Thanks for the info, nice to see they try to get the games out on location with something more than just "words".

I still don't get why such a long delay before Premiums and Pros for the general population (or even premiums for operators, most around here put out premiums on location).

Could be dangerous having that big of a delay. If the game isn't all it's cracked up to be, plenty of time to move on from that pre order. Probably not the case but still.

FWIW, I haven’t seen the manufacture date yet, but my LZ premium gets delivered Friday this week. I believe the Stern ship date to my distro was 9/30, so I’m expecting a late September born on date.

Sheesh, talk about an unhealthy stranglehold....... Control supply, control price, control who can be sold product (and when), select which groups of customers are allowed to have product (and when), track customers and verify if they are complying, blacklist & punish those who don't comply.

I wonder how long it will be before these machines have a remote kill switch and require a terms of service & annual license to function.

i disagree. Rules have to be put into place since some abused it. And no one has to get a first run game if they dont agree with it, pretty plain and simple. Also, when the operators give us the information, stern will then make post about where you can go and play the latest game, so many of these places will get in a sense, free advertisement, by providing the location info

'select which groups of customers are allowed to have the product'??

Did you hit your head or something? This is nothing more than part of Stern's marketing to get the games out on location where they can be seen and encouraging sales to operators.

zOMG... Ford ships cars to all their dealers instead of shipping MORE cars to MY dealer so I can get the car sooner.

Did I miss it or is there an estimate when 007 LEs will be produced. Got lucky getting one so just waiting.

easiest way to get this info is to search this thread for a game you know is on the prod schedule but nobody is really talking about (TMNT, home edition pins)
and you'll easily find the last time someone posted the production schedule:

Oct 2022 - Led Zeppelin Premium
Oct 2022 - Godzilla Premium
Oct 2022 - TMNT Pro & Premium (final run)
Nov 2022 - Bond Pro (for locations only)
Nov 2022 - Star Wars Home Edition (original & comic art)
Nov 2022 - Jurassic Park Home Edition
Nov 2022 - Bond LE
Dec 2022 - Bond Premium
Dec 2022 - Bond 60th
??? 2023 - Elvira Premium
Apr 2023 - Bond Pro & Premium (for non-location buyers)

All 1,000 LE Machines get produced in one month?

Couple weeks if Stern is full steam and there are no parts issues.

It looks like they’re doing 8+weeks of Bond games. That’s a lot of games. It also doesn’t look like January February and March are spoken for….just a few more Elvira’s and that’s it. Doesn’t stern have multiple assembly lines? If so, they can several versions simultaneously.

I think if all goes well, they make 500 games a week. I heard that once.

Don’t forget there will be a new cornerstone announced in January (usually a music pin) and also Stern usually shuts down the line the first two weeks of January to do inventory and get ready for the year. Or that’s been what it was in the past.

Apparently they are also doing a run of GZ premium in November

Really? 500 games/week.....I knew they great manufacturing ability, but 500/week? if true thats impressive

Factory Friday post says they are cranking out GZ premiums. I'm sure it won't be enough to get to mine but there's always hope

chance (resized).png

When did you order?

Around the first part of June.

September 2021, still waiting on mine

Depends on who you ordered from as well of course, but i feel like sept 2021 you should have gotten an invoice by now.

Was it a $1 special?

Curious...did you order from a local dealer?

Quick update: My LZ premium from GEx was delivered today. I know they’ve delivered several recently in CO over the last week or so…

September 25th born on date… seems probable that the LZ pins are done? But I don’t have any info beyond my pin.

Tons of fun playing already!

Got my LZ yesterday from Game Exchange, just south of you.

Waiting on my LZ prem too, disti told me 2 weeks ago they would be shipped to him soon

Won the game in a raffle from a very well respected charity. They ordered the game from a large national distributor in September 2021 (not the $1 special). I’ve reached out. My theory is that the distributor has been sliding me back to accommodate more profitable customers.
Not upset, I’m confident it will come eventually.

That’s awesome, but still kind of a bummer.

So are you guys saying that the $1 or no deposit orders are basically worthless?

No, but they’re a no risk way to get on a list that’s a mile long. From a highly visible vendor.

I really like the $1 special.... wish they had that for every title.
What would be nice is if they had some sort of regular update about where they are on the orders (such as "we're filling July 2021 $1 specials right now"), that way there would be some kind of indication of how much further away your order month is and can have fun guessing based on Stern's production calendar.

Then again, a dollar is just a dollar and you can't expect anything for a dollar really..... but for a buck I have just as much information as two $1000 deposits I have sitting out there. Maybe a dollar is a better deposit after all.

I got my $1 special in April, so that's what? 2024?

I’m technically still on their $1 list for a GZ Prem as of 01/01/22. And I haven’t heard anything.
I for a smaller dealer in April and got my GZ Prem in July. That was a $1k deposit but it came no tax no ship. Just had to call around.

I love how stern has years worth of GZ orders at $9000 but they carve out time in the schedule for JP the pin. Are people really buying that?

Of course. Besides, no need to make too many GZ at $9000 when in 2 months they can sell them at 9700.. surprised they are making any now actually

Congratulations! That's awesome.

Except no one waited for 2023 to hike the prices...... they've already been the new 2023 price for a month or two.

