Avatar Pinball -- Stern

The last Stern I would consider buying is Iron Man. It is a fun game but I don't think its worth the NIB price. I like plenty of Stern pins, I've had a Simpsons Pinball Party and currently I have a Spiderman. I still want a Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Carribean and an Iron Man someday.

Stern is going to have to step it back up to keep the people that actually buy these things buying them.
 
khabbi said:
Hey, I see that some people are bashing the Avatar pin, just be grateful that there's ANY pinball machines being made... and we forget that these are meant, for the most part, to be put in a public place to draw attention and earn money.. and this one fits that bill for sure. I don't think they're catering to the home collectors as much... Even though that's probably decent (10% perhaps?) percentage of their sales.
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I'm with you. I'm generally an optimist, I just can't get to the point where I think a game is a shitty game. I like almost every game I've ever played, and although I haven't played Avatar yet, it looks fun to me.

We could argue whether it's as fun as another game, but that's not really the point. Are people going to enjoy it? Yes.
 
LyonsArcade said:
No Tron pinball from Stern. The next pinball is Rolling Stones. I am not kidding.
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That's not surprising, with all of the talk on their Facebook page about guitars and such.

Rolling Stones seems quite limiting since a lot of kids probably won't give a crap for it but at least it's a little different.
 
I have no problems with Stern... I like Stern's games... I like Gary Stern.

.... but saying they're making a strange business decision by releasing Rolling Stones is ignoring that they released, um, ... "C.S.I.".... "Wheel Of Fortune"... "24" ... "Roller Coaster Tycoon" I mean they're not really known for giving a damn whether or not a theme makes any sense as a pinball. I guess Roller Coaster Tycoon kind of worked with all the ramps, but did csi, wof, or 24 really help the gameplay with a theme like that?

I know Rolling Stones is going to be their Music themed game... and of course there was a Rolling Stones released back 'n the day, but I wish Stern would have gotten way out of the box on this one. A Metallica pin would be incredible... it would sell very, very, very well in my opinion. I know Metallica is dated, but so is pinball and so are pinball players. A Metallica pin (and I'm not a big Metallica fan, really) would look great, would be almost impossible NOT to play if you saw it on location, would have just KILLER pinball music, and would be highly collectible.
 
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VectorJunkie said:
They don't have to put any gameplay up there, just update the outdated DMD. I guess my problem is that I never liked the DMD displays and here we are in 2010. Yawn... :)
Click to expand...

This. 2010 and we are still using DMDs. That should say everything about the state of things.

10 Pinball can't afford to not innovate and upgrade
20 Pinball can't afford to innovate and upgrade
30 GoTo 10

Iron Man was "enh". Darkknight level of "enh". It has it's moments, but I'm not making a B-Line towards it if I have other choices. Still rather own a Spider-Man, Lord of the Rings and Family Guy. I only played Buckhunter three times, but was surprised by how entertaining the total experience was. I dare say I had a better time with it than I did with my Iron Man experience. Spider-Man is still king of the Stern hill. Stern IJ is still the benchmark for their latest worst.

So I guess we can confirm that this is not Ritchie's design?
 
Yes, it's definately not Ritchie's design.

On the LCD, you guys really don't get all the things involved. The thing Gary likes about the DMD is it's easy to code for, he's stated before that if they go with LCD's, then he has to use realistic video, which costs more to produce, and if he uses shots from the movie... he's got to pay the actors guild and it opens a whole other can of worms. Right now he can make some cheap ass dmd animation that you can't recognize anybody in, and it's cheap. He's never, ever going to make things more expensive, they don't sell worth a shit anymore and he's going to limp on like this until he dies, 30 years from now.

If people (and this is at no one in particular) want to be pissed at a pinball company, get pissed at Williams. They were still making money, but said fuck it and closed the company so they could make MORE money in Vegas.

At least Gary's still making Pins. There's nobody else you can say that about. And NO, that spanish company doesn't count :)
 
LyonsArcade said:
I have no problems with Stern... I like Stern's games... I like Gary Stern.

.... but saying they're making a strange business decision by releasing Rolling Stones is ignoring that they released, um, ... "C.S.I.".... "Wheel Of Fortune"... "24" ... "Roller Coaster Tycoon" I mean they're not really known for giving a damn whether or not a theme makes any sense as a pinball. I guess Roller Coaster Tycoon kind of worked with all the ramps, but did csi, wof, or 24 really help the gameplay with a theme like that?

