Episode 1210: "Has Stern LE FOMO Reached an End?"

Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)·podcast_episode·22m 37s·analyzed·Apr 13, 2026

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

Stern LE FOMO is dead; Pokemon price crash signals end of collector speculation era.

Summary

Kaneda analyzes whether Stern's Limited Edition FOMO has ended, examining Pokemon LE's dramatic price collapse from $25,000+ initial deposits to $14,500-$16,000 current market prices. He argues Stern LEs consistently lose value due to oversaturation (15,000-20,000 units annually), inferior materials compared to competitors, and lack of meaningful differentiation from Premium editions, contrasting this with boutique manufacturers' stronger value retention.

Key Claims

Pokemon LE initial deposits reached $25,000-$27,000 (Charizard Edition), now trading at $14,500-$16,000 on April 13th
high confidence · Host Kaneda, observing current market data; specific pricing observed on Pinside marketplace with ~20 Pokemon LEs available
Every Stern LE released at $13,000 (Jaws, James Bond, Walking Dead, Star Wars, John Wick, X-Men, Foo Fighters) has lost substantial value
high confidence · Host Kaneda, synthesizing secondary market pricing patterns across multiple Stern LE releases
Stern manufactures 15,000-20,000 games annually, far exceeding competitors (Spooky ~1,000/year, Jersey Jack ~3,000/year), causing oversaturation
medium confidence · Host Kaneda's industry analysis; estimated production figures based on observable market data
Pokemon LE only has 750 units produced, less than Jaws LE and prior Stern LEs
high confidence · Host Kaneda, citing officially published production limit for Pokemon LE
Evil Dead currently holds value at ~$18,000; Winchester Mystery House trades at $18,000+; Beetlejuice declining from $18,000 to $13,000-$14,000 over spots
medium confidence · Host Kaneda, observing secondary market pricing for competing manufacturer games
Sonic the Hedgehog (Jersey Jack) will ship code-complete with four flippers and significantly more gameplay depth than Pokemon
medium confidence · Host Kaneda, referencing Jersey Jack's design philosophy and upcoming Sonic release; predicts it will outclass Pokemon gameplay
Stern LE proposition no longer justifies $3,500 price premium over Premium edition without substantial mechanical/code differentiation
high confidence · Host Kaneda's analysis; compares historical LE pricing ($1,500 premium in 'golden age' with 500 units) to current $13,000 LE vs ~$9,700 Premium gap
Pokemon LE lacks meaningful exclusive features beyond art; Stern needs exclusive modes, toppers, and reduced production (500 units max) to restore LE value

Notable Quotes

“Every single Stern LE that has come out that was $13,000, every single one has lost a ton of money.”
Kaneda @ ~11:30 — Core thesis statement about Stern LE value depreciation pattern
“Stern Pinball LE proposition just is not worth it...They need to do something more something further to really bake in the value of these LE machines.”
Kaneda @ ~13:00 — Direct critique of Stern's LE strategy and call for remedial action
“I think Stern has done so many great themes over the years, but all these other companies are gathering up some of those other bangers that would have been made by Stern Pinball.”
Kaneda @ ~27:00 — Identifies competitive pressure from boutique manufacturers acquiring major IP licenses
“The one thing that really could slow down the hype on Beetlejuice, and you know what it is, it starts with a G, gameplay.”
Kaneda @ ~34:45 — Emphasizes gameplay as primary value driver over theme and art
“I think what we should demand for this much money is a little bit of both...You can make a game with a lot in it that also shoots tremendously well.”
Kaneda @ ~40:00 — Articulates new standard for premium-priced machines: both mechanical depth and shot quality
“The moment to sell and scalp a game is before a single one is even made. The moment more make it out into the world, especially with Sterns, and the more you give people a chance to think about it, they're going to change their mind or they're going to wait.”
Kaneda @ ~24:00 — Explains market mechanics of LE speculation and timing of peak FOMO
“It's anybody's guess where this market is going to go...Buy the games you love. Enjoy them. Don't worry what ranking they are on Pinside's top 100.”
Kaneda @ ~47:30 — Shifts tone toward consumer well-being over investment speculation
“If they don't put in a Jigglypuff singing moment in this game, what are we even doing here?”

