Sung to the tune of the Beatles' "The Long and Winding Road":

"The long and rambling rant, that leads to nowhere,
Will never disappear
I've read that rant before..."

The route has been dead for years. The shift in price and the recent entry of JJP and the few other manufacturers are due to rise in popularity and price of the home collector. Sure there will be a few places that will may pop up that cater to the pinball crowd, but pinball collecting is growing, not routing machines. The market has switched to a boutique market. Stern is maximizing their profit on the remaining market. With the prices heading where they are, the home collector demand will soon drop. The amount of people willing to spend 8K multiple times a year on the next pin is less than the amount of people willing to spend 4k. Stern is being smart with the market that remains. Why should they take a big gamble? They are selling their products.

Please. If I buy the product I have more right to bitch about the product and future products than if I rent some game time for $1.00. As far as making the hobby smaller, I think game consoles, iPads and the plethora of entertainment options compared to 10 to 20 years ago is a *teensy* bit more responsible than I am for there no longer being arcades on every corner.

The hobby is shrinking based on price alone.

Jpop's projects 10K
Stern LE's now 8K
JJP 8k.
How is pinball gonna survive on route with those prices?
By the way everybody is allowed to complain or not,that's why we have a forum.Scott

Agreed.

Don't forget about the Stern Pro. I know. I know. It's not the full game. And probably not good for pinball savvy locations. But it is the only game at it's price point. I actually think Tron Pro was a good deal considering. You even got a little innovation with the disc. But overall I agree. These prices have to be hell on ops.

LOL What can I say, I guess I (and everyone I've played with in person) just have mutant powers of observation and detected the super subtle way the entire playfield, you know, changes color instantly, and large groups of leds make different color flashes with different shots. Reaaaaalllly tough to distinguish from yellow blinking 47s under colored inserts and plastics It's inconceivable to me that it would take a player all day to notice that. But hey, I guess that's how it is.

It's like this. Plunge the ball, 3 rollovers (also spotted w Blackbird scoop) and you light Blackbird, 3 more and you light Villian. You scroll through the Villains and the *entire playfield* changes color. Most players experience that on Ball 1 or 2 of their very first game. I noticed it in my very first BALL after unboxing it. Everyone that came over to play later noticed it immediately. With ACDC, it happens on the first plunge. With XM it takes 6 rollovers (most live catches net 2 rollovers), an incredibly easy thing to get started, not to mention the other relay triggering shots and modes. How someone cannot see that effect is different from blinking 47s is mind-blowing to me.

It's the same 3-4 guys who are thumbs-upping every anti-XM post, or thumbs-downing every post of mine and on XM in general. LOL!! You guys are so silly. And I've also noticed nearly every negative opinion on XM mentions "Twister," and what that tells me is preconceived notions weigh heavily on those opinions. Once they saw the spinning disc/magnet assembly in the pics their minds were made up what the game was. That's your loss, fellas!

I'll bow out of this discussion because nothing is being accomplished, the powers of observation are at a staggeringly low level and open-minds have flown the coop. Take care! Keep your heads in the sand and your mouths complaining!! And bring on the thumbs down, you same two guys! I wear them proudly!

I sat down with Gary stern a few years back at the BBH launch party. I repeated the fact that consumers stopped caring about pinball in the 90's. He agreed. I pointed to the BBH sitting in the corner and asked, "If consumers stopped caring about pins in the 90's why are you still making a pin that looks no different than funhouse to your average consumer?" He stated that now was not the time to innovate to get back the consumers. Making it cheaper would bring them back by getting more on location. He didn't have a great amount of success with that plan. Pinball 2000 was the last great innovation in pinball IMO. The one exception is what Gerry is doing with proc and his pin. It still looks very similar but will bring a new style of gameplay to pinball which I think is cool.

Arcade was dead until raw thrills came out with some great games and showed you could make money. In order for pinball to thrive again someone needs to really revolutionize the game. Unfortunately most are doing the same thing again and again with minor cosmetic upgrades, not revolutionary gameplay updates.

So if there are no games on location around you, what should you do? What would be your move?

I know from people just playing pinball at my house over the past 10 years I've probably directly influenced the purchase of maybe 200 machines. (One of my friends alone bought over 30 in just one year).

