Charlie's Angels

This 1978 Gottlieb solid-state game -- listed under the name Charlie but better known as 'Charlie's Angels' -- was designed by Allen Edwall with artwork by Gordon Morison. A licensed tie-in to the hit 1970s TV show, it features the likenesses of Jaclyn Smith, Kate Jackson, and Cheryl Ladd, and its November 1978 release came as Gottlieb, then a Columbia Pictures Industries company, was rolling out its System 1 electronic platform.

The four-player game offers classic late-70s Gottlieb gameplay: two flippers, two pop bumpers, two slingshots, a 5-bank and a 3-bank of drop targets, and a standup target. Drop target banks were a Gottlieb signature of the period, and they anchor the scoring here.

The game was produced in unusually large numbers -- 7,600 confirmed solid-state units -- and, remarkably, a further 350 electromechanical versions were also built, a reflection of the industry's transitional moment. A show model with a cutaway cabinet and semi-transparent backglass was displayed in Gottlieb's booth at the AMOA show in Chicago in November 1978, underscoring how prominently the company promoted this license.