Bally Lane

Bally Lane, released in November 1973, is the novelty counterpart to Bally Alley - a wall-mounted bowling light game played via wireless radio remote control from a table, rather than a traditional pinball machine. Unlike Bally Alley, the Lane version has no replay awarding, match feature, or score-to-beat function, making it purely a for-fun novelty.

Both games used the Intel 4-bit 4004 microprocessor, reportedly the first use of a microprocessor in an amusement device, built by Bally as a demonstration project of what microprocessor-driven games could do. Players used a scanning light and timed control release to determine how a simulated bowling ball would roll and which pins it would leave standing - a system reportedly based on real bowling-league data recorded ball-by-ball to program realistic pin combinations.

About 100 units were produced in total, split evenly between the Alley and Lane versions, with the replay-awarding Alley outselling the Lane. A stash of roughly 25 unsold Lane units was reportedly discovered in Bally's warehouse around 1982 and given away to employees. Flyers showed cabinet, wall, and pedestal cabinet styles, but only the wall-mounted version is confirmed to have shipped in quantity.