My friend down the street used to play, and stopped playing because there's nowhere to play. He hadn't played since TAF-days, and he discovered pinball again at my house when he was invited over for a card game; he has bought 5 in the past year. All from playing at my house.

Idealism vs Realism. The reality is that arcades are dead, and I'm not going to open one because I like my current business, which is successful, and I don't want to go broke at a dead-end business. But I still buy new machines, and I encourage sales of new machines through my friends who discovered pinball (or re-discovered it) through me. But my voice doesn't count because I don't open an arcade and operate machines? Because there are almost no pinball machines to play around me, and I buy them for my home, I'm to blame for making the hobby smaller? Get real, dude. Please tell me that's a joke.

The death of the arcade is a whole different can of worms, but somehow blaming individual collectors (without whom Stern would've closed up shop in 2009, and JJP would never have formed) is just plain silly talk. Collectors are the ones keeping pinball alive right now, and if it returns to locations it's only because we kept it alive through our purchases and enthusiasm, and the companies benefitting from that, through RnD, found a way for them to earn again on location.

JJP is trying to accomplish a return to location pinball, but he'd never be able to get off the ground without us collectors kickstarting his company. So tell me again how we are shrinking pinball? Please think about what you're saying.... LOL

Pleeease!! The home market is the only thing keeping this hobby alive. If you want to say there just isn't enough business to push the creative envelope,ok, that's your prerogative. So, that being said, don't tell me the hobbyist is killing the hobby, that's just plain nonsense.

While, P2k was the last significant innovation that really changed pinball, it didn't earn $. It was not a great ROI.

There needs to be some sort of innovation which resonates with the next generation, reinspires the casual players who went to the bars to play TAF and T2 but have lost interest in pinball since, and captivates the hardcore players who are buying games for their homes but only because they have to buy them to play pinball (because there's nowhere left to play).

That's a tough task, and it probably won't happen with one machine, but over the course of several machines which ease innovation back into pinball, and while making a new pinball machine really look like a new pinball machine (and not something which could've been easily disguised in a row of 1995 machines) still keeping the core of the game sacred... the player and the ball.

WOZ could be the first step down that road, if that road even exists...

Three threads for the price of one!
You guys are all wrong!!!
BOTH the OP and the home market are keeping pinball alive, and have through trying times.
That said, too many home owners can kill the ops, cuz nobody goes out to play.
Ops help feed the home market with secondary supply, not all collectors buy new, that is a relatively new thing.
Home guys buying new is killing the ops, because of the prices that are able to be charged to home guys is now what the ops must pay, and those sales are lost for used equipment.
Bottom line is:
Ops need to maintain better games to make more money, and sell good used games to homes.
Home guys need to play more on location, and support ops more/buy their used stock.
Home market will not support JJP/Stern alone.

Perhaps your could enlighten us how to do this. After all the ops that are left must be pretty dumb to have gotten this far.

In your dissertation please include a brief synopsis covering pinball machines that earn the same maintained or not. And with ops hardly buying new games, where the good used games will come from.

Thank you.
LTG : )

It's sort of a Catch 22. I understnad the dynamics of both sides. But phish is way out there, essentially blaming home buyers for killing pinball. No, home collecting boomed because pinball on location died, and we all still wanted to play.

In 1997 I owned a single pinball machine at home. Because I could go out and play many machines in various places. If I had my choice, I'd rather that was still the case. But it isn't. Where I live, if I want to play pinball, then I have to own them.

DNO, in CO it's a different beast. Location pinball in CO is a money maker. I just spent time at the 1UP/2UP a few weeks ago, as my friends run the machines there, and seeing people stacked four deep on machines on a Friday night at the 1UP was a wonderful thing (there were a group of college girls putting a credit in CFTBL for every plunge!! They were still putting quarters in with 9 credits when I stopped them and organized their game, LOL). But where I live, those places don't exist.

Denver, Portland, Seattle, Boston, etc seem to have strong location pinball earnings as well as lots of home collectors, monthly tournaments, etc. A nice balance all the way around. But to criticize people who live where arcades are deader than dead for owning machines in their home, because it's the only way to play, is silly talk. There's no other option, other than opening an arcade or putting our machines into non-existent locations! And please realize, as operators, when you buy a new pinball machine, that probably wouldn't be an option for you if home collectors hadn't kept Stern in business over the past 3-4 years. You are right in that it's not the fault of any single group, but it's certainly not the fault of the home collector in the vast majority of the country!

