As a general rule, a pinball is forever. Once it’s released that’s it, the table design is done, and while newer tables get regular software update packages the overall setup is carved in stone. The Addams Family pinball on day of release is roughly the same as a refurbished one now, even if it’s been updated with a color LED below the backglass and brighter LCD lighting on the field.
A new pinball table will feel faster and slicker than a well-used one, for better or for worse, but that’s about all the difference you can hope for. Unless you’re Spider-Man or Metallica, of course, in which case your pinball gets a complete remaster.
A Whole Lot More Than a Fresh Coat Of Paint
The Metallica pinball originally came out eleven years ago in 2013, and predictably enough it was incredibly popular. At the time it was made Metallica had thirty years of history to draw from, with hits from the 80s when they lost the heavy metal grammy to Jethro Tull through to the start of the 2010s, and the table released with an impressive fourteen licensed songs.
Granted, the art was oddly cartoonish, feeling more than a little like it was watering the band down for general consumption, but the board layout was strong and it had a good number of table toys, including a snake head and a goon strapped to an electric chair. It was very close to what it needed to be but could have been just a little less goofy to sell its theme.
Stern Firing Up New Iron Maiden: Legacy of the Beast Pinball
Metallica Remastered is a complete re-do of the Metallica pinball, keeping the table layout the same while updating everything else. First up is the soundtrack getting a major boost from fourteen to twenty two songs, and while the new ones aren’t yet officially announced, they do include tracks from Hardwired to Self Destruct and 72 Seasons. The backglass display is updated from the LED readout to a full LCD screen, complete with plenty of band footage running for you to not see while being laser-focused on the ball.
All the table-toys have been rebuilt with plenty of new ones added, all designed to go with the brand-new art drawn by the band’s official artist, Rhys Cooper. Rounding out the package are changes to the table geometry to make it play better, new and more durable tech for long-term play, two new game modes that open up during play, the Insider Connected online features, and over a thousand lines of speech, many of which are from the band.
Metallica Remastered went on sale yesterday in two versions: Premium and LE. For the Remastered edition, Stern is skipping the usual budget-priced Pro model, which lowers the cost by cutting features, and seeing as the LE was limited to 500 units it’s sold out now as well. The Premium version is an impressive beast of a machine, though, and if you don’t have a spare $9,699 kicking around to buy one of your own, it should be finding its way into the world fairly soon.
