Imagine using your phone to add Pokémon you caught in Go! to the pinball machine via insider connected. Now imagine exclusive Pokémon in the pinball machine that you could bring into Go!

This feature alone would selling 50k machines. I’m not even joking.

All the old farts here have no clue how huge this franchise is with the >40 crowd.

Pokémon Go! Has made over 5 billion dollars alone. One game.

Pokémon is essentially most 90s kids first rpg, and the possibilities for pinball are masssive. Imagine a ceramic powerball style master ball for the game, where it’s a guaranteed catch and travels through magnetic barriers like twilight zone. Roaming shots a la Jurassic Park to catch Pokémon. Custom etched poke balls. This shit would print money.

Agreed.

Attack from Mars feels like Super Mario Bros. 1

Stranger Things feels like Mario 64.

Both are great and stand on their own as classics, but in terms of depth of gameplay, Stranger Things just has more to do and better presentation.

1. As some one who owns a totally dialed-in premium, the demigorgan shot is the most satisfying shot in all pinball. That’s been No Good Gofer’s hole-in-one honor for years, and as someone who also owns a mint HUO NGG, the demigorgan beats it by a country mile.

2. the telekinesis ball lock is the most satisfying ball lock in all of pinball. Got the new ramp cover from Stern, so like any ramp, a clean shot works almost 100% of the time. As someone who also owns a Godzilla Premium, it’s a close call in terms of super fun ball locks, but the magic of Stranger Thing’s telekinesis shot edges out Godzilla’s.

3. The projector adds such a dynamic element to the experience. Especially if you do the Darkstar 9 mod, which replaces the generic white screen material with high-end home theater material. How no one else has used this idea continues to blow my mind. It’s like the evolution of the Revenge from Mars pinball 2000 concept. It makes each mode of the game more dynamic.

4. Speaking of dynamics, the UV kit is the most jaw-dropping “holy shit” element I’ve ever seen in any pinball machine. I’ve owned mine for a year, cracked 2 billion on it, and I still never get sick of it.

5. Sound design of the drop target tones being in key with the main theme of the show is probably my favorite clever use of sound design in all of pinball.

6. The amount of episodes, wizards modes, multiballs, etc. are just outrageous in Stranger Things. It’s super easy for a newbie to get something going in demigorgan modes, but very challenging to get to the 5th one. And for an expert, the amount of stacking is just wild - get a telekinesis multiball while fighting 3 demigorgans, Demodogs, an episode, while 2x scoring is running? Adrenaline bliss! Racking up and holding on to 200 million plus in bonus will have you holding your breath and nudging with the most anxiety of any game you’ve played.

I love Attack From Mars, and its simple goofy fun vibe can’t be touched by stranger things, but in terms of an overall package, AFM can’t touch stranger things.

What are the odds that Stern pulls a Spooky and does both?

Not the right comparison here.

Voltron, Heman, etc. are cartoons, movies, and action figures. That’s the franchise.

Mario and Zelda are games first, that’s the franchise.

We all know that video games ain’t pins, so by that measure, they’re all equally ripe for the picking.

However, Zelda alone as a franchise absolutely dwarfs all those cartoons you mentioned combined. From a money making standpoint, it would be a No-brainer to do Zelda and / or Mario first. But these games came out in like 1984, which is apparently too new of a theme for Stern

But in all seriousness, it’s most likely Nintendo being Nintendo. Seeing as how stranger things was made, which is an original IP and the newest one in all pinball of the last decade I do believe.

Know what’s a great indicator of someone not understanding how huge Pokémon is? Comparing it to WWE.

WWE, across all revenue streams, like tshirts, streaming, live events, toys, video games, etc. made around $940 million in 2021.

Pokémon Go made 1.21 billion.

That’s JUST Pokémon Go.

A game about a castle.

A game about Martians.

A game about Metallica.

A game about Godzilla.

All of these games could be underwhelming too if the designers only possessed your lack of imagination.

"you see, MY toys are so much more sophisticated and manly than THOSE other toys"

Pokemon is a dream theme to a lot of people. Hell, they've made several Pokemon pinball games over the years. Honestly, makes far more sense than Bond or Jaws or Venom.

