Stern is very active on social media. It would be really nice if they did a “happy Monday, here’s what’s getting made today.” Sort of quick pic/video on mondays. It’s pretty easy to do now that clips/stories are a big part of FB/IG and even YT.

When did you order? I called before ordering and was told if I ordered them I wouldn’t get a GZ premium until August. This was fine with me as it gave me time to shuffle things around and hopefully get rid of a few games since I already had too many. I ordered on December 7th.

Wow, so it’s not just CT that has a healthy reservation list. Congrats, from a NOV waitlister.

The Pinball Show.

Episode 100 is coming up and Zach wanted to get Gary Stern on. I wouldn’t delay anything if you have a Gary interview and you are waiting for JJP to announce. After two years, JJP news can wait for 101 or 143 or whenever.

The well known distros have a backlog. Some of the smaller ones might have earlier availability, maybe. No distro is getting every game they order, so I’d expect a wait for certain titles no matter where you go. Pros and cons to large or small distros.

This is not a normal scenario. Stern has a backlog and has since IL was shut down for 2-3 months early on in covid. They haven’t caught up from that but then they have put out a few high demand games since then, plus some high demand titles still in production designed pre-covid. Normally, if you order a stern you can find one in stock and it will be on the way to you in days, or on the line and drop shipped. Hopefully they will be able to catch up to the point that the waits are 1-2 months at worst. A manufacturer would love to know they have some backlog, but it varies by industry. My employer has never had less than a 12 month backlog but never longer than 24 months. That timeline is agreeable to us and our customer base. That range doesn’t go over quite so well in pinball.

Did anyone watch the video?

They are country specific groups, and when you ship to another country you want to fill up as much of a container as you can.

I called my distro on Friday and they said they don’t have info yet for the next run as far as how many they are getting.

This GZ premium run was what I was estimated to be as my run when I ordered last December. I feel like pinball time is going to feel very slow this month. Trying not to get to excited, but I am.

Friday’s factory pic will be exciting. Looking forward to that for sure.

And how? Those shouldn’t be on the line til the 4th week of this month.

They can obviously do whatever they want. Guess we will have to see who else gets asked to pay for something this week and see what it is.

Anyone getting calls for either GZ model this week?

What date was that even? Not super thrilled about my December 6th (7th?) order.

Thanks. Fingers crossed for all us Cointaker buyers to get some good news this week.

Starting to look like I need to be on the lookout for the next GZ premium run.

Do we know what they are doing until then?

That you put in for in JAN? I’m did mine in DEC through CT, so I wonder what’s up.

Ah, ok. If it was through CT, that would be an issue, but with somebody else it really isn’t since each distro will have different lengths of lists.

Looking at the last schedule I’d be tempted to say yes. Between the cornerstone and the last calls they are going to be very booked for the rest of the year. I’d be pleasantly surprised if they fit in a small GZ run and I got the call, but won’t be too shocked it that didn’t happen til next year.

With all the last call games and James Bond just announced I’m not expecting GZ to get made again til December if not til 23.

As a 12/7, thanks.

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

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.

Same. I was hearing there was maybe going to be another run this year but we will see. In a Dec 7th order from CT. I was poking around yesterday and one distro had a note of Dec 6th for an estimated next run. No idea if that is true or not, but I’m hopeful until the last week of December, and then I expect to pay 700 more for being patient. Yay.

I would really like it if Stranger Things got a whole new game when season 5 is done. Keep the layout, I don’t care, but get all 5 seasons in there and make the feel of the game more about the kids and their challenges and friendships and less about being dark and brooding with a splash of a girl with powers. Enjoy playing the game, total miss on the vibe.

GZ before 2023, GZ before 2023! Say it with me, GZ before 2023.

Please.

That’s the rule for distributors. If you what to know “why”, ask Gary.

Nice entitled response you got yourself there. You are asking a bunch of people THE reason Stern does something when none of us work for them. It’s been their pricing policy for several years. They could allow dealers to sell at the legacy price when they received those specific boxes of games, but then you open up the potential for that to be abused. If you say any games you sell have to be the new price as of JAN 1, then there is no confusion.

I am 56 weeks since I ordered my GZ premium. I was originally estimated as getting it last August, which didn’t happen. I talked to CT in early December and asked what the odds of a late 2022 run and they said it wasn’t looking very likely. That was a $700 conversation. It’s not something I blame CT for, just the way it is.

I could have probably got one earlier from a different distro, but I was waiting on another game as well, which was supposed to be early 2023 and instead was November 2022.

In the end I was ok with the games coming at opposite times from when the other was estimated. Biggest bummer is the increase on GZ when the calendar rolled over.

Once I get my GZ I will wish you all the best and unsubscribe from this thread. I don’t think I will be a Stern buyer for a while as there are several games on my wishlist and even with inflated prices of those as well, I can get 2-3 for the price of a stern pro.

I don’t think they will miss me either. If they keep up the pace they are making games, there will be a very large pool of games in the used market, so even if something I want comes out there will be plenty available when the time comes.

