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Any thoughts on the newer manufacturers?

AlanJ

AlanJ

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Alan
I'm referring to:
American Pinball - Houdini
Homepin - Thunderbirds
Heighway - Alien and Full Throttle

What are your views on each of these newer suppliers please?
 
All too early to tell - heighway very bad start but improving...


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American Pinball - Houdini
Have delivered when they said they would,based on proc so vast support. Good model without all the LE bollox, keen price for fully deatured game.
Homepin - Thunderbirds
Horrible art, meh layout unproven tech. Would wait till #3 to see if they make it.
Heighway - Alien and Full Throttle
On game #3, still struggling, own hardware. wouldn't touch.
 
All hot air all company’s who talk the talk but still not Walked the walk
American pinball Houdini still not here yet as promised and when you send them an e mail normal us reply of no reply also vastly strip of stuff over the original proto type

Don’t know anything about home pin

Highway pinball 3rd game now lots and lots of failed promises circa and ft seem now to be forgotten about Hugh price rise that has priced alien out of the market in the UK over competitors nobody still has there Le ordered years ago and the se sales seem to be drying up will be interesting to see what they come up with in 2018
 
American P have deep pockets and seem determined to make many games. Rosh is a real determined, organized guy.

Homepin. Thunderbirds doesn't look great, can't update code without sending board back to manufacturer!

HP. Games too expensive in UK, their home market and reliability a big issue. Cabinet shape is a miss. Shame as would love a Queen pinball which is being revealed in March so says Kaneda......
 
I would like to clarify a few things:

Homepin is an Amusement machine manufacturer NOT a pinball machine manufacturer. We ship a container of arcade machines from our own Shenzhen factory every second month and have done so for over four years.

The Homepin factory is 100% Australian owned and run by Australian electronic engineers - we do not have any Chinese partner. Homepin is a registered legal entity in China as a "WOFE" (a wholly owned foreign enterprise).

We have a new arcade machine in the works to be announced shortly. It is not a pinball machine.

Homepin also makes an extensive range of replacement pinball machine printed circuit boards that are well received around the world and sold by dealers in most countries.

Thunderbirds Pinball has been exhibited around the world to our target markets for a few months now and we are currently finishing the last batch of eight prototype machines to confirm the myriad of changes, small and large, are all OK before launching into full production later this month.

One of these final sample machines will be shipped to the UK for Pinfest in Daventry and be delivered to ITV London after Pinfest.

ALL Homepin products are inspected by a world recognised inspection authority and ALL carry CE (and numerous other) inspection and testing marks. These are all done legally and are EXPENSIVE and time consuming to get through the approvals process (which is why some don't bother). Our plywood is made for us by a wood factory and is made without the use of dangerous and illegal glues. Every batch carries certification.

We do not make copy products at all and respect all IP - indeed, that's the very reason Thunderbirds Pinball is fully licenced and approved by ITV London.

Whether or not Thunderbirds Pinball is successful or not remains to be seen but one comparison I see bandied about is not correct - comparing it to a Stern Pro is not comparing "apples to apples" as our machines come standard with shakers, real knockers (not available on ANY Stern machine), cabinet protectors, programmable coin mechs, licenced Thunderbirds tokens and many many other things as standard. That makes a TAG about HALF the price of a comparable Stern machine.

You do NOT have to "return the board" to the factory for program updates at all. Indeed, program updates is an area where many have been hoodwinked into thinking it's "the norm" and you should do it every week - RUBBISH! Updates (if and when required) are a simple chip swap that can be done via your local dealer, but by yourself in 30 seconds. No fuss, no downloads, no bricking your machine or complications doing it - IF it is ever required.

I will be attending the Pinfest show in Daventry and I welcome all along to have a chat and discuss our direction and ideas for the future.

Constructive comments and criticism is always welcome, trolls and comments without constructive merit are not.
 
No idea about the first couple of manufacturers but you would have to be very brave to jump in for a heighway pin

When I played Aliens last year I genuinely liked it. Some interesting shots etc and far ahead of stern pros in terms of features

However the subsequent price hikes and missed deadlines since means there is no chance of me buying one.

I know Iain has just received his which is good news but what about all the other customers still waiting? If you bought Queen then I suspect your deposit will be used to try and sort their current mess out rather than going towards your machine.

Unless they start cranking their current games out and you can physically pick up a fully working game #3 then I would suggest extreme caution

Such a shame as it could have been great.
 
Alien is a theme that I’d snap up in a moment (actual thunderbirds is too!) but the minute I saw the machine struggle to work at Chicago then all the agro a couple of years ago at EAG I knew it was a risky proposition, I was hopeful that the new management would get on top of things and it seems they are for the most part but still have a lot of things to sort - but now having had a close encounter with an alien machine that lasted seconds because of a high voltage fuse that keeps blowing - trying to debug that in what must be the most complex machine I’ve ever seen - nightmare. I can’t imaging alien lasting the same length of time as a SAM based Stern or a Williams. The only way I might have bought this game was to buy it from the factory as an in stock item - anyone putting money down on a HP Pinball is mental - better to goto the casino and put the wedge on black! Now having seen how unreliable it is the only way I’d take one is if they paid me the 8K to take it!

