No. you no there is no lube with it comes to stern. infact; free sandpaper if you get one of their PF specials!

Just dump the serial eeprom which probably in the topper.

No. But they almost have to have some universal serial number in this topper because even Stern isn't stoopid enough to have a "wire"/"jumper detect" feature that can easily be reverse engineered, right?
They probably have a "node board" up in this topper that can be detected by the CPU to enable the "DLC".

Just guessing/spitballing... I have no dog in the race as I've stopped buying Sterns because of the anti-lube they've been providing to their customers since Star Trek. Star Trek was my first and probably only Stern product. Been tempted by Metallica, Stranger Danger, and Star Wars... but I've convinced myself the risk just wasn't worth the short term enjoyment.

Stern Fanboi tax.

Disagree.
It's the DLC plus an unbelievable price for printed, laser cut plastic set.
There's actually less material in the topper here than a CPR plastic set (If I were to make a comparison).
If stern did put a node board in the topper; then they are A) lazy and B) stoopid.

Stern was on thin Ice for me back shortly after releasing Spike2... The ice gave way with the first Cabinet/Playfield quality issues they saw shortly after that. I haven't been more than briefly interested in any title since. I don't see that changing anytime in the near or mid-term future. IMHO; they lost touch with me as a customer with their ever increasingly "F-the-customer" attitude, rising prices, cost cutting moves. This is just another example.

There is going to need to be a radical "back to basics" / "customer obsession" mindset/management change at Stern before they will get another dollar from me. IMHO, Gary and Gomez aren't it and likely never will be.

Was it free... or was it part of your fang club membership?

Doesn't matter WHO you use... they are treating shipments like that.
Don't get me started how UPS has screwed me twice at their fu-xup and the first was "customer packed" issue. (lies - computer in original box)... and right now I have an open claim on bent Stern Armor. I'm not convinced they aren't going to claim the same "customer packing issue" when they likely drove a truck over it. Apparently; you need to crate everything and pay 100s over for the weight to protect anything from their shipping goons.

To be protected from UPS... you have to have them pack it in their store for a very high fee... then pay retail which is twice the cost of wholesale... and pray they don't have some boiler plate language in the two pages of fine print. Just yesterday; I tried shipping a 23 pound box of stern armor to a customer using UPS Store. 3Day select for this package was 104USD. I took it home and printed the same label using my Stamps.com via UPS account... it was 49USD to ship the same package, same value, same 3day select.

Trust no one. Expect failure.

Stern can sux a bag of... They really are trying to alienate every "pinhead" in existence thru a series of bad business decisions.

I've seen and restored worse.