In my last post, I briefly mentioned Pedretti Gaming's FunHouse 2.0 Rudy's Nightmare game conversion kit. Afterwards, someone reached out to me to inform me that not only is Pedretti in the process of developing a second 2.0 kit for another Williams game (I'm assuming that it's Williams and not Bally, but I don't know that for a fact), but that kit is actually nearing completion. While I don't personally own a FunHouse or the 2.0 kit (Rudy's too scary for me lol), I've always liked the concept of creating another way to give older games additional life with new modes and expanded play. Remember, people who installed the FunHouse kit still have the ability to play the original game using its original rules.
I haven't gotten word on when Pedretti will reveal its next 2.0 kit, but since it's nearing completion it would be pretty cool if it showed up at next month's Texas Pinball Festival.
Does anyone have any guesses as to which game Pedretti is launching a kit for next? There's no reason to produce a 2.0 kit for a rare game because there won't be a large enough audience of potential buyers to justify putting all the work into making it. The highest production early 90s / late 80s solid state Williams games include:
Firepower (17,410 units though there already is a Firepower II)
High Speed (17,080 there's already a sequel for this game as well)
F-14 Tomcat (14,502 units)
Gorgar (14,000 units yes I realize that this was '79, but that's close)
Black Knight (13,075 I don't see this happening given how many BK sequels there are already)
Pinbot (12,001 already sequels)
Cyclone (9,400 units sort of already has sequels)
The Machine: Bride of Pinbot (8,100 units, already has a 2.0 kit)
Whirlwind (7,304 units - someone is already sort of doing a 2.0 for it)
Taxi (7,303 units. Potential licensing issues with the characters?)
Earthshaker (surprisingly only 5,265 units, I thought that it was more popular than that)
So of those games, which one would I make a 2.0 kit for if I was Pedretti given the above info? Probably Gorgar or F-14 Tomcat. Those are my guesses. Am I right? Probably not, but we'll see very soon. What game do you think is getting the kit?