You have a point there. They would have been forced to spend their equipment dollars on Buck Hunters, E Tunes, Golden Tee Live, and redemption equipment.

LTG : )

I have a home collection and play out whenever I see a pinball machine.

Nothing has changed here. BW used to sell machines to the home market. So I don't believe this point is relevant at all.

My local ops want top dollar for junk machines. One op won't sell any of his used machines (this boggles my mind.)

I do agree with only one of your points, machines need to be better maintained. But in order to do this I'm guessing the ops need to make more money on location. I think the problem goes back to the average coin-op consumer not caring. In chucky cheese the pinball machine is always free while the kids play the redemption machines. Just a fact of life.

You're right LLoyd, sometimes I do feel dumb still operating after 9 years, and having over 25 years in the industry myself.
I have made a go of it, and you can't just operate pins to make a living. Jukes, pool, and actually Golden Tee making a comeback nowadays.
SS billiards and multiple "bar" pinball locations are 2 different things.
I would like to think my operating, and starting leagues and tournaments has helped pinball thrive in general in Co.
Lyons Pinball helped anchor this alot too.
Ops also need to do more with promoting pinball in general, everywhere.
I have done pinball more because I like it, than as a great business choice.
My "dissertation" was more just quickly showing a circle of life that has existed in pinball for a long time, between home guy and op.

God Bless Chinese products, so what can we do? I know, stop buying cheap rubbish.

Time change, things change.

Time for a new circle of life.

LTG : )

I hear this all the time from people. If you're just a player or casual observer, I understand thinking this way.

When a game designer/developer says this, however, it may be time to put them out to pasture. It's a sign that they may be done and have lost whatever creative spark they had. To be a designer in any medium, especially games, you need to approach the limitations you're handed with a glass-half-full mentality. You can't settle for "it's all been done", because when you do, someone with more imagination, vision and charisma is going to prove you wrong.

As a side, but related: Two older games I think about a lot, Spy Hunter and Hollywood Heat, are two layouts that prove the modern designers have a ton of things they can do outside of their base layouts. One part of the problem (of many) is that the modern pinball audiences are jaded, knitpicky and bitchy when the game does not fall into a similar base design as Medieval Madness, Adam's Family, Twilight Zone, Monster Bash and Terminator 2/The Getaway. Sorry to shit where I eat and if I am hurting everyone's feelings, but from my perspective it's the truth. Yet another part is that the currently employed designers and the industry haven't had legit competition since the 90's. At least for the latter, JJP needs to have his tires touch the pavement already.

On the brighter side: After WOZ we'll at least have LCD's as the norm. We have P3 tech just waiting for someone to implement. P-Roc is allowing independent garage devs like the Predator crew a crack at putting something out there. AC/DC is an incredibly clever table over all and IMO pushes the bar of non-linear-mode-depth rule design. Things are at least much more exciting with these recent developments than, say, pre-2009.

Essentially, that's not what I said. I said that if you buy games for the home and don't play on location, you have no right to complain about lack of innovation. Read it again.

For feeling okay about your contributions to the hobby, some of you guys sure do protest a lot.

Good idea.

There's really no need to be condescending about this. Did I notice things changed color? Of course. Did I think it was totally awesome? No. How is it so much better than what Tron did with its multiple colors of lights? Beats me. Does it make me want to keep playing the game? Not really.

Thanks, I'll keep on not observing things. PS, you meant "drop catch" and not "live catch", a "live catch" doesn't go to the rollovers.

http://pinball.org/videos

Too late - we are all addicted to the stupidly cheap prices....of the "Chinese rubbish"

The idea of dropping the price below 3K is not to build smaller runs, but bigger runs as more people can afford them and operators make their ROI sooner. I was at a distributor last week who simply said his ops are passing on the new games as they have become too expensive. Or would you say building 12K innovative games is the way to go? Who will buy them?
I play on location, I have operated games on location. I'm even considering operating some elder games on specific locations.
If you read more of my posts you'd see I'm not at all high on themes. Most often the themes don't appeal to me at all. I'm about fun gameplay. Fun doesn't have to cost 3K and it still can be innovative. Take a look at a game like Breakshot for example. At that time it may not have worked in that market, but that game is more fun for me to play than many games from the past decade (and yes there are exceptions). So at 3K you won't see 3 Rudy heads, 2 sinking ships, 25 magnets and what else is there. But is the game is fun, addictive and looks appealing (all things that don't have to cost a fortune), it will be played on location and earn money for the op.

