I have an avalanche of interesting news about Stern Pinball this morning and it's fantastic stuff. Stern Pinball has decided to hold its pricing steady at the current level. Also, It has decided that any remakes going forward will only be of Pro and Premium trim level games. Stern is done making second runs of Limited Edition games for machines. The specific statement that they made to distributors was "Drive Value: No more limited editions after launch. Current generation (LCD) LEs will only be issued once, buy with confidence." When Stern does bring back Pro and Premium Spike 2 games, they will add new code for both new buyers and existing owners.
Stern is considering remastering older generation DMD machines from its vast catalog of games and as mentioned above will re-run Pro and Premium versions of in-demand LCD games.
Stern has returned to its three new Cornerstone games per year business model. It plans to introduce new features with each future cornerstone release. Furthermore, Stern wants to extend the life of its existing games by introducing new Insider Connected content and code updates. Stern made a whopping 94 updates to its games code in 2023.
Lastly, going forward Stern is trying to reduce the lag between new game and accessory launches.
Wonder what remaster means? Does it mean remade as a Spike 2? Or re-released as a SAM? If remastered means SAM->Spike 2 I'd love to see Iron Man (probably licensing issues). Real movie footage on the LCD would be awesome.
Sounds like marketing nonsense….when have they ever remade an LE?!? They call them SLE so not technically the same…this announcement changes nothing…
Everybody (me included) will be clamoring for a remaster of Ghostbusters, but what they most likely mean is taking another look at Metallica, AC/DC, and Kiss.
Man, the Jaws stuff has made me a pessimist today. Sorry bout that.
Great news for LE buyers!!!