Entities

KanedapersonStern PinballcompanyPokemongame Jersey Jack Pinballcompany Sonic the HedgehoggameSpooky PinballcompanyBeetlejuice

Signals

?
collector_signal: Pokemon LE deposits dropped from $25,000-$27,000 peak to $14,500-$16,000 current (~$3,000 over MSRP) in ~4 months; 20+ units available on Pinside suggests continued downward pressure toward $13,000 MSRP
high · Kaneda observes Pinside marketplace inventory and pricing data; notes people selling at $3,000 over vs initial $12,000+ premiums
$
market_signal: Stern LE FOMO peak occurs only at announcement/pre-production; once units enter market, speculation collapses within weeks as consumers can acquire at lower premiums or near-MSRP
high · Kaneda's analysis of Pokemon timeline and historical pattern across Jaws, James Bond, Walking Dead, Star Wars, John Wick LEs
$
market_signal: Boutique manufacturers (JJP, Spooky) maintain secondary market premiums ($18,000+ for Evil Dead, Winchester); Stern LEs consistently depreciate below MSRP within 6-12 months despite lower production volumes (750 units)
high · Comparative pricing data: Evil Dead/Winchester $18,000+, Beetlejuice declining from $18,000 to $13,000-$14,000, vs Pokemon $14,500-$16,000, Jaws $11,000
?
industry_signal: Boutique manufacturers acquiring major IP licenses (Back to the Future, Goonies) that Stern historically dominated; shifts competitive advantage toward JJP, Spooky, CGC on collector appeal
medium · Kaneda notes Stern has missed major themes and boutique companies are 'gathering up some of those other bangers that would have been made by Stern'
?
manufacturing_signal: Stern manufactures 15,000-20,000 games/year vs Spooky/Barrels of Fun ~1,000/year, Jersey Jack ~3,000/year; oversaturation reduces collectibility and secondary market value retention

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.068

0:00

The truth is never far behind, you kept it hidden well, if I live to tell the secret, I knew that we'll lie, if I had the chance again.

0:22

Welcome everybody to Canada's Pinball Podcast. Happy Monday. I hope everybody had a great weekend. And the Masters was exciting. Rory held on for his back-to-back championship green jacket. I'm looking at the pinball world right now, and I woke up with a question. A very simple question that I want to explore on this episode of Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, and it's simply this. Is FOMO over for Stern LE Machines? Let's stay focused on this one topic for a little bit. Because I'm looking at Pokemon right now and man, what a sort of spectrum of prices we've seen on this game. When the game was first revealed to the world, we saw some people spending upwards of $25,000 to get a spot. I think the highest recorded spot ever might have been the Charizard Edition, which I think some dude spent $27,000 on for something that's not even plaqued as the Charizard Edition. He's just got number six. And now we are at April 13th and I have people looking to get $3,000 over for a Pokemon LE. There are still buyers at that price. So that's around $16,000. But then I've got people over in a corner telling me that they can get the game for $14,500 right now shipped to their door. And I went on Pinside and I saw about 20 games available for sale. So there are a lot of Pokemons out there and you know a lot of these LEs they're not gonna make their way into people's homes. I think a lot of these guys are gonna scalp the machine as I've been saying about this game. It's a very very basic simple fun game and I've been saying that's gonna be a little bit of an issue for diehard pinheads that want more from a machine. If you don't like this theme and you don't have kids or you don't have someone in your household that wants a simpler, easier to understand game, I don't think this game is going to find a place in your lineup. And if you want something that's colorful, if you want something that breaks up the monotony of the games you have, and this is like the first Japanese kind of animated property in Pinball. It's adorable. It's cute. It's colorful. It's Pokemon. It's Pikachu. But here's the thing. If you're a real pinhead who really wants gameplay above all else, yes, this game plays fun. But, you know, in just a few months, Steve Ritchie's Sonic the Hedgehog is going to give you all of the colorfulness, all of the cuteness, all of the fun of a Pokemon like theme. But it's going to be in a game that's going to be much, much, much more what you want from a gameplay standpoint. It'll most likely have four flippers. It's going to have a lot more shots. It's going to be even faster. And it's just going to have a lot more going on. And we know that Jersey Jack ships their games pretty much code complete. So you're not going to have to wait when you see Sonic the Hedgehog to have a lot more pinball out of the box. And, you know, I think it's a great time for Pinball in general that we're going to have Pokemon and Sonic the Hedgehog. Both games are humongously fun properties for Pinball and both of them are going to be available and shipping to customers this year. That's great. So when I look at this game though and we zoom out a little bit, the whole concept of can a Stern LE at $13,000, can it hold value? Can anything at that price hold value and hold strong for at least a year? And when I'm looking at what's happening to Pokemon and I see what happened to Jaws LE and I saw what happened to James Bond LE and The Walking Dead LE and Star Wars LE and John Wick LE and X-Men LE. You just keep naming games Foo Fighters LE. It's like every single Stern LE that has come out that was $13,000, every single one has lost a ton of money. Jaws is holding around 11. We've got Pokemon, which is still way too early to tell, but based on the number of available Pokemon LEs right now, and there are 750 being made, which is less than they made of Jaws LE and all those other LEs, you start to see the writing on the wall. That Stern Pinball LE proposition just is not worth it And I been saying this for years They need to do something more something further to really bake in the value of these LE machines Remember, LEs used to be like $1,500 more than the premium. And the golden age is when there were 500 LEs and they were $7,500.

