I was convinced this was some sort of custom machine, but some ebay hunting dug up an old manual. The post expired so all I can get is the thumbnail image. Not sure if I buy all the crazy stories, but it does sound like a unique machine. Could be really valuable to a collector.
Can you make out any of the developer names on there? The lead (or central one there at least) looks like Joe Blackwell to me?
He seemed to be a lead Stern technician at a Chicago company but only officially joined Stern in 2011. This was a while before that - definitely a super interesting connection. If I'm reading that name right, this could be a great rabbit hole to go down for more info: https://rec.games.pinball.narkive.com/M2S8w6ck/joe-blackwell
EDIT: Actually, it looks like Blackwell was with Stern before this too - prior to 2008 - so the dates could line up. https://www.pinballnews.com/news/sterncuts.html Wild to think they were designing a Junji Ito pinball machine in Chicago around the dawn of the new milennium. I wonder if we could track him or any of the other's down - it's a small world on the internet, after all.
I'm gonna try to message the ebay seller and get some more information or at least a better photo. Joe Blackwell's credited with games back to 1993 though, including one with Sega. So maybe there was a connection to the Sega contest?
