Episode 690: "The Wrong Side of $10,000"

Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)·podcast_episode·29m 27s·analyzed·Jun 29, 2022

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

Kaneda critiques inflated pinball pricing and recommends Jurassic Park Premium Edition as the best $10K value.

Summary

Kaneda discusses the escalating prices of pinball machines, analyzing what's available at the $8-10K price point on Pinside and reflecting on how prices have doubled compared to 5-7 years ago. He critiques the greed of manufacturers and collectors who flip machines at inflated prices, argues that new games must deliver exceptional gameplay to justify premium pricing, and ultimately recommends Jurassic Park Premium Edition as his choice for a $10K budget.

Key Claims

James Cameron's Avatar (Limited Edition) and Collector's Edition machines are now trading for $12,000-$15,000
high confidence · Kaneda, opening segment discussing secondary market prices on Pinside marketplace
Stern Limited Edition machines that sold for $9,000 (Stranger Things, Ghostbusters, Godzilla) are now being sold for $15,000-$18,000
high confidence · Kaneda, marketplace pricing analysis
5-7 years ago, the best new-in-box games were around $6,500, Limited Edition around $7,000-$7,500
high confidence · Kaneda, historical pricing comparison
Guns N' Roses Collector's Edition originally sold for around $20,000 new, now available for $15,000 in good condition
high confidence · Kaneda, secondary market example
There is no gameplay or feature difference between Limited Edition, Premium Edition, and Collector's Edition machines at Jersey Jack Pinball
high confidence · Kaneda, product differentiation criticism
Toy Story 4 is a prime example of manufactured greed with minimal content and excessive pricing
high confidence · Kaneda, critical opinion on pricing strategy
New pinball players lack historical pricing context and accept inflated prices as their benchmark
medium confidence · Kaneda, speculation on market dynamics
Stern is watching secondary market flips and using them as justification to increase new game prices
medium confidence · Kaneda, opinion on manufacturer strategy

Notable Quotes

“It was such a nice time to be into pinball. You know, I think a lot of us look at that period like the halcyon days of old in which pinball was a hobby, in which everything, almost everything, like 98% of the games could be purchased between the prices of $2,500 and about like $8,000 to $9,000.”
Kaneda @ ~8 minutes — Establishes the nostalgic baseline for historical pricing that frames the entire episode's critique
“The problem is they took everything... The only way moving forward at these prices we're going to be able to justify buying them is if the games are amazing. It's if the games are loaded.”
Kaneda @ ~22 minutes — Central thesis: manufacturers must now deliver exceptional gameplay quality to justify premium pricing
“There is no greater example of pinball greed than seeing how little is in there in Toy Story 4 and how much money they want for it. Like that's greed. And look in there in the world of business greed is good, right? This is the Gordon Gekko era of pinball.”
Kaneda @ ~15 minutes — Captures the frustration with perceived value disconnect and industry-wide greed narrative
“Everyone's gotten greedy. The consumers have become really greedy. The companies have become so greedy.”
Kaneda @ ~14 minutes — Directly attributes price inflation to both consumer flipping behavior and manufacturer pricing strategy
“If they made Star Trek The Next Generation today, if Jersey Jack Pinball made it with modern code, it would be like a $25,000 pin. Like that thing has everything in there in it.”
Kaneda @ ~32 minutes — Illustrates how legacy games packed with content would command premium prices if released today, supporting content-justification argument
“The winner because once I would hit the start button and that theme song comes on. There is no way I would pick Deadpool over Jurassic Park because I love Jurassic Park as a movie and that music would emotionally pull me in.”
Kaneda @ ~41 minutes — Final recommendation decision, revealing how emotional connection to IP and audio design factored into his $10K choice

Entities

KanedapersonStern PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanySteve RichiepersonKeith Elwinperson Godzillagame Jurassic Parkgame

