Astronaut

Astronaut, produced by Chicago Coin Machine Manufacturing Company in June 1969, is a two-player electro-mechanical game released in the summer of the Apollo 11 moon landing, with an astronauts-and-outer-space theme rendered by artist Christian Marche. It was designed by Al Schlappa, Jerry Koci, and John Gore; a 4-player version was sold as Chicago Coin's 1969 'Moon Shot' with different backglass artwork.

The playfield offers two flippers, five pop bumpers, two passive bumpers, two slingshots, and four standup targets. Its most distinctive feature lives in the outlanes: gates that look like metallic flippers are activated by hitting targets in the upper and lower playfield, and when open they convert the outlanes into inlanes, returning would-be drains to the flippers. Managing those gates adds a satisfying layer of strategy to an otherwise classic late-1960s layout.

With Marche's angular space-age artwork and its timely theme, Astronaut is an evocative artifact of pinball's moon-race moment and a solid example of Chicago Coin's electro-mechanical output.