# Episode 987: "Pinball Quality IS a Black & White Issue!"

**Source:** Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2024-08-19  
**Duration:** 24m 47s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://www.patreon.com/posts/episode-987-is-110378240

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## Analysis

Host Kaneda delivers a scathing critique of Stern Pinball's quality control in the context of skyrocketing game prices ($9,600–$16,500+). Using the newly released black & white Godzilla as a case study, he catalogs widespread manufacturing defects (wrinkled/scratched cabinet artwork, mismatched bolt colors, sepia color cast, missing pins) that should have been caught at the factory. He argues that at premium price points, customers should not be responsible for bearing the burden of quality failures, and he speculates that Stern's profit margins ($3,000 per game) could easily absorb a dedicated QC inspector. Kaneda concludes the hobby is unsustainable without price rollbacks and genuine quality improvements, and warns that early adopters bear the highest risk of defective units.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] Stern Pinball games are leaving the factory with wrinkled/scratched cabinet artwork, mismatched bolt colors, missing pins, and sepia color tints that should have been caught by QC — _Kaneda cites multiple customer reports on Pinside and Facebook of Godzilla black & white premiums arriving defective out-of-box_
- [MEDIUM] Dutch Pinball and DPX have dropped Mirko playfields and are now using a new company called 'Bah Humbug' for Back to the Future and Alice in Wonderland — _Kaneda states he spoke to 'Melvin' (likely Melvin Trifecta or equivalent DPX representative) who confirmed happiness with new playfield quality_
- [MEDIUM] Stern could hire a dedicated QC inspector at ~$30,000/year to white-glove inspect every game, which would be easily offset by the $3,000 profit per game — _Kaneda's own calculation and business logic argument_
- [HIGH] Premium/LE pricing ($9,600–$15,000+) creates heightened customer expectations that Stern is systematically failing to meet — _Kaneda's central thesis throughout the episode, comparing unboxing experience to Christmas morning and referencing the 'premium' marketing term_
- [MEDIUM] The sepia/yellowish-brown tint in Godzilla black & white games is caused by CPU lighting in the back box that is not bright white — _Kaneda's technical analysis based on customer observations and his own viewing of Godzilla Minus One_
- [LOW] The pinball hobby will not survive the next five years if manufacturers do not rollback prices and improve quality — _Kaneda's prediction based on current market trends and his personal sentiment shift_
- [HIGH] Early/new-in-box purchasers bear the highest risk and often serve as unpaid QC testers, while waiters can benefit from their defect identification — _Kaneda's consumer strategy advice and commentary on the current market dynamic_

### Notable Quotes

> "There is clearly not somebody at the end of the line... somebody before that game goes into a box has to turn the game on, make sure everything works... Needs to make sure that there's not like wrinkles and scratches on the cabinet artwork."
> — **Kaneda**, ~mid-episode
> _Core critique of Stern's missing QC checkpoint; identifies the exact process failure_

> "If you ship a game out with something like that, that customer should get a brand new game... The defective game should be picked up by the distributor and sent back to Stern Pinball and Stern Pinball should be the company paying for the shipping."
> — **Kaneda**, ~mid-episode
> _Prescriptive stance on manufacturer responsibility; challenges distributor role_

> "Stern probably makes $3,000 per game... If you have quality control issues like this, how many people are going to not buy a future Stern machine because of the quality? A lot more than a $30,000 a year salary."
> — **Kaneda**, ~mid-episode
> _Economic argument for why QC investment would pay for itself; critiques Stern's cost-cutting logic_

> "They're making these games and the bolts are different colors on different consumer games... what this telegraphs to me is sloppy and rushed manufacturing."
> — **Kaneda**, ~mid-episode
> _Identifies bolt color variance as symptom of systemic manufacturing sloppiness_

> "The best quality control person Stern could possibly hire is just a customer that spends his or her hard-earned money. It's going to be you and me who looks over a game with much more scrutiny than Stern ever would."
> — **Kaneda**, ~late-episode
> _Damning observation that customers have become unpaid QC; inverts the value proposition_

