Episode 676: "What I Want In a $15,000 Pin"

Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)·podcast_episode·26m 47s·analyzed·May 9, 2022

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.030

TL;DR

Pinball prices doubled but content halved; Chris demands physical toys, not just screens, for $15K machines.

Summary

Chris (Kaneda) discusses pinball pricing fatigue, arguing that modern $15,000+ machines lack sufficient physical content to justify their cost compared to earlier $7,000-8,000 games. He expresses concerns about Jersey Jack's upcoming Toy Story pricing strategy, criticizes the industry's shift toward screen-based design over mechanical toys, and vents about boutique manufacturers like Haggis Pinball struggling with execution and delays.

Key Claims

Jersey Jack Toy Story will likely be priced at $12,500 for LE and $16,000-16,500 for CE, with ~1,000 CE units planned
medium confidence · Chris (Kaneda) making prediction based on recent JJP pricing patterns and secondary market behavior
Modern high-end pinball machines are delivering less physical content than games from 5-7 years ago (Hobbit, Pirates, Dialed In, Wizard of Oz) despite doubling in price
high confidence · Chris comparing Willy Wonka and Guns N' Roses to earlier JJP titles
LCD screens enabled designers to move content off playfields to screens, reducing manufacturing complexity and mechanical failures
high confidence · Chris explaining industry design shift from dot-matrix era
Jersey Jack machines are significantly more problematic and require frequent maintenance compared to Stern games
medium confidence · Chris observing maintenance burden differences between manufacturers
Haggis Pinball founder Damien has no manufacturing expertise and is struggling with Fathom production; only 250 Mermaid editions were sold
medium confidence · Chris citing conversations with ex-employees who are bound by NDAs
Stern regularly produces multiple versions (Premium) of the same game indefinitely, unlike limited JJP releases
high confidence · Chris comparing production strategies of Stern (Godzilla, Mandalorian) vs JJP
Pat Lawlor is designing Jersey Jack's upcoming game (implied to be Toy Story) and is the designer most capable of delivering physical toys and memorable experiences
medium confidence · Chris expressing confidence in Pat Lawlor's design philosophy despite known difficult personality
Steve Ritchie has been hired by Jersey Jack Pinball and will design a future game, representing his chance to deliver after criticizing Stern's constraints
medium confidence · Chris discussing Ritchie's career transition from Stern to JJP

Notable Quotes

“We're paying more but we're getting less. And unfortunately, pinball has gone into the full collector space right now. It really has. It's all about collectability. It's not even about what's in the game.”
Chris (Kaneda) @ ~mid-episode — Core thesis about market dynamics shifting from gameplay/content to FOMO and rarity
“If it doesn't have that, right, I'm thinking Mandalorian. I mean think about Mandalorian for a second. What in it physically wows anyone who plays the game? The game is a mech. The entire game is a concert in a box.”
Chris (Kaneda) @ ~late episode — Criticism of Jersey Jack's recent design prioritizing spectacle over physical playfield content
“The greatest thing that hurt pinball was the LCD screen. The moment the LCD screen went into pinball machines and we moved away from dot matrix, it gave the designers the ability and the companies the ability to take a lot of the magic off of the playfield and put it onto the screen.”
Chris (Kaneda) @ ~mid-episode — Identifies root cause of design philosophy shift in modern pinball
“For this much money, I just want it all. I want the best art. I want the best shots. I want the best toys. I want the best experience. And anything less, and I mean it, anything less than a magical experience is not going to be worth it.”
Chris (Kaneda) @ ~late-mid episode — Establishes his expectations for $15K machines
“Pat freaking Lawlor. And the man might be a little bit of a jerk, but so are most geniuses. Like Steve Jobs wasn't nice, Kanye West isn't nice to work with, but real geniuses, they don't want to be told by anyone else what to do.”
Chris (Kaneda) @ ~late episode — Defends Pat Lawlor's difficult personality as necessary trait of genius designers
“If Steve Ritchie delivers a game that doesn't blow us away after all of his complaining about Stern, then the truth is going to be this, that Steve Ritchie's done, that he's got no more original ideas that are amazing and he needs to retire.”
Chris (Kaneda) @ ~late episode — High-stakes prediction about Ritchie's JJP opportunity

Entities

Chris (Kaneda)personPat Lawlorperson Steve RitchiepersonDamienpersonJersey Jack PinballcompanyStern PinballcompanyHaggis Pinballcompany

