Cosmic Venus

Cosmic Venus is a one-of-a-kind pinball machine built in October 1978 as a custom prop for the Hollywood movie 'Tilt' (1979), designed by Michael "Pinball" Sehnert, with cabinet art by movie company artist John O'Connor and additional art by Sehnert and Delana Bettoli. Like its sibling prop machine Astrologic, its cabinet was reused from an earlier game (very likely Williams' 1975 'Triple Strike'), while the backglass and playfield were original creations blending a dinosaurs-and-outer-space theme.

The game plays one ball per turn, a limitation caused by the fact it was built without an MPU and so has no ball counter. Notable features include four flippers, three pop bumpers, two slingshots, two kick-out holes, a 10-bank drop target, and a spinning target; dropping all ten targets in sequence scores an extra ball.

During filming, because the machine had no electronics, Sehnert hid behind the backbox and manually operated the LED score displays by wire in time with the on-screen action. Sehnert has since added a custom-built MPU to drive the displays and add ball counting, but the game is otherwise preserved as it appeared in the film. With only one unit ever built, Cosmic Venus remains a singular artifact of pinball and movie history.