6:07

And the premium was somewhere closer to $6,000 or $6,200. Now that an LE is $13,000 without a topper and it's all the same exact game, it's really hard to justify what is ostensibly $3,500 more and it just doesn't feel like you're getting $3,500 more than the premium edition of the game. Now, luckily for Pokemon, unlike some of the other titles out there, luckily Pokemon LE looks way better than the premium. But even then, I don't think art is enough. And I still think Stern needs to go back and make only 500 LEs on everything. But they also need to add more. A few more exclusive modes. I think an exclusive topper. And they just need to think about it because otherwise, really what's going to be happening and has already happened is all these collectors are holding the bag. They're all losing so much money. And if you go on to the pin side marketplace, there's so much available. Now, is this just a Stern problem? Let's look at it through that angle that maybe, just maybe, people don't see a Stern machine being worth $13,000 for a few reasons. First and foremost, the quality of the product itself. It might shoot fine, but the actual bill of materials in the game, when you see a Stern machine next to a Beetlejuice or a Harry Potter, does it look like it's worth $13,000? Remember, that's $3,000 more than a Beetlejuice. It's more money than a Winchester. It's more than a Dune. It's more than an Evil Dead. It's more than a Harry Potter Wizard Edition when you look at a Stern LE. So I think just the materials alone don't really make you feel like you see $13,000. Okay, from there, the other issue is this. They just make so many games, which is not bad if you're a buyer of a secondhand version of any of these games. But Stern's going to put thousands of every single IP they make out into the world in a single year. Everyone else has sort of like a collectible advantage because of how much slower they make games. So by nature, everyone else's games have more scarcity. So when you look at a company like Spooky, only a thousand a year. Same with Barrels of Fun. Same thing maybe with American Pinball. Same thing with maybe like CGC maybe has a little bit more. Jersey Jack is second to Stern in terms of manufacturing. Maybe they put out like 3,000 games a year, but nobody is dropping like 15,000 to 20,000 games out into the world every single year, which by nature oversaturates the amount of that game that is out in the world. So again, not really a good recipe for holding value or collectability. So I'm here to tell you right now, as I think about Transformers around the corner, are we going to see the same sort of running at an LE and are we going to continue to see consumers spend over sticker to get one of these Stern LEs? I don't think so. I don't think it's going to happen on Transformers. My hunch is that Transformers will look very similar between the LE and the premium versions of the game. I think Fallout might be a little bit different because it's Keith Elwin and we're going to have the Fallout Boy version of the LE cabinet, which could be really cool. But again, if they make a thousand or 750 Fallouts, I don't think they hold. I think Stern needs to go down even more to 500 only. But even then, as I say it, I just think maybe, just maybe the ship has sailed on anybody looking at this stuff anymore with any desirability or envy or collectability anymore. I just don't think people care anymore. I think when you say I got a Stern LE, it doesn't carry the same sort of significance that it used to. And look, for a lot of people out there, that's okay, right? Just buy what you enjoy. If you buy a Pokemon LE and you're going to keep it like I'm going to keep it for a while, then you're not going to lose any money on it because you don't care about the resale value. That is obviously a much more healthy and happy point of view to have. But if you're like me also, you like to look at the pinball market. Think about it like this For the dude out there that spent I guarantee you he super loaded He doesn care But for some of the other people out there that got bit by the Pokemon FOMO and they went in and they spent three to four thousand or five thousand over Imagine spending five thousand over and then a week later you can go get one for two thousand over You know, you're going to