Signals

$
market_signal: High-end pinball machines have doubled in price ($7-8K to $15-16K) over past 5 years while content volume has decreased; CE versions commanding $4K premiums
high · Chris directly comparing historical pricing to current JJP machines and noting secondary market premiums on GNR ($18-20K)
?
collector_signal: Secondary market pricing for limited editions significantly outpacing MSRP; drives manufacturing strategy decisions toward higher CE volumes and pricing
high · Guns N' Roses CE reaching $18-20K secondary market; JJP responding by raising MSRP and planning larger CE runs
?
design_philosophy: Industry-wide trend away from physical playfield toys toward LCD screens and code-based content; driven by reliability concerns and manufacturing cost reduction
high · Chris identifying LCD adoption as root cause; noting Led Zeppelin, Mandalorian as screen-heavy designs vs. Godzilla as toy-heavy
~
sentiment_shift: Growing community frustration with pricing, FOMO-driven collecting, and perceived lack of value justification for premium-priced machines
high · Chris directly stating 'everyone is sort of feeling the fatigue from inflated prices' and criticizing unboxing addiction culture
?
business_signal: Stern on hiatus; creates market gap and stagnation; JJP and boutiques competing for limited collector base with escalating prices and limited editions
high · Chris noting Stern hiatus causing hobby staleness and all machines from same set of games

Transcript

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Welcome to Kaneda's Pinball Podcast everybody. I hope you had a great Mother's Day weekend and we reached our milestone. Our first milestone was to get to 500 club members. I want to thank our recent club members Mr. Andrew, Matt, Jim, Rob, Sam, Bill Brandes missedit, Sam Hall was number 500, Bill you slept on it, you're 501, Mark Grubbs and only Pinball. If I told you a year ago that this Pinball Podcast would be subscription only and we would reach 500 people, you would have said I'm crazy but I knew that the number one Pinball I'm a fan of Pinball Podcasts and I love doing this show so much more now than I did a year ago. So thank you for contributing to my happiness. Hopefully this show makes you happy on a weekly basis. Now speaking of a weekly basis, has anything new really happened over the last week in pinball? And the answer is no. We are all waiting for Toy Story. I want to talk a little bit about what I think the pricing is going to be for Toy Story. We are all waiting for these manufacturers to deliver more games to us. This is what happens when Stern goes on a hiatus. This is what happens without Stern giving us a new game every four months. The hobby gets a bit stale. It gets a bit boring, right? There was a show in Allentown this weekend. I was looking at photos. I'm like, all right, you know, same games, same people, same bad channel, same bad time. It just gets kind of stale. And I think everyone out there is feeling this. And the other thing, and I'm just going to say it right now, I think everyone is sort of feeling the fatigue from the inflated prices in pinball. I don't know about how you're feeling, but just the feeling now that one high-end version of a pinball machine from a manufacturer is now probably going to cost us $15,000 or $16,000 per game. Just a few years ago, you could get the top of the line of every single company's machines for around $7,000 or $8,000. We are going to start the show by talking about that. Let's start the show there. Let's just talk about price and what you expect to be in a pinball machine that costs over $10,000. Let's just say hypothetically Jersey Jack's Toy Story is going to be $15,000 to $16,000. Here's what I think the price is going to be for Jersey Jack's machines moving forward. I think the LEs of Toy Story are going to be $12,500. I think the CE is going to be $16,000 or $16,500. I think they're going to charge $4,000 more for every collector's edition. And I think they're going to make a thousand collector's editions. So now all of a sudden, right, we have a game where they're going to double the volume and increase the price. And they've been seeing what's been going on in the used market and they're not silly. If Guns N' Roses collector's editions can sell opened for $18,000, a new in box game is about $20,000. We're looking at this and saying we want more of that money to go into Jersey Jack Pinball's pockets and not into the secondary market. Now there are a lot of different ways companies could tackle all the flipping and all the scalping, but I don't want to go down that road right now. What I want to talk about is when you take a pinball machine out of a box and let's say it is a $15,000 Toy Story machine, how do you not unbox that game and expect to see more toys in Toy Story than a game It's helping to get used to the diminutive parts of the world that are pessoas. The country has a good погfeh is played inSavecatoracon onTalk. I think you'd be over placed. It's remove because it downside over noticing. Yes, of course let's jump into presentation. Do you hear me from here theivasxующafenieirabook.com In F cource of not peruse, Isahav The last two Jersey Jack games, Willy Wonka and Guns N' Roses, you are seeing half as much in those games as we saw in The Hobbit, as we saw in Pirates, as we saw in Dialed In and WizardOfOz. So we're getting less for our money and that is kind of the definition of inflation. We're paying more but we're getting less. And unfortunately, pinball has gone into the full collector space right now. It really has. It's all about collectability. It's not even about what's in the game. It's just about rarity, FOMO and just supply versus demand. So if you're Jersey Jack Pinball and you know that there are way more than a thousand high-end pinball collectors out there that want Toy Story, you then have a decision to make. Are we going to put everything and the kitchen sink into the game or do we just do enough? Do we just do enough to satiate the pinball fans who will buy 5K If you ovatin strugglesᴺ � Voor seniorieza WPPR hairstyle52021promotionока Schools deals �ütfen3 지금 ja flip시다 Feng at mé b partial at Bitco respiratory Math who culpa is commentator I in front of this mic I wish I could honestly say that each of these companies with each new game they trying to make the greatest pinball experience possible But I don quite believe that I really don I don even think they reaching for that I think you know it hard being a pinball company It hard staying profitable I think the cost of goods have gone up But I do think there a lot of bean counting going on in the pinball space and we seeing it And I think the majority of games that have come out over the last like Fin Roy halo You just can't get enough of it. If you have five machines, you want ten. If you have ten machines, you want twenty. And I think there is just such an endorphin released when you unbox a pinball machine that for so many of you out there, you just want what's next. You want to unbox something new. And I'm here to tell you, like, look, life is about balance and I'm getting to the point in my life, you know, I know I'm looking for a house, I know I've got larger priorities I'm trying to figure out in my life. But I also do know this, that you won't be able to I'm going to be a pinball machine from now on. It has to be a dream theme and it has to be executed well. And unless it is that, I'm not even wasting my time. Now sure, am I still going to flip the occasional machine every now and then? Why not, right? I didn't do it with Rush because there wasn't that much money to be made on Rush. But I flipped Mandalorian and made money. I flipped Godzilla and made some money. But look, it's not that much money. We're not talking like watch flipping money. 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9:20

