Laser War

Laser War, designed by Joe Kaminkow and released in May 1987, holds a genuinely pivotal place in pinball history: it was the very first pinball machine from Data East Pinball, the company that would go on to become Sega Pinball and eventually Stern Pinball. Kaminkow explained at the 2012 Chicago Expo that he and Gary Stern built the game using parts from Williams' 1986 'Road Kings', and that it was designed on Thanksgiving Day 1986. A confirmed 2,569 units were produced.

The game's most important innovation is its sound: Laser War was the first pinball machine from any manufacturer to feature a stereo 2.1 channel sound system, stereo plus subwoofer, carrying David Thiel's digital music and speech. On the playfield, the fantasy-themed game offers two flippers, three pop bumpers, two spinning targets, three kick-out holes, a ramp topped by a laser-gun turret toy with an internal light show, and a left outlane kickback. Two- and three-ball multiball modes and lane change round out the ruleset, with the first and second player displays rendered in 7-digit alphanumerics.

One more piece of trivia: the flyer showed a trapezoidal backbox topper containing a spinning LED board (a repackaged Lyte Sound Visualizer) that reacted to the game's sounds. Kaminkow has said the topper proved too expensive and was discontinued during the production run, guessing that only about the first 500 machines shipped with it, making topper-equipped examples especially collectible today.