Medieval Madness reproduction

[Sumez]

I'm happy to see this happen. As much as it could be to the chagrin of collector, it's better than slowly watching the number of machines dwindle to nothing. I'd love to see some ckassic solid state machines be reproduced as well

MM is hardly lacking in numbers. For some reason the demand just seems to be through the roof.

I wonder what the resale value will be like for these.

I bet it won't be much lower than an original MM once the market "settles". Providing the build quality is decent.

 

[Worf]

Well, MM was underproduced - there were only like 2500 odd tables produced. Decent, but it suffered from the early 90's tables crowding it out. By the time people realized how good it was. it was out of production.

I really hope the build quality is decent. If it feels like a Williams, it'll be awesome. If it feels like a Stern... that'll push the price of original MM's even higher.

I want.

 

[Sumez]

According to IPDB there's over 4000. Compared to the time it was released, MM had one of the biggest production runs.

 

[Worf]

Ah, right, my bad. 4016.

Still, it was a table that drove the prices ever higher. $15K, $24k asking, geez, if that's the market value...

 

[karl]

I know we have some members here that already own MM. I'd be curious to see what their thoughts are about the remake.

Luckily I bought my MM to play it and not to make money out of it. One part of me think this is great since the price of the original is way to high. I am glad they are making more standard runs after the LE ed so that this is not just becoming another collector thing and those that have been wanting MM for a long time now have the chance to finally get one.

One part of me is a little worried that this will hurt sales for Stern and JJP. (especially if we get other re-run titles later)

The most important thing is to keep pinball alive and both Stern and JJP are dependent of the home market these days to stay afloat. If those two companies start to loose a lot of sales, it will be the end of pinball. Even if the market has gone up a little bit in later years, it is still on thin ice.

 

[Sumez]

and those that have been wanting MM for a long time now have the chance to finally get one.

Ideally yes, but they still need $8000 to spare, which most people don't have.

 

[karl]

And it sold out in a day, so it is still hard to get one (at least until probably sometime around 2015 when the standard one will be ready to ship) This also means that those who already have a MM now more than ever will not sell it. I bought mine for ca 10 000$ and if the prices go down to say around 7000 for a used one, there is no way I am selling it if I don't have to. ( but then again, I was not planning to sell it soon anyway)

Over all I still think this is a good thing but I'll bet that 80% of those that was fast enough to place an order before it sold out is hoping to make money out of this instead of enjoying the game. Sad but true.

Edit: Maybe it is not a good thing after all . The more I think about this the more unsure I get

 

[Sumez]

Well, it's definitely only helping improve MM's reputation

 

[Worf]

Well, $8000 is a lot of cash, but if you've got a reasonable income, it's doable from a savings standpoint - if the regular models are shipping in 2015, you've got over a year to save up.

And yeah, owners of original MM's probably won't sell if they realize they're going to take a huge hit on it. But it also means those of us who wanted one can get one for reasonable prices. Though, they'd probably be happy since they can get replacement parts a lot easier now too...

 

[smbhax]

One part of me is a little worried that this will hurt sales for Stern and JJP. (especially if we get other re-run titles later)

The most important thing is to keep pinball alive and both Stern and JJP are dependent of the home market these days to stay afloat. If those two companies start to loose a lot of sales, it will be the end of pinball. Even if the market has gone up a little bit in later years, it is still on thin ice.

That's what I was thinking too; its new designs that really keep it alive; I wouldn't want to see sales get sucked away from development and pinball continue only in zombie mode. But there are prrrobably enough people out there who are interested enough in new stuff that this won't kill development off; it could even spur Stern in particular to push forward and distinguish their games from the late Bally/Williams ones they've kind of been trying to emulate for over a decade now, with only a few breakouts into new-ish-feeling design approaches like Tron and Iron Man and even AC/DC to an extent; Metallica and Star Trek (LEDs notwithstanding) look like slightly more conservative approaches to me, although I haven't seen them in person so I can't say for sure.

 

[Worf]

If Stern can't sell their pins because some $8000 MM reproduction is sucking away all the buyers, there's something critically wrong with Stern and other pinball manufacturers. If reproductions really start killing sales of new designs, then there's really something wrong. Like maybe the new designs, or the table feel just isn't there. And I notice how all the new designs are licenses - sure they bring in the money (and repros will have a hard time reproducing licensed tables - we know T2 is dead now, and I'm sure STTNG and TZ are probably going to be quite difficult).

And pinball's been down this route before. The problem stemmed from operators who refused to spend money on table maintenance and let the tables rot until the point where Williams exited and Stern was left. The early 2000's pinball was basically dead, it's just the mobile revolution brought it back.

And look at the flip side - if people who wanted MM spent $15K for it, it means they really wanted it, and that extra money was given to the seller and not spent on a new table. Now, you can buy it for $8k, and have $7k left over for a new table.

 

[Espy]

Modern tables with new licenses will always do well. I think there is actually a big source of revenue from random passers-by dropping a credit into a pinball machine out of curiosity, and they're more likely to do with if it has a big name on it. At my arcade the most popular machine is either AC/DC or Family Guy, even with a great RFM (and in the past, WH2O) sitting there. Home buyers will see the value in something like this, but operators will always go for the big names. There's a reason that every Stern machine has a famous license on it these days.

