Pinball Industry

"here's the truth let's be honest they're not doing this so that the customer you and me feels the fomo they're doing it so the dealers fight over each other to stock the inventory"

FOMO marketing tactics are primarily designed to benefit dealers, not customers

"It's actually a really, really, really good buyer's market"

It's currently a really good buyer's market for pinball machines

"if you put Neo Tokyo under glass and got the Akira license and the movie and the soundtrack and the Akira would sell like no tomorrow, man."

Akira would be an amazing pinball theme that would sell incredibly well

"The amount of quality across the board is better now than it's ever been in pinball. I mean that like quality pinball playing experiences and you know look I know these games don't have the mechs like they used to but the game has changed."

Modern pinball quality across all manufacturers is better than it's ever been in pinball history

"I think it's a three-horse race now where the excitement lies in all of pinball I think it's Jersey Jack pinball I think it's spooky pinball and I'm gonna put barrels of fun in it right now"

Three-horse race for exciting pinball companies: Jersey Jack, Spooky, and Barrels of Fun

"it is going to be the new dawn of pinball driven by the boutique companies. That if you're a pinball company, you want to be in a place where you're making anywhere from 500 to 3000 games a year. Not Stern's ship that needs to crank out 20 to 30,000 games a year"

The future of pinball is boutique companies making 500-3000 games per year, not Stern's 20-30k volume

"If I were to get a crystal ball and say, what does pinball look like in five years? I see JJP leading it. I do. I think Stern's in trouble"

JJP will lead pinball in five years, Stern is in trouble

"I think the future of pinball is boutique. The days of mass consumption of new inbox are going to be over. The days of distros making half a million dollars a year or more like just drop shipping Stern machines are going to be over."

The future of pinball is boutique - hobby will shrink 60% and mass consumption of NIB will end

"these companies you gotta remember this they're not making games for the most part to steal our quarters away when we go to the arcade that was what BLE Williams was designing their games for when they made games in the 90s"

Modern pinball companies target home buyers, not arcade operators like 90s Williams/BLE

"And again, I think market research is everything. I keep suggesting that these companies do more of it. They don't really seem to be doing any of it. And that's just a big risk. You know, you could have easily surveyed people. Would you buy a Predator Pinball machine if Arnold wasn't in it? And then you'd get back like 99% of people. No, I wouldn't."

Pinball companies should do more market research before committing to themes

"these games are so expensive. The magic is not in most of them. The themes aren't really what we want. We've had like four years of that. COVID made everything silly"

Current pinball market is oversaturated with overpriced games lacking magic

"I think more and more people are just gonna be content with the great games they have. And I think for newer games to... To make their way into your game room, they're gonna have to be really special."

People will be more selective about new games, only buying really special ones

"98% of pinball marketing absolutely sucks. They have no idea what they're doing and I would love to help them out... all I would do is help them sell more games everybody."

98% of pinball marketing sucks and he could help fix it

"I think we've been gaslit. I think so much creativity has come out of these games. It is absolutely incredible to me. What people consider to be a packed world under glass. Putting artwork down is not a world. That is a poster."

Modern pinball has been gaslit - creativity has declined despite higher prices

"I think that 2026 is going to be won by. J.J.P. and spooky. That's my prediction. I do. I think these two companies. Really have the most momentum. And really have the most. I think the themes people want the most."

2026 will be won by Jersey Jack and Spooky Pinball

"Let's release a game that's basically a beta version of the game and make everybody wait. It is not the way to go."

Modern pinball code development strategy criticism

"If you make more than one game a year, I'll call you mass produced. Jersey Jack is boutique. They're still make, they're stay only when you only make one game a year. You are a boutique bespoke pinball manufacturer."

Boutique vs mass production definition

"This hobby, I really mean this. It's arrogant. It's elitist... And yet for a $7,000 to $15,000 Pinball machine, everybody that worked on it remains absolutely quiet until they want your money on the day it's revealed. That is stupid. That is idiocracy. That is arrogance."

The pinball industry's marketing is arrogant and elitist - they don't give release dates or hype games like movies do

"it's a three horse race now. There are only three Pinball companies that people are really feeling FOMO for. Spooky, Stern and Jersey Jack. Everybody else in my honest opinion is on the outside of that race"

Only three companies create real FOMO: Spooky, Stern, and Jersey Jack

"It's a three horse race between spooky Stern and J.J.P. Those three companies that's where all the excitement is that's where all the energy is and that's where all the enthusiasm lies"

It's a three horse race between Spooky, Stern and JJP - other manufacturers will struggle

"I think the next three years of Pinball will produce the best Pinball we've ever seen ever. I mean it. I think the next three years of Pinball will produce games better than the last 30 years of Pinball."

The next three years will produce the best pinball games ever made

"Are you all tired of it? Are you all fatigued by now of almost every single game that's good? Is now gonna cost us over $10,000? Games that aren't even yet good, like Predator, $15,000 to your door? Games like Merlin's arcade, close to $10,000 if you get everything included?"

Every good pinball game now costs over $10,000 and people are price fatigued

"All you need to sell a thousand units is 20 people in 50 states, and you've got a thousand units sold. When you break it down like that, doesn't it get really embarrassing when you have to spend months trying to get a thousand people to see your vision?"

Pinball games can't even sell 1000 units when broken down to 20 people per state

"I know there's like 15 pinball companies out there, but the truth is there's really only like four that are consistently executing the right way. Stern pinball, Jersey Jack pinball, Spooky pinball."

Only three companies consistently execute well: Stern, Jersey Jack, and Spooky

"There's just an oversaturation of everything in pinball. There's an oversaturation of games. Content. Oversaturation of even conversation. I, I do think people are like burnt a little bit."