be kicking yourself just a little bit. And based upon the amount that are out there still for sale, I think it's going to continue to slide down closer to 13 now. When I was like, oh man, it's going to go to 20. It sure felt like that for a little bit, didn't it? But again, I'm learning just as much as all of you are learning. I think the Stern hype and FOMO window in that small little period at the beginning of a new game launch, it's definitely at its highest. The moment to sell and scalp a game is before a single one is even made. The moment more make it out into the world, especially with Sterns, and the more you give people a chance to think about it, They're going to change their mind or they're going to wait. So if you want to scalp, scalp right away. What's weird to me is all the people scalping now. Like what were you waiting for? Was it greed? Were they waiting to see if the market would go up higher and higher? And they're now left holding a much smaller bag of money than if they sold right away. So I think because Sonic is around the corner, I think because we know Back to the Future is coming, we know Goonies is coming, we know that these boutique games are holding value much higher than Stern LE's. I do think for the most part that Stern, Ellie, FOMO is basically dead unless and this is the big unless unless they make a banger theme that is a game you're going to want to keep forever. And I'm not sure they have that theme coming anytime soon. I don't think it's Transformers. I don't think it's Fallout. I don't think it's Dracula. I don't think it's Mountain Dew. I don't think it's a remastering of ACDC. I don't. Where's like another Batman? Where's another Ghostbusters? They missed out on Back to the Future. Where's another major, major, major theme like Matrix or Die Hard? Where are these themes? You know, I don't know. I think Stern has done so many great themes over the years, but all these other companies are gathering up some of those other bangers That would have been made by Stern Pinball. So then the other question I want to ask is, is there anything out there that really is a good investment in pinball? And I always get annoyed when people are like, it's not an investment. Come on, guys. Everything you buy, everything you buy that you might want to think about selling in the future, you have to think about it with a little bit of an investment mindset. And so, yeah, like Evil Dead has worked out great for people. They're still going for around $18,000. You can't swing a dead cat and get a Winchester's Mystery House unless you're willing to spend $18,000 or more on this game. And the more we see so many people unboxing these Sterns, the more desirable a game like Winchester becomes. Betelgeuse is going through a little bit of a rough period right now. I'm looking at the Betelgeuse prices at the height. We were talking $18,000 all day long for Betel. But now look at Pinside's marketplace. We're starting to see Betel spots trade for three to four thousand over. And remember, over is $10,000. That's not a lot of money. And the one thing that could be hurting Beetlejuice right now as they make more of them, it's not the theme. It's not the theme integration. It's not the artwork. The one thing that really could slow down the hype on Beetlejuice, and you know what it is, it starts with a G, gameplay. Gameplay is so damn important. Now, the verdict on Beetlejuice gameplay has been somewhat polarizing. There are people that don't like the three scoops. They think the game is a little too stop and go without enough flow. And again, when you jump on a game like Harry Potter and a game like Pokemon, you are going to get nothing but nonstop flow and the gameplay is very satisfying. This is what gives me hope for Pokemon though. If the code gets amazingly good, even though there's not a ton in it, the gameplay is very rewarding. The gameplay on Harry Potter is phenomenal. The gameplay on Evil Dead, I would argue, people are saying is better than Beetlejuice. The gameplay on Winchester, we shall see. I keep hearing from people being like, it's tight, it's hard, but once you learn the shots, it's amazing. It's not going to be instantly satisfying the way Potter and Pokemon are if you jump on a Winchester. And we all know this. We saw this with Guns N' Roses. It's like if