody who blindly defends skit-b and kevin jumps straight to it.

Yeah I'm probably exaggerating. I can't remember when the first reports came that people were calling FOX and checking out the license. Maybe last sept/oct?

I've just been correcting people who clearly misunderstand the situation.

... I haven't changed any quotes wtf are you on about?

After reading the whole story, the part where kevin is talking about licensing in this interview is just mind blowing. I can't believe he fabricated so much... unbelievable.

I understand your perspective on this Ice, but if you could see the PM's sent back and forth between me and Aaron when the truth was coming out, you would realize that Aaron's nice guy persona is for business purposes. He heavily flamed me for getting him to admit the truth on the forum. His #1 priority in all this was to keep people in the dark and try to keep EOD solvent.

I normally would hesitate to bring PM's into the public, but I am really sick of people defending slimy people who "seem like nice guys."

Now wait a minute - talking about virtuapin, this isn't just villifying them for nothing. They are absolutely complicit in fraud in this quote. They outright say that they have vetted the license, which is completely untrue as we know now.

I feel bad for the hundreds who must have preordered it.

*nevermind

No, this site was filled with people who even when faced with factual evidence just deny it and call the people bringing it forward troublemakers and haters. Having Fox come at Kevin officially would make the situation undeniable, and the anonymous group wouldn't have to be the ones "busting" him. Turns out Fox dragged their feet so long that the community just outed the whole story anyway. And no, I'm not involved with the anonymous group.

No... a couple mr. x's that think there is a problem pull out. Then wanting to save the rest of the group from being burned alive in a fire go verifying that there is a problem before pulling the fire alarm.

The difference being this was 5k of money per person that kevin gambled on being able to illegally manufacture a major luxury item. Which takes years. Which he even admitted he now couldn't even build in his house if he wanted to. There was never a possibility that these people were going to get their black market pinball machines.

I'm wondering if the paypal money is unfrozen/released to kevin after the 180 day appeal period is up, and that's why he could buy the new house and apparently other fancy stuff recently but not before.

Sure if you ignore all the facts and actual happenings over the past four years that makes sense.

Whistleblowers should be held in the highest esteem. They are the ones going out of their way behind the scenes to bring you the truth. Sometimes it's a difficult truth. It's a shame that there are so few, and it's even worse how they are treated by the most ignorant among us when they actually do bring a hard truth into the light.

Print the email of him saying he has a license. Show that you paid him $4750. Wow, so difficult.

Because these pins were NEVER getting made, period. Those "pinsiders on a crusade" put a stop to a never ending scam.

News flash, bud. You DID work on an unlicensed product because you DIDN'T verify the license, which you came onto pinside and assured everybody that you had personally verified.

Meh, it just makes it easy to know who should be on your ignore list.

No, your example was a bad one. If you want to compare it to a new stock, it would be like if somebody said they had the rights to mine a new gold mine with x ounces of gold in it. They go public and sell a bunch of shares in the company and 4 years later people find out they never had the mining rights to the property they said they did.

They would be prosecuted for fraud and go to prison. Whatever money the company had would be split amongst the shareholders and the company dissolved.

Kevin wanted to create predator pinball machines without a license. He knew that he would never be able to do so if people knew he didn't have a license. So he had to scam the money off of everybody by pretending to have a license all along in order to get their money. Because you would have to be a complete idiot to buy into a project like this if you knew he didn't have a license. YES it was a scam from the start. Premeditated. Scamming the pinball community out of money they would NEVER have invested in a project that didn't have an official license.

Are you still really on about this? Let it go, your analogy was bad.

I disagree with a lot of your points.
- In my opinion the anonymous group has adequately explained why they took so long getting the info out. At any rate they were doing the best they could to handle the situation delicately, and maybe they aren't "perfect" and can't please everybody but they did what they could when they could. Saying they had "vicious intent" just because the information didn't come out fast enough for you is probably the most hateful thing anybody has said in this entire thread, and it came from you.
- The numerous downvotes are people showing their support in a contentious issue. it's a valuable tool on a forum. And there were a lot of them used because there were a lot of ignorant comments being made. There were actually far more "thumbs up" if you will notice, and people supporting those who brought good points to the issue.
- The manufacturers that helped Skit-B are fairly inexperienced and have never dealt with a case of fraud like this before. I'm sure they will be checking licenses in the future. Spooky has already said that they got suspicious and stopped taking work from kevin.
- That you see this thread as pure mudslinging with no value shows that you don't respect the process of discourse and the valuable information the rest of us were getting from it. That's fine. Don't read it if that's the case.
- Saying we don't have an idea what kind of people they are after 1000 posts of discussion is not necessarily true. We have a lot better understanding of certain peoples thought processes.
- holding onto the information does not "invalidate the good" done by obtaining it... that's just wrong.
- You've seen no physical evidence, but we have multiple parties admitting it exists, and it is not denied by anyone that a license doesn't exist at this point. So you can go on denying it if you want, but everybody else is moving on from that point...

You are clearly very sensitive to negativity, and you consider talking in person to be a "real" discussion but talking online isn't. This is actually one of the most intellectual forums I have been a part of, and despite a few knuckleheads we have been digesting some very tragic news in a pretty orderly manner. I can see a lot of positive out of this, and have felt acceptance and support from a lot of good people who wanted to find the truth in this mess.