Signals

$
market_signal: Significant secondary market price inflation documented: Stern LEs that sold for $9,000 now $15,000-$18,000; James Cameron's Avatar (Limited Edition) at $12,000-$15,000; Stranger Things Premium Edition unavailable below $10,000
high · Kaneda's direct marketplace observations and multiple pricing examples throughout opening segment
$
market_signal: Early signs of secondary market correction: Guns N' Roses Collector's Edition dropped from $18,000-$20,000 asking prices to $15,000; abundance of inventory listings suggests saturation
high · Kaneda: 'So many people have pinball machines listed for sale. And almost every single game is available for sale.' Guns N' Roses example as primary market softening indicator
?
product_strategy: Jersey Jack Pinball's unlimited Collector's Edition model eliminates gameplay/feature differentiation between tiers, undermining traditional LE/PE scarcity premium model
high · Kaneda: 'There is no gameplay difference. There is no real feature difference between Limited Edition and Premium Edition between collectors editions and Limited Edition over at Jersey Jack Pinball.'
?
business_signal: Manufacturers appear to be using secondary market flipping as pricing justification; speculation that Stern monitors secondary market premiums and raises new product pricing accordingly
medium · Kaneda: 'You don't think Stern is watching people flip Stranger Things for double the money and saying, aha, let's just keep increasing the prices of our games'
?
community_signal: Community split between legacy players who remember $6,500-$8,000 pricing and new affluent players with no historical benchmark, creating dual-track market acceptance of inflated prices

