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Pinball Omnibus Episode 10

Cary Hardy·video·28m 47s·analyzed·Aug 21, 2024
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.037

TL;DR

Carrie Hardy reviews pinball industry QC issues, manufacturer confidence problems, and Dutch Pinball's Alice reveal.

Summary

Carrie Hardy discusses ongoing issues in the pinball industry including quality control problems with Stern's Godzilla 70s (LED and decal issues), American Pinball's delayed trailers and rumored game delays suggesting lack of confidence, Turner Pinball's conservative but serious expansion, and Dutch Pinball's Alice in Wonderland game with impressive sculptural detail and a rumored $11,900 price point for 500 units. She also covers upcoming Expo announcements from Spooky Pinball, Jersey Jack's focus on location earnings, and broader market nervousness among manufacturers and distributors.

Key Claims

  • Godzilla 70s units are shipping with inconsistent LED colors on CPU boards—some cool white, some yellow—affecting game appearance

    high confidence · Carrie reached out to George Gomez, who confirmed engineers are investigating; issue confirmed on Stern's end and they will fix it for affected customers

  • American Pinball disabled YouTube comments on all videos, unlike every other pinball manufacturer including Turner Pinball, signaling lack of confidence

    high confidence · Carrie directly observed comments disabled across American Pinball's channel; confirmed all other manufacturers have comments enabled

  • American Pinball is rumored to be delaying their next game beyond Expo to avoid simultaneous release with other manufacturers

    medium confidence · Reported via Naps Arcade; Carrie emphasizes this is alleged/unconfirmed but notes the delay itself would signal lack of confidence

  • Dutch Pinball's Alice in Wonderland will be priced at $11,900 with only 500 units produced, manufactured by Boothenberg

    medium confidence · Naps Arcade shared pricing from outside source; Carrie cannot confirm or deny but presented as likely accurate based on her NDA-restricted viewing

  • Alice in Wonderland features extensive sculptural detail, full color above playfield, moving Jabberwocky mech, shaker, knocker, and integrated topper into gameplay

    high confidence · Carrie viewed the full game and described features in detail; described as 'most world under glass in pinball in a good while'

  • Turner Pinball is building conservatively with dedicated facility on owner's property, learning from mistakes of other manufacturers

    high confidence · Carrie had recent meeting with Turner owner Chris; observed pallets of Ninja Eclipse parts, powder-coated legs, display boxes, and facility infrastructure

  • Stern quality control issues extending beyond LED problems—Godzilla 70s also showing wrinkling decals and non-powder-coated hardware inconsistencies

    high confidence · Carrie documented wrinkled decals around hinge bolts, inconsistent bolt finishes suggesting QC lapses; attributed partly to shipping conditions but also manufacturing processes

Notable Quotes

  • “If your game is good, it will win in the end. So by you delaying your game that also oozes lack of confidence before it's even released.”

    Carrie Hardy@ 6:02 — Core critique of American Pinball's rumored strategy; argues confidence in product should override market timing concerns

  • “Give you $10,000 for a game, damn it, everything better look good on that game. If it doesn't, then it's like, why are we spending this much money on something whenever it's a roll of the dice.”

    Carrie Hardy@ 13:48 — Articulates collector/customer expectation vs. Stern pricing; connects pricing premium to QC standards

  • “Words to describe this game are beautiful, creepy, and sexy... This game is the most world under glass we have seen in pinball in a good while.”

    Carrie Hardy@ 20:34 — First impressions of Dutch Pinball's Alice after private viewing; sets high expectations for reveal

  • “The reason why it's number one on earnings is because people aren't at their house playing it. They're playing it on locations. So it sold more to locations than it did to people in their homes.”

    Carrie Hardy@ 16:20 — Criticism of Jersey Jack's marketing framing of Toy Story 4 success; distinguishes location performance from home collector demand

  • “Pinball manufacturers are nervous. All of them. Because of the market right now. There is no guarantee when they release their game that it's going to sell.”