 

[Sumez]

If Stern can't sell their pins because some $8000 MM reproduction is sucking away all the buyers, there's something critically wrong with Stern and other pinball manufacturers. If reproductions really start killing sales of new designs, then there's really something wrong.

I can tell you for certain that an extra purchase is not gonna saturate any pinball collector. Maybe an operator, but these reproductions are bough by collectors/private owners, and when was the last time you heard a pinball collector go "This is my last table, I'm happy with what I have and won't buy any new tables"?

 

[karl]

Well, Stern do have a much larger enemy than reproductions of old games: Code updates. Almost 6 months after the release of Metallica there have been almost no additions to the game play rules, just a few bug updates. Same goes for other Stern titles. Leaving out half the features for Lyman Sheets to finish on his free time at home sounds suspect to put it mildly. The pinside crowd is getting restless but probably not the first time that happens

I can live with a few bugs and ideas coming out after the games is finished, but features that clearly was meant to be there from day one is still missing. What's the point in having a mystery scoop with basically one award. Crank it up it says on the playfield, but it is not there. Even The wizard mode is missing. What we are left with are 4 multiballs, a ramp mode, fuel mode and seek and destroy hurry up mode. All of those are pure fun and enough to keep me busy so I am not one of the most vocal about this. It is a bit concerning never the less if they don't shape up on this problem soonish.

 

[Metalzoic]

Well, I don't know about you guys, but this is my last table, I'm happy with what I have and won't buy any new tables.

 

[Metalzoic]

Well, Stern do have a much larger enemy than reproductions of old games: Code updates. Almost 6 months after the release of Metallica there have been almost no additions to the game play rules, just a few bug updates. Same goes for other Stern titles. Leaving out half the features for Lyman Sheets to finish on his free time at home sounds suspect to put it mildly. The pinside crowd is getting restless but probably not the first time that happens

I can live with a few bugs and ideas coming out after the games is finished, but features that clearly was meant to be there from day one is still missing. What's the point in having a mystery scoop with basically one award. Crank it up it says on the playfield, but it is not there. Even The wizard mode is missing. What we are left with are 4 multiballs, a ramp mode, fuel mode and seek and destroy hurry up mode. All of those are pure fun and enough to keep me busy so I am not one of the most vocal about this. It is a bit concerning never the less if they don't shape up on this problem soonish.

I didn't realize that was business as usual at Stern. I know that JJP started shipping WOZ without software being anywhere near complete, but they have also been updating and adding to it regularly about every 2 weeks since it began to ship. I understood they needed to do it that way to start getting the games out to people since it is their first game and they work on ramping up production.

Stern is established though with a steady stream of releases. They shouldn't be pushing games out the door until they're actually complete.

 

[brakel]

I didn't realize that was business as usual at Stern. I know that JJP started shipping WOZ without software being anywhere near complete, but they have also been updating and adding to it regularly about every 2 weeks since it began to ship. I understood they needed to do it that way to start getting the games out to people since it is their first game and they work on ramping up production.

Stern is established though with a steady stream of releases. They shouldn't be pushing games out the door until they're actually complete.

This is business as usual in the world today. The last time I bought a new A/V receiver I returned the first one because there were several features that didn't work right. The manufacturers web page said that they would have a patch out "soon". They knew what they were shipping. Ship first, patch later.

 

[Worf]

Well, it's because the publication/manufacturing deadlines usually mean you have to build it a couple of months in advance. If you patch later (or day 1 patch), it gives the software teams an additional couple of months to add features and fix bugs. Of course, like all software projects, things sometimes take longer than estimated.

If it's a console game, you need to schedule a month for approvals, a month for manufacturing (not that it takes that long, but the factories usually run full tilt so you get added to the queue, and this can't happen until approval). Then you have a month to get all the discs and cases from the factory and to ship them to distributors who ship them to store warehouses, who then ship them to stores. If it's a PC product, it still takes a couple of months to manufacture.

If it's hardware for a holiday release, you're looking at hardware finialization by June, parts by August (a lot of parts can have 4-6 weeks of lead time), manufacturing in September for shipment in October so it's out on shelves by November. And since software can be updated, it gives your software devs another 3-4 months of development and QA time.

 

[karl]

brakel and Worf. I agree with you and I am not expecting Stern to deliver a bug free or even feature complete game at launch. It is the low priority of updates afterwards that bugs me a little bit. JJP is something completely different. As you say Metalzoic, they show that they prioritize updates and they are a much smaller business so delays are understandable. If you go to Stern Facebook page and ask about code update in a nice way and give them some love also, they will still delete the message. Only full-on praise is allowed over there. This is a business model that will sooner or later come back to bite them in the ass if other companies like JJP start to sell well. They still make some great pinball machines thanks to a lot of great designers and of course Lyman Sheets also, but AC/DC will probably be my last NIB Stern game for a long long time. I would rather wait a year to get "The Hobbit" than to buy another new Stern at the moment. Just my to cents

 

[Worf]

Well, technically, code updates cost the company money because it's work done for free. Basically the product is sold and the money made, any additional work means less profit.

JJP is probably doing it because they need to - give less profits in exchange for known customer support and thus, excitement towards the tables.

Stern probably doesn't care - it works, and they're really working on the next table in line.