“Practice makes perfection!”
Introduced by Lakeside in 1973, Perfection was a family-friendly tabletop action game that mixed manual dexterity, visual perception, and the thrill of a timed race.
GAMEPLAY
The game’s object was to place as many plastic geometric forms as possible in their corresponding holes in the game cabinet before running out of time.
With the red and yellow game cabinet set up on a flat surface, 26 playing pieces of various shapes were mixed up and placed next to the playing surface. The PUSH button was used to set the ejector plate, the starter switch was moved to the STOP position, and the timer was set to 60 seconds.
After moving the switch to start, the timer counted down while a player frantically attempted to fit shapes into their holes as quickly as possible. If a player completed the task, the timer was stopped and a score was calculated. One point was given for each shape placed properly in its correct hole, and an additional point was scored for each remaining second on the clock. Scoring pegs were used to track each player’s progress.
If time ran out, the ejector plate popped up to scatter the pieces on the table. In this case, the player only received points for the shapes placed before the “pop-up” occurred.
The first player to score 60 points was declared the winner.
To make Perfection more accessible to younger players, Lakeside provided a series of “blank-out” squares that could be used to cover some of the geometric locations, reducing the number of shapes to be placed.
VARIANTS ON A THEME
Two years after introducing Perfection, Lakeside released a version of the game with a slightly different format. The number of playing pieces was reduced by 1 to 25, the option to use block-out squares was removed, and the ejector plate was replaced with a “pop-up tray”.
In 1978, Challenge Perfection hit store shelves. The multi-player game pitted two to four players against each other in a non-timed race to fill in the shapes on each player’s side of the playing surface from a pool of shared playing pieces.
IN THE BOX
A complete Perfection game includes the game cabinet with a timer, 26 geometric forms, four scoring pegs, and a card of detachable block-out squares. Printed instructions were provided on the inside of the box.
COLLECTOR CONSIDERATIONS
Lakeside’s original Perfection game and subsequent releases are readily available on the secondary market at affordable prices, making it entirely feasible to acquire one or more copies for your game collection.
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