Here's the thing. I'm guessing the plan WAS for Stern to announce a title this month. But with everything going on, who knows? Shit happens. Heck, they might all be scrambling literally at this very moment to announce the title either today or tomorrow, but why would they announce a delay if they weren't sure they couldn't hit the end of August?

I work on records for a living, and a lot of the time, shit comes down to the wire, be it with writing, recording, videos, mixing, mastering, etc. There are a ton of moving parts, and you absolutely need to hit release windows for many reasons, like touring, making sure the label isn't competing with it's own releases, the industry shutting down around christmas, etc. but sometimes, shit just happens, and you need to delay.

No offense, but I don't think your business has nearly as many moving parts as the music industry or Stern, so don't flatter yourself and pretend you know what it's like to roll out a product that relies on a bunch of different teams, licensing, and promotion.

Just adding to your enjoyment of the thread.

pikachu (resized).jpg

Haha, I'd have no shame flipping a My Little Pony pin, if the geometry was great and the rules were interesting.

Unlike some fragile men here, my masculinity isn't defined nor threatened by the toys I play with

Imagine how much lower we could sink!

If you two don't stop, I'm gonna get up on Bret's rope and start dropping elbows.

My guess is the main theme from other movies, like golden eye, live and let die, etc. might be difficult to license.

1. every company has their share of fanatics, Stern simply makes ~ 7x as many games as the next biggest pinball manufacturer, so it would make sense if they had 7x the fanatics as well.

2. they have the biggest themes, from Supreme, to Star Wars, to Stranger Things, Marvel, The Beatles, etc.

3. Features vs. gameplay vs. design vs. support vs. quality vs. reliability vs. manufacturing capabilities vs. history vs. repairability there simply isn’t another company that even comes close.

4. They’ve survived the worst era in arcade history

Have your upvote, now get the hell out of here.

I honestly thought the same until I picked up the 4k trilogy recently (Highly recommend for any of you cinephiles out there, as the film transfer looks astonishing). I remember liking the 2nd one much more than the 3rd, but I found I felt the exact opposite when I watched it earlier this year.

Like Indiana Jones, the first and 3rd movies are best, and the middle one stinks.

Hundreds in the table, twenties on the floor…

You could be beat other people’s score without beating their score, thanks to Stern’s new electoral connected system. It’d be yuge in tournaments.

Nobody has touched on the psychological effect of the 3 tiers yet, so I will.

1. Pro. Least amount of money, and for the significant penny pinching population out there, it makes them feel as though they got a great deal. You feel like everyone else spends too much money on pins, and this is the wise financial choice. You just wanna play the game, and none of those mechs really matter. The building in Godzilla? Pfff, gets old. Slows down the game. I’m a pro, short for “professional”.

2. Premium. Goldie Lock’s porridge. You get all the mechs without spending top dollar. You don’t feel like a cheapskate, but at least you’re not those crazy people who buy LEs. Ah yes, best if both worlds. You are in balance with the world. A true centrist, not like those whacky democrats or republicans.

3. Limited Edition. Spare no expense. All the bells and whistles, and you got #348 / 1000, so you really feel like you got a one-of-a-kind item, not some hollow shell of a game. You are missing absolutely nothing, where even with a premium, you’d be missing out. Heck, you can’t even buy those art blades! Top of the food chain, alpha pins only, and my distributor comes over for thanksgiving! Put down my topper / shooter rod money when I pre-ordered, because fuck it, yolo.

Three distinct psychological approaches to justifying spending way too much money on a single game. Stern is brilliant for covering all three significant markets.

r/incels is leaking again

My wife is the one who suggested our first pin - Jurassic Park premium. We got an Elvira House of Horrors last year, and she wants to own all 3 some day. Local arcade has Party Monsters, and she’s working her way up to breaking the GC.

Sad people who can’t fathom life outside their own sad existence say things like “women don’t like pinball”.

No grown ass man is afraid to play a pin because of its theme

Imagine having a sense of masculinity so fragile that a cartoon threatens to dismantle it.