> "This hobby is not going to survive the next five years unless someone really thinks about where these things are priced."
> — **Kaneda**, ~closing
> _Existential warning about hobby sustainability; highest-stakes claim of the episode_

> "It's like, how did we get here? How did the entire pinball hobby transform into this super expensive? Everything is so much money and they're acting like it's still three years ago when the COVID world was upon us."
> — **Kaneda**, ~late-episode
> _Contextualizes current market malaise as post-COVID pricing failure; industry-wide critique_

> "I don't think any of these things are worth it anymore... The only value I see in pinball now are the relationships I've made with each and every one of you."
> — **Kaneda**, ~closing
> _Personal sentiment shift from product focus to community value; emotional climax_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Kaneda | person | Host of Kaneda's Pinball Podcast; central speaker; industry critic and opinion leader with significant platform |
| Stern Pinball | company | World's largest pinball manufacturer; primary subject of quality criticism; facing reputation damage over Godzilla defects |
| Godzilla (Black & White) | game | Stern's latest release; central case study for manufacturing defects (wrinkles, scratches, bolt color variance, sepia tint) |
| Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Competitor manufacturer; mentioned as upcoming game source; implied higher quality positioning vs. Stern |
| Dutch Pinball | company | European pinball manufacturer/distributor; confirmed switched from Mirko playfields to 'Bah Humbug' company |
| DPX | company | Distributor/operator; switched from Mirko playfields; mentioned as happy with 'Bah Humbug' quality |
| Mirko | company | Playfield manufacturer; known for quality issues; being phased out by Dutch Pinball and DPX (Back to the Future, Alice in Wonderland) |
| Bah Humbug | company | New playfield manufacturer replacing Mirko for Dutch Pinball/DPX; Kaneda notes ironic name given quality context |
| Back to the Future | game | Jersey Jack title; transitioning from Mirko to Bah Humbug playfields |
| Alice's Adventures in Wonderland | game | Jersey Jack title; transitioning from Mirko to Bah Humbug playfields; Kaneda expresses anticipation |
| X-Men | game | Unannounced/upcoming game; Kaneda expresses anticipation despite quality concerns |
| Guns N' Roses | game | Recently released game; Kaneda cites as personal positive experience with no quality issues; used as contrast to Godzilla problems |
| Batman SLE | game | Previous game owned by Kaneda; he references selling it to fund furniture purchases (~$28,000) |
| Melvin | person | DPX representative (likely Melvin Trifecta or equivalent); confirmed to Kaneda that DPX is happy with new playfield quality |
| Steve Jobs | person | Referenced by Kaneda as source for quote about 'premium' being a marketing word with no inherent meaning |
| Jonathan Adler | person | Furniture designer/brand; Kaneda purchased credenza that developed defect, used as parallel example of customer service |
| Pinside | organization | Pinball forum; cited as source of customer complaints and defect documentation |
| IFPA | organization | Not explicitly mentioned but implied context for competitive/tournament discussion |
| Godzilla Minus One | product | Classic black & white Godzilla film; Kaneda references watching it to contextualize Stern's black & white design choices |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Quality control failures at Stern Pinball, Premium/LE pricing and customer expectations, Godzilla black & white manufacturing defects, Pinball hobby sustainability and market viability
- **Secondary:** Mirko playfield quality and transition to new suppliers, Community sentiment and social media amplification of defects, Distributor and manufacturer responsibility for defective goods, Early adopter vs. waitlist strategy and risk

### Sentiment

**Negative** (-0.85) — Kaneda expresses deep frustration and disappointment with Stern's quality at premium prices. While he retains some optimism about Jersey Jack and other manufacturers, and finds value in community relationships and gameplay depth, the overall tone is one of disillusionment with the hobby's direction. He warns of existential unsustainability and signals potential market correction.