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.088

0:00

Welcome everybody to Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, the only pinball podcast that doesn't sell you cake toppers. Alright, we're going to talk on this episode about what pinball machine I would buy if I had $10,000, okay? And what I did is I went on the pin side marketplace and I put in the scale between eight and $10,000 just to see what's available. I'm going to read you every game you could get if you had 10 K burning a hole in your pocket. And then I'm going to tell you which game I would select. I'm going to talk a little bit about where I see prices going. And then I want to talk about what's exciting me in pinball right now, which is what's coming down the road from each company because there's a lot that's Cooperative Channel, I wanted to start this show. So if I were to tell you what machine would you get for $10,000, if you're new to the pinball hobby, you might say to yourself, well, Chris, like there's not that much available for $10,000. That's not true. There's a lot available. But the games everybody really wants right now, I mean this, most of them are trading for around or above $10,000. If you go on the marketplace, people are now asking around $10,000 for Stern premiums. Some Sternpros are around there. And now if you want an LE or a CE, it's in the realm of $12,000 to $15,000. And some of the SternLEs that used to sell for $9,000, stuff like Stranger Things. Ghostbusters was $8,000. Godzilla wasn't even that hard to get for what, like $10,500? Now these games are being sold for roughly somewhere between $15,000 and $18,000. Now it's hard to look at these prices and not remember a time in pinball just a few years ago when the running joke in the hobby was this game is going to be $10,000 by Christmas. There was a period, right? It was like six, seven years ago in which the best of the best new in box was around $6,500. Then LEs became around $7,000, $7,500. I remember buying Ghostbusters LE. I think it was like $7,500 gregory afael, drawing a mismaon some выложиться per chain honey i like thee DCNT v. существdasmejoe Glutara ST You can get it for like $7,000. If you wanted to Lord of the Rings LE, you could get that for like $7,500. It was such a nice time to be into pinball. You know, I think a lot of us look at that period like the halcyon days of old in which pinball was a hobby, in which everything, almost everything, like 98% of games could be purchased between the prices of $2,500 and about like $8,000 to $9,000. Brittany The game had no Tron Premium and TronLE had the Daft Punk multiball. Think about that for a minute. They gave you a game in which you had the only version of it. It had features in the game that only your game had and it had a code and a mode in the game that only your game had. And now you look at where we are today and there's absolutely no gameplay difference. There is no real feature difference between LEs and premiums between collectors editions and LEs over at Jersey Jack Pinball. And so what's happened in pinball and everyone is feeling this right now is the prices have continued to go up and up and up but what really makes these games special, what makes them unique, what makes them rare, what makes them ownable and collectable has all really been a bunch of smoke and mirrors. Prounce 약ovic,مكنского. UW, It's easy to get Toy Story collectors Edition It's easy to get Godzilla Ellie It was easy to get rushELLI It was easy to get Yeah! for some of you newbies I wish you could've been back in pinball a few years ago It was super easy to get a Stranger things Ellie It was easy to get Ghostbusters Ellie It was easy to get Jurassic Park Ellie to get Ironmaiden Ellie стать plate spec So many premium machines now that are being offered up for around $10,000. And if I told you five years ago, if we get in a time machine and go into the future, that premium pinball machines from Stern and even some pros are going to cost customers close to $10,000. They're going to make an unlimited amount of these games. You would tell me I'm crazy that the hobby has jumped the shark. audience customer engagementcrew It starting to swing back down It is It can sustain itself at these prices First and foremost there are so many games for sale So many people have pinball machines listed for sale And almost every single game is available for sale Like if you want something you can find it I want to talk about an example of where it just getting softer So I was on the marketplace and I was shocked to see that you can get a Guns N Roses collector Edition now You know this game was like $20,000 new in box if you got it for 12 five you were one of the lucky ones right you couldn't touch this machine for a year for anything south of $18,000 now today you can go get a Guns N' Roses collector's Edition on pin side in great condition for $15,000 now if you ask me I would much rather go buy that pin where there is only 500 for defensive Eviamente films Like Hedgeselect as well. I think about Ghostbusters and all the stuff that was in that game and it was like $8,000 to get all of those goodies. Why would I want to spend now $12,000 on a game that has less in it? And if you think about Ghostbusters and you think about where the market is today, if Stern released Ghostbusters exactly the same way the game is now, yeah maybe it has an LCD and they did some animations, but if you think about everything that's The game with the zombie eddie artwork and all the mechs and all the fun stuff in that game it would be a thirteenpendenten thousand dollar game today and I think what's happening in the hobby now is like the community is divided you have people in the community that remember what these things used to cost they remember the value we used to get they remember how easy it was to get pins enjoy them and pass them on and either make a little money or lose a little bit of money but they didn't have � rimate feudentwick tangibleco ănball branuelas picsoftnays vista palliabou Scheove bioOULD love golden labilitye advertising appartement of Today's Leach youth The game is going to make so many LEs and a thousand CEs is too many. What's going to happen is everyone's going to start to lose a few thousand dollars on every game they buy. And as much as people say they don't mind that, that wasn't the case years ago. You didn't lose that much money. You lost maybe 500 bucks and you might have gained a couple thousand dollars. The other thing about pinball years ago, if you bought a game and it was great and let's say you had a The LordoftheringsLE, arguably a great game and you bought it for like $5500 bucks. When you went to go sell it, you listed it for $7500. You were happy buying a game, enjoying a game and making a couple thousand dollars on it. The problem today, if Lord of the Rings came out and it was like $6500 and you bought it, you would then go list it for sale for like $15000 or $13500. That's the problem with pinball today. is people are doubling the price they paid for the machine. If you have a Stranger Things LE and you got it for $9, you're now listing it for $18. Everyone's gotten greedy. The consumers have become really greedy. The companies have become so greedy. There's no greater example of pinball greed than seeing how little is in Toy Story 4 and how much money they want for it. Like that's greed. And look in the world of business greed is good, right? This is the Gordon Gekko era of pinball. Everyone wants to make a profit. Those companies want the money in their pocket. They don't want the money in your pocket. You don't think Stern's watching people flip Stranger Things for double the money and saying, aha, let's just keep increasing the prices of our games and we'll make all that money. That is what's happening. But I think the mood overall is that there's a at a little bit of the suckers they don't know like they don't remember what it was like these are just new to the hobby probably somewhat successful man who have money to burn who are bored and to them see their benchmark now like their starting point in pinball is today imagine if you get bit by the pinball bug like this year your benchmark for what pinball should cost is twice the The game is available for purchase at the price as the benchmark we remember. So I think that's what's happening pinball. I think you've got a lot of newbies with money and to them they don't know any better. They don't remember when these games only cost $6,000 to $7,000. They came into the hobby and saw all these $15,000 games and $16,000 games and if they want a Ghostbusters LE they've got a drop close to $17,000 on it. When you and I wanted one, we could get one for $7,000. I remember when GhostbustersLE came out and everyone realized how bad the game shot. Like it's still a horrible shooter. It's still beautiful. It's got toys, but it's a horrible shooter. And I remember what happened. Everyone realized that there were all the playfield issues and you could easily for an entire year find a GhostbustersLE for around seven to 7,500 bucks. They were for sale. They were on the marketplace easily. You could find one. Now look, those days are gone. The end of the day is over. But I will say modern day pinball collecting is not as much fun.