Current pinball market is oversaturated with games and content

"I think a reckoning is coming. I do, I think a reckoning is coming in this hobby and I think we're gonna see a reckoning within the next year. And by reckoning, I just think we're gonna start to see less and less people run at these new inbox games."

A reckoning is coming in pinball with people avoiding new games

"I think if you were to pull people right now, remember when I used to say like, whoever spends the most amount of money should get on the plane first. But now I'm feeling like, LE owners don't wanna be first. Why do you wanna be first through the door now and get a game that's incomplete or get a game that's gonna have so many mechanical issues?"

FOMO is dead - LE buyers no longer want to be first in line

"I don't think it's the best time ever for pinball lovers. I think it's one of the worst. 2008 was the best time."

This is one of the worst times for pinball lovers, not the best

"How many of you out there would go to a movie for $30? Think about this. How many of you would go see a movie for $30 where the movie wasn't finished? They didn't put in all the special effects. They didn't put in all the lines of the actors. All the scenes weren't even filmed."

Pinball companies should never release unfinished games and make consumers guinea pigs

"The whole notion of L.E. C.E. I think that's kind of over now. I do. I think the only next evolution of that will be super rare, super limited edition versions of games. So for example, if back to the future comes out and there's only 88 SLES, I think that's how they're going to do it."

The LE/CE model is over, future will be super rare limited editions only

"I think the battle lines are drawn. I think the companies that are executing right. If you ask me right now, spooky Pinball, Jersey Jack Pinball, Stern Pinball, after that, barrels, they're getting games out, you know, not as many as they should be. But man, it feels like that's kind of like, those are the big guys now."

Battle lines are drawn in pinball - Spooky, Jersey Jack, Stern, and Barrels are executing, while others like Chicago Gaming and Pinball Brothers are struggling

"Now is the worst time ever to get into this hobby as a buyer of NIB BOX. But it's the best time ever to be in this hobby if you've been in it for many years because gang, it's entertaining."

Now is the worst time to buy NIB but best time to be in hobby if you've been in it for years

"I see a Toy Story CE4 sale. The game was originally $15,000... It's on the market now for $8,750. That's like a $6,400 loss on the game and the scary part, it's not sold."

Current pinball market shows massive value losses on recent releases

"If pinball is primarily now going to be a toy and a hobby, where the cost to get in on a new game is $10,000 or more. I'm just going to say this right now. This hobby is headed for trouble."

Hobby headed for trouble if $10K+ is new normal

"I think $10,000 is kind of all anybody wants to spend on a pinball machine, and I mean a high-end collectible pinball machine. Nobody wants to spend much more."

$10,000 is the threshold for what people will pay for pinball machines - nothing can hold value at $13,000+

"The future is going to be boutique. It is. But boutique still need to be smart. You need to make a game people really want and you need to put a lot in it and the consumers will decide if they're getting their bang for the buck."

The future of pinball is boutique manufacturers, not large factories

"Stop using non-reflective glass as a teaser for your game. Nobody cares. All these games that are around 10 grand or more should come with non-reflective glass."

Non-reflective glass marketing is stupid and should be standard on $10K+ games

"I don't think you could pick a worse month to launch a new pinball machine, but there's four machines coming over the next four weeks."

Worst possible timing for pinball launches during economic crisis

"If pinball pricing is now this and it's not going to change, this industry is going to decline by 40 to 50% over the next three years."

Current pinball pricing is unsustainable and will cause industry decline

"I think the pinball market over the next three years is is going to shrink by 20 to 30% in terms of new inbox sales as an overall industry."

Pinball market will shrink 20-30% over next 3 years

"It's also why I think pinball is not going to stick around for that much longer. We're all going to get old and there's not going to be a next generation of kids that will pick up and buy these games."

Pinball won't stick around much longer due to generational change

"I just don't think like the big dogs will survive. I think the boutiques are the future because again, you're always going to be able to find a thousand customers over the next 10, 20 years in pinball. What you're not going to be able to find consistently if you want to make three to four games a year are 5,000 buyers per title."

Boutique manufacturers will survive while big companies won't due to generational change

"Nobody cares. That is not an important thing. The moment your company has established itself as a company that will deliver product, we know that people are okay waiting a couple months to get the product."

Companies should announce games before they're manufactured - waiting for boxed inventory is a critical marketing mistake

"The first thing we're going to witness are dealers and distros going out of business because these dealers or distros are the ones who have to buy these games."

Dealers and distributors will fail before manufacturers due to inventory carrying costs

"If you're making an LE or a CE of a game, you should only make that run once. You should not make another LE or CE of the game at a later date. You are burning your buyer base and your collector base."

Companies shouldn't make multiple limited editions of the same game - it screws over collectors

"Stern and Jersey Jack are really the major leagues of Pinball. They're the two companies that get thousands of games out a year. Everybody else is either nipping at the major leagues or the minor leagues."

Company tier system: Stern and Jersey Jack are major leagues, everyone else is minor leagues or lower

"I think in general, the entire hobby has oversupplied everything from shows to games to content five, six, seven, eight years ago. There used to be much less of everything... It just becomes a little overwhelming"

Pinball hobby has oversupplied everything and become overwhelming

"Theme is like 80% of it for me. It really is. And most of the themes have been horrible in pinball over the last like three to four years."

Theme is 80% of pinball appeal - most themes have been horrible for 3-4 years

"Like 30 years later, we're spending so much more money on every single game and all the games have a third in it as the games used to have in the mid 90s."

Modern games have 1/3 the content of 90s games despite costing much more

"But I think COVID has changed pinball marketing forever. You don't need to go to a show and sales during COVID were phenomenal."

Show reveals are dead - COVID changed pinball marketing forever and companies don't need expensive show presentations anymore