### Signals

- **[product_concern]** Multiple customers reporting wrinkled/scratched cabinet artwork, mismatched bolt colors (black vs. silver), missing pins in coin boxes, and sepia color tinting on newly shipped Godzilla black & white premiums (confidence: high) — Kaneda cites Pinside and Facebook posts documenting defects; describes specific issues like decal wrinkling around bolts, hairline scratches from factory application, T-molding stains, and color variance
- **[sentiment_shift]** Growing community perception that Stern games no longer deliver quality/value for money; shift away from new-in-box purchasing mindset toward waiting/used markets (confidence: high) — Kaneda states 'I feel it on pin side. I can see it on the Facebook comments. I can just feel it everywhere. It's over.' Notes LEs with <200 plays as indicator of collector fatigue, not engagement
- **[market_signal]** Pinball games priced at all-time highs ($9,600–$16,500+) while competitors (cars, fast food, furniture) are rolling back prices post-COVID; market correction likely needed (confidence: medium) — Kaneda: 'Car companies are rolling their prices back. McDonald's is rolling back its prices... and yet pinball is full steam ahead with these ridiculous prices'
- **[product_strategy]** Stern's apparent cost-cutting prioritizes speed-to-market over quality inspection, despite margin structure ($3,000 per game) that could easily absorb dedicated QC inspector salary (~$30k/year) (confidence: medium) — Kaneda's business logic argument: defects cost far more in customer relationships and future sales than QC salary investment would
- **[supply_chain_signal]** Dutch Pinball and DPX officially transitioning from Mirko playfields to new supplier 'Bah Humbug' for Back to the Future and Alice in Wonderland; Mirko quality issues being addressed (confidence: medium) — Kaneda: 'happy to report that Dutch Pinball and DPX have dropped Mirko playfields moving forward... Melvin and they're very happy with the quality of these new playfields'
- **[design_philosophy]** Stern's Godzilla black & white games feature black/white cabinetry but color inserts and lighting, creating aesthetic inconsistency; Kaneda suggests full grayscale treatment would require code adjustments but be worth it at premium price (confidence: medium) — Kaneda: 'I don't even understand the marketing behind these black and white games because then you turn the game on and every insert is in color... it's just so silly'
- **[manufacturing_signal]** Evidence of rapid manufacturing without adequate time for decal settling before bolt installation; scratches suggesting rushed assembly or lack of final inspection (confidence: medium) — Kaneda theorizes bolts applied before decals settle, causing wrinkles; scratches look like contact with metal watch; stains on T-molding suggest no final wipe-down
- **[community_signal]** Community increasingly aware that new-in-box purchases carry highest risk; strategy shifting toward waiting for used market to identify and document defects (confidence: high) — Kaneda: 'The person who rushed and bought new in box Godzilla premiums, that person has the most risk... let somebody else, let the new in box person lose money'
- **[competitive_signal]** Jersey Jack (and by implication, other smaller manufacturers) implicitly positioned as higher-quality alternatives to Stern's mass-production model; Kaneda expresses anticipation for JJP releases (confidence: low) — Kaneda: 'I can't wait to see Jersey Jack's next game' (contrasted with skepticism about Stern going forward)
- **[gameplay_signal]** Kaneda observes lack of mechanical/innovative features in recent games; notes games from 10 years ago had more interesting mechanics at half the price (confidence: medium) — Kaneda: 'you can put up games from 10 years ago and there was a lot more interesting stuff and games were half the price'
- **[collector_signal]** Limited Edition games with <200 plays suggest collector fatigue and lack of authentic engagement; collectors buying to flip/scalp rather than play (confidence: medium) — Kaneda: 'when you see all of these, you know, LEs with less than 200 plays, you know, what does that say? It's like these people bought these things, they never really enjoyed them'