Need U to keep NEW descriptions? You could sell it tomorrow for $35,000. That's how silly the watch collecting market is. And pinball is very much the same, right? It's like we're seeing these games sell for so much more than MSRP. And I think a lot of us, I don't know, maybe it's just me, it's a Monday, I'm kind of tired, but I do think a lot of us are just getting fatigued by it all. It's not exciting. We're not seeing stuff in these games to justify these prices. And then we're seeing the used market go through the roof. I don't know about you, but every time I see someone list like a premium of a Stern machine for like way over sticker price, I just kind of die a little bit inside because these are not even limited games. Stern will make premium versions of Elvira, of Godzilla, of Mandalorian, of Stranger Things. They're not going to stop making premium versions of these games for years. The thing is this, is just distributors don't really have inventory. But when I see people paying thousands 407 00 ROAD LINE CALL OUT THE FUNDAMENTAL Today, at Midday Bad News, we have articles from odds against Fox News, TVN.com and Bro信's merebutton paper forum calling out Vacuvette's absence as part of the rumors. I think there's a lot of people with a lot of money who are very bored. And I think life can sometimes boil down to just that. You have money, you're bored, you want stuff. You think stuff is going to make you happier. When you unbox new things, it gives you that feeling of Christmas morning as an adult. And because you're an adult and you have money and you have means, you can make every morning Christmas morning for you. You could constantly be ordering new things that you want. I'm not going to judge you on whether or not that's the right way to live life, but I do know this, and all the cliches of life are true, is that experiences are far more valuable than things. It's why when you go to a pinball show, it's so rewarding to hang out with the people and you don't even really care about the machines. I always laugh when people go to a show and complain about the machines this, the machines that. The whole point of being at a show is to hang with your pinball friends. It's not to jump on a machine that you can jump on anywhere. It's the same thing when people travel. Like I always die a little bit inside when people travel to a new culture. Like they'll come to New York and they just want to play pinball machines. It's like why would you go to New York or go to Paris or go to Rome or go to Ireland and seek out pinball? Like don't do that. Play pinball with your friends in pinball bars, but don't just seek out pinball. Don't waste the limited time you have on planet Earth when you go to a new culture or a new city just to sit in front of the same pinball machines you sit in front of all the time. To me, that's not balanced. That's not the way you should be doing it. So look, here's my fear is I think Toy Story is going to be expensive and I'm just worried that it's not going to be packed with enough toys to justify the price. And so then what kind of toys am I looking for in Toy Story? Well, if you watch the Toy Story movies, there are so many amazing toys and there's so many different environments to pull from that they could bring to life in the Toy Story game. I mean, everybody wants the clawmachine. I mean, how do you not have the clawmachine move over and pick up a ball? Like, that needs to be in this game somewhere. The Etch-A-Sketch, I think, is going to be in the game because the Etch-A-Sketch became WonkaVision in Willy Wonka. It would be great to have Buzz Lightyear somehow fly across the machine Buzz Lightyear always wanting to fly and go to infinity and beyond So I would love a Buzz Lightyear toy that maybe picks up the ball You know how he picks up Woody and he grabs the ball and it flies it down the playfield I would love something like that It'd be great to lock balls inside of the piggy bank. It would be great to have Rex the T-Rex sort of like come to life and grab a ball. I mean there's so much you could do with Toy Story. See what I don't want Toy Story to end up becoming is a game without a lot of physical toys and where most of it is happening on the screens and with the code. I've had a lot of pinball fanatics come to me and say, Chris, the greatest thing that hurt pinball was the LCD screen. The moment the LCD screen went into pinball machines and we moved away from dot matrix, it gave the designers the ability and the companies the ability to take a lot of the magic off of the playfield and put it onto the screen. Because there was only so much you could do with the dot matrix screen if you wanted to physically bring to life all of the elements of Lord of the Rings and you wanted to show all of the great stuff from the film, you put it physically onto the playfield in the form of toys, in the form of sculpts, in the forms of characters, in the forms of like unique designs and now a lot of that is being relegated to the screen. That is why we love games like Godzilla where a lot more of it was on the playfield itself. It's the reason why the T-Rex mech was such an exciting thing to see in pinball. And it's also the reason why we still get so sad when we see Star Wars, a tie fighter on a spring next to a screen. Like the fact that Steve Ritchie put a screen on the playfield on Star Wars is reason enough To just shake your head and realize what a horrible creative decision that was. That's all you could do? You could not put anything physical and create a unique Star Wars area there? No, you put a screen. It's lazy. But we all know the reason why. Everybody knows the reason why there are not as many physical toys in these games anymore. It's because they can break down. And you know what doesn't break down? Artwork doesn't break down. The code of a game will never really break down. So these companies have realized we can emphasize and we can invest in things that won't become problematic. The more you put physically in a pinball machine, the more you open the door for problems. That's been the interesting tug-of-war with modern pinball. It's like the companies that jam stuff into their games had a lot more problems. There's no denying it that Jersey Jack pinball machines are very problematic. They require more lifting of the hood. Stern games are pretty bulletproof for the most part. I mean, when you own a Stern game, you rarely have to lift off the glass. You rarely have to look under the hood. There's not a lot to go wrong in the games because there's not a ton in it. And we see it. Whenever Stern gets more ambitious with what they put into their games, guess what happens? There's usually more problems with those games. You know, they would love every game probably to look like Led Zeppelin. If you've got nothing in it and you've got a theme people want and it shoots well, well, what more could you ask for, right? I mean you hear people who talk about Led Zeppelin, the people who own Led Zeppelin, they enjoy it, it's fun to shoot, it has nothing in it, but they still enjoy it because of the gameplay. Now Stern would love it, they would love it if all we wanted from a game was just gameplay. If flow and feel was everything, that's what they would love because then they don't have to spend money engineering magical mechs. Now for these prices for $10,000 to $15,000 here's the thing, we want it all. I mean we want it all. I want good flow, I want amazing toys, I want an amazing theme, I want the game to be a world under glass and to do magical stuff. I want in any pinball experience I buy, I want to be able to pull Brenda and Killian over to the machine and say, The I can't wait to show you this check this out when this happens like that is what a pinball machine should have for

