Lariat

Lariat, designed by Ed Krynski with artwork by Art Stenholm, was produced by D. Gottlieb & Company in September 1969. It is the Add-A-Ball version of a Western-themed design that Gottlieb also sold as the replay game 'Wild Wild West' (1969) and, for export to Italy, as 'Western' (1969). With a confirmed production run of just 150 units, Lariat is by far the scarcest of the three, making it a genuinely rare find for collectors.

The two-player game offers a classic late-EM feature set: two flippers, three pop bumpers, two slingshots, two kick-out holes, and two vari-targets, the spring-loaded targets that award more points the harder they are hit, adding a satisfying element of precision to the gameplay. The sound package is pure electro-mechanical charm: a knocker and two bells, with the high-pitched bell handling the tens and hundreds and the low-pitched bell the thousands, while the ones digit is a fixed dummy zero.

Ed Krynski was Gottlieb's principal designer during this period, and his contributions to pinball are still celebrated by enthusiasts today. Lariat's Western theme and Stenholm artwork place it squarely in the tradition of Gottlieb's late-1960s output, and its tiny production run gives it a mystique its more common replay sibling lacks.