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## Transcript

 It's funny, the group of people that do not use quality in their marketing are the Japanese. You never see them using quality in their marketing. It's only the American companies that do. And yet, if you ask people on the street which products have the best reputation for quality, they will tell you the Japanese products. Now, why is that? How could that be? The answer is because customers don't form their opinions on quality from marketing. They don't form their opinions on quality from who won the Deming Award or who won the Baldrige Award. They form their opinions on quality from their own experience with the products or the services. And so one can spend enormous amounts of money on quality. One can win every quality award there is, and yet if your products don't live up to it, customers will not keep that opinion for long in their minds. I've been to dream and different from all the lies Which is the darling of the rest of our lives You know, one word, quality. And it means so much now in the world of pinball, more than it ever has before. And if you think about it, pinball is the most expensive it's ever been. So once you raise prices to the point we're at now, where the price of entry for a fully featured game is around $10,000, you add a few accessories, you get the LE, you're now somewhere $13,000, $15,000, $16,500 with shipping and taxes. And when you're a customer of modern pinball and you're spending this much money, and everybody, it's a lot of money. I mean, we have the price debate on every single episode, it seems like, these days. and you unbox your pinball machine, right? That moment, because remember, the unboxing moment is that Christmas morning for all of these buyers. For you, for me, doesn't matter if you're a newbie or you've been in this hobby for a really long time. There is that moment when your new in-box game slides out of that box and if there's no damage to the box, you expect that game to not only be flawless when it comes to the decals and the artwork and the T moldings and the coin doors and the coin boxes and all the bolts are the same this and that you also expect the game to work to play all the mechanisms to be functioning you expect the company to have put that game in a box brand new in a pristine mint condition now look things happen when games are sent in boxes and shipped around the country, we all know that these things are three, four hundred pounds. Connectors come loose. There's acceptable things you might have to do out of the box that everybody should be willing to do. But then there are things that are unacceptable. And I think that's where we're at now as I'm looking at this black and white Godzilla from Stern Pinball and some of the issues that these new in box owners are experiencing are things that 100% should have been caught at the factory. And what these issues are telegraphing for a lot of us, and this is not a good week to have this be the thing that people are talking about as Stern is getting ready to launch a new game and expect us to pony up all this money all over again. I think a lot of people are starting to realize a very simple fundamental thing. That Stern Pinball is a ginormous mass-produced product. They do not have the quality of the Japanese. There clearly isn't someone going over each of these games making sure they're made exactly to the standard and the quality that Stern expects of its products. it feels like things are being rushed out the door. It feels like there is nobody that is looking up and down a machine and going around it and making sure there's no blemishes, there's no scratches, it's got all the right pieces and parts, the right color. Everything should be this way before it goes to a customer. And instead, we're seeing the opposite. We're seeing things that should have been caught at the factory and we're seeing those headaches passed on to the customer. And the problem in the modern world, which is good about technology and this is good about Pinside, is you can no longer hide these defects. Like people are going to see them, they're going to share them, and we know that people with game issues will always have the megaphone and speak the loudest. Now the problem now with Stern Pinball is these games are no longer cheap, right? We no longer approach these games with any cheap and cheerful mindset. We look at these games and you call something a premium. You know, what does that mean? Does it mean anything? Remember, premium is a marketing term. You feel like you're getting something better, something that's more expensive, something that is a higher level of quality and a higher level of craftsmanship. And the truth is, you're not. It is, as Steve Jobs would say, just a marketing word. Remember when Mirko put that quality seal on his playfields? Oh, and by the way, happy to report that Dutch Pinball and DPX have dropped Mirko playfields moving forward. So we are no longer going to have Mirko in Back to the Future or in Alice in Wonderland. I think the new company is called like Bah Humbug. Interesting name for a company making playfields. You hope people don't feel that way after they open their games. But I talked to Melvin and they're very happy with the quality of these new playfields as they move away from Mirko. But all of that doesn't matter, right? You don care about a quality seal I don want to even hear the word quality in Stearns Marketing You just want the product to be of great quality That is how you establish your brand as something that people don't have to worry about, right? You're going