As I mentioned yesterday, things were pretty quiet in the pinball and arcade hobbies to start the week. I hate going more than a day or two without a new article so I started digging. That resulted in two interesting new articles yesterday AND one of my infamous Rumors articles today :).
Let’s start with a big one that I have only heard one place and have no idea whether it is correct. This is a true “Rumor” rumor rather than some of the other ones that I am going to talk about later that are almost certainly happening. I recently heard that Jersey Jack Pinball has a pin based on the massive ten-movie franchise “The Fast and the Furious” (FNF) in the works. FNF movies have grossed over $7 BILLION in the theaters, making it one of the Top 10 highest grossing movie franchises in history. It’s big. Bigger than I initially thoughts when I heard this rumor.
Is a JJP FNF pin definitely happening? I don’t know, but to me it’s very believable. I specifically heard that it is coming after JJP’s strongly rumored next game (one of those almost certainly true rumors) Sonic the Hedgehog from Steve Ritchie. I’ve also heard that Jersey Jack may have the license for Despicable Me / Minions. I’ve been listening closely for JJP rumors about what is coming after Sonic and these are the only two themes that I’ve heard anything about. I don’t have massive confidence in FNF and Minions yet, but the talk is out there for sure. The rumor that JJP is remaking Ghostbusters was garbage. It’s not true. The long-rumored JJP Matrix isn’t happening either.
Let’s talk about some more certain “rumors” now. I have heard that Pedretti’s next remake, the 1996 Williams game Tales of the Arabian Nights (TOTAN) is nearly ready. It is ready enough to show off at next week’s Texas Pinball Festival, though a reveal at TPF is far from certain. Next up after TOTAN for Pedretti is a remake of the 1995 Bally pin Theatre of Magic. I personally absolutely LOVE both of these games. They are definitely two of my favorite 90s games. With Pedretti’s new and improved coding team in place I can’t wait to see what they do with them. Expect to see Theatre revealed sometime mid-2026.
While we are talking about remakes, the rumor about the first game from the new and improved American Pinball is that they are doing a remake of the 1997 Bally pin Cirqus Voltaire (CV). Work on that game is well underway, though I don’t know when we will get to see it. AP will have a very strong presence at the Texas Pinball Festival, but to me it feels a little early for us to see its first game under the new regeime.
Beyond the CV remake, American Pinball has two licensed games in the works right now, one of which is a movie and the other a band. I don’t know any more than that about them, but I feel pretty good that at least that is correct. I recently heard that AP may have added a third pin in development to those two through the addition of a new employee.
Any discussion of rumors has to include the Big Dog, Stern Pinball. The long-rumored Pokémon pin is now out. It has been pretty much confirmed that a cartoon Transformers by Elliot Eisman is next followed by Fallout by Keith Elwin and his crew. Somewhere in there we likely will see another “Remastered” stern game.
The long-standing remastered rumor that was part of a list of leaked titles that pretty much all have come to fruition at this point is that Stern is remaking its 2012 game AC/DC. I am pretty darn sure that a remake of Stern’s 2015 game KISS is coming. A few months ago, I wrote that KISS is next. I don’t know for sure that is the case. If AD/DC is true, it may be it next then KISS.
Next up is Spooky Pinball. The Spooky folks are going to have their hands full building the sold out Beetlejuice game for the rest of 2026. Its normal reveal cadence is to show off its next game late in the year, November or December. This year’s reveal will likely be a pin based on the 1985 film The Goonies. I am pretty confident about that, so much so that I’m already on a list for it. After that, Spooky’s next big game is likely based on the 1984 film Gremlins and possibly its sequels. At that point we’re talking about a 2027 announcement and 2028 production. Man that really sounds like the FUTURE doesn’t it? I have heard that Spooky may sneak a small production run of the Motörhead pinball machine that they helped David Peck create a couple of years ago somewhere in that mix.
Who else is left? Chicago Gaming Company (CGC) continues to be the slowest manufacturer in the World. Play Mechanix’s Halo pin, designed by Mark Ritchie, is definitely coming at some point. I heard a while ago that they were trying to have it ready by this year’s Pinball Expo in October, but knowing what I do about them it wouldn’t surprise me at all if CGC misses that date.
Dutch Pinball rivals CGC in the slow department. They continue to work on Back to the Future. I have no idea if we will see it in 2026.
Something awesome is coming from Turner Pinball fairly soon.
Barrels of Fun sure keeps a good secret. There has been some talk that its next game may be based on the 1984 film The Neverending Story. I have no idea if that’s true though. Another possibility from Barrels is a pin based on the 1986 Kurt Russell film Big Trouble in Little China. Barrels has been mentioned in rumors about that theme for a while now and a recent hire lends credibility to it. The book series Dungeon Crawler Carl is also a possibility for Barrels down the road. With Dune production pretty much done and the company cranking out a fairly small run of Winchester Mystery Houses we will almost certainly see Barrels’ next game this year, perhaps as early as June?
HEXA Pinball’s next game, The Three Musketeers will be revealed at the Texas Pinball Festival on Friday March 20th at 4:00 PM local time.
Pinball Brothers is ceasing orders for its current game Predator on March 31st, so its next game should be right around the corner. I have no idea what it is. I expect it to be another 80s action movie theme, but that is just speculation.
I don’t think that I have heard any rumors about what Multimorphic is working on for its game after Portal.
Wow, so much awesome stuff is in the pipeline! I think that’s all of the rumors I have at the moment. Have you heard any? If so, shoot me an e-mail at info@pinballmachinesaleaustralia.com. I love to talk about this stuff and always appreciate people sending stuff my way 🙂