I did not mean to be condescending, honestly I was just blown away that you and Newsom claimed to not see any lighting innovations on XM (because you are the only two people I've heard of who've played it and not noticed). This is a thread about innovation, and ACDC's and XM's lighting rgb/relay system is very, very different from all previous Stern games. It's a small innovation, granted, but it is one.

This is the statement which puzzled me and I was responding to..

...and Newsom...

...and the other guy who admitted that he noticed them, but it took him all day of playing and watching before he saw it.

Hehe, sorry, just seemed really odd. It was one of the first things I noticed when I started a game on ACDC Premium (with the new code at PAPA) and on my very first game on XMLE after unboxing it. Maybe I need to realize that it excites some and doesn't others, and isn't even noticeable to a few.

And yes, drop catch not live catch!

Ok, cause it kinda sounded a little like you were blaming home buyers...

And you do realize that many areas where people live there are no pinball games on location to play, or next to none, right?

And you do realize that when pinball was in locations everywhere in the 90's, relative to now the amount of home buyers was almost non-existent. Players started buying them because they had to, if they wanted to continue to play pinball. I played throughout the 90's and nobody owned pins, if they did it was one or two, or maybe an older one like HH. The pinball collecting craze launched in the last 10-12 years or so, after Wms closed up and pinball on location slowly began to die.. then collecting slowly began to take off... It boomed in the past five years, and I suspect that is mostly due to people experiencing pristine pinball collections others owned at home, and it began to trickle out from there...

Thank you for doing that. I applaud you, sir!

Maybe you do have a point in that collectors with large collections in areas where there is no pinball to played should take the initiative to at least put a game or two out on location somewhere to spread the hobby to others. I invite people over to play at my house and have large gatherings, and many new players and enthusiasts have been born at my place.

But what you're suggesting, while ideal, isn't that easy is it? What does the bar owner say when I want to put a pin in his place? Or three? Doesn't every bar already have an op who takes care of the juke, Golden Tee/Silver Strike, touchscreens, etc? Are they going to allow multiple ops? Give up floor space for a pin? Essentially, are they going to share the location? From what I know about ops, that's not going to fly.

It seems the only way for a collector to do it, without quitting his job and becoming a full time op with a shop full of Golden Tees, would be to find a place with no existing operations going on (a record store, a tiny pizza place) and put in a single pin or two, and justify the reduced space to the owner. There are a couple guys who have tried that around here, with mixed results, and have tried many many locations and only found literally one or two ones who would allow it.

I like your enthusiasm, and I applaud you efforts. But the word "blame" is used a little carelessly! Most of us would like nothing better than to be able to play pins on location, even those of us with many pins at home.

Absolutely right. I just realized how I'd have reacted 10 years ago ...

"Would you like a pin in your flat?" - "Hell yeah! How cool would that be?"
"Would you like two pins in your flat?" - "Huh? What would I need more than one pin for?"

Now it's more like "How will i reasonably justify a third one?"

The lights are much more noticable on ACDC than Xmen, and I think I know why.
Lights change on ACDC when you are selecting songs, unrushed and at the beginning of the game.(1st time)
Lights change on Xmen when you select a villain mode,(If I get it correctly).
That is a ~5 second span where a player is switching through, looking at the display, wondering if they should pick Juggernaut, Sentinels, Omega Red, or whatever.
A new player should be watching the display, trying to pick, not staring at pretty lights on the PF.
So I fully see why the colors could be missed, while looking up.
-DNO-

Don't know if this was mentioned above to many posts to read, but pinball went out of business, its amazing that any pinball company managed to survive. Without Stern my pinball collection would be a lot worse off, I think Stern have have done brilliantly over the past decade or so to continue making any sort of pinball.