to unbox it. You wrote a check for $9,600, $9,700 for these Godzillas and you pull it out of a box and it should be perfect, at least for the most part, right? And so let's talk about what's happening right now. There are customer games that have gone out and people have unboxed them and the decals on the cabinet either are wrinkling around where the bolts are, which is most likely because Stern is rushing these games into boxes and not allowing those decals to sort of settle before the bolts are put through. Because think about it the bolts are putting pressure down where that artwork is touching the wood so maybe it's a timing thing but more concerning than that is some of these games are leaving with scratches that happened at the factory and you could see it and it's almost like whoever is on the line over there at stern who's supposed to be looking at these things is almost turning a blind's eye because they don't want to get in trouble because they allow that to happen you know think about it Whenever we see those videos of like two guys with a squeegee putting on the decals and what happens when they throw one on and maybe someone's wristwatch like moves across the decal. I mean, that's what it looks like. Some of those scratches. You ever have a you ever move a metal watch across the surface like it can create that hairline scratch. And so I think somewhere in this process, some scratch is happening and nobody wants to say anything. Right. But there is clearly not somebody at the end of the line. And this is the most important part of the quality control that happens on a pinball machine is somebody before that game goes into a box has to turn the game on, make sure everything works, make sure the black and white is in sepia. We're going to talk about that. Needs to make sure that there's not like wrinkles and scratches on the cabinet artwork. Also needs to make sure this was another thing someone posted on their red T molding on Godzilla. There's like all of this black material that stained the T molding that came from the factory that the guy can't remove. Now, look, that's an easy fix, but it's more about what that telegraphs that nobody went over that machine and saw that before it went into a box. And that's the main point, people. It's not about whether or not this is going to happen to your machine and you are one of the lucky ones. It's more about that Stern doesn't have someone over there that is catching this stuff. And what does that mean for the world's largest pinball company that is selling now $9,700 premiums, $13,000 LEs, that they're not capable internally of catching these things. Now, I hope Stern Pinball is having a meeting this week and saying, what's going on here? Like, whose job is this? Because this should not be hard to figure out. Like, there should be specific roles over at Stern where someone's job is to do nothing else but catch these things. And the moment you pass these headaches on to customers, they really do become much bigger headaches for the entire company. Because think about it like this. You know, Stern probably makes $3,000 per game. All right, think about that, right? And if you have quality control issues like this, how many people are going to not buy a future Stern machine because of the quality? A lot more than a $30,000 a year salary, which is what you could probably pay somebody if their only job was to go over a pinball machine with a white glove. Like that's your job. Every day we make 100 games and your job is to go over it with a white glove and catch any blemish that you see for every blemish you catch and almost reward that person for catching more defects. And here's the thing. We know Stern is all about the bottom line now, so they probably don't. There's probably some acceptable level of quality issues that they're willing to put into boxes and hoping nobody says anything. And that's a sad part too, as we all know, for every person that speaks up, there are going to be people that don't speak up. They don't want to even think about it and they're just going to accept it. I can't tell you how many people in life I know that would accept a quality issue and a defect like we're seeing here. Just to give you a personal story, I told this to people on my chat. I bought a bunch of furniture. When I sold Batman SLE. I put that like $28,000 into furniture for the house. Beautiful bar, beautiful credenza, beautiful desks, all these things. A lot of the furniture I bought was from Jonathan Adler. And we bought this beautiful credenza. It's $5,000. And we love it. It's like a centerpiece in our living room. We love it. It's a work of art. It's gorgeous. It's made of glass. I didn't realize that when I got it. And it's been such a focal point in my living room. And two weeks ago, Brenda noticed that underneath the glass on the upper right drawer, a bubble started to form right on the crease of the artwork that's on the credenza. And it was just an eyesore. So here I have this $5,000 credenza. It's not even two months old. And now there's a visual defect that just became a headache. So every time I looked at it, it was annoying. So I called customer service and they said, hey, you got to call the store where you bought the credenza from. Okay, that was a little annoying. I emailed the store the pictures two weeks ago. And I will say their customer service wasn the greatest at the beginning because on a Monday I made them aware of the problem Now the thing about these issues is when you wake up with an issue whether it on a pinball machine or a credenza every day you staring at it You want a fix and a solution