    Carrie Hardy@ 26:01 — Broad market assessment; documents sentiment shift from prior era of guaranteed sales to current uncertainty

  • “I'm going to be limiting the number made to the number sold again a poke at a manufacturer”

Entities

Carrie HardypersonAmerican Pinball Inc.companyStern PinballcompanyDutch PinballcompanyTurner PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanySpooky Pinballcompany

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: American Pinball's strategic delay and disabled YouTube comments signaling lack of confidence in product before release

    medium · Rumored delay beyond Expo (via Naps Arcade); YouTube comments disabled across all American Pinball videos; no other manufacturer has comments disabled (including Turner despite criticism)

  • ?

    product_concern: Mirko's pre-cabinet releases for Medieval Madness/Adams Family showing incomplete finishing (unsealed backs, missing ground strips) reducing plug-and-play appeal

    medium · Carrie observed unsealed cabinet backs and missing ground strips; notes additional work required for integration; concerns about brand reputation given history of playfield quality issues

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Dutch Pinball's Alice emphasizes 'world under glass' sculptural depth and color saturation; intentionally adult aesthetic rather than whimsical/Disney tone

    high · Carrie's viewing notes: 'creepy and sexy,' 'dark but with color,' 'Alice is an adult not a child,' extensive sculpts with color integrated above playfield

  • ?

    event_signal: Spooky Pinball announcing company directional change (not new game) at Expo that is beneficial for company and fans

    high · Carrie has inside info; stated 'I like what I've heard so far'; explicitly stated not a game announcement, directional/strategic announcement

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Jersey Jack continues focus on location performance metrics as marketing angle for Toy Story 4; distinguishing location vs. home collector sales in promotional messaging

Topics

Quality Control IssuesprimaryStern Pinball Godzilla 70s ProblemsprimaryDutch Pinball Alice in WonderlandprimaryAmerican Pinball Confidence/StrategyprimaryPinball Market Softness and Manufacturer NervousnessprimaryPricing vs. Quality ExpectationssecondaryPinball Expo 2024 AnnouncementssecondarySecondary Market Pricing Trendssecondary

Sentiment

mixed(0.35)— Carrie expresses frustration with Stern QC, American Pinball strategy, and market uncertainty, but enthusiasm for Dutch Pinball's Alice, Turner's conservative approach, and upcoming Expo announcements. Tone is critical but constructive—she's advocating for improvement rather than condemning manufacturers.