Only Bond should be. In January, all games go to Bond prices.

If you check the distro websites, almost all the prices are Bond prices now, and they have been for at least a month (depending on the distro).
What is not clear is: Did Stern already hike? Or did the distros hike early to get that spread as additional profit for the next couple months?

The average premium prices and spread I'm seeing (averaging across :FNO, CT, GEX, Fun, LSG)
Bond: $9700
GZ: $9700
AIQ: $9500
JP: $9500
DP: $9500
EHOH: $10K+ (TBD)
Rush: $9k - $9500
Mando: $9k - $9500
SW: $8700 - $9500

So except the oldest and least desirable, which you potentially can find on the lower end of the price scale at only a couple vendors, all the averages are $9500-$9700 which is 2023 pricing. There are still 5000 machines to be built in 2022 (although many will be Bond). That's a lot of machines which should still be 2022 pricing unless Stern was the one to already hike.

That’s unfortunate, but I could see a situation where all of their 2022 orders are spoken for so all games bought now would be the higher price anyway. Either they do it now and only we notice, or they wait til Jan 1 and then they have to explain the price increase to everyone that “ordered” in 2022.

Godzilla Premium on the line. As we make our way down the line...

Oct 2022 - Godzilla Premium
Oct 2022 - TMNT Pro & Premium (final run)
Nov 2022 - Bond Pro (for locations only)
Nov 2022 - Star Wars Home Edition (original & comic art)
Nov 2022 - Jurassic Park Home Edition
Nov 2022 - Bond LE
Dec 2022 - Bond Premium
Dec 2022 - Bond 60th
??? 2023 - Elvira Premium
Apr 2023 - Bond Pro & Premium (for non-location buyers)

George Gomez reiterated tonight on the Deadflip stream that he was uncertain that it would truly be until April 2023 before non-location buyers started seeing Bonds. He didn't say for certain, but this is the second time I've seen him publicly say that the rumor that non-location buyers wouldn't see Bond until April 2023 was inaccurate. He wasn't very wishy-washy in saying as much - he seemed about as confident as he could without saying anything for certain. Zach indicated that he received "not quite a wrist slap" but some level of communication from Stern implying the same in the most recent TPN episode.

Ya know, I ordered a EHOH Premium in September.... 2021. I was quoted a certain price, and put down a $3000 non-refundable deposit. I'd be pretty disappointed if they didn't honor it.

I believe they still have more led Zeppelin premiums to make. I have one on order and my distributor told me they're waiting on parts for the expression lighting. My distributors said he's waiting on about 20 of them still.

Inaccurate NOW. Because Stern backed off saying that first run of Pros was all location when the market freaked out. AFTER that Gomez and Stern's story changed to "we might be able to get enough pros made so some non-locations can get machines from that first Pro run. That was NOT what was communicated first. The story and intent changed after the freakout.

But even if they do, it's not going to be enough pros to satisfy 1/10th of the demand, so most people that want pros will be waiting months or giving up and buying a Premium from the Dec run (which is much more profitable for Stern).

Prepare for disappointment. Because the deposit is with the distro, and not a binding thing with Stern, you'll be paying whatever the price is when it is ready to ship.

I guess Rush owners will be waiting a long time for expression lighting.

A deposit for a Stern game should not be non-refundable. Talk to your distro.

In general, if the price is changed, that's a material change of your contract and you can get your deposit back if you don't want to pay the new price. Your deposit is only non-refundable if the price of the machine you put the deposit on does not change. IF it changes, you have the right to receive your deposit and walk away if you do not agree to the new price.

Agree, when I had my deposit down for Elvira the last time for over a year they ended up raising it $500 over what it was at preorder. When they did that you had the option to cancel and get your deposit back. Kind of stinks but I would say poster above you have a 0% chance you locked in the price. But in their defense it was $8500 when you locked it in and now regular premiums are going to be $9700 next year. From there Elvira always had a price increase over the premiums so I would guesstimate the Elvira MSRP will be 11K.

Not to mention that some of the distributors are now asking for prices above MSRP on many popular machines. Just look at some of the recent ads on pinside for left over spots for Bond LE’s. Some guys are asking $14,999 for slots in their allotment queue PLUS freight for a $12,999 machine that would normally be negotiated as a shipping included pin. The huge price hike over the last 18 months is likely why they have had slots open up in the first place, I bet this is the beginning of the end for huge prices on pins, but then again…

I don’t blame the distributors for hiking prices above MSRP. It is good business as long as they can sell their machines. I just think that those who put down deposits on a very popular machine like Elvira are at the mercy of the popularity of the pin. As long as there are people willing to pay ten and twenty percent above MSRP, the distributors would be silly not to set their small allotment at a higher price anyway just because they can get it. If you don’t like it, then there are fifteen other buyers behind you in line. It’s the law of supply and demand at it’s very purest definition. Your $3k is much better off in your hands at this point.

I probably should have held off saying it was non-refundable. It has been a year, and I thought it was non-refundable. I need to look back at the emails.

Also... even if it was non-refundable at the time.. I am sure I could probably get it back without too much grief.

My main point... I have had $3000 tied up for a year, with no ship date in sight, and with the agreed upon price jumping.