18:33

The game is a mech. The entire game is a concert in a box. But Jersey Jack can't keep doing that, right? Toy Story should not be a light show in a box. Toy Story should be a world of toys coming to life in a box. And that is the lens by which I will look at Toy Story. It is my expectation for Toy Story. And for this much money, I just want it all. I want the best art. I want the best shots. I want the best toys. I want the best experience. And anything less, and I mean it, anything less than a magical experience is not going to be worth it. I will easily pass up these super expensive toys that none of us really need. And that's the part I think we all sort of land there. We love pinball. We want pinball to be amazing. With every new launch of every new game, there's a new set of expectations. There's like hope. We're all hoping that Pat Lawler is going to go out with a bang. I'm going to say this, Pat Lawler is the guy that is capable of giving us great shots, Great toys great experiences great moments in pinball machines It Pat freaking Lawler And I know that he a curmudgeon I know he hard to work with I know that my episode 500 like crucifies the man in a way but it still Pat Lawler And the man might be a little bit of a jerk, but so are most geniuses. Like Steve Jobs wasn't nice, Kanye West isn't nice to work with, but real geniuses, they don't want to be told by anyone else what to do. I'm excited because at the end of the day, this game will have Pat Lawler's stamp of approval on it. I don't like it when Steve Ritchie gets up there and complains about Stern, but now Steve Ritchie has to deliver. That's what's exciting about Steve Ritchie's next game with Jersey Jack Pinball because there's no more excuses. If you're the king, Steve, and you know what to do to make a game amazing and you keep complaining that Stern didn't give you enough to make your games amazing, Well now you have your shot and he better deliver because if Steve Ritchie delivers a game that doesn't blow us away after all of his complaining about Stern, then the truth is going to be this, that Steve Ritchie's done, that he's got no more original ideas that are amazing and he needs to retire. I mean this is his chance at the plate to knock it out of the park. But man there's just no getting around it if I want to buy two Jersey Jack Pinball collector's edition machines, not just this but maybe it's Toy Story and Matrix or Toy Story and Godfather. I can't escape the fact that two pinball machines will now cost me $30,000 for two machines. Stern LEs used to be like 6,500 bucks. You used to be able to get four machines, five machines for the price of just two now. It's getting out of control. But it is what it is. Now, speaking of getting out of control, before I end this episode, and again, everybody, thank you so much for your support. I want to say this about Haggis because I put up a post on Facebook yesterday in which I said that I had spoken to some ex-employees over at Haggis Pinball and I did. And they told me stories. They told me stories about how stubborn Damien is. They told me stories about how there was so much fighting going on behind the scenes over at Haggis Pinball. They told me stories about why they quit and how they signed NDAs and they can't really talk publicly about it. And they told me what a joke the stage video was that Haggis put up recently I'm here to tell you this right now. I'm kind of sick of talking about Fathom. If these ex-employees want to tell you their story, they can. They can come on the show anytime or they could publicly go out there and tell you what an SHIT show they think it is over at Haggis Pinball. For some reason, this happens time and time again. Ultimately, I don't see anything but red flags with Haggis Pinball, but I'm tired of talking about them. They only sold 250 Mermaid editions. I say only because Stern Pinball is a great company. They have a lot of I'm tired of these men who have no idea how to manufacture a complex product like this and they might have been successful in some other career and then they wake up one day and think they want to become a pinball manufacturer. I think it's one of the most inane things you could do with your life is wake up one day and say, honey, let's take all the money we made doing something else. I think Damian made his money in IT and other things he's doing. Let's take all of the money we've made. We've got our kids in private schools and we have a great life. I've got a nice car. I've got a nice life. I've got nice cash flow. Let's take everything we've done and put it in jeopardy by opening a pinball manufacturing company where the margins are razor thin, where the community is brutal, where there's a blowhard podcaster in New York City that's going to call me out every time I miss a deadline for a year. I'm going to talk about everything we have. Let's take our great life and put it in jeopardy to make a pinball machine because being pinball famous is a dream of mine. I don't understand why anyone would do it, why you would wake up and want to do it, and I don't think it's worth it. But ultimately what's going to happen is this. Damien is either going to grind it out and get people their games or he's not. I see nothing but red flags but I'm just tired of talking about them. I don't think people who paid in full eight weeks ago are going to be unboxing their games and Subtitles by the Amara.org community I think he's got a skeleton crew of like five people putting these machines together. I think Marty Robbins knows better than what he did with that stage video. He knows exactly what's going on. They all do and I think it's gonna be a slow slow burn. And I think in two weeks, we're gonna get Toy Story and we're gonna be talking about Toy Story. We're gonna be analyzing Toy Story and no one's gonna care about the slow release of Fathom anymore. The same way we don't care about the slow release of Big Lebowski anymore or the slow release of like Highway Pinball's Alien which is now Pinball Brothers Alien. This is going to be another one of those games that slowly trickles out and no one's really going to care because pretty soon we're going to get Stern's new game, we got Jersey Jack's new game. I want to focus on the companies that have positive momentum. These boutique companies in my mind are all struggling, they're all flailing, they have no idea what they're doing. Thank you for watching. If you enjoyed this video, please subscribe to my YouTube channel and hit the bell icon to get notified when I post a new video. I love doing this podcast a few times a week for you. Tell me in the comments section on Patreon if you agree. I love discussing these topics with all of you. Thank you to Bond by the way. Bond is one of the club members who is very outspoken. Don't ever change brother. I love hearing from you. I love that you push back on stuff I say. Don't worry about agreeing with Kaneda. I have a wife that never agrees with me. So it's only natural that most of you will also take her point of view. Everybody have a great day. We'll talk to you soon. ©T46J Neo4j Twitter.com