I think rather than loading up on toys and other garbage that clutters the playfield, or special DMD animations, let's have pinball go to a simpler, cleaner, and most importantly, more RELIABLE builds. Pinball lost the war with the video machine in part because it was more costly to maintain. A lot more things broke, required maintenance was much more intensive.

I'd argue to go back to the golden era of pins - the early 80s. Make a machine with no toys, no DMDs or video displays. Focus on beautiful art - not photoshopped slop. Keep the advances in good sound, voices, etc. AVOID LICENSED PRODUCTS. Come up with your own original themes. And then build a machine that's cheaper, more solid and far more rugged. Offer modular replacement parts that snap in. There's plenty of things you can do with layout, an infinite amount, actually. You can even have a line of mods operators and collectors could choose to add, or not add. Anything from eye candy to ramps or modular diverters that change the flow of the game, keep it fresh, that drop in place. But keep the basic machine clean, rugged, and simple to set up, service, and of course, manufacture.

Is this innovation?

One would think. It's been brought up in this thread a couple times but no one really seems to want to talk about it. IMO this is the future. And now Nordman's on board.

Innovative? Yes, and very creative.
Yet boring as hell if you asked me. I like shooting ramps and physical targets that the ball rebounds off in certain ways.
This seems like P2K revisited, a simpler PF design, compensated for with video.
I have played it, and the ball tracking is cool, but should only be a part of a bigger picture that involves an actual playfield design.

Nice of you to keep an open mind

Every pin looks boring in a whitewood (or clear plastic) state. The thing you're completely missing is the geometry of the playfield changes on this one. Normal pinball machines are fairly static. This one has lots of variation on the geometry which means variation on the gameplay. I can imagine all sorts of cool stuff to do with this one. In the hands of Nordman, one of the most creative designers IMO, I expect cool things. Of course I'll wait to say boring or fun until I play one.

New Coke was innovative. So was the DeLorean car and Web TV. Innovation does not always = good.

Really? Do you see this as a game that might be mass produced? Or do you see lots of boutique companies building small runs of games for the home? Or somewhere in between? Where exactly are we going?

Pretty cool, Rob. I'm not sure (by looking at the prototype) that I'd prefer it over a traditional pin, but it's definitely interesting.

This exact machine? Probably not. But I don't see why the tech couldn't be licensed if they pull it off. I could easily see Stern licensing this and making a mass produced Angry Birds pin.

I believe the innovation will come through the boutique companies. They have the ability and incentive to take the risk. The P3 platform to me seems ideal for getting a younger generation to play pinball. I can see a 15 year-old looking at this and instantly getting it. Way more than AC/DC or WOZ. Not that they're not great too. But I see them more for us.

If something like this isn't the future what is?

This is the risk faced by a company like Stern or JJP if they decide to really innovate. They could spend a ton of time and money on R&D, come up with something new and exciting, and much of their target audience would scream for something more traditional.

I've been following this also. This is much more than P2K. It's P2K on Steroids. Everything has been revamped and reengineered. Network aware, upgradeable and modular. If you ever wanted innovation then this is the most enthusiastic shot at one for pinball in a long time.

Unfortunately, I have a feeling that purist will pan it like P2K. It looks phenomenal though.

I see no reason why multimorphic cannot pull this off AND start mass producing the P³ platform. They are a start up and starting out small, which is smart. After the first orders are out and production credibility is established, I can easily see one of these being in every chuck-e-cheese and Dave and Busters in the country. Especially with customizable code and cabinet artwork. I think Gerry can figure out production and scale it, and I think starting out small reflects the company's practical and prudent approach to the growing pinball market. You don't have to be established in an industry to disrupt it.

The quality of a pinball will not save pinball for arcade/on location games. Doesn't matter what they "innovate" into a machine. Nothing they can do will make people get up and go gather at a location in high numbers to play them. If you want to revitalize the number of games on location you need to revitalize the arcade. You need a bunch of things to come together that says to consumers "don't go to the movies tonight - come join us down at the arcade where we ALSO just happen to have a bunch of pinball machines".

