Combination

Combination, manufactured by the Buckley Manufacturing Company of Chicago in October 1936, is a one-ball payout machine from the pre-flipper gambling era of pin games - a category that blended pinball with slot machine mechanics. Its signature feature is a set of three slot machine reels mounted right on the playfield.

The play sequence is genuinely clever. The game starts by releasing a barrier so the ball can travel down a runway to the plunger; along the way it trips a spring that sets the three reels spinning in the center of the playfield. If the reels stop and spell 'WIN', the player is guaranteed an award. The ball is then shot onto the field, where it can land in one of 14 channels bearing payout odds from 2 to 20. Most channels trap the ball, but two 'free' channels let it pass back to the plunger for another complete play.

Buckley sold the machine with a choice of Electropak or battery power, a standard option of the period. As a late-1930s combination of reel-spinning chance and ballistic skill - presumably the source of its name - it is an evocative example of the payout machines that flourished before flippers transformed pinball into a game of skill.