I only counted proper pinball machines and consider a real production run to be 100 pinball machines or more to be a realistic figure to call it a fully produced pinball machine for the public.
I haven't seen anything mass produced by Spooky ? I have seen one or two prototypes but haven't seen 10 or 20 of the same pinball machine being delivered to customers, nothing about price or public videos etc etc. I thought this would have made www.pinballnews.com if it was newsworthy and something worth noting but it seems to be in the dark because I stick to this pinball forum or PinballNews or FB and Stern or JJP for pinball news.
Is there a video of ten or more finished and shipped machines from Spooky etc.
They seem to have been working on apx 4 different titles for Apx five years with little end results, so I have never taken them seriously. ?
Heighway Pinball, hope they do something cause I don't count the Bacardi toy etc, but the issue with Full Throttle is that reports say they only have pre orders for half a dozen in the USA only, a couple machines in Australia, and no great figures for the UK published. I wonder just how many millions this title has cost to set up a factory for, and if the orders haven't reached 100, it will be a massive financial loss ? I am perplexed how Heighway can possibly financially survive on paper.
The Big L pinball, again, how many have really been sold and how will they financially be able to set up a factory for such low numbers ? It's all great in theory, but the calculator tells a grim story for money being spent versus total returns to come in. If these were my businesses and my balance sheets, it would be almost like trading insolvent.
Financial warning bells. I just wonder if anything with these start ups are really ever going to eventuate and if any of them will be here in 1 or 2 years.
Spooky sold out there run of 150 only ever to be made "AMH" with approximately 70-80 already sent out to customers already with 6-8 coming to Australia at the end of the year which is the last of the production run.
Spooky scrapped "Pinball Zombies from Beyond the Grave" but the word out suggests they are using that layout with new art for a licensed deal that they are going to announce in the next month or so. They have never worked on more than 2 designs publicly and there model has always been get the pin close to finish and then ask for a deposit 3 months out from the build. So if anything I think they will survive and people have been very happy with there games. Plus they are out west and have a strong support from Pinball Life for parts with about 6 people employed so they are taking it slow and steady. I doubt these guys will do big runs for a while but they admit building pinball is hard but they are living the dream.
Heighway are probably going to use Wayne in Melbourne for importing and distribution and they have a licensed deal to do Aliens and he has other businesses so guessing that they are funding his setup.
Big L are contracting a company to build the cabinets and then outsource assembly so they don't really have a factory.