As for Stern not innovating - I won't even comment whether they are or aren't. I'm glad they kept it alive and if their games are not firing on all cylinders only leaves room for someone else to come in and fill where they're missing. That's a good thing. I don't believe there would be JJP without Stern. That Stern kept it alive when there was essentially no one else speaks to Stern actually knowing the basics of business. They kept an industry alive and employed some people in the process. So I give them an A+

Rule sets - honestly, the only people who care about rule sets are the people who also have a pin in their house. The average "Joe" playing games on location has got at most 6$, 1 hour, and a 3x5 paper card to try and figure out the rule set to get the highest score they can. What counts number one for a game on location is theme - period. Again 6$ and 1 hour and how are you going to get someone to walk over and put their money in. Its the theme thats going to do that. Quickly after to get them to feed in the 3$ left from the full 6$ is fun factor which I think is lighting, music, sound fx, and how fast their ball's drain. Games that end too fast will have the on location player walking away to spend the other 3$ on a drink.

Guess my point is the original post is made from the position of a collector alone. I don't think producing pins "only" for the collector is going to keep any pin manufacturer in business long term.

Someone needs to figure out the formula to make the arcade a destination again. Not just pins, but everything it used to be in all its glory - and it was never just the pins that made an arcade what it was. It was many things put together. I have hope - when I see pins on location or video games, they're still being played. But they're always part of some "other" venue.

You get the arcade back and you'll see pin and everything else go back to its glory in the early 90's. Multiple tables out by multiple companies annually and yes - at that point true innovation when there is room to take some risks and make some failures. Still not much room right now IMO to stumble.

_{Post edited by Hobbypinball : typo}

+1. Sometimes it helps not to be. Look what id software did to the videogame industry with a little shareware title all those years ago.

It plays great too. It honestly felt like a snappy B/W game, which surprised me considering the new "floating flipper" and "floating sling" design.

You played it but you don't remember the ramps or the wall of illuminated drop targets and pop up scoops?

Which is what I did. I have played it, as I said before. (TPF)

I remember those targets. Like hitting a wall 2 feet up the playfield.
Pop up scoops? Meh.
I'd rather bounce balls off Wolverine, and that's not saying much.
Maybe there will be more and it will get better (I really hope), but when I played it at TPF it was just kinda boring.
And people weren't exactly lining up to play it, at all.

I agree.

That's where I disagree. It's bigger than the arcade or the game. Stern has had a run of good games lately. AC/DC may soon be considered one of the best games ever built. OZ looks like it will also be an awesome game. Yet kids still won't come out of their basements to play. Obesity and diabetes rates are soaring. Kids would rather text each other than actually talk face to face. No fancy arcade chain is going change this. What's needed is a change in culture. Kids need to embrace social contact again.

If you want to help the hobby and your kids, take them to play on location regularly. Whether you have games at home or not. It will teach them social interaction skills and instill more of a love for the hobby than playing games at home ever will.

Oh hey - i'm not saying the revitalization of the arcade would be easy or that the underpinnings of why there aren't any don't have deep cultural causes. Just saying if you could revitalize the arcade (hows or reasons aside) would allow some real innovation by allowing makers to take some more risks.

You played a tech demo prototype, not a finished machine.

Coincidentally enough on the arcade forums we (Raw Thrills) get called out all over the place for pretty much still reintroducing the same Cruis'n game again and again and again since Eugene brought that out 20 years ago.

I'm pretty sure if we "Raw Thrillized" a pinball machine, most people on this forum would not like the end result

Where is the innovation? It is stuck in the 90's, which is maybe where it should be. B/W had a dream team of pinball. Not sure we will ever see a run of pins like that again. The state of technology at that time also allowed for such massive improvements.
These days, it takes more to impress people. & there is less new things to try. The 90's were a time when all the new tech was, well, new. & so the ideas were fresh. It was a perfect storm in some ways that I don't think can be duplicated for a variety of reasons. Yet... pinball still vanished, nobody was buying them. But I don't think you can blame designers for that, which also means I don't think we need to change that much. Do the same thing as back then, or try to, but apply it to now, a time where people are paying $$ for pinball.

I know what works in pinball, for me at least. But unfortunately I don't have the $$$ to start my own pinball company. I just know what used to catch my eye back in the day.
The game that got me into pinball as a young kid... Cyclone. I sucked at it & had the typical awkwardness of a little kid trying to peek over the glass to see the back of the PF while having no idea on how to control the ball. But I kept pumping quarters into it because I wanted to get that damn ball into the ferris wheel & watch it go around. Couple years later, I saw Funhouse, which sucked me even further into pinball, just as Rudy sucked on my balls. Then ToM & AFM also came to my area. At the time, I didn't know how special those games were. That was just the status quo, far as I knew.

