To continue to reclaim the node from the
lyric transcribers…
In pinball, a “Special” is a certain extremely rare and valuable type of award which, on most machines, is worth a free game, or replay. Usually, to earn a Special the player must perform some rather difficult task then hit a particular difficult shot, although a few games (such as Party Zone) light a Special randomly (though infrequently). Specials are popular awards to light as a result of Wizard Mode. Also, a popular place to light a Special is an outlane, where, if collected, the player loses a ball but earns a credit.
While, on the vast majority of machines, a Special is a replay, operators can usually select what a Special is worth, with alternatives being Extra Ball and some number of points (usually pitiful). Machines which have a Tournament Mode almost always award something other than a free game for a Special, since all awards must be reflected in the scoring somehow to make the score an accurate measure of skill.