 Slots: Best of the Show
The Global Gaming Expo offers some remarkable surprises for tomorrow’s slot floor.
by Frank Legato
The Global Gaming Expo, the casino industry’s major trade show, is always well-documented in our sister publication, Strictly Slots, and this year was no exception. In the November issue of that magazine, I offered a preview of what was being introduced by the major slot manufacturers in the way of new games, which will be rolled out within the next few months.
That was, as always, an objective report of what the slot manufacturers plan to launch on the nation’s casino floors in the coming year. The manufacturers were listed in alphabetical order, and, since it was prepared before the trade show, certain games the manufacturers were keeping secret until the show were not included.
For Casino Player, the editors have asked me to do something a little different—to list some of what I thought were the best new slots to be launched at the big show. The following is a completely subjective report. It constitutes my own opinion, my own comparisons, my own evaluations on how the new games stack up to the games I’ve written about and evaluated over some 22 years of doing this.
I started out to do a “Top 10,” but as you will see, there were a few manufacturers that had two or more games I had to place among my favorites. So, I ended up with 12 faves. Here is my “Dominant Dozen,” my favorite new slots from the big trade show.
 1. WMS Gaming — Monopoly Super Money Grab
This game, kept under tight wraps until G2E, definitely gets my vote for “Best of Show.” It is a video/reel hybrid, but one like you’ve never seen before. It is what WMS calls “Transmissive Reels” technology. Traditional physical mechanical reels are covered with a semi-transparent, ultra-thin video screen, and the game proceeds as a combination video/reel experience.
In fact, the entire face of the machine is a high-resolution, color video screen, broken only by the openings to the physical reels. “Mr. Monopoly” strolls along a street in 3-D animation between reel-spins, and complete video bonus sequences occur over top of the reels. The game itself is an enhanced and modified version of the “Monopoly Money Grab” game released a few years ago. As bonus credits rack up, animated dollar bills flow over top of the mechanical reels. You have got to see this to believe it.
The best part is that it’s just the beginning—the next “Transmissive Reels” game is already in the works, based on a really unique licensed image—John Wayne. “John Wayne Duke It Out” will be the next game in the series.
 2. Bally Technologies—Fireball Two-Way Frenzy
This is the best of a new series for Bally, but truth be told, any game in the series could have occupied my number-two spot this year.
The “Two Way Frenzy” series takes the “Frenzy” concept from the reel-spinners with that name to new heights in video. The reel-spinning Frenzy games were three-reel slots with a fourth reel used for bonus events. When a winning combination appeared on the reels with a bonus symbol on the fourth reel, the bonus would apply—bonus credits, a 2X or 5X multiplier, a re-spin of the winning combination, etc.
The Two Way Frenzy series uses the wide-screen format that is now standard in all new Bally video slots to create a seven-reel format. It is actually two three-reel games with a bonus reel in the middle. If the player wagers enough to cover three reels on each side, he actually plays two three-reel games, with the middle bonus reel applying to winning combinations on either side. It is a great concept, and a fresh way of approaching the slot game.
 3. WMS Gaming—Top Gun
This game was previewed at last year’s gaming show, and refined over the year to enable its official launch this year. It is another new series for WMS, this one called “Sensory Immersion Gaming.”
The game itself is “Top Gun,” and at first glance, it looks more like an arcade game than a slot machine. The idea is to immerse the player in a virtual reality experience while at the same time offering a good, high-hitting slot game.
There are Bose speakers built into a vibrating chair, in front of a video screen that triggers a bonus round placing the player in a fighter jet for a dogfight. This is another one that is hard to describe in print, but trust me—you won’t want to miss this one. When the bonus is triggered, the chair rumbles and the roar of a jet engine comes through speakers to engulf the player in the experience. The player uses a control on the panel to dodge, dive and shoot at bogeys for bonus credits.
 4. International Game Technology—Price Is Right Cliffhangers
This is one of those games that will be hard to miss on the slot floor. It is one of the first games in IGT’s new “MP Series.” The MP stand for “multi-player;” they are all games offering community-play experiences.
Price Is Right Cliffhangers is a 20-line video slot in the Advanced Video Platform that offers striking video animation and ultra-fast computer power driving the features. The central feature is a top-box display that is shared among three individual Price Is Right video slots—mountain, on which a 3-D “climber” ascends during a bonus round common to all the games.
It re-creates the “Cliffhangers” prize game on the Price TV show. Players get into individual bonuses based on reel symbols. If a bonus is already under way on the big display when the player gets the bonus combination, he can opt for a simple video wheel bonus, or wait until he can join in the community experience with other players.
5. AC Coin & Slot—Super Slotto
The most popular product for New Jersey-based AC Coin, an exclusive IGT distributor that has made a name for itself by adding proprietary bonus games to IGT base slots, has been the “Slotto” franchise. This game super-sizes that lottery-themed game.
Imagine eight individual Slotto games around a giant—and I mean giant—Plexiglas sphere containing lotto balls swirling on air. Several players go into bonus rounds at once, and the balls swirl until one ends up suspended on air in front of each player. It is a striking visual experience, and a game that is simply great fun.
6. Bally Technologies—Pong
This game was previewed two years ago at the G2E show, on Bally’s old “EVO” video platform. The manufacturer retired that platform last year in favor of the fantastic new “Alpha” platform, now the home of wide-screen games in a series called “Alpha Elite.”