I know Rolling Stones is going to be their Music themed game... and of course there was a Rolling Stones released back 'n the day, but I wish Stern would have gotten way out of the box on this one. A Metallica pin would be incredible... it would sell very, very, very well in my opinion. I know Metallica is dated, but so is pinball and so are pinball players. A Metallica pin (and I'm not a big Metallica fan, really) would look great, would be almost impossible NOT to play if you saw it on location, would have just KILLER pinball music, and would be highly collectible.
Click to expand...

I also like Stern but I didn't say it was a strange decision, just a limiting one, given their recent push to find ways to get more people involved in pinball after they got that new investor. At Comic Con they were obviously delighted to have so many kids try out Ironman pinball and they are jumping onto the Avatar bandwagon for that purpose too. I know their target market, which beyond the amusement business mostly consists of older collectors will probably appreciate Rolling Stones but it's not something I would consider for my arcade if I was looking to buy a new pin unless it was really innovative. TRON seems like it would be a good bet on grabbing the attention from people of all ages thanks to the new movie.

That Metallica pinball that the band had made for themselves is pretty awesome though. I'm not sure who has a larger fanbase, the Stones or Metallica but if they simply reproduced that one, it looks like it would be a winner. Maybe I'm just slanted towards Metallica as I could care less for the Stones (blasphemy to someone, I'm sure).
 
LyonsArcade said:
On the LCD, you guys really don't get all the things involved. The thing Gary likes about the DMD is it's easy to code for, he's stated before that if they go with LCD's, then he has to use realistic video, which costs more to produce, and if he uses shots from the movie... he's got to pay the actors guild and it opens a whole other can of worms. Right now he can make some cheap ass dmd animation that you can't recognize anybody in, and it's cheap. He's never, ever going to make things more expensive, they don't sell worth a shit anymore and he's going to limp on like this until he dies, 30 years from now.
Click to expand...

GoTo 10

;)
 
LyonsArcade said:
Yes, it's definately not Ritchie's design.

On the LCD, you guys really don't get all the things involved. The thing Gary likes about the DMD is it's easy to code for, he's stated before that if they go with LCD's, then he has to use realistic video, which costs more to produce, and if he uses shots from the movie... he's got to pay the actors guild and it opens a whole other can of worms. Right now he can make some cheap ass dmd animation that you can't recognize anybody in, and it's cheap. He's never, ever going to make things more expensive, they don't sell worth a shit anymore and he's going to limp on like this until he dies, 30 years from now.

If people (and this is at no one in particular) want to be pissed at a pinball company, get pissed at Williams. They were still making money, but said fuck it and closed the company so they could make MORE money in Vegas.

At least Gary's still making Pins. There's nobody else you can say that about. And NO, that spanish company doesn't count :)
Click to expand...

Well there is a way to get around the LCD problem of paying the actors guild - stop making games based upon movies/TV shows! :) I know it won't happen due to all the reasons you mention but I still would prefer to see them go in that direction. I would pay a little extra for a pin using an LCD than a dot matrix as it would make the DMD's look even older and out-of-date than they already do.
 
Gary Stern is as we speak the KING of pinball. He runs shit when it comes to pinball. There's no idea you or I can come up with that he hasn't heard 10,000 times, and he has a reason not to do every damn one of them.

The reason he won't do a non-licensed pin is because operators won't buy a non-licensed pin, and the home buyers who buy pins as status symbols won't buy one.

The only people that would buy non licensed pins are collectors and pinheads, which isn't the majority of his market. Gary claims that a large portion of the home sales are to people who only buy 1, and only play it for a few weeks and then leave it turned off sitting in the Den, and they brag about it when company comes over. They'll buy a Batman pin, but they won't buy a non-licensed pin.

If they don't buy a license for a pin, then now they get to draw every inch of the artwork on every inch of the machine. That's character development money, extra artists, etc. Right now they just do it all digitally with existing artwork.

If they do an LCD with no license, then they have to hire animators to create characters and artwork for the LCD display.

OR, they can pay what Gary says is about $50 per machine for a full theme and artwork package of something people are familiar with, and already know how to play before they step up to the machine. When you play a Batman machine, you know that you want to drive the batmobile and you want to beat up the Joker. When you play "Old City Blues" or whatever a non-licensed pin would be, how do you play it? It just doesn't make the same money from casual players out on location that a licensed pin would.

I mean what it comes down to is: it ain't gonna happen. What you're getting is what you're GOING to be getting for quite a while, lol.

