2 themes isn't the issue to me, that seems fun. 2 coding teams seems weird to me.

Not my cup of tea. Don’t really see the point from a consumer point of view, other than that there’s more choice of themes.

I think it's probably a necessity if you're selling horror-themed pins. Not every home and location will buy a pin with blood and gore. Having a second option caters to those buyers.

That's fair. And I think we learned niche' themes like Ultaman don't cut it

Bingo. I think this guy is directly on point.

They are smart for going with themes they know their audience wants.

Seems lazy to me. Design one game and re-skin it 10 times to appeal to more people?

On the other hand, lots of people like playing MET but dont care for the band/music, so maybe they'd buy an identical Muppets or Van Halen game.

Sometime's it's a curse seeing both sides of the coin.

Glad I could help.

Wouldn't be the first time.

https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=4540

Supreme, Spider-Man home. Heavy metal, Star Wars home. Whoa Nelly, can crusher, Primus. Family guy, shrek. All fairly recent Stern games that are using shared layouts. Makes sense for smaller runs of games. Spooky only does small runs of any game so it makes perfect sense for them to do a split theme. Helps them minimize the design and production costs of key pieces associated with a specific layout.

Nah. It’s laziness. Imo it robs the table of it being unique & special. Every theme deserves its own treatment. Time will tell if they’re smart. Last I last checked ultraman & Halloween weren’t terribly well received.

Releasing two identical playfield cornerstones at the same time does seem like the kind of thing people would crucify Stern over. But then spooky has always received huge swaths of slack from people here due to their plucky small town earnestness.

Gottlieb used the El Dorado layout for what, seven different titles?

Yup. And they’ve been tits up for 25 years.

Really makes you think.

Could be a way to develop code and rules experience for future projects.

But they were still in business for 25+/- years after those El Dorado look a like games.
Really makes you think those games had nothing to do with them being out of business.

Personally I think they are smart. Can make two games that are on different ends of the theme spectrum. I had no interest in Halloween but love the Ultra man theme. Same with Many of the other games that were copied. Of course I buy pins to have fun playing. So doesn't matter if the same playfied was used on another game.

Someone should start a was Gottlieb smart for going out of business thread.

Maybe spooky just trying to get bought our by a movie company; now that's smart!

I think it’s because the rulesets are completely different.

And I don't buy because it is a horror theme argument. TFTC killed it on location and women always gravitated to mine when I owned it. They seem to get a kick out of that stuff.

Then you also have TWD more recently.

You think family fun centers are going to buy TCM?

I actually bought my TWD from.someone who had to sell it because the backglass was giving his kid nightmares.

Don't know but TFTC was at our Camelot Golf and Family Fun Center and did just fine. I played the crap out of it there and didn't see any kids or moms getting scared. You should also see some of the video games they have now.

If you are routing games at Chucky Cheese you might want to stick with Shrek or Looney Tunes.

Point was I was responding to was a general statement that if you are selling horror themes a reskin would be a necessity and TWD seemed to do just fine without one. As did TFTC and BSD to name some others.

It seems easier to just release one machine vs two. Laziness I don’t thing is the correct term. Capitalizing on two completely different groups may be more accurate. I can’t speak for them, but laziness I don’t think is the correct term. Making money is likely the correct term.

theyre trying the tesla approach by using current/future products to fund the next project but cant polish off any previous projects before moving on leaving the previous person in limbo. While not delivering a complete 100% usable product. This will only last for so long before people stop playing. People will get tired of fixing brand new machines not stop and they really need to stop relying on the consumer to fix their problems. Whens the last time an appliance company told you they would send you the parts and want you to fix it? Theyre also going the Data East route grabbing any theme they can get the rights to and making a pin for it.

If it works for JJP and Stern, why wouldn't Spooky do this?

What a take..

its not wrong.... ever have a New out of the box game take out a 20 amp breaker? while being the only thing plugged in on the circuit.

I think its a great idea. Lots of games I like playing game wise but cant stand the theme, art and sound packages. Lots of new sterns.

Maybe in the past. Won't be too smart to continue to take a year to manufacture a game and still require non-refundable deposits

I think a lot of pinheads fail to realize that there are numerous games out there which had the layout designed and pretty much done before a theme was picked. Suggesting that a reskin somehow makes the game less fitting the second theme is kind of laughable. I bet the folks over at Stern are silently giggling at some of these takes as well.