One of the new Alpha Elite games offered in the wide-screen “CineVision” cabinet (it re-creates a movie experience) is a new and vastly improved version of that old EVO game—Pong.
You know the game—it was the very first video game, a crude DOS-like computer game of table tennis, you against the machine. It was a staple of Atari home video systems and arcade machines of the late 1970s. Bally has managed to re-create it in a video slot machine.
I love this game. If you line up the trigger symbols, the entire wide screen transforms into the familiar old Pong screen, then you use a knob on the button panel to actually play Pong. It behaves just like the Pong you remember—if you are doing well against the computer, it speeds up. If you stink at Pong, it remains slow. The good news? Even if you stink, you win a bonus award. But if you do well against the computer, that award is higher.
 7. International Game Technology—Indiana Jones Raiders of the Lost Ark
This is a classic IGT licensed-theme game, with all the bells and whistles you’ve come to expect but with several modern features as well. It is a four-level progressive game on the order of “Fort Knox,” but it is also a community-play game—multiple players will enter the bonus at the same time, and will play free spins simultaneously. One of the players will be awarded one of the four progressive jackpots on every bonus round.
But the reason I love this game is its fantastic presentation. It uses IGT’s Advanced Video Platform, so the clips from the film play in high-definition video at each bonus round. The striking images are all wrapped up in a gigantic display of tall machines under a common LCD video display. This game offers the bonus in grand style, as only IGT can do it.
 8. Bally Technologies—Playboy Strip Poker
Well, it was only a matter of time, wasn’t it?
This is one of the coolest games yet in Bally’s “Playboy” series. It is a standard game of video poker, available in various genres from Jacks or Better to Double Bonus. However, the Playboy kicker comes in when you get a full house.
At the start of play, a Polaroid-style photo in the corner of the video screen shows a Playboy Playmate fully clothed. With each full house, a random bonus is paid while one item of clothing is removed from the picture.
Five full houses gets you down to the final image in the game. Okay, it’s P-G rated, but in the past, European versions of Playboy games have leaned more toward R ratings. I’m waiting for the European version of this one.
9. Aristocrat—Jackpot Deluxe
Aristocrat has released its share of great game groups over the past few years, but what has really set the manufacturer apart is its ability to mix and match these innovative game styles into totally new game groups. Such is the case with “Jackpot Deluxe,” an enhanced version of the Hyperlink multi-level progressive game.
Like Hyperlink, Jackpot Deluxe features four levels of progressive jackpot, won through a bonus round that is triggered as coin-in as a bank reaches a predetermined level. However, the progressives in Jackpot Deluxe are attained through a free-spin bonus round. Feature symbols on the reels during free spins cause icons to drop into four separate bins, representing each of the four progressive jackpots. Get three icons in a bin, and you win that jackpot (they range from a “Mini” jackpot starting at around $5-$10 to a “Grand” jackpot in the thousands).
Here’s the really good part: The bonus round continues until all free spins have been spent, giving the player the chance to win all four jackpots in a single round. Free spins can be triggered within the free spins, which increases the player’s chances at the big jackpots, and the chance to land multiple jackpots.
 10. Konami Gaming—Mystical Temple
Konami introduced a couple of new video slot groups at the sow. My favorite is “Mystical Temple,” a four-level random progressive system with a unique betting structure. It is a 20-line video slot with a fixed bet—20 cents is the minimum bet, which activates 20 lines. Players qualify for the progressive bonus round by covering the paylines, so that means anyone who plays the game will always qualify. However, Konami is making it clear on the face of the machine that higher initial bets actually increase the chances of landing the higher of the four progressive prizes.
The progressives in Mystical Temple are won through a bonus round. The cool part is that this is a “mystery” progressive jackpot. You don’t have to line up a special reel combination to go into the progressive bonus round. It just happens.
 11. Atronic—The Game of LIFE
Atronic’s sister company, lottery king GTECH, landed the license to produce the second video slot based on the legendary “Game of LIFE” board game. This new version is a vast improvement on the game Sigma released several years ago, and its main improvements lie in the fact that it is based on Atronic’s best game styles. It is in the “e-motion” dual-screen format, and includes a multi-level progressive jackpot along the lines of “Cash Fever,” except that this one has five levels of progressive jackpot instead of four. But most of all, instead of a single game, LIFE employs four popular Atronic base games, each in a volatile penny program and Atronic’s first 30-line format, with lots of large credit wins and free-spin bonus rounds.
The main bonus event is quick and simple. The player picks from tiles on the main screen to get either a quick credit amount ending the round, or the familiar spinning dial from the board game. The player spins the dial to move along the LIFE board as far as he can—to achieve the highest of the four jackpots he can achieve.
12. International Game Technology—Guaranteed Play
This one isn’t really a new game, but the concept is so intriguing I had to include it in my Top 12. IGT’s venerable video poker group launches a new series this year called “Guaranteed Play.” These are standard single-line IGT video poker games and multi-hand games in the Triple Play and related groups, with one large change: Instead of buying one hand with each credit, or one credit for each quarter or dollar, the player will buy a guaranteed number of video poker hands for a set amount.
For instance, a player could pay $20 for 75 hands of video poker at the equivalent of