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.086

What is it? Spoiled writing. Yes you are. So this is going to be take two on me recording this video. The first one guys, it went on way too long and I feel like it shouldn't be this long. So I'm going to go through these bullet points and we're just going to talk about what's going on in pinball right now. now in 4k what's up guys and welcome back to the channel where i talk and do everything pinball so if that sounds interesting to you then hit the subscribe button down below so you can join the over 9900 people that have done this already and the thing is i'm getting so close to hitting the 10 000 subscriber mark and what i plan to do when i hit the 10k mark is i will be releasing a limited edition anniversary limited anniversary exclusive shirt which obviously is going to have little pokes at a certain manufacturer but and i'm going to be limiting the number made to the number sold again a poke at a manufacturer so i'm looking forward to that so by all means once again subscribe button down below guys thanks for watching also you're going to see some stuff behind me back here this is some filming gear that I just haven't put away because I'm still working on and I'm doing a video for myth pinball speaker light kit system here's just a little bit of a taste of what I'm working on at this point in time now all this equipment everything is due to my patreon supporters out there without them i would not be able to upgrade my equipment as quickly as i have so by all means once again thanks to them I have had an increase of subscribers recently and that's more than likely due to the haggis videos and they want to see it first rightfully so so chances are I will lose them over time but by all means I am very grateful for your support out there and it's with people like you that allow me to upgrade the equipment which will hopefully upgrade the quality of my videos going forward now it's been a while since I've done these omnibus videos and the thing is I've been busy doing other things but now the kids are back in school and I'm falling behind on what's going on in the pinball hobby and stuff because I've been working on the haggis stuff and I just I need a break from working on that it's a little depressing working on that for so long and stuff so again let's just talk about things that have that are going on I'm probably going to miss something here and there I'm not going to mention every manufacturer but I've got a little bullet point list that we're just going to speed fire through give you some quick thoughts on how I feel about certain things that are going on. So, let's get started. Now, granted, there is a lot of things that are going on behind the scenes that I cannot divulge to you at this point in time when it comes to pinball and stuff like that. But I am maybe going to give you little hints here and there about what is coming. But I do want to start from the top of the list. And let's just go straight into it with American Pinball. They just released, I say just released, but recently released a trailer video for their barbecue game. And the thing is, their game released five months ago. I don't understand why they are just now releasing this trailer video. It should have came out when the game released. So it's like, what's going on here kind of thing? But alongside with them releasing this five months late, you can also notice, and I've noticed this a long time ago, is that they have disabled the comments on their videos. And the thing is, they disable their comments on anything that they possibly can. And that includes YouTube comments section. And things like this is just like oozing lack of confidence for me kind of thing. If you go to every other manufacturer, I've looked, every other manufacturer when it comes to pinball, you have comments enabled. You go to American pinball, comments are disabled. And this includes Turner Pinball, which, trust me, they have been a punching bag for a lot of people out there. Their comments are enabled. So to have your comments disabled just kind of shows that you don't want feedback, good or bad. You just want to silence your audience kind of thing. So you're just oozing the lack of confidence. And speaking of the lack of confidence, rumor has it that American Pinball is going to be delaying their next game. We were expecting it before Expo. supposedly it's going to be delayed till after and allegedly the reason for that is because they do not want to release this game the same time other manufacturers are going to be releasing their games they don't want a repeat of what happened with gtf because i'm guessing in their mind the reason why gtf is considered a failure is because there was just too many options out there i disagree i have an idea for you american go over here what if this is just spitballing here but what if you just made a good game do you think about that maybe i don't care when other games are being released around your game in the end it comes down to whether or not you're making a good, entertaining, fun game to play. That's what people want. It's not a matter of like, well, there's just so many choices out there. I better go with Stern or I better go with CGC or Play Mechanics or JJP or Spooky. It's no. It's what people find fun. That's what it amounts to. If your game is good, it will win in the end. so by you delaying your game that also oozes lack of confidence before it's even released and again this is just alleged stuff this is what's on nafs arcade he's reporting what he's hearing so it's not confirmed that they're delaying it but if you are then that also shows a lack of confidence in what you are building at this point in time if you believe that your game was going to win no matter what you'd be like yes we're releasing our game the same time the other companies are can't wait to show it to you guys we are confident that we're going to be selling these like crazy because people are going to love them now maybe it's because you chose cuphead again not confirmed that this is the next game but cuphead being the license that they chose to do i feel like it could be good don't know yet because i enjoyed the game it was damn hard but the game was good i just don't know how well it's going to translate to pinball i think there's a couple of other licenses out there that would be better for pinball including Borderlands even though the movie was god then you have bioshock but american do not touch bioshock i would like spooky