Match Race

Match Race, released by Williams Electronics on March 22, 1973, and designed by Steve Kordek, is a horse racing-themed novelty game rather than a true pinball machine — IPDB classifies it explicitly as 'Not A Pinball.' It is listed here for clarification because it sometimes appears on pinball machine lists.

Each of the two players controls a single bagatelle, and the game's standout feature is a mechanical playfield animation in which horses physically race across the field, a novel mechanical effect for its time.

Match Race is extraordinarily rare: production records show only 4 units were actually built and shipped, all on March 22, 1973, out of 50 originally approved for production, with the run ending just two weeks later on April 4, 1973. That scarcity, combined with its unusual horse-racing bagatelle format and Steve Kordek's design credit, makes it a notable curiosity for collectors of unusual coin-op novelties rather than a pinball machine in the traditional sense.