Nice article.

i enjoyed it too

Good stuff. I concur that Williams flipper assemblies are superior to that of Stern's.

A nice recap. This machine is going to be good

nice positive plug for stern pinball too!

Awesome. Get me excited though now I want to know if end of July is a realistic date

What a wonderfully unbiased article.

Cool article. I remember an inverse flipper mode on Zen Pinball's: Marvel Pinball - Spiderman (video game for ps3) and it was crazy, something like that on REAL table should be spectacular!

Stern's Simpsons Pinball Party - Mystery Spot.

Screws my brain up every time.

My sarcasm detector exploded.

I see you couldn't resist your transparent Stern-bashing even in a blog post that was supposed to be about WOZ. It's great that JJP can address the small niche of high-end collectors willing to pay $6500 for a game without playing it. Meanwhile Stern will keep rolling out the smash hits: LOTR, Tron, SM, IM, AC/DC, X-Men...

I do not drink that cool aid any more . The newer sterns make W/B feel clunky .. I thought I would never say that ever. LOL

Jim

You can just flip your hands around to play it.

Interested in seeing the game. I still hope the upper playfields don't cramp things up and have an actual point to them.

I actually think Stern's flippers are better..

Lol, mine too!

Personally i think when you speak such strong language against a direct (and only ) competitior, you raise the bar very high for yourself. So future games from JJP will always have original toys with new game designs and new ramps and so on. If not he will be eating those words for some time to come i think.

Don't get me wrong i'm all for it! but when you speak up like that, you better deliver!

I can be wrong of course, i don't follow all of the news like a hawk. But i think Stern has never openly attacked JJP like that. But like i said i can be wrong.

With both platforms with flippers in good shape, I don't feel there's a significant difference in play quality. That said, "real world", flippers on Stern games tend to be newer and play better. Much more snappy and precise. It's getting harder and harder to find B/W games without that severely "worn in" feeling.

If people would just bite the bullet and do a full rebuild shouldn't even be an issue. The flippers on my Space Shuttle are WAY "snappier" than my unrebuilt ones that are on STTNG that I have yet to touch since buying it. STTNG plays great though, I'm not messing with it at the moment, just saying that for that particular feeling, rebuilding the entire thing except the mounting plate will likely get you there. Go figure, right?

All my games look like turds when AC/DC is turned on . When I have people over I show them the old games first. LOL

Not sure I agree. I may be getting X-Men LE so direct comparison easier. However AFM, new p/f or WH20 with a new ceramic clearcoat do not feel clunky at all.

So maybe a difference between high quality restores and as is pins??

I thought SM would have them since Zen did that and then played it and found it it did not. It was the reason I was NOT going to get one. I cant stand that feature.
My advice, play this before committing. Its a big deal.

I own 2 Sterns, and plan to buy more. However I agree that the B/W flipper design (with a separate "hold" winding) is much better. The Stern coils get hot and sometimes buzz. It doesn't make that much of a difference to gameplay, but all things being equal I wish Stern would license the patents so they could switch to the B/W design.

Back to WOZ...I'm not a fan of the theme or the playfield layout. I may be more positive on it once I see how it plays, but it looks very stop-and-go to me. Artwork and toys are great though.

Have to admit it looks amazing.

One thing that was missed is the new way that the cabinet and playfield art are going to be applied/created.

The side art is not going to be a big sticker

I thought i heard on spooky pinball that the artwork are going to be actually printed directly on the cab. I may have misheard, but that how i understood it.

That's what I heard also ...

B/W use the typical dual-coil, three lug system, where Stern uses a single coil, two lug flipper coil, simplifying the hardware. I think it may be more reliable in commercial settings, and require less maintenance. The EOS can drop off entirely, and the Stern flipper will still function.

I swear that at TPF they said that the boards will be down in the cabinet also, NOT in the head.. anyone got a transcript of Jack's presentation?

If I'm remembering that right, and if they stuck with that design, it's freakin' awesome too.

As far as I know, all electronics will be in a removable "cage" in the cabinet bottom. The only things in the head will be the LCD, speakers, and lighting (plus, I guess, some cables to the topper).

So can B/W flippers since 1991, the year they came out with the first Fliptronics board!

Jim, I'm glad to see someone else agree with me on this. The newer Stern's (specifically referring to LE models personally) have a great flipper feel, and perhaps even seems a bit more solid than some of the B/W flippers.

Do the LEs have different flipper components than the standard models?

I agree but what is the price point ? I can tell you that it is way more than the new games !

Jim

Not that I know of. I just wanted to be clear that my experience has been specific to the LE models.

Sorry guys, but I already had to replace a coil stop on my Tron LE. flipper kept sticking because the coil stop fell apart.
Not one of our other B/W's has had this problem... I'm talking about 15-20 year old machines here.

I've played many Sterns, and they all have that 'light/cheap' feel compared to our B/W's. Not a 'clunky' feel, just light-weight and cheap.
There's a lot of B/W games that feel 'clunky' to me, but that's caused by the gameplay, NOT the flipper build.