pinball to do bioshock that would be better but borderlands go for it Why not? I mean, and hopefully you can do it justice if you want to go into the video game market when it comes to pinball. Next up is this gun shooter rod from Interactive Pinball. And I saw this and I thought, okay, that looks really good. And I'm going to have the video right here just showing you what their YouTube video is showing you what all it can do. So it's obviously going to be aimed towards John Wick pinball, but it's also going to be good for Deadpool. And the thing is, this could actually go on any game, it looks like. It's any Stern game. That's what it states, is that it works on any Stern Spike 2 system. So technically, you could hook this up to Stranger Things or whatever, I'm guessing. Led Zeppelin. But the fact remains is that it looks cool. so I was definitely interested in it. I think it would look good on Deadpool, so they reached out to me, and I'm being sent one right now, actually, so hopefully I should get that here in the next week, and then I will do a video review showing you all there is to know about this particular shooter. I'm just iffy about putting it on the Deadpool whenever my Deadpool's over here, because there's a reason why I've got Last Action Hero on the end. My daughters, when they were younger, they would always walk by, bump their head. I would walk by and bump my hip. That's why I call them hip breakers. But maybe this won't stick out very far, and I can keep it where it's at. I don't know. We're just going to have to wait and see on that. But I'm definitely curious, and it looks pretty damn cool so far. So let's jump to another manufacturer. One in the making, rather. Turner Pinball. I had a meeting just recently with Chris, and we went over a lot of topics, including future content in the works. I'm excited about a lot of things. just a little behind the scenes here that I feel like I can divulge is that he showed me pallets full of parts for the ninja eclipses that he will be making and I saw the pallet full of pinball legs that are about to go out to powder coating show me all the boxes full of displays that are going to be going into their games the facility that he's using to build all these games is his building on his property that he owns so he's he knows that he's not going to be upgrading his building or trying to build up before he even gets his feet off the ground. So there's something that you should know is that he's learning from the mistakes of others, I guess, and he's going to be doing everything, starting small, building up his reputation, and then eventually build up from there. So that's something that you guys can know about from there. But I'm definitely curious to see where things are going to be going with them because it looks like he's definitely serious about what's going on and he wants to build up, but he's being very conservative about it and real. So looking forward to what they've got going on. Hopefully, like I said, content with them coming up probably pretty soon. All right, let's talk about the Goliath Stern. We've got Sepia Gate. Now, for a select amount, I say select because we don't have an exact number, of the Godzilla 70s. evidently from what we're seeing different types of leds were placed on these particular cpu boards and you have ones that have the cool white and then you have ones that look more of a yellow giving it that old-fashioned look and it's really turning certain people off and it doesn't look good honestly and the thing is who knows how many people have this on their games right now but they They just don't even realize it. And so this got brought to my attention. I reached out to George Gomez and basically brought it to his attention. Hey, this is probably going to blow up and get even worse. Just to give you a heads up, do you know anything about this? At that point in time, he wasn't aware. So now he is aware. And from what I can tell you from our conversation, in a nutshell, their engineers are looking into it. And the problem is definitely on their end. they will fix the issue and make it right with all the customers that have been affected by it. But alongside the sepia gate, we also have wrinkling decals on Godzilla 70. This game is just getting a lot of bad QC, it seems. But I don't know about so much QC as possibly the Carl Weathers, at least to an extent. Because not only are we getting wrinkling decals around the hinge bolt for the playfield on the outside of the side of the cabinet. But I can see that. Like heat from the outside in the box and everything causing the adhesive on the decals to kind of give away a little bit, causing that wrinkle. But what do you say to when they use different hardware? We have a bolt here that is not powder-coated like their standard black they have on all of their games. So I don't know how this got put into a game on QC and they were just like, eh, this will work. That doesn't just happen. I'm hoping, I can only assume at this point that the people building these games at the factory are hoping that maybe they don't go to somebody that's going to notice. Like it goes to an arcade or something like that and they're going to slide it into a lineup and no one's going to see it. Or the person buying it isn't just going to notice. Sadly, a lot of us out there that buy these games have a great deal of attention to detail. And I think one of the other reasons why we have a high attention to detail on these games is because Stern is asking for $10,000. But here's the problem, Stern, and it's not going to get any better when you keep asking for the money that you are for these games. The more you charge or the more consistent you are with asking for the money that you are asking for your games, then the more scrutinistic we're going to be with the product that we get. give you $10,000 for a game, damn it, everything better look good on that game. If it doesn't, then it's like, why are we spending this much money on something whenever it's a roll of the dice, if it's going to be good or bad. But again, this could be just a small, small batch out of the hundreds of games that get pushed out their door. Assembly and manufacturing is difficult for pinball. Things happen. And I'm sure that Stern will do their best to make the customers happy. So again if you have a problem with your game reach out to your distributor That way they can get the ball rolling and get things working for you So talking about QC and issues let talk about Mirko releasing these pre