I would get the AC DC pro and the MBr CE.

I would go for the ACDC and MBr . Especially since your wife loves MB. One cost to figure in is the color upgrade chip for MB cause it's a must have!

2. All day, every day.

Pick the option where your wife is happy. Having her included in the hobby will make it more enjoyable. Plus, you’ll have a better chance of getting some action later.

long post for the OP:

when you have no pins; going for 2 is the way to go. When you have 7, you can be a little bit more picky, choosy, and selfish. I own ACDC pro - fantastic game - love the gameplay way more than the premium. That said, i was just recently in the market for a new game; at the time, my 3 pins were serious, fast, brutal games (SW, IMDN, ACDC) - so i wanted something ‘different’ ‘quirky’ and ‘fun’. Wonka & WOZ were at the top of that list. I had owned WOZ in the past and would love to own again. I love Ritchie games so wanted to wait and see BK3 too. So i waited...i saw both reveals; BK3 - hard pass, even though it looks super cool it was just too serious and brutal and sort of similar to IMDN in the atmospheric sense. Then i saw Wonka; it checked a lot of the boxes i was looking for, even the price hit my budget at $7500. But it seemed half baked, the sounds and display did nothing for me, I didn’t see any excitement or Adrenalin factor (yes its hard to tell those things from the streams, and who really knows when they’ll start rolling out. I think Wonka would be worth revisiting in about 6-9 months when code gets baked more.

So that left me at a standstill; i started looking at 2 for 1’s with my $7500 budget. Had a few options with some 90’s pins like DH, R&B, WCS, and even MBr was a choice - but again, another fan layout with MBr meant an easy pass for me on that. Then, some friends and Pinside’s started diverting me towards Deadpool. And they told me to get the premium, not the pro (cause i like stern pro’s). It was right in budget. Problem was, i played the pro numerous times on release and hated it. But 8 months later, the code is at 1.00 and i put it back on the radar. I sought out an LE to play on location and had fun. It didn’t say instant buy when i played it on location, but i watched a couple streams and talked to more Pinside’s and everything they were saying was checking all the boxes for what i was looking for. I pulled the trigger on a Premium and just got it this week. Holy hell is this game that good and more.

Moral of the story; do your research! find out what you want as your next game. You have a pretty brutal lineup, so it kind of makes sense to get something quirky like Wonka; but research for me showed that i really didn’t want a wonka movie themed pin - for myself. So find out what you are really after. And if you haven’t given it a look, check out DP Prem/LE.

hope this helps and isn’t too much rambling haha

Two for sure.

two for sure

Two.

Do what the wife wants initially so she’ll keep her top lip very close to her bottom on future purchases.

2 for sure. Who knows when you'll get your Wonka. You can buy and sell 4 more new release Stern's before JJP ever gets their shit together. Plus LEs aren't really limited from JJp so you'll be able to buy them later once the games get properly engineered causing you less headaches down the road.

Do the 2! Get a used wonka later if you play it and like it.

This guy has it all figured out...

I have never seen excitement for a game die as quick as Wonka. Pick up an LE down the road. Get the other two now.

i hear ya. I didn’t quite want to sound like suggestions DP (but it kind of did), but the point was to research which it sounds like you have and are doing. Problem with Wonka is its half baked, not shipping, and you really don’t want to be first in line to guenea pig the issues. For those reasons alone, i’d hold off on Wonka; at least til they can get the code more fulfilled.

I am less of a fan of MB (much prefer AFM) but that's beside the point. If my choice was between 2 or 1 I'd get two if they were pins that I truly liked. Some of my better pins are Met pro and TWD pro and IM VE which are all in the $5K range.

JJP pins are superior in many ways to Stern pins but they are not worth 2x the price of a Stern pro (IMO). Keep in mind that you can add stuff later like Color DMD but you can start out cheaper to get your foot in the door.

Or at least you'll have the illusion of it until you beat her down on it in 2 player games a few times. :Þ

Can I pick option 3? Wonka Standard and AC/DC Premium?

I would go for 2, and maybe check out Munsters pro since you like brutal games. The Munsters pro is pretty fast and not having a ball save keeps the line moving.

I'd go for the acdc and Wonka se. You'll get over the lack of the wonkavator. Seriously, jjp put a game out in the premium price range, and even with the lack of the elevator it will still be more packed than those others. Mbr is really cool, but in a home it will get stale quicker than the others IMO. Ask yourself if you'd rather have a MBR over a standard Wonka. Everyone is different, but I'd consider Wonka.

AC/DC & MB are both ultra fun bonafide classics. Can’t go wrong with them. Wonka’s horrible canned slot machine audio package would drive me nuts within 5 minutes, but that’s me. In any case, it’s not done/shipped yet. Wouldn’t buy before launch unless you’ve got a Wonka themed house or something.

We’re talking pinball action, right?

Get the 2 pins

how true it is

I'm not a fan of the lower playfield, but the other things that the Premium has make such a drastic difference in AC/DC, it's really really hard to justify the Pro...and the Pro is much more difficult to locate for sale too, there just aren't a ton of them out there...or people are death-gripping them. If you prefer the pro because it's faster BECAUSE it lacks the crossover ramp and drop targets, I can totally get that. For me, I owned a premium for about 6 months, and I still couldn't get to Encore even though it was 'slower' than the pro, so YMMV there.

Wonkavator...psh. That...yeah whatever. It's not worth 2 grand for a 3 ball physical lock mech.

Not if I can help it. She's already screwed me over in enough tournaments that I needed to win. No mercy for her, and I'll continue to PLAY BETTER.

Unless you absolutely love and adore WONKA, I say go for two as well. The chances that the 2 you buy will be come staples in your collection are small. You'll likely end up flipping them and the good news is, the older ones values aren't exactly dynamic these days so you'll likely get your money back out of em whereas a WONKA you'd lose your rear tail feathers getting rid of.

You prefer single color GI to the 3 color?

Well, for one... DE Star Wars is just a dark game to start with. It NEEDS really really bright white GI to be well lit. I had more of a problem with the flashers on AC/DC Premium blinding me than the color GI being too dark.

We can agree on that. I hate everything about Lightsaber Duel! I hate that it kills my modes, I hate that it doesn't end when you drain, and I hate the GI choice they made for it. =\

id rather have a bottle in front of me ….than a frontal lobotomy

There 2 fantastic games, I would choose the 2 over the 1, AC/DC an MB are proven hits, see what happens with Wonka an get one down the track.

I guess it depends on your preferences. I can not personally stand AC/DC pro (unpopular opinion, I'm sure). To me it feels cheap and clunky, I don't like the theme (AC/DC are basically the only CD that every bad strip club DJ has), the shots don't feel particularly interesting, etc. MB is amazing of course, so that is a little tougher.

All of that said, I would rather have one game I really loved than two "safe choices." Most of us still have not had a chance to actually flip Wonka yet. I know I wouldn't trade my TZ for 2-3 games I didn't like as much...

Id rather have a bottle in front of me , than a frontal lobotomy !!