internationalcasinoreview


G2e10 REPORT


Slot players demanding greater interaction


The balance of power is shifting in Las Vegas, not from one giant operator to another but in favour of the player who is demanding much greater control of how they play their slot machine. Phil Martin and Hugh Sorrill report on how the latest slots are putting the game very much back in the hands of the player.


technologicalintervention GLOBALGAMINGEXPO


Despite all the hype involv- ing new game licences and product launches, it was dif- ficult to tell whether the bite really was back in Las Vegas at the Global Gaming Expo held in mid-November. When pressed on the


downturn, some North Amer- ican manufacturers sug- gested there was a twitching of the curtains from the oper- ators, a wait to see what the neighbours were going to do. Invariably, as soon as one breaks the trend and opts to renew part of their floor, the rest will suddenly want first mover advantage and the stampede for new slots will be underway.


An optimistic standpoint, perhaps, but one that ana- lysts believe will ring true in 2011. Since the recession, R&D teams have been in overdrive focussing on product creation in the hope that technological interven- tion will save the day. Previ- ous years have seen our vocabulary enhanced with once unimagined terminol- ogy; server-based gaming, network gaming, community gaming, transmissive reels gaming, sensory gaming, adaptive gaming. The year’s trend of player interaction was much more palatable for the non-specialist tongue. Alongside the plethora of


blockbuster licences taking the big screen to the slot screen or slot screens as the case is today, this trend really stood out on the stands of the slot giants at G2e Las Vegas, and it was prevalent on almost every slot manu- facturer’s stand; players want better control over the machines that they play. Long gone are the days when they move like sheep looking for the greenest grass from


machine to machine scour- ing for the right game, the right denomination of play or the right volatility to suit their tastes. Today’s slot player demands choice but more than that they want to interact with their machine and feel some sense of control over how that machine rewards them. Examples were every-


where. Bally’s biggest ode to interaction came with USpin where players spin to win with touch screen precision giving them a sense of control over their jackpot prize. They can even choose their own risk and reward levels. Atronic’s diversity multi- game also comes with a range of player controls allowing players to select their pre- ferred game types with dif- ferent volatility levels, standalone progressive games, all in multi-line and multi-denomination format. This choose your way


format is featured on Aristo- crat’s new Viridian WS cabinet where players wanting better control on how they play their game will certainly feel at home. Multi Mega Pay puts the multi-game experience firmly at the fingertips of the player, who can pay to set up the game how they want and play two, three or four base game reel sets directly from the outset. Alongside this, the Drag ‘n’ Drop capability brings greater interaction between player and game by allowing the player to choose and position key elements of games. Win Your Way is a mas- terpiece of complex mathe- matics that puts the player firmly in control of their playing experience. Players can select one of three pay tables to suit their personal gaming style and play their way to win their way. The engagement of


26 January 2011 •G2ereport


Ken Jeong surrounded by the leading gaming executives as he officially opened the show by cutting the G2E 10th anniversary cake.


players is something that WMS has been looking at for some time with its commu- nity bonuses, especially those based on the success- ful Monopoly theme. Its new idea is that players can trigger the bonus games whenever they want; in the Mega Multi- plier jackpot, for example, players are randomly awarded credits that they can store and then use to trigger the pinball-based top game, with the chance to multiply their stored credits by up to 100 times.


Mega Multiplier is one of


WMS’s Portal applications, meaning that it can sit on any machines linked to the central game controller. This


networked-based flexibility is another hallmark of what the company is doing, extending not only to its own games but also to those of other OEMs, such as Konami. It is also using a network - the internet - to motivate players’ interest in its Adap- tive Gaming stream of prod- ucts. The first games were based on the original Star Trek series: the latest is based on Lord of the Rings. Players can progress through differ- ent features, bonuses and video content - player loyalty cards help them ‘keep their place’.


Through WMS’s


Player’s Life Web Services site, they can connect online to the game and progress


through the non-gaming content, including leader boards, practically guaran- teeing they will return to the slot machine when next in the casino. IGT’s stand was a hymn to


player choice but perhaps the highlight in terms of player interaction came with Reel Edge, which allows spin- ning-reel players to actually stop the reels to create wins and use an arcade-style joy- stick to control the outcome of the bonuses in the top box. This skill element is based on the enormously popular Pachisuro games from Japan and are designed to appeal to the 21 to 44 age group. The joy stick, more readily


associated with arcade games and consoles, was at the centre of perhaps the most visible example of player/slot interaction at the whole of the show. Aruze Gaming has built vibrating joysticks into its Paradise Fishing game allowing players to catch fish to win prizes and feel the pull of what they were catching as they were doing so. With the amount of inno-


vation flooding the slot sector and a recovery tar- geted in late 2011, slot order books stateside must surely start to feel a similar kind of traction soon. The R&D guys have certainly done their bit. It’s time to see what bites.


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72