As for the question at hand...I think it makes great business sense. You hit a much bigger market with 50%(?) less work. I would have bought an Iron Maiden if it was Archer or just about any other non-band theme.

Hate it. You are supposed to cater the layout and toys to match the theme.

I couldn't agree more. Make Rush into a sequel DE time machine. That would be awesome! The layout of Iron Maiden is cool but I couldn't name one of their songs with a gun to my head. The art is good, Pharaoh's Curse, boom. Much more interesting than a band game. The layout and engineering is already done. Make some rules, sounds and music. Hell, recycle the lightshows.

Family Guy and Shrek would like a word

I currently have 5 spooky games and 1 Dataeast game, love all 6. Which spooky games do you have that aren't finished? RAM is outstanding! ACNC is a fun, uniquely satisfying game to play. HW took a long time to get where it is currently but it is an absolutely gorgeous, challenging game. TNA simply kills taking me back to the 80s. As for software updates, they kept enhancing play. Sure I'd like buying completely developed games but that seemed to go out with EMs.

For the most part besides a few bug fixes, that actually went out with ROM chips when downloadable code to thumb drives gave manufacturers an excuse not to.

Yes, that's what I think is weird.
Sounds great in theory but could lead to issues. What happens if one is really awesome and the other one is shit.
Then LT is gonna want TCM code and Spooky is such an 'aw shucks' family l biz they'll try to oblige and you'll have 2 coding teams doing the same thing...meh we'll wait and see. Maybe it'll be fine.

TNA wasn’t Designed or coded by Spooky, just licensed. Scott Danesi did all the work on his own and deserves all of the credit. Rick and Morty’s layout was designed by Scott as well, while a spooky game, feels way more like a Danesi game.

Yup

I don't think family fun centers are going to buy pinballs.

These two check both boxes.

Cartoons I watched as a kid and still do, and a movie that came out when I was 12 and all into horror.

Can we get a third rendition, perhaps a music theme?

A lot of the smaller mini-golf/go-kart/redemption arcade combo locations I've been to up and down the east cost typically have one or two, ocassionally three.
Mando seems to be a hit with those places.

But that is what so many complained about with Halloween and UM, that the rules were too similar and most of all that they had one programmer doing both games, meaning it took code longer to get out the door as they had to take turns with each game instead of simply focusing on one. Like right now the programmer is focused on doing Ultramans big final wizard mode code update, so bugs in Halloween are on back burner while UM gets it's code then it will come back around to Halloween? Players for both games are constantly waiting for the other game's code to get done and release so their game gets attention. Then there is the general critique folks had that the games shared rulesets.

2 coding teams, designers, and teams allows each game to get the full attention of their respective team.

Except LT could end up with aweome rules and the Horror crowd could end up with crappy rules. Won't be happy then.

As long as the codes are different, and the rule sets aren’t too closely aligned, I think it opens the door for having more niche themes.

I’m sure I’m in the minority, but I could go the rest of my life without another marvel theme. It’s fun to see the niche ones.

I can go the rest of my life without watching another Marvel movie. So burnt out.

IMHO - as a player, the only question for me is whether or not I would care about playing two identical layouts even if the rules were different. It's obviously been done in the past several times. For me personally, I have no desire to play TCM, so the only version of this playfield I will ever experience is LT.

As for Soooky, the only thing I think they are really saving on is a second play field design. The cost/BOM to manufacture the same playfield under two themes is probably marginally cheaper than making two completely separate PFs in the first place.

You still have to pay for two licenses, you have to do separate artwork for each game, you have to make different toys for each game, you have to make the same parts but in different colors and quantities, you still have two fully separate dev teams, and so on. I just don't see where there's major savings by reusing a PF design. But it is probably is a faster way to get two games to market.

But that's just my opinion. I don't build pinball machines.

It will be interesting to see which game ultimately comes out on top in the market and with the pinball playing public. My money is on LT.

I can't believe they actually invested in and manufactured TCSM.
The preview gave me worse creeps then the movie, which was junk then and continues to be junk.
At least Motel Hell tried to be funny.
What a reach.
First Elton and now this.
There has to be better choices for new pinball then this.
These would be the LAST choices if I were building a new game.
Smart? Maybe Loonie Tunes will be a hit.
A blood soaked pinball machine with meat saws wouldn't stay long in my house.
The kind of thing that with an innocent visit from some sort of local Official turns into an investigation and bad press.