the gameplay isn't there, you will eventually tire of any game. It's the opposite if the theme isn't something you like, but the gameplay is amazing. Those games do well over time. And Elton John and Iron Maiden are two examples of that I know a lot of people Foo Fighters too a lot of people that just don love these musical acts just enjoy the way those games shoot Now, all three of those games have also gone down in value, but you know what I mean. You know what I mean. Ultimately, this is a toy where gameplay matters so much. And you know how I feel. I don't understand how you get gameplay wrong. I don't. I don't understand it. It's like so obvious how to make a game fun to shoot and yet still in 2026 we still get so many games released that are still a little clunky still don't have that much in it. Now look it's the age-old debate would you rather have great gameplay and flow versus a lot of mechanical toys and magic in the game. And you know, after all these years I've been covering this hobby, my new point of view is this. I think what we should demand for this much money is a little bit of both. Every game out there should have both. And I don't even mean like a little bit. Like you can make a game with a lot in it that also shoots tremendously well. Hello, Godzilla. Hello, Tales of the Arabian Nights. It is possible. Hello, X-Men. I still think X-Men, even though the code's not good, that is another example of a game when it's dialed in, it shoots so well and it has so much fun stuff in it. You know, it is possible. Hello, Elvira. Like, you can do it. Hello, Jurassic Park. It is possible. Evil Dead. It is possible. And I think that's going to be the new bar in pinball is that people are going to want both. And ultimately, ultimately, you know, when you kind of get past the hype windows of the new game that just came out, ultimately, the advice I've been giving each and every one of you is to wait and see. And that continues over the years. That continues to remain the best approach, the best way to approach all of this for each and every one of you. And in the end, it really is the ultimate buyer's market. There is so much good Pinball out there. It's almost scary when you go on the Pinside Marketplace and look at the sheer amount of games you can get. Life is very short. We all know this. Buy the games you love. Enjoy them. Don't worry what ranking they are on Pinside's top 100. Pokemon just entered the top 100 at number 281. All right, sure. Okay. It's not that bad, is it? Now, there's not a lot of code. I will admit it needs a lot of code. If they don't put in a Jigglypuff singing moment in this game, what are we even doing here? I think the code updates are going to be really, really long waits because of the approval. But the next major thing we're going to get for Pokemon that is going to be exciting and make you spend even more money is the Pokemon Topper. I can't wait to put that fish on top of the game. Everybody, look, it's going to be an amazing year for Pinball. Make sure that you get me your Beetlejuice entry. If you know the details, canadapinball at gmail.com. You got another like two weeks to get your entry in and then we're going to give someone a chance to buy Beetlejuice at MSRP. Who knows? By the time we do this drawing, these games might be going for MSRP. You know, it's just really fun to watch. It's anybody's guess where this market is going to go. I will say this. I'm very humbled today because today Brenda loses her job and her whole company is winding down. And these are hundreds of people that have families, that have mortgages, that have payments. And it's not just her being impacted. That's the word. You don't get laid off anymore. You get impacted. And I just want to say, when you go through these moments in life where there are some curveballs and it's going to get a little bit more difficult in this household, it's almost crazy that I'm here talking to you about $15,000 pinball machines. We are all very blessed that we even have the opportunity financially, not even like physically or mentally, just financially to even consider buying one of these games. So we all should be very thankful for that. Thank you so much for your subscriptions. And I really look forward to this year. Everybody have an amazing Monday and we'll talk to you soon.