I bet like many of you guys, I grew up with a fascination of contraptions. Games like Mouse Trap. has anybody actually played that game? Or were you like me & just liked playing with all the "toys" & loved dropping the ball onto the diving board to shoot the guy into the air & all that good stuff? I loved the chaining of the domino effect where one action leads to another, & to another. Later I moved on to those SpaceRail/Spacewarp things with the marble & the rails. In years earlier I even built my own pinball machine. It didn't have flippers & was more of a bagatelle, but still.

What do all of those things have in common? You can see the ball & watch it do some cool things. But look at more recent pinball machines. They get really cluttered, & instead of following the ball, you just hit a switch that makes a toy do something that takes your focus off the ball, or the ball is stopped/hidden somewhere while other things are happening. That stuff can be cool for a while, but these days gadgets don't impress people very much. We've seen it all already.

Some of you might want some crazy modern tech on games. & I'm all for improved displays, LCD, colors. Better lighting, better sound. Down with all of that. But on the game itself, do we maybe need to take a step backwards in some ways? Or at the very least, lets not forget what made pinball great in the first place, what made it catch fire in the early SS days. Take the best parts of old pinball combined with the best parts of new pinball, but still advance the technology.

I say... please get rid of photoshopped PF's, hand drawn art was one of the best things about 20th century pinball. Nobody here seems to like them, & we are all aware it is done to cut costs. Man some of that stuff is ugly. Meanwhile I have a JD here that is a fraction the price of a Stern that is dripping with great artwork that I sometimes just stare at & look for new details. I don't do that when I see a newer title. I just hope that at least the gameplay is good.

Especially with home game use on the rise, I would think it be more important than ever to have great art. There are pins I would just refuse to put in my home because of the theme or how bad they look. But I feel much better putting in a machine that is also a great piece of art. Also, even on location, a pin with photos slapped all over it with dark ugly colors just doesn't grab my attention. I like the Avengers cab's, though. But then look on the PF & you got more photoshop. Ugh. Really you just can't have that same artist also come up with a PF while your at it?

I just don't want to invest in games with photoshop on them. Why? Because in 20 years, is anybody really gonna be interested in a game with 20 year old photos of people that are outdated as hell?
Meanwhile, people look at my JD that is now 20+ years old, & they think it is brand new. Part of that is how clean it is, but it just goes to show how timeless artwork is. Look at all the 90's pins that sell for insane amounts of $$. What is the common denominator? Yup, you guessed it. Of course it isn't only the art, but if say an MM was splattered with photoshopped people from 15 years ago, would people really be paying as much as they are today for it?

This is something Stern needs to remedy if they want to have games stand the test of time like B/W, & to even be considered on the same level with them. People are buying your stuff, now put some money back into the product & hire a damn artist. Or if you really need to use photos, really try to make it look better somehow. Surely some things can be done.

I also sometimes miss a bank of 4-5+ well placed drop targets on a game. I love drop targets. Don't like the way balls play off of standups.
IN PINBALL I LIKE TO KNOW THAT I NAILED A TARGET & FEEL THE SATISFACTION. I hate these standups that in the heat of battle you have no idea if you are even hitting or not. Give me some tangible action/reaction, with drops even if I don't see that I dropped one like during multiball, I always at least hear that lovely "cla-chick" sound, & the bank resetting is also unmistakeable. B/W came up with tons of clever ways of making targets have different reactions when hit, other than standups.

Where is the flow? Too many games I'm just feeling like the ball is starting/stopping/vanishing way too often, or too much chaos if multiball happens too often. This kinda goes along with what I'm saying about wanting to be able to follow the ball more/better.
I know sometimes it needs to happen, but lets pick & choose where it does a little more carefully, & add flow where we can.
Again with the action/reaction, is there anything more satisfying than hitting a smooth combo? On some games it is possible, but it gets very difficult because the proper flow just isn't there. I'm really not even a big multiball fan. Sometimes I even get irritated when I have to deal with multiple balls. Multiball certainly works well on many games, but maybe make it a little harder to achieve or maybe have more 2 ball multiballs. I don't always like getting a 3+ ball multiball just as a random award or when I wasn't even trying to get it.

