The Beatles (Gold)

Christopher Franchi did the backglass, playfield, and cabinet art. The playfield layout was previously used on Stern's 1980 'Seawitch'. Designer George Gomez tells us about the several playfield changes he made for the new game:The notion of getting the license & building the game around classic Beatles songs was all Joe Kaminkow. He acquired the license thru his company Kapow Pinball. I started with Mike Kubin�s famous Stern Seawitch layout and made modifications to update, modernize it, and fix problems in the original. From conversations with [Stern] guys like Keith Elwin & Zach Sharpe who knew the game very well, they complained that the Seawitch top orbits were not accessible from the bottom flippers. So I fixed that, added the guarded target and hidden return on the left, added the plunger skill shots, the spinning record with magnet & the top magnet feed to the bumpers. Also updated the slings, drains, etc. When I was done, 100% of the old layout was modified, no posts or features are actually in the same place. Joe Kaminkow and I did the overall concept for the rules of the game and collaborated on conceptualizing the game features. I felt strongly that it should be built on a simple single level board from that era- we settled on Seawitch even though its from the 70�s, based on its popularity. The flyers for the three different versions of this game all show a coinless door. George Gomez told us that initially the requirements of the license stipulated that the game could not have a traditional coin door. Late in the process, after review of a working prototype, that requirement was modified and Stern was allowed to ship with the coin doors. Zach Sharpe, Stern Director of Marketing, told us that all of the games shipped with coin doors. Stern advertised this Gold Edition as having a production run of 1,614 units. This unusual quantity, when added to the 250 units made of the Platinum Edition and the 100 units made for the Diamond Edition, totals 1,964 units produced, representing the year (1964) that The Beatles were introduced to the United States on the Ed Sullivan TV show. Stern told us they had no Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Prices for the three editions of this game. However, we found an article in an online business journal indicating they were given an MSRP of $7,999 for the Gold Edition.