cabinets for their games like Medieval Madness and Adam's Family and stuff like that. Now, at first glance, when you look at these, you're thinking, okay, that looks pretty good. That's awesome. And then you look at the backside, and this is where some of you aren't going to be bothered by this, and a lot of us that restore cabinets and stuff like that are going to look at this and go what happened to the back why why didn't you seal the wood and make it look like the rest of the machine and well and the thing is this is going to be a cabinet just fine for a lot of you out there that don't pay that much attention to the detail and just want a game to go up against your wall like I've got back here, and you're never going to see it. I get it. That would be fine. And the thing is, he's building the cabinet and having it the way it is almost like it's just an easy fix. Like, hey, you guys got to destroy a cabinet, take out your play field and your boards, and just move it over here to the new cabinet. No, there's not even ground strips going throughout the cabinet. So that's also some more work that's going to be involved for it to be a plug-and-play. I think if you're going to do this kind of cabinet, make it as close to plug-and-play as possible and adjust your price accordingly. I do feel like the backside definitely could look better. And when you have a reputation like you do for your playfields with pooling and chipping, then you're already kind of like rolling the dice on how well this is going to sell to the public when they know the history of your product. Let's talk a little bit about Jersey Jack. So look, they're pumping out their Elton Johns, but not only are they pumping out Elton Johns, they're pumping up Toy Story 4 right now on social media. Once again, talking about how it's the number one seller when it comes to locations on how much the earnings are and stuff. And that just, once again, kind of hammers in the point. The reason why it's number one on earnings is because people aren't at their house playing it. They're playing it on locations. So it sold more to locations than it did to people in their homes. Which is fine. As long as people are enjoying the game, do you. Enjoy the game. I personally didn't care for it. I really did enjoy Elton John though I just didn't enjoy the price and when it comes to what they're working on now rumor is Matrix if that's true definitely a theme right up my alley all I ask whatever the game is going to be whenever it gets announced here within the next month I want to say put more than just like two or three games at Expo please I don't want to have to wait in line to enjoy your games okay I mean, a little bit of a line is okay because you only have two or three games. You're going to have, like, really long lines, and I don't want that. So bring more than what you did last year. That's all I ask. Please? So moving on to Expo again, there's a couple of things to talk about here when it comes to bullet points. This is the 40th anniversary for Expo, and it's happening in mid-October. But it's going to be going on all week long. I'm not going to be there all week long because there's only so much pinball I honestly can handle and I'm going to be doing it probably like maybe the Thursday, Friday, Saturday kind of thing so that's when I should be there I didn't manage to get a hotel room at the Renaissance where it's being hosted so I'll get one somewhere else and I'll make it work but I will be at Expo over the weekend and a couple of things that are going on around Expo time one is going to be the Pinball Olympics tickets will be going on sale here probably within the next few weeks i'm supposed to be getting a heads up of when that will be so that way i can let you guys know when they are going on sale because there's going to be a limited amount of tickets and a lot of you really wanted to go to this when you saw my video showing it off last year so hopefully i'll get to play some games and have a lot of drinks with you at pinball olympics coming up uh going further into expo spooky pinball will be making an announcement in regards to where their company is going to be going in the future and i like what i've heard so far about this announcement i think it's going to be very beneficial for them and beneficial for those out there that enjoy their games uh that's all i can really tell you at this point in time when it comes to what they're going to be announcing don't look at it as being like their game it's not going to be their new game we shouldn't get that announcement until later but uh look forward to them making an announcement at expo i'll tell you that much so now let's move over to dutch pinball they have their alice adventures of alice in wonderland and for those that don't already know i am under nda so there's only so much that i can divulge i can't give you specifics or anything like that or i can't confirm and deny certain things either. Now, they have released a couple of pictures since basically confirming their game and stuff, and there have been little teasers. But what's going on is that they're going to be edging us on this release. They're going to be foreplaying the hell out of this game over the next X amount of weeks. I would assume that the game should be revealed before October. That's my assumption. I haven't got a release date or anything like that, but I would like to hope that we get this game fully revealed before Expo, and I'm really hoping to see a couple of these at Expo for everyone to play. Now, I have seen the game in its entirety, and I did mention to my patrons, basically, my first impressions of it. now um once again i've already done the recording this is like my second take so i will cut to that portion of me talking about this and then we'll come right back to me now okay i got the full tour of the game note that i cannot give you specifics the video wasn't in hd quality and i don't know how it shoots or sounds yet. Words to describe this game are beautiful, creepy, and sexy. Now, first thing to note, this game is, in fact, the most world under glass we have seen in pinball in a good while now. Lior has done an amazing job on the sculpts. There's so much detail. Color, this game has color. Yes, the image we have all seen on the play is on the play field, and that is near the flippers, but everything else above is full of color. Art is integrated well. For instance, the white rabbit looks to be holding an insert. My favorite part of the art is probably the left