Do we maybe slow games down? Again, its fun to follow the ball. Sometimes on modern games the ball moves crazy fast. This is great where it fits (like super fast ball/flow works great on a game like BK2K which is designed for it). But for myself, & it seems like others, EM's or older tables are nice to have around because it is nice to not be so "on edge" when playing pinball sometimes, & needing lightning quick reflexes constantly. Let's make some games that might better suit those who like to slow things down & think a little more than react. Rather than having an all out spazzfest. Or at least more moments of "zen" or calmess during a game. I love games where you can better control your pace, but only at certain times things get crazy.

I grew up mostly with more modern, DMD titles. Yet when I'm at a place with lots of pinballs, I almost always spend more time on non DMD games. Why? I don't do this on purpose. I didn't even grow up with these games, so no nostalgia there. I just get drawn to them. & I am young to the hobby, only a pin owner for 4-5 years, trying to increase the value of my humble 4 game collection & one day own maybe a TZ or IJ. I might be who Stern is targeting as a customer, or I will be soon. But here I am more interested in games before my time than I am with new titles.

I already explained why I think this is, but will anybody do anything about it? Does anybody even agree with me? IDK.
& I'm not saying I don't like modern games. TZ is incredible to me. I love the 2 more modern pins that I own. I love ramps when they are well done & don't seem forced onto a game, my JD has 4 of them & I love it. Even with Stern, there are some good ones, I'd love a TSPP as much as anyone. Really like TFG as well. I maybe don't like LOTR as much as some. AC/DC is a good game, but there again, its just a bad theme for my tastes, IMHO. I don't want that in my house. AC/DC peaked before my time. Lets not forget that even people in their 30's to 40's now have grown up listening to newer bands. 90's Punk was the thing when I was growing up, not AC/DC.

I don't want a machine with that ugly Angus guy snarling at me with that huge face drawing. Ugh, gives me the willies. That is just not a theme that will attract many younger people. & so in some ways, Ritchie's good design goes to waste. & I'm steamed that they made versions of this game without the lower PF. You can't omit such a huge game feature, I don't care how much $$ they say it saves.

& I believe theme & art are incredibly important to pin sales, & quite honestly the life of pinball itself. Keep churning out photoshopped PF's & licensed themes that most ppl don't care about, then I'm sorry but no matter how good the game behind it might be, you just won't have a classic on your hands. I mean, doing TV shows that nobody will know about or care about in a decade... come on. You really can't just do a cool original design instead? & save the licensed games for when you get a great, universally liked license? & I do think x-men & Avengers are good licenses, though kinda wish they didn't do them so close together.

I have yet to really check out WOZ or any of these other upcoming, possibly innovative machines. So I can't really comment on that. Maybe somebody is on the right track to becoming the next B/W. Though I wish B/W would just be the next B/W. But if they did return I'm not sure if they could assemble the same talent they once had.
Also to create talent to make great games, you really need people who grew up loving pinball & know what makes it great.

Unfortunately, these days that is fewer & fewer people. Any kid in college for coding/game design might not have even ever played pinball at all! But back when the B/W legendary designers were in college, pinball was huge.
So there is simply less talent to choose from these days.
But we still need to find a way. Somebody has to step up, & create games this generation that will stand the test of time & create the future designers, who will make great games themselves... & keep the cycle going. The cycle got broken, time to fix it.

So do we really need that much innovation? I don't think so. I'm not sure I would care much for a pinball machine that was way different than what I'm used to. There is always room for some innovation, but you can't force what happened in the 90's to happen again. Different time, different situation. Just different.
Instead, what you do is evolve. Build on the great ideas already out there, make them better, & maybe go back to simpler times for inspiration on what got us all hooked onto pinball in the first place. & if you come up with a cool new feature, then go for it. But don't force it. We all know how things went the last time designers were "forced" to make something innovative. It should all happen naturally. Didn't hurt that B/W always had good competition as well. I believe the old B/W designers have even talked about this. Just the willingness to 1 up the competitor, by itself inspired some great ideas & games.