Quoted from Vengeance

Other side of the coin is, show me a company who is not currently laying people off in the curent economy.  My company just did 300 people whcih was a 5% drop it the work force.  MY Fiance's company just did a 5 %- 7% layoff as well.  These are leans times, somethings has got to give.  

I agree; however they have let go some of the best talent. That does not look good for long term.

Keith is the reason TSPP and LOTR are as good as they are. He had passion for the games and went beyond expectations. Same is true for SM except it was the passion of Ritchie and Layman that made it exceptional (not great, but exceptional).

When the talent goes, what are you left with?

Duane

Quoted from TwilightZone

I agree; however they have let go some of the best talent. That does not look good for long term.

Keith is the reason TSPP and LOTR are as good as they are. He had passion for the games and went beyond expectations. Same is true for SM except it was the passion of Ritchie and Layman that made it exceptional (not great, but exceptional).

When the talent goes, what are you left with?

Duane

Mabye it was just numbers, mabye Keith was one of the higest paid Stern Developers, mabye firing Keith was the equivilent of keeping 2 Lymans.  Mabye they will hire him back when the economy picks back up if he is still avaliable, Mabye if my Aunt had private she'd be my Uncle  

End of the day I don;t think this means the end, but time will tell.  

Quoted from necro_nemesis

My sense is if Stern goes you better appreciate what you got. Just look at Sega. They poured a ton into the market and still exited. They had the passion and the money and they still backed out (sold out, turned it back to Gary, or whatever you want to call it).

Sega was in hard times.  They poured a lot of money in the Saturn, and it failed.. they most likely backed out of pinball to pour all their final resources into the development of the Dreamcast.

Sadly I think there just isn't any money to be made for a pinball manufacturer anymore.  Does anyone know what the cost to manufacture a pin is?  I'm kind of curious.. After doing the factory tour, my guess is it'd be pretty high!  

It's also important to mention that, they were saying at the tour that some licensees are incredibly difficult to deal with.  Movie related pins like TDK especially, as most of the movie house production team is on vacation while they're trying to design the pin, and they're the ones responsible for approving design, art, etc.  Let alone the tight deadlines to meet in terms of software design -- TDK's software was designed in what, 3 months?

I think we're very lucky Stern is even still around.. I bet most manufacturer's would have called it quits by now for sure, due to the sheer headache of it all.

I bet CSI will turn out to be a decent game, they don't have any "movie release" deadlines to deal with.

I'm seriously surprised that Stern still exists, which probably says a lot about me. I'm really glad they're still churning out games though. The next big hit can still be in their future! Maybe if CSI's design is awesome, they can retheme it like they did with FG.

Quoted from jonny_eh

I'm seriously surprised that Stern still exists, which probably says a lot about me.

enter joke here:

Quoted from HP5P

Anyone else out there with lots of money and a passion for pinball to take his place?

I am working on it... 6-49 is 39 million. Either that, or get a massive ioncrease in pinball restorations...

Quoth the RGP rumour mill:

Quoted Text

Dwight Sullivan, Keith Johnson, John Borg, Joe Blackwell, and Dennis
Nordman.  All Gone.  Steve is contracted out so not sure what is going
on with steve.  Does not look good t all though

I hate to say it but if Stern goes under, I think its R.I.P. pinball (from a new manufacture standpoint)

The only hope would be someone immediately buying Stern and taking over operations.  Once the factory gets sold and the equipment/tooling sold off then it would be virtually impossible to restart
Stern really had everything going for it after the takeover of Sega.
1.  A worldwide monopoly.
2.  An existing tooled factory and skilled workforce
3.  Access to the best pinball designers, programmers, etc.

For a new operation to start from scratch at some point in the future - and the TENS of MILLIONS it would cost to obtain a factory, new tooling, new machinery, train a workforce, etc, etc. in order to sell 5-10 thousand games a year would be financial suicide even if the economy weren't falling apart.

Check out this Post from Dennis Nordman:

http://groups.google.ca/group/rec.games.pinball/browse_thread/thread/6dcbb0f3a6975f35?hl=en#

He states: It's my understanding that ALL the designers were let go, including the ones
under contract.  That's what I was told by management.  It's just my
personal opinion, but the future of new pingames doesn't look bright to me.

It's likely a lot worse than any of us were really thinking.

Oh well, pinball's dead, it was fun while it lasted. I guess I'll go back to collecting comic books. They still make those, right?

Quoted from jayd

Stern really had everything going for it after the takeover of Sega.

Actually, it's the same company. Stern has been the same company since Gary started Pinstar in 1985. Then it became Data East. Then Sega. Then Stern. It's always been the very same people using the same equipment in the same building (yeah, they moved once, I think). The only difference throughout the years has been the one footing the bill.

Quoted from jonny_eh

Oh well, pinball's dead, it was fun while it lasted. I guess I'll go back to collecting comic books. They still make those, right?

You mean I have to start collecting something else if Stern closes? That's kinda silly logic if you ask me. Don't tell collectors of World War II memorabilia that they have to collect something else because the war is over.

And who said Stern is dead? Sure, they laid off a few people. How many times has Nortel laid off part of its workforce yet continues to operate? Or the auto manufacturers? Hell, American Express laid off thousands of people yesterday, yet I highly doubt that they're going under any time soon.