Beatniks

Beatniks, produced by Chicago Coin Machine Manufacturing Company in 1967, is a two-player, Italy-export 'kick-up' add-a-ball machine with a music and dancing theme, featuring artwork by Christian Marche. It arrived near the end of Chicago Coin's run of Italian-market EM releases; some consider it the company's last Italian game, though that distinction may actually belong to 1968's Gun Smoke.

Gameplay on Beatniks is built around two flippers, four pop bumpers, two slingshots, two rollunders, and an Action Ring. Its standout feature is the ability to kick extra balls up from the outhole back onto the playfield, a hallmark of the add-a-ball format used in markets where extra-ball awards weren't permitted. Unlike Gottlieb's Italian export games, which often worked extra-ball lights into the backglass artwork, Beatniks reportedly displays ten musical notes on the backglass -- lit from behind -- that double as the match numbers on the domestic replay version.

While detailed records of the machine's broader reception are scarce, Beatniks stands as a distinctive piece of 1960s Chicago Coin history, blending a counterculture theme with the mechanical craftsmanship of the late-EM era.