immediately. And I think that's the thing, too. You have to learn to be a little bit patient. You got to give the company some time to come up with a solution. But in the modern world, I will say this. Customer service is terrible in the modern world for the most part. I got an email back that said, hey, we've sent your pictures to the furniture team and we will get back to you with any possible solutions. And just that wording alone made me so annoyed because it's like, what do you mean any possible solutions? I bought something for $5,000. It's defective. The only possible solution is a solution where you fix this. There's no world in which I'm just going to live with this. All right. So fast forward two weeks. I let Brenda handle this because her sweet Irish accent and disposition gets you much further. And we finally heard back. And the company said, Chris, we would like to give you two options. One is you could live with it and keep it the way it is. And we will give you store credit or a partial refund. Or we will replace the entire unit for free. It'll just take a couple of weeks. We have to get you into the order banks and the shipping schedule. But would you like a new one or would you like the credit? and I thought those were two great options and I took the brand new unit. I don't want money back. I wanna look at something with peace of mind. And so when you think about a pinball machine and you mail someone a $10,000 product, twice as much money as my credenza and you unbox it and the cabinet artwork is destroyed, it has wrinkles, it is scratched. What do you do? You cannot expect a customer to have to do all the work that is required. And it is a lot of work to replace artwork on a cabinet, people. Like this is not an easy fix. It's not like a broken trans light where you just slide it out and slide in the new one. You have to do so much work. You have to remove the backbox. You have to normally turn the game on its side. you have to get off the original artwork and make sure it's super smooth and flat. And when you look at how they install it at the factory on its side with two guys that know exactly what they're doing in a dust-free environment, all the stuff you need to do, and you're going to expect a pinball customer who's got this thing in his house, who doesn't have any of the tools required to do this, you're going to expect that person to replace the cabinet artwork on his brand new pinball machine or her pinball machine. And I'm sorry, but I'm just going to say this. If you ship a game out with something like that, that customer should get a brand new game. I'm sorry. The defective game should be picked up by the distributor and sent back to Stern Pinball and Stern Pinball should be the company paying for the shipping and the picking up and the sending back. But here's the thing. They don't want to do that. And I don't think distributors are in a position to pay for those costs because then it just eats into their entire margins. But then it begs the question, what is the point of distributors in the first place if they are not going to help you out when something like this happens? Now, look, it is a huge quagmire. It is a huge headache. And this is why if you just pay that guy $30,000 a year to go over each game with a white glove, you don't have to go down these roads. But the thing is this, we are down that road and there are multiple people with issues on their games. And now the conversation around a stern new in box game is I have to walk around it. I have to make sure there's nothing wrong with it. And if there is something wrong with it, you're going to wake up for weeks with a headache and possibly no solution. And I'm telling you right now, it's not worth it. Like life is too short. We spend this much money on these toys because these things are supposed to alleviate the headaches we have in life and give us a moment of enjoyment and pleasure. It's a toy. And the last thing you want is for your toys to create extra headaches to spend $10,000 on an item and it arrives like this. And it's not just the scratches. Did you see this other thing? They're making these games and the bolts are different colors on different consumer games. Let's talk about that for a minute. If you're making Godzilla black and white, how is it that some people have black bolts in their cabinet and some people have silver? It doesn't make any sense. Again, what this telegraphs to me is sloppy and rushed manufacturing that is happening. How is that even possible? Aren't there just these are the only bolts we're using for Godzilla cabinets. I don't understand how silver bolts even get anywhere near the assembly line for a Godzilla black and white. And again, it's just these little things are creating huge headaches and huge uncertainty when it comes to our perception of Stern's quality. And then the final thing is just the sepia color issue. And I think everyone's got this issue because Stern is using the same CPU in every single game. So it's not a question of like, oh, I got a good one. I just think depending on the lighting and the angle you take the photo, all of your Godzilla black and whites are going to have this sort of sepia, sort of yellowish brown tint to them because they're using lighting in that backbox from the CPU that's not a bright white. And so that's another thing where it's like I kind of forgive them a little bit on that. You know, I don't know how that happened. and it definitely doesn look good When you photograph it it looks terrible At some angles it just looks terrible but my whole issue and i been saying this recently and i