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Seed import (backfilled).

description

California Games was a short-lived Los Angeles pinball maker active from 1934 to 1936, one of several West Coast firms — alongside [[manufacturer:california-exhibit-company]], [[manufacturer:allied-amusement-company]], and [[manufacturer:automatic-amusements-company]] — that proved pinball innovation in the 1930s was not exclusively a Chicago story. Its six known titles span the transition from [[technology-generation:pure-mechanical]] pin tables to early [[technology-generation:electromechanical]] designs. The catalog opens with *[[title:radio-station]]* (1934) and *[[title:rebound]]* (1934), followed by *[[title:numbers]]* (1935) and *[[title:olympic-pins]]* (1935). *[[title:numbers]]* featured sixteen trap holes and four horseshoe lanes; *[[title:marble-parade]]* (1936) went further with thirty-two trap holes and a ball-advance unit in the upper playfield. *[[title:figure-8-4]]* (1936), recorded as an electromechanical game, stands out in a lineup otherwise rooted in the earlier mechanical era and hints at the direction the industry was heading. California Games appeared and disappeared within three years — a common trajectory for small manufacturers during the mid-1930s boom. Its surviving catalog is modest, but it captures a West Coast pinball scene that was livelier and more inventive than its size might suggest.

Seed import (backfilled).

name

California Games

slug

california-games