The kicker often needs a good nudge to operate and the one flipper does a lot actually. The drains are not hard to save/recover from so you actually get to "play" a lot more than you might expect from this era of game. I've played a lot of 60's/70's EMs where I barely get to touch the ball. This is a lot better than that.
I was thinking about this again the other day, and the distinction I came up with is that when I said that it wasn't quite pinball, the distinction was control. I think the line is in control-for something to really be what we think of as pinball today, a player has to have control of the game. On most pins, assuming you played absolutely perfectly, you could play indefinitely. Yes, there are exceptions (e.g. timed games), and features designed to induce randomness and remove control, but for the most part the player is in control of the game and how long it lasts. There are also games where you have some limited control over features as you play (through nudging etc), but the game is always going to end when it ends. These are things like the original bagatelle games, flipperless games, and even on up to modern pachinko and redemption games. There's certainly skill there, but there's a limit of how well someone could do at the game. There are features designed in those games that will, no matter what you do, end the game, and put you in a position where you can't save a ball and extend play.
Anyway, tangents aside, it looks like an interesting game, and if it's able to recover from a drain, then maybe there's more to it than meets the eye. Looking forward to seeing how the restoration goes!