just watched godzilla minus one minus color like old school black and white godzilla i don't even understand the marketing behind these black and white games because then you turn the game on and every insert is in color it's just so silly like it doesn't make any sense and i don't know if they're gonna do this but right now or as of right now. I don't think you're going to be able to turn all the clips on the backbox into black and white. I think it's going to stay the way it stays. I don't even like it now. I think a game, when it goes black and white, should go all black and white. Yes, even the inserts, even the lighting. And yes, what that means is, is if you want to make a special edition black and white version of a game, then you might have to go and adjust the code a little bit so you can telegraph what to shoot because you can't rely on color anymore. Yeah, that's a little bit more work. Yeah, do it. Yeah, because I'm spending $10,000 on this special new version of the game. Ladies and gentlemen, I think we all know what the answer is. You gotta wait and see. Now look, think about it. The person who rushed and bought new in box Godzilla premiums, that person has the most risk. If you're someone who waits it out, not only are you going to save money, you're going to be able to avoid any headaches because let somebody else, let the new in box person lose money. Let the new in box person find any defects and have to deal with them. And then you can swoop in when the game's been overlooked because we know that the best quality control person Stern could possibly hire is just a customer that spends his or her hard-earned money. It's going to be you and me who looks over a game with much more scrutiny than Stern ever would. That's not the way it should be, but that's the way it is. When you spend your hard-earned money, you want to make sure that your car doesn't have a scratch or a dent in the door or your pinball machine has all the right color bolts that it's not missing the pin inside the coin box which also that's happening it's just indicative these things are going out too fast nobody's looking them over and yet they will happily take 10 grand on a freaking mass-produced premium that is just being rushed out the door It's leaving so many people with a feeling and I feel it on pin side. I can see it on the Facebook comments. I can just feel it everywhere. It's over. Like these products do not deliver the quality for the money, the experience for the money. They don't deliver the mix for the money. It's like, how did we get here? How did the entire pinball hobby transform into this super expensive? Everything is so much money and they're acting like it's still three years ago when the COVID world was upon us. It's over and everyone else has to roll back prices. Everyone else is rethinking their strategy except pinball companies. Car companies are rolling their prices back. McDonald's is rolling back its prices. Everyone is doing what they can to lure consumers back. and yet pinball is full steam ahead with these ridiculous prices with quality control that's not there and there's like barely anything mechanical or innovative going on in the games like you can put up games from 10 years ago and there was a lot more interesting stuff and games were half the price and look you're not going to hear this everywhere right and i know you tune into canada's pinball podcast and look i'm excited to see what this x-men game is going to be about i'm excited for you guys to see Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, all the stuff. I can't wait to see Jersey Jack's next game. But now it's just become like, I don't even think about new inbox. It's not just about space for me or money, you know, or can I scalp this thing? It's just like, I don't think any of these things are worth it anymore. I don't. And I think the only value I see in pinball now are the relationships I've made with each and every one of you. Like, it's fun to talk about this stuff. It's fun to communicate with each other. That's where the real value is. And it's fun to just enjoy the games you have. I've been putting so much time on Guns N' Roses. I absolutely love it. I've had no issues over the last few weeks playing the game. I'm learning about the game. And when you learn about these games and you dive deeply into them, you don't need like 15, 30 games. Like that's absolutely inane. Like when you see all of these, you know, LEs with less than 200 plays, you know, what does that say? It's like these people bought these things, they never really enjoyed them. They never played them. They never dived deeply into them. It's like weird, right? If you just fully immerse yourself in the few games you have that are great, you're never going to need more new in box. And I think that's where we're at. This hobby is not going to survive the next five years unless someone really thinks about where these things are priced. It's not going to work, especially with quality like this, especially when you pop the hood and there's nothing happening underneath the game and then you want people to shell out ten to fifteen thousand dollars for fully featured games it's not gonna last much longer everybody happy monday everybody we're gonna get there i mean this is where the fun is at for five dollars a month i'm gonna entertain you more than these games could ever entertain you everybody we'll talk soon later This is the coming of the last of our lives. This is our lives on holiday. Thank you.

_(Acquisition: groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: 92389672-81c5-4a27-a49f-4bc1bd8d9e28*