Here’s an exceptionally rare bird — King of Diamonds, a 2010 machine from boutique outfit Retro Pinball, built as a faithful recreation in the spirit of the classic Gottlieb design, with a confirmed run of just 55. That tiny number makes it one of the scarcest machines a collector could ever hope to encounter. It features carousel roto-targets, backbox animation of dropping playing cards, and a charming throwback touch: a single set of score reels serving up to four players, smoothly rotating to show each player’s accumulated score as the ball is served.
The strategy is delightfully old-school and direct. The core wisdom is to keep the ball in the pops, where fifty-point targets surround the bumpers and the ball can rack up points while staying safely up top. Hitting the top rollovers pays fifty points each, giving you another steady scoring avenue. But there’s a critical bit of self-preservation: avoid the roto-target, because shots toward its center tend to drain straight down the middle while shots to either edge tend to drain down the outlanes — a genuine hazard the careful player steers around. It’s a clean, minimalist game where survival and patient point-accumulation in the pops carry the day.
King of Diamonds is a fascinating modern rarity, a loving small-batch tribute to pinball’s mechanical heritage with that gorgeous reel-scoring presentation. For the collector who prizes scarcity and craftsmanship, fifty-five units is the stuff of legend. Keep the ball alive in the pops, work those fifty-point targets and rollovers, and respect the danger of that roto-target. It’s a quiet, elegant throwback that rewards patience and ball control — a true king among rarities, and a genuine treasure to find in the wild.