13:38

Because it's not as much fun spending twice as much as you should be on these games. And the only reason we're spending twice as much on these games is because all of us went and told our friends how much fun pinball is. How much fun this hobby is. So now twice This is many people want each game and this is what happens. It just naturally inflates the price. But the problem we all are feeling right now and Toy Story is the greatest example of this. I have always wanted a $15,000 pinball machine. I have always said that nobody caters to the wealthy. That someone should make a special pin and just load it up and you would easily sell it. The problem is they took everything I also want to mention that right here on this are the dealers and The only people that are excited by this are the dealers and Distributors who want to sell you these games? Everyone in the community has the same exact feeling about Toy Story. The game is fun. It's not worth it everyone I talked to you you can't find a single pinball enthusiasts that can justify the price when I bought my Lord of the Rings le for $7,000 I could justify that when I bought Ghostbusters for 8,000 I could justify that that was a Ghostbusters le when I bought Batman SLE for 16,000 from coin taker I could justify the cost of that machine but these new machines and these manufactured like tons of The only way moving forward at these prices we're going to be able to justify buying them is if the games are amazing. It's if the games are loaded. And this is what excites me because at this price point you're going to have to make games as good as Godzilla. Games as packed as the The Big Lebowski, you're gonna have to make these games amazing and if they're not and if they come up short, I think you're gonna see this community absolutely say no and that's a good thing. So if you wanna charge me this much, then you better deliver this much and that's gonna be the new sort of rally cry of Kenaidus Pinball Podcast. I'm not gonna jump on board just because you made a theme I like. If the game is empty, if the game doesn't have and those who are watching on youtube, please don't even knock on my door and ask me to spend $12,000 to $15,000 and if you knock on my door and say, but it's fun Chris, let me tell you something, it is not expensive to make a pinball machine have flow. It is not hard to design a game that has combos and shots and orbits and satisfying shots up the ramp, it's not hard at all. and an The Week in Pinball, Johnny Pneumonic, Black Water, Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, Twippies Awards, transliteelectronic Pinball Podcast, Tanyo Kneumonic), Franchi, WPPR bathtime, Crapman, Black Water, Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, Twippies Awards, translite What would I buy for $10,000? Now, let me go down the list right now. And this is not even all of them, but this is my consideration list. If you go on the marketplace for $10,000, you could get the following. And I'm just going to say it right away. Everyone, and I heard from some people that Godzilla premium, no brainer, just go get a Godzilla premium. And I'm not going to pick it because that's the easy choice, right? The easy choice is just to go get Godzilla premium, new in box, and you probably have one of the greatest pinball machines of all time, signed, I'm not going to do that. I'm Kaneda. Kaneda didn't get to the top of the pinball podcasting world by telling you what you expected to hear. Alright, but here are the games available. Godzilla Premium, Monster Bash, Halloween, Ultraman, Stranger Things Pro, Mando Premium, Alien Standard, Whitewater, Simpsons Pinball Party, Family Guy, Rush Premium, Walking DeadPro, TransformersLE, Deadman's Game, and the