backbox. It's a little ooh la la. The game isn't going to be Disney. This is what I was hoping it to be It a little dark and creepy but with color Alice is an adult not a child The game has multiple points for us customers to make our own from game difficulty all the way to the game aesthetics. Now the way the scopes are integrated into the playfield is sweet. Game is coming fully loaded with shaker and real knocker. Many spare parts will be included just in case something breaks in the future but side note from what i'm reading here is that i've been told from the pictures that you've recently seen i will show up on the screen here when it comes to the lampposts and everything people question those breaking i have been told that for the last six months they've been beating on this game not one of those lampposts has broken but you will have extras in your goodie bag and the leds that are inside there run at like 2.5 to 3 volts so the life on them should be a lot longer than your typical led the topper is creepy and awesome looking integrated into gameplay too you have a moving multi-action mech now this picture was also released and it's basically the jabberwocky back there and it's a little difficult to tell how he moves but um from what you can see from the sculpts that's a pretty good guess to show you that that arm is definitely one of the things that moves now the display looks pretty clean and suiting for the game but i haven't really seen a lot of it yet now the price is even better than it was the last time i got a number you stern le buyers are gonna question what all are you getting now the official tease image will be released next week to show everyone and that's whenever we got the pocket watch image and everything like that. And I state that I really hope to see this game in its full quality soon. So let's back step a little bit to where I mentioned the price. And from Naps Arcade, he shared from an outside source that the price for Adventures of Alice in Wonderland is going to be $11,900. They're only making $500 of these. Now I cannot confirm or deny What that price tag Is if it's true or false But let's just say Let's say that's right Let's say that is what the price is going to be $11.99 Fully loaded game Real knocker, shaker motor, topper All that From what you've seen so far Sculpts and everything Almost a little too good to be true For what we've been seeing in the past especially for you stern le buyers at 13k so is 11.9 the price of this game like i said i cannot confirm or deny so there you have it on the dutch pinball and the thing i need to mention also is that they just recently announced that the people that are going to be manufacturing their playfields for alice is boothenberg so is it bothenberg or boothenberg it's it's it's german but uh but it's either way great decision everybody that has bought a play field from them is excited that that's who they chose because their quality is great so i'm definitely happy that they chose to go with that company aside from the other options that are out there we'll just say that maybe another option that I've already stated in this video. But it's going to be great to see what they're going to be doing with the quality and I've already heard other things that I'm guessing they have told them to do with their playfields for that extra touch of, you know, making sure that the quality is there kind of thing. Now I will be getting exclusive information and pictures and stuff like that that I can share with my patrons. So by all means, if you would like to see or hear about the stuff before anybody else, then by all means, Patreon link is in the description down below. Now, I just wanted to talk for a moment about the pinball market right now. And I've already stated this in previous videos and even on my podcast, is that we're in an iffy state. Pinball manufacturers are nervous. All of them. Because of the market right now. There is no guarantee. When they release their game. That it's going to sell. They used to have that mentality. Because that's the way things were at one point. Was they would release a game. And it would just sell. Everyone wanted it. Now it's a toss up. When they release a game. It's like I hope it does well kind of thing. So you have manufacturers. That are nervous and iffy. About what's going on in the market. And the pinball market as well. And then you have the distros out there. That are hesitant. on what's going on as well. I mean, I've seen it personally just looking through Facebook, and I have a lot of them that I follow, and just by what's being posted, I can see that the market has changed. We may just be making an adjustment right now, but hopefully things are about to get better because a lot of new games are about to be released, so things might change for the better, or when all these games come out and we're still down in a soft point, then I guess things could technically change for the worse. And only time will tell on that. And I wonder about new in boxes actually because when you have instances of people opening their games and finding these defects, for paying a premium price to get their game first, for a new in-box price versus those that wait a little bit longer, possibly buy it off the second-hand market, and get pictures and a confirmation that everything works in its entirety and the game looks good for thousands cheaper. It's like, that's always up to the individual on that kind of thing. But it's like, if I would have known, like, hey, Carrie, if you just wait, you know, just a couple of months, you'll be able to get this premium Foo Fighters back here for another $1,000 cheaper. I would have held off for a month. But the good thing about my demo game that I bought is that I knew that everything worked on it because it played at Texas Pinball Festival for the entire weekend. So it was tested, improved, and everything was good to go on this. So I knew that my game was going to work when I got it home kind of thing. But anything can happen in transit, so there is that. But I just wanted to give you a little bit of an update on what's going on in the hobby. I feel like this video is still too long, but hopefully I gave you a bunch of information out there. and I'm always curious about what you think on all these topics. So put your comments down below. Can't wait to read them. And until next time, guys, peace out.
  • Current pinball market is in 'iffy state' with manufacturers and distributors nervous; no longer guaranteed sales like in past eras