Re: Thunderbirds - I hope thunderbirds is a good game and does well. Looking forward to playing the game and meeting you in August. Hopefully we can do a live stream of the game too. Best way to silence critics is to knock it our the park game wise.

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Homepin said:
I would like to clarify a few things:

You do NOT have to "return the board" to the factory for program updates at all. Indeed, program updates is an area where many have been hoodwinked into thinking it's "the norm" and you should do it every week - RUBBISH! Updates (if and when required) are a simple chip swap that can be done via your local dealer, but by yourself in 30 seconds. No fuss, no downloads, no bricking your machine or complications doing it - IF it is ever required.

I
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Are you saying that the machine will be released with a full set of finalised code and will rarely, if ever, need to be updated?
And, are you saying that if, in those rare instances where a code update IS required, it's a chip change, not a software download?
 
I would love an alien at some point, but then I I am mad cos I bought a full throttle, which I love the theme of.
I Do worry about problems in the future, but hey not a lot more than new sterns, and alien was way better than guardians or twd, or game of thrones, or Star Wars in my opinion and a lot better build quality, longevity we will have to see

I also love thunderbirds as a theme, be interested in what price it will be.
 
Houdini looks great and really can't wait to play but don't know enough about the company and it's way too early to tell.

Thunderbirds - Looks good and a promising start so can't wait to play it at Daventry. Like what they are saying above and watched a few you tube videos on the manufacturing side. No nonsense stuff which I like. They are NOT new to manufacturing so know what they are doing which is more than can be said for some of the others.

Heighway - Mmm. Where do we start. Everything Neil said above. Was at the factory tour years ago, never got going and so many issues. I was even at Flipout on Sunday and the Alien there was broken which is standard. Hardly worked at EAG and was removed from Brewdog for blowing the fuses (I believe) and as much as I want them to be successful (as I would any pinball manufacturer) I would not invest any money at this stage.

CGC remakes look a good safer bet and AFMr + MMr have been receive well.

Deeproot - Who knows!
 
Alien seems to be a cursed franchise - so many videogames have been absolutely awful. I'd love an Alien machine as it a favourite film and must admit I thought about one last year but it seems to have so many issues.

There's a part of me thinks that with modern bus-based digital electronics, that running some lights and a few switches and coils from a small low powered computer is one of those 'how hard can it be' questions - I'm guessing that's what Heighway thought too, and why Stern have been so slow to change to newer systems (like LCDs instead of DMD).


I do find it odd that anyone would decide that a chip-swap update is the way to go. I'm sure Homepin have their reasons, but the ease you can do firmware updates these days on everything, I can't see what it would be. I think the last chip-swap I had to do on anything was a stuffed BIOS about 20 years ago.
 
cyberkryten said:
Alien seems to be a cursed franchise - so many videogames have been absolutely awful. I'd love an Alien machine as it a favourite film and must admit I thought about one last year but it seems to have so many issues.

There's a part of me thinks that with modern bus-based digital electronics, that running some lights and a few switches and coils from a small low powered computer is one of those 'how hard can it be' questions - I'm guessing that's what Heighway thought too, and why Stern have been so slow to change to newer systems (like LCDs instead of DMD).


I do find it odd that anyone would decide that a chip-swap update is the way to go. I'm sure Homepin have their reasons, but the ease you can do firmware updates these days on everything, I can't see what it would be. I think the last chip-swap I had to do on anything was a stuffed BIOS about 20 years ago.
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Well in this day and age, when you can get a plug socket that has built in wi-fi, and our printers have been wireless for years now, you would expect ALL PINBALL manufacturers to be putting in wi-fi and networking capabilities as bog standard. Automatic software downloads, central diagnostics, ability to link to each other, etc. etc.
 
AlanJ said:
Well in this day and age, when you can get a plug socket that has built in wi-fi, and our printers have been wireless for years now, you would expect ALL PINBALL manufacturers to be putting in wi-fi and networking capabilities as bog standard. Automatic software downloads, central diagnostics, ability to link to each other, etc. etc.
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Dutch Pinball have actually done this - my Lebowski has WiFi built in and the plan was for over the air updates, leaderboards etc - but it isn’t activated in the software as of yet and who knows if it ever will be at this point. They even have a page dedicated to it on their website with two machines linked so you can get an idea of what they had planned.

http://www.dutchpinball.com/tbl/live/
 
Guys, when talking about Wi-Fi, USB updates etc etc you are 'usually' talking about companies that are making tens or hundreds of thousands of the same item - they have an enormous budget to spend on R&D and things like this.

