UK-based pinball software and hardware developer, Team Pinball, today revealed details of their working relationship with Pedretti Gaming and issues around the planned Big Bang Bar Remake game.
Team Pinball have worked with Pedretti Gaming for several years, providing coding, animations and circuit board designs for Pedretti’s series of remakes, starting with Funhouse: Rudy’s Nightmare and continuing through Whirlwind: Total Chaos.
They have revealed that they have also been working with Pedretti on a remake of Capcom’s Big Bang Bar.
However, according to Team Pinball that project ran into trouble after Pedretti first fell out with Big Bang Bar rights owner, Melvin Brouwer-Williams who had prototype Remake machines built, and then with Team Pinball who developed the code and designed circuit boards for the game and then stepped in to purchase one of Melvin’s prototypes with their own money in order to keep the project alive.
Team Pinball claim they developed the prototype further until it was ready to send to Pedretti in Bagnatica, Italy so they could work out how to build it. They then claim Pedretti made some changes to the prototype and now claim it is their property, leaving Team Pinball €90,000 out of pocket.
The claims were made in a post on Team Pinball’s Facebook page.
| For many years, Team Pinball has worked with Pedretti Gaming to provide hardware and software solutions for their Funhouse and Whirlwind 2.0 kits, and for the Funhouse remake machine. Team Pinball has also been working on several upcoming titles, including a remake of Capcom’s Big Bang Bar. After careful consideration, we believe we owe it to the pinball community to publicly explain what happened with the Big Bang Bar remake project from our perspective. In 2022, three parties began working together on the Big Bang Bar remake project: The original collaboration eventually stopped after disagreements between Melvin Williams and Pedretti. At that point, Melvin Williams had completed the prototypes and held all related paperwork. Despite this, Team Pinball continued working with Pedretti on other projects. Team Pinball worked together with Pedretti for almost four years on very good terms. We always believed our relationship was more than just business and considered them friends as well as partners. Even during stressful periods and difficult production times, we always remained respectful and friendly. In October 2024, Team Pinball purchased one of the original prototypes from Melvin Williams with the agreement and knowledge of Pedretti. The understanding was that we would complete the game with software and electronics support, provide the manufacturing PCB files, and receive royalties per machine sold. In 2025, we shipped our prototype to Pedretti and travelled there personally to finalize the machine using version 2 PCBs. During this process, Pedretti updated several physical elements of the machine, including the cabinet and replacing the blank whitewood playfield with the final printed version, which had also been designed in collaboration with Melvin Williams back in 2022. At that stage, the machine was getting very close to completion. Only software polishing and final adjustments remained. Afterward, we continued working remotely together until communication suddenly stopped. Initially, we believed this delay was related to Predator production. Later, we were informed that the Big Bang Bar remake would be postponed to 2026, which we accepted, as additional time for refinement was not a problem for us. Following this, we requested the return of our prototype so we could continue polishing and finalizing the software ourselves to prepare the machine for production. Our intention was always to return the machine to Pedretti afterward, exactly as we had done during normal business cooperation. The answer regarding the return of our prototype was NO. This came as a complete shock to us, especially because Pedretti at this point stated that they had decided not to manufacture Big Bang Bar at all. We were later told that the prototype could be returned if we paid for the cabinet swap, playfield changes, and other modifications made during development. Although disappointing, we were still willing to pay for the modifications in order to get our prototype back. To us, this indicated that the prototype was still recognised as belonging to Team Pinball. After another period of silence, we were ultimately informed that the prototype would not be returned because it was considered Pedretti’s property. This directly contradicted the previous statement that they wanted some kind of contributions for the cost they spent on modification on our prototype in order to return it. Our estimated loss is approximately €90,000, including: Considering how events unfolded, we cannot help but wonder whether we were only expected to recover the prototype and finish the machine before being pushed out of the project entirely. We truly hope that was not the case, but from our perspective, it is difficult not to feel that way after everything that happened. At this point, we do not intend to continue with expensive legal action. However, we believe the community deserves to know our experience and why we are no longer involved in this project as well as other Pedretti branded projects. We have agreements, screenshots, photographs, and development records supporting our statements. We also hope this explains the rumours surrounding Big Bang Bar throughout the years, and why Melvin Williams’ name was mentioned from time to time, as he created the prototypes and held the original Capcom parts and moulds. Thank you, |
Pedretti Gaming are expected to announce their next remake game in the next few weeks. It is rumoured to be a remake of Tales of the Arabian Nights. The fate of the Big Bang Bar project is now even more uncertain.
Pinball News will bring you more developments in this story as they unfold.