19:07

Deadpoolpremium, TMntpremium,jurassicparkpremium,avengerspremium,creaturefromtheblacklagoon,cactuscanyonse,startrekthenewgeneration,bonsairun,beetlesgold,restoredquicksilver,elvisgolds,and Len Mondle, T-GNR LEs a year from now, $7000 all day long. They're just everywhere. Everyone's played it, everyone's had their fun with it, everyone's gonna move on. Tron Pro, can't get an LE, World Cup Soccer, there's a restored one, Led Zeppelin Premium, Lord of the Rings, there is actually a Lord of the Rings and I know what you're saying, you're gonna pick Lord of the Rings, Kaneda. Circus Voltaire, Spiderman Black Edition, Dialed In, and Oktoberfest. How the hell is Oktoberfest on this list for 8-10 grand? That game's not selling. Now I probably missed some Stern premiums that are available on Stern Pros but how do you decide? I give you 10k, what are you going to buy? Do you want a new game? Do you want something new in box? There's a lot of Stern premiums new in box. Do you want an old game? Star Trek The Next Generation. First and foremost, you can get a Star Trek The Next Generation for Closer to $6,000, this one has a bunch of mods in it. Do me a favor everybody, go look at a Star Trek The Next Generation which you could get for $6,000 and then go look at Toy Story Ellie. Go look at how much is packed into that game and the bomb of that game. If they made Star Trek The Next Generation today, if Jersey Jack made it with modern code, it would be like a $25,000 pin. Like that thing has everything in it. And it's so much cooler from an analog physical standpoint what you do in that game than in Toy Story. Am I being too Toy Story negative? Maybe. Cause I love the theme. I'm gonna take some cheap shots. The hard part with this, you know, if you think about buying a game for 10K is there's variables that you have to take into account. One is, am I buying this game as if I only have one pinball machine or do I already own like other machines and this machine is meant to sort of balance out my collection? Let me do it like this I going to say this is the one machine I would buy if I didn have any pinball machines yet If I were new to the hobby and someone said Chris I got what machine should I buy to really fall in love with pinball and I know what all of you are saying Chris it Godzilla premium why would you recommend anything else well the other thing is this if someone came to me and was gonna spend on their first machine it wouldn just be like the game itself I also would realize that anyone who buying their first pinball machine would also The game that will introduce this person to great pinball moments, but a game that when you go to sell it C wszystk Mouse ahead at시 Qi Delete and remember subscribe to this YouTube channel!!! And let's face it people Sterne is gonna make thousands of them so if you buy it today for $9,000, you're gonna lose money on it. Like, it's going south. Like right now, the line has been on pause, but they're gonna make so many Godzilla premiums. They're gonna make so many Stranger Things premiums, which by the way, you can't even get a Stranger Things premium now for less than $10,000. Once Stern opens up the floodgates of its premium production, you're gonna see all of this stuff go down in price. This week in Pinball, Johnny Pneumonic, Black Water, Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, Twippies Awards, transliteelectronic Game like Circus Voltaire and World Cup Soccer than they would on a game like Rush Premium or a game like Avengers. They probably would have a harder time understanding the modern game and also some of these modern games are just more difficult when it comes to shots. Like they are a lot more difficult for a neophyte. But this was Chris, right? This is Kaneda's selection, right? I don't know why I'm acting as if this is like my recommendation to a newbie. So here is the game I would buy if I had $10,000 and I know how to play pinball like I'm a decent player and the game I would pick just because it's a game that I love the theme. I love the mech in it. This is the game I would buy right now if I had $10,000 right and I've already owned a Lord of the Rings. I wouldn't really go for the older stuff just because for a few reasons I think the older stuff can be a little bit too shallow and I also don't want to be working on like older games. They are a little bit more problematic. So the game I would buy. If I had $10,000 sitting in my pocket right now, and it was a toss up between two games for me. There were two of them that I was like, you know what, it's one of these two. And the two games that I was like figuring out which one would I want for 10K, the two games are this. It would be, and it kills me to say this because these two games I could have got in LE format just a few years ago, and now I have to choose between the premium versions of the game, but it is what it is, right? The game that I would buy with $10K would be Deadpool and Jurassic Park. Those are the two games I really want to explore right now. Those are the two games where I hear such good things about them. People who own them rave about them constantly. And yes, I know, probably I should just say Godzilla like he's better than both of them. But I just wanted to be a little bit contrarian. There is a lot of information. So if I had to choose between Deadpool and Jurassicpark, it's a hard choice, right? Because Jurassicpark, to me, has the way better mechs in it. Like there's not really the cool mech in Deadpool, but Deadpool just looks so much better. Like the artwork in Deadpool is so cool. But the winner, because this is it, this is the winner for me. The winner because once I would hit the start button and that theme song comes on, There is no way I would pick Deadpool over Jurassicpark because I love Jurassicpark as a movie and that music would emotionally pull me in. Yes, I wish it didn't have Johnny Craps art package on it. Yes, I wish the playfield looked much better than it does. Yes, it is so frustrating that Stern made a misstep by having Johnny Craps make the game. But that T-Rex, the Raptor cage, it's a Keith Elwin game and it's got longevity. It's got great flow. It's difficult, but it also has fun for the casual player. I would pick Jurassic Park as the one game I would buy if I had $10,000 burning a hole in my pocket. You know what, everybody? This show has gone on longer than I thought it would because I just had a lot of thoughts on pricing. On my next show, I'm going to talk about what's coming up down the line in pinball and what I am really excited about. I'll probably do that show Friday. I'm probably going to do three shows a week right now in Ireland because I'm up when you're sleeping and nobody I work with is up when I'm up. And this is how I love to start my day with an episode of Kenaida's Pinball Podcast and I'm going to make each and every one of you a deal. Okay, so here's the deal and you know me. I love to gamify getting people to join the club. I'm going to let you know what the rumored pin is Steve Richie is working on if we are able to hit 500 in Sub Bright minute add Well done, guys. I hope you enjoyed the hobby without having to spend a gazillion dollars. I mean, this is the greatest bang for the buck in pinball. So, there you have it, 550 club members and I will let you know what Mr. Ritchie is working on over there in Chicago. Everybody, have a great day. I'll talk to you soon. Anything went wrong? Ask to play.