I added IC to my Iron Maiden (pro) on location and the apron is just sitting on a shelf waiting to go into my homebrew. I’m sure there is a premium owner out there for whatever pre-IC title you are thinking of with a legacy apron that would sell it to get it out of their way. Not everyone enjoys the “collecting junk on a shelf” hobby like I seem to.

I’ve got a 10-pin spot on the west side of Tucson at Grant and I-10, and then a 4-pin spot on the east side on Houghton, just north of I-10. Tucson metro area is trying, but a slow grower so far. Phoenix metro area has grown like crazy in the last few years, but with 5X-ish the population I would expect it. Just hope to keep growing down here too.

I wasn’t asked to insure my machines, but I did anyway. Lots of appealing reasons to hobby operate, as long as making a lot of money isn’t one of the things you hope to see. Out of space, create a local public place to play/compete, find local pinheads, offset cost of games, and more. Happy to chat about my experience if you want to PM me.

Dang, I’ve been waiting something like 58 weeks to give them $9,000, now $9,700 (yay!) thanks to how long it’s been since I put in my order. I can imagine waiting what’s probably felt like forever to get a game I won.

Yeah, if there is a Venom, I hope it has a ton of Carnage.

It seems like the IP owner for James Bond is a major PITA to work with. They have to approve all code updates that have IP assets and it’s taking forever. Hope these turn out okay because I highly doubt they will work with this IP ever again.

Just realized, it’s February!!! May the epic GZ production commence!

He was on the Marco Twitch stream this week but I wasn’t able to watch it. That’s the only place I would imagine him discussing that, if at all.

There were 2 buyers from CT that said they got theirs when the last run happened last year. They were mid/late November orders. I’m a first week December 2021 order, so pretty hopeful.

This one is showing GZ, but I did not investigate at the clothing level.

Nobody got a call about their GZ today I guess, or Indy IV wouldn't be the topic de jour.

He was on the deadflip stream last night for 007 60th, so I’m guessing it was there.

Anyone getting their game a CT customer? If so what was your order date?

I thought this was supposed to be the mother of all GZ runs, but ended up being a week. Hopefully they revisit it next week since I don’t think a single week was what they intended.

Seems like that’s my hope at this point. I feel a little selfish, but I think I’m really close to the top of the list at this point so now every day is a “maybe today” sort of day.

FF looks pretty awesome. I don’t expect much time to fill back orders for other titles once that goes on the line. Congrats to Jack Danger and team, condolences to anyone waiting for anything else.

I’ll take that over waiting for the next run. Fingers crossed for both of us.

That’s up to 500 games. It might satisfy everyone waiting or it might not, I have no idea. But 500 new EHOH going out is quite a good number.

Start a new thread already. This thread is for people to see what titles stern is making besides the one they are waiting for.

Guess that was it. The “mother of all GZ” runs ends up being a week and a half, the half being the EHOH/GZ shared week. Yay.

When covid picked up. Expo 2021 was supposed to be on site, and then they changed it to virtual.

I hope they do offer tours again. I’m a mechanical designer and seeing how stuff is made is really interesting to me. If I could tour the various factories in Chicago (and maybe a trip to Benton) that would be a pretty cool experience.

Same. I was told August of 2022 when I ordered in December of 21. August came and went, Feb run came and went and I waited a few weeks just in case and then reached out to a dealer that had a listing here saying a few were en route. I got one of 4 they got in that run and have had it for a few months now. Got to play it at home for several weeks and took it to my location 2 weeks ago where it is getting played quite a bit for Tucson.

I still have my spot with CT and I certainly put no blame with them, it’s not like they are making the games. They request as many games as they can get and likely get fewer, just like everyone has recently. I will probably reach out soon and cancel and then everyone behind me on the list will move up a spot.

Looks like I’m not getting a call for my Dec 2021 GZ premium order. Oh well, I got one a few months ago and will probably go to less busy distros from now on.

If a buyer that was expecting to get theirs in 2024 is getting theirs now, I would have guessed I should have had my invoice prior to that. I didn’t cancel my order, and it seems I don’t even have to.

I called before ordering (December 2021) and was told August 2022. Then nothing from the Feb (I think that was the previous run) 2023 run. And now nothing from this run. Anyone with a CT order might want to reach out to them and confirm you are still on the list.

In my job my task requests come in via email, and I don’t like it. We used to have a web based system where a requestor could fill out a form in the site and it would get logged into a queue system. We got rid of that for some terrible reason and I’m trying to set something up like what we used to have. I only get emailed a few task requests a day, and that’s on pace with how long they take to do. My biggest concern is missing a request or worse, forgetting one before logging it into my makeshift tracker. Long story short, any of these large distros that are trying to manage their various lists in email alone are probably working way harder than they need to and have a big risk of a miss, which might cost them current and future sales. This isn’t meant to be critical, just how I see things playing out in my mind, but having (apparently) been missed in the list, and having that happen and not fixed before 2023 added $700 to my purchase price and that was not fun to account for.

I got my CT email as well. 2 years later I have my closure. I’ve only had my GZ for 5-6 months at this point, but at least the story has ended. I don’t recognize the name, but it seems like CT has somebody helping handle orders. With the volume they do, their previous efforts weren’t enough. Not that they weren’t trying hard enough, just that they needed more help to manage the volume.