I'm typing this response on my Lenovo notepad - I have two of them and they have likely made hundreds of thousands of them - the R&D has well and truly been recouped for all the 'nice' stuff like Wi-Fi, USB, BT etc etc.

Homepin is building a pinball machine and making 21 at a time, not tens of thousands.

The R&D is simply not there, nor would be the return to do it. We are struggling to have enough budget to actually get the code to where we want it and that is costing tens of thousands.

Those that think this is all 'a piece of p-i-s-s' and that Homepin are dunces for not including these things - please talk to me about buying me out and implementing it yourself. I assure you all it is NOT easy like some might say.

What *IS* easy is to say "they should include this or do XXXX".

A simple plug in chip actually *IS* easy and I can't understand what the fuss is because programs should be complete when the product is sold so it's a no brainer - it is a NON PROBLEM!

We are running an embedded system NOT a PC based system. I dislike PC's for use in amusement equipment because (from my 40 years in the trade) it always ends in tears. Let's just see how things pan out over the next 10 years for the stuff that has been sold using PC motherboards shall we. We all know how reliable they are and how compatible they are in a few years when you need to replace one. Please don't get me started on that.

As for companies that are selling you expensive products that do not have finished code (or certainly very near finished) - well, you should direct your comments to them about that. Bugs that show later are a different thing and for that we have things in hand should it be required.
 
@Homepin As I said, I assumed you have your reasons. Even with embedded systems these days, a USB stick firmware update is pretty much default and the code for that is built into most embedded systems. With such low volumes, I guess it is cheaper to replace chips which is fair enough especially when you're intending the code to be complete then replacing zero chips therefore has no cost, and I didn't mean it to be as blunt as it probably came across.

My comment about 'how hard can it be' was meant along the lines of it looks easy, but due to the repeated failures/problems of new entrants, it clearly isn't!
 
I've done work with embedded systems - let's just say that a ROM in a circuit is basically free, and a USB stick immediately requires support for an entire USB stack, an implementation of a file system, all the circuitry required for the darned things, and then a lot of headaches regarding compatibility, which believe it or not with USB, is not a sure thing.

Not only is it not simple, it's not cheap either!
 
@mission65 - I'm not selling it - you will have to talk to the UK agent about that. I know nothing about costs of importing into various countries (other than Australia) and it is far more complex, and different, for every different country than some imagine.

My time is in running the factory, building products and organising compliance with the different things required by different countries.
 
Hi All
I was fortunate enough to play a Thunderbirds Are Go at Pincade NZ last month. I had a couple of games and enjoyed both but as I am an average player I didn't get very far into the game rules. Mike has put some good ideas into this. Sadly with so many other games being played around me the full effects of the sound was muffled.
I can also vouch for his replacement boards - the magnet board I put into the Guns N Roses made the balls reverse from seemingly impossible paths! ( ball was almost between the flippers and it was pulled back up the playfield!!)

I also played a Multimorphic P3 Lexy Lightspeed. - what a wonderful morphing of pinball and lcd? technology. The interchangability to other games is a nice feature with magnetic artwork and changeable top playfield. There are mini games to be played on the lower playfield and with artwork that changes makes for a visual feast.

Regards
Clive
 
Of we are talking about newer manufacturers then spooky looks the way to go

Alice Cooper and TNA both looks amazing
 
Don't know if there is a better place to post this, but as of today Cointaker in the USA is no longer selling Alien (or Full Throttle). They were the sole US distributor.

Word on the grapevine is that they're at loggerheads with Heighway over a shipment of "30-40" Alien pins (no idea if all LE). Heighway wants them to pay in full, up front, before the container is shipped to them, and Cointaker are reluctant to because of all of the issues they have had reported to them by customers, and difficulty in acquiring spare parts, and general radio silence from Heighway on the support side of things.

Doesn't bode well for the future of Heighway 2.0 if they are operating hand to mouth. As Neil said earlier - it's hard to imagine their pins being around or functional in even 5 years time, let alone 25+
 
Cointaker have paid money to Heighway is also mentioned on pinside, which means Heighway may have a lot of pins to sell cheap soon, paid fo in some large part by unfortunate yanks who paid deposits.
Heighway keep the deposits , cointaker don’t lose and the consumer gets walloped. Very sad, especially as I love the pin theme
 
mission65 said:
Cointaker have paid money to Heighway is also mentioned on pinside, which means Heighway may have a lot of pins to sell cheap soon, paid fo in some large part by unfortunate yanks who paid deposits.
Heighway keep the deposits , cointaker don’t lose and the consumer gets walloped. Very sad, especially as I love the pin theme
Click to expand...

Such a shame Heighway had such potential.... But Im so glad I didnt preorder alien when we were at the unvailing like i nearly did
 
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