Big Top

Big Top, released by Pioneer Coin Machine Company of Chicago in August 1945, is a wartime-era conversion game: Billboard advertising from August 1945 announced it as a new revamp of earlier Keeney games, including 'Twin Six', 'Clover', and 'Sky Ray'. Such conversions were common around World War II, when new game production had been curtailed.

This flipperless electro-mechanical game offered five balls for five cents. The playfield features 14 passive bumpers and a kick-out hole, and two bumpers marked 'Spin' activate a spin unit in the backbox. A projection replay counter sits in the backbox, and a plug in the backbox lets the operator choose between free game (replay) and novelty operation.

The circus and carnival theme gives the game a festive character, and while little is known about who designed the conversion, Big Top is an interesting artifact of the transitional 1945 period in coin-operated amusements.