    high confidence · Carrie stated from personal observation of distributor Facebook posts and previous podcast commentary; contrasts old 'release and it will sell' mentality with current uncertainty

  • Secondary market pinball prices dropping significantly—waiting months can yield $1,000+ savings vs. new-in-box premiums

    medium confidence · Carrie reflected on willingness to wait on Food Fighters; cites risk-reward of waiting for potential defect confirmations vs. paying premium for immediate release

  • Spooky Pinball will announce future company direction at Expo (not a new game announcement) that is beneficial for company and fans

    high confidence · Carrie has inside information under informal disclosure; stated 'I like what I've heard so far' and confirmed it's directional, not product-focused

  • Carrie Hardy@ 1:08 — Self-aware jab at limited edition/LE production practices; implies criticism of artificial scarcity strategy

  • “They just don't even realize it. And so this got brought to my attention. I reached out to George Gomez and basically brought it to his attention.”

    Carrie Hardy@ 11:29 — Documents her role as community quality control advocate; shows direct line to Stern leadership for issue escalation

  • “For the last six months they've been beating on this game not one of those lampposts has broken”

    Carrie Hardy (reporting from Dutch Pinball source)@ 22:14 — Durability claim about Alice's lamppost mechs; preemptive response to community concerns about breakage

  • George Gomez
    person
    Naps Arcadeperson
    Interactive Pinballcompany
    Boothenbergcompany
    Godzilla 70sgame
    Alice's Adventures in Wonderlandgame
    Toy Story 4game
    Pinball Expoevent
    Pinball Olympicsevent
    Elton Johngame
    Food Fightersgame
    Ninja Eclipsegame
    John Wickgame
    Deadpoolgame
    Last Action Herogame
    Texas Pinball Festivalevent

    medium · Jersey Jack promoting Toy Story 4 as 'number one seller on locations'; Carrie notes location sales vs. home sales distinction; implies different priority than home collector market

  • $

    market_signal: Pinball manufacturers and distributors nervous about market; no longer guaranteed sales; manufacturers hesitant about release timing and market saturation

    high · Carrie states all manufacturers nervous; observed via distributor Facebook posts; contrasts current uncertainty with prior 'release and sell' era; notes upcoming game releases may improve or worsen trend

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Carrie Hardy positioned as community QC advocate with direct line to Stern leadership; escalated Godzilla 70s LED issue to George Gomez resulting in investigation

    high · Carrie reached out to George Gomez directly; he confirmed investigation; issue acknowledged as Stern's responsibility with fix promised

  • $

    market_signal: Dutch Pinball Alice rumored at $11,900 for 500 units, positioned as value vs. Stern LE at $13k+ despite Carrie's concern about confirming authenticity

    medium · Naps Arcade shared pricing from outside source; Carrie cannot confirm/deny but presented as likely accurate; notes full features (shaker, knocker, topper) make price credible

  • ?

    product_concern: Higher premium pricing ($10k+) raising customer QC expectations; defects more unacceptable at elevated price points

    high · Carrie articulates that $10k price point should guarantee flawless product; defects on premium machines reduce confidence in value proposition

  • ?

    product_concern: Godzilla 70s experiencing systematic QC issues across multiple areas: inconsistent LED colors on CPU boards, wrinkling decals, and non-powder-coated hardware variations

    high · Carrie reached out to George Gomez who confirmed engineers are investigating; issue confirmed on Stern's end and they will fix affected units

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community sentiment shifting from excitement about new releases to skepticism about quality and pricing value; secondary market preference growing

    high · Carrie's observation of willingness to wait for secondary market purchases to save $1,000+; notes awareness of defect risks incentivizing patience over new-in-box premium

  • ?

    business_signal: Turner Pinball learning from other manufacturers' mistakes; conservative expansion with dedicated facility on owner's property rather than building/upgrading before establishing reputation

    high · Carrie's meeting with Turner owner Chris; observed pallets of Ninja Eclipse parts, powder-coated legs, display boxes on-site; owner deliberately avoiding pre-expansion infrastructure investment