Now... don't construe this as my support for it. I'm just saying, from a business perspective, I see why he does what he does. I'm not sure there's a better way to do it. There may be a way that you or I would enjoy more....... but that doesn't mean it would keep them in business, and it very well might push them out of business.

I mean, it's like asking Willie Nelson to quit writing all that bullshit music he's done now, write one more "On The Road Again", and then kill himself. lol. I think I'd prefer him to keep putting out mediocre albums.

Similarly, do you want Stern to blow their load on 1 last great game, then close like Williams did? Or would you rather them putt along, doing mediocre games. I think the two are PROBABLY, mutually-exclusive right now.
 
I would buy a Metallica pin NIB! ...if it had their older tunes.. Imagine having a 10 ball multiball mode that plays the entire "Whiplash" tune. Once the tune is done, all balls drain - similar to LAH. And as the new ball is set for plunging, the tune "Ride The Lightning" starts the gameplay.

It would be SWEET!

:headbang:
 
LyonsArcade said:
Gary Stern is as we speak the KING of pinball....

...I mean, it's like asking Willie Nelson to quit writing all that bullshit music he's done now, write one more "On The Road Again", and then kill himself. lol. I think I'd prefer him to keep putting out mediocre albums.

Similarly, do you want Stern to blow their load on 1 last great game, then close like Williams did? Or would you rather them putt along, doing mediocre games.
Click to expand...

More like Willie Nelson keeps remixing "On The Road Again" with late 80's audio equipment and country music fans being told, "Just fucking take it. It's all we can afford. Joe Blow automatically recognizes 'On The Road Again', so the last remaining shitty record shops are only going to stock those albums with 'On The Road Again' plastered on the cover (also, the CD will be cracked and only play the first 1/4th of the song...and the record shop owner is not gonna waste his precious time trying to glue it back together). Would you rather NOT have new country music at all? Ingrates!"

Maybe "country music", as a genre, doesn't deserve to survive if it's going to just keep being mediocre on every front possible. I realize "country music" fans don't want to deal with that, but there we are. I wish "Willie Nelson" all the luck in the world in his noble quest to keep "country music" alive. Doesn't stop it from coming off behind the times and frankly...a little sad.
 
sosage said:
Maybe "country music", as a genre, doesn't deserve to survive if it's going to just keep being mediocre on every front possible. I realize "country music" fans don't want to deal with that, but there we are. I wish "Willie Nelson" all the luck in the world in his noble quest to keep "country music" alive. Doesn't stop it from coming off behind the times and frankly...a little sad.
Click to expand...

Country music is the bile of all music. It's not even good enough to become sh_t.
But, I digress.

Yes, pins could be better. And I don't agree with the whole, it's all that's left, so you have to appreciate it attitude. I really do believe that a company should start making new em games. people used to go to arcades because they could get something that they couldn't get at them. Now, arcades are in the house. Classic games can be had on a multitude of platforms, and the new arcade games are based on the same hardware as the consoles. Then, the arcade games are released on the home consoles a month after they come out in arcades. There is no reason to go to a place and spend money to do what you can easily do at home for "free". Em games are really what got people interested in arcades in the first place, and they still can be fun and challenging. Anyone who has played zeke's peak or ice cold beer can attest. Those games are fun, challenging, and you can't get the gameplay anywhere else. I think an arcade dedicated to pins and em games would thrive as long as it had exposure.
 
LyonsArcade said:
Yes, it's definately not Ritchie's design.

On the LCD, you guys really don't get all the things involved. The thing Gary likes about the DMD is it's easy to code for, he's stated before that if they go with LCD's, then he has to use realistic video, which costs more to produce, and if he uses shots from the movie... he's got to pay the actors guild and it opens a whole other can of worms. Right now he can make some cheap ass dmd animation that you can't recognize anybody in, and it's cheap. He's never, ever going to make things more expensive, they don't sell worth a shit anymore and he's going to limp on like this until he dies, 30 years from now.

If people (and this is at no one in particular) want to be pissed at a pinball company, get pissed at Williams. They were still making money, but said fuck it and closed the company so they could make MORE money in Vegas.

At least Gary's still making Pins. There's nobody else you can say that about. And NO, that spanish company doesn't count :)
Click to expand...

That all sounds very short sighted and moronic. If you don't want to license footage, create your own damn theme. They seem to think they need to use a franchise to get people to play or buy. That is probably true, but only because they don't innovate on the games and they are polishing the turd with Avatar blue.

They need a skunkworks team to do a derivative label under stern or something. It sounds like that will never happen and stern will suck with an occasional B- title to tide pinheads over.
 
LyonsArcade said:
Gary Stern is as we speak the KING of pinball. He runs shit when it comes to pinball. There's no idea you or I can come up with that he hasn't heard 10,000 times, and he has a reason not to do every damn one of them.

The reason he won't do a non-licensed pin is because operators won't buy a non-licensed pin, and the home buyers who buy pins as status symbols won't buy one.

The only people that would buy non licensed pins are collectors and pinheads, which isn't the majority of his market. Gary claims that a large portion of the home sales are to people who only buy 1, and only play it for a few weeks and then leave it turned off sitting in the Den, and they brag about it when company comes over. They'll buy a Batman pin, but they won't buy a non-licensed pin.

If they don't buy a license for a pin, then now they get to draw every inch of the artwork on every inch of the machine. That's character development money, extra artists, etc. Right now they just do it all digitally with existing artwork.

If they do an LCD with no license, then they have to hire animators to create characters and artwork for the LCD display.

OR, they can pay what Gary says is about $50 per machine for a full theme and artwork package of something people are familiar with, and already know how to play before they step up to the machine. When you play a Batman machine, you know that you want to drive the batmobile and you want to beat up the Joker. When you play "Old City Blues" or whatever a non-licensed pin would be, how do you play it? It just doesn't make the same money from casual players out on location that a licensed pin would.

I mean what it comes down to is: it ain't gonna happen. What you're getting is what you're GOING to be getting for quite a while, lol.

Now... don't construe this as my support for it. I'm just saying, from a business perspective, I see why he does what he does. I'm not sure there's a better way to do it. There may be a way that you or I would enjoy more....... but that doesn't mean it would keep them in business, and it very well might push them out of business.

I mean, it's like asking Willie Nelson to quit writing all that bullshit music he's done now, write one more "On The Road Again", and then kill himself. lol. I think I'd prefer him to keep putting out mediocre albums.

Similarly, do you want Stern to blow their load on 1 last great game, then close like Williams did? Or would you rather them putt along, doing mediocre games. I think the two are PROBABLY, mutually-exclusive right now.
Click to expand...

King of pinball? Not something worthy of bragging about given the current state of things. Maybe Slumlord is more accurate.

His approach that you have outlined at best is going to keep them afloat, but I'm not seeing it expand the market in any meaningful way. I'm just glad there are a great deal of machines available that I would be proud to own. Just not any of the newer sterns. I still hope they get there shit together, but I won't hold my breath.
 
Lyonsarcade I have to agree with you on pretty much everything you've said. Sadly people get their panties in a wad because your opinion comes across as fact. I get what you are saying. None the less I honestly do agree with you.

When people think Stern can simply replace a DMD with a drop in LCD like replacing a CRT with an LCD that couldn't be any more further from the truth. It's flat out too costly to use LCD's and all the other shit that goes along with it ... Stern himself has admitted this. Too costly - dead issue people.
Wish in one hand shit in the other.

Bagging on Williams - why even waste the energy? They saw a market that was destined to fail is what I think. Hard to argue that huh? BAck to the same old shit argument of reinventing pinball. Seriously - what the hell else can be done with pinball? Pin2K's was a mixture of vids and pins right? That shit failed too. Yes I liked all 2 of them just fine but they didn;t sell well. Hell even Steve Ritchie said they just weren;t cost efective. Arcade games - fail. We have IT Technologies pretty much one of the last games in town. Are they the Gary Stern of Video games? Kind looks like it don;t it? Video games are dead people. Our glory days are just that - glory days. It's too freaking expensive to make this pinball shit anymore. Stern just has to be on their last leg. They gotta be. Cheapening their machines to me is a last stand. Let me say I love pinball to the point it gives me a hard on. My wife says the word pinball and I get hard. I really do love it that much. I hate saying 90% of what I did but it's time that people try to understand if it was your business what would you do? I'm not a brand snob. I think Stern has made some killer games .... but the games IMHO just keep getting worse and worse. Sorry Zcamaro - I too was stoked about Avatar until I saw how they disembowled the hardware. I was looking forward to actually nutting up to buy my first NIB. Instead I'm buying a LOTR. I hope this game gives you and your family all the happiness in the world. I sincerely mean that but I won;t be buying one.
 
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