Alpine Club

Alpine Club, designed by Steve Kordek with artwork by Art Stenholm, was released by Williams in February 1965, with a confirmed production run of 1,200 units. This single-player electro-mechanical game carries a snow skiing and vacationing theme, and it offers a well-appointed playfield: four flippers, four pop bumpers, three passive bumpers, two slingshots, twelve rollover buttons, two kick-out holes, a standup target, and a right outlane ball return gate.

The game's signature feature is its backglass light animation of a mountain climber ascending a peak. Scoring the A-B-C-D-E sequence advances the climber up the mountain; when he nears the summit his lamp flashes, and reaching the top briefly lights a flag, scores a replay, and resets the climb. Notably, this progress carries over from game to game. The rollover buttons light one at a time from the bottom up — hitting a lit button lights the one above it, and completing the ladder lights a target that opens the gate, scores 300 points, and increases the kick-out hole value.

Alpine Club also holds a genuine place in Williams history as the first Williams game with several features that became standard: a hinged backbox door for easy backglass and bulb access, a backglass advertising marquee, an automatic ball lift, a one-piece lockdown bar, the familiar rectangular plastic ball shooter escutcheon, a coin return flap, and a new single-slot coin door accepting nickels, dimes, and quarters — a change that required the distinctive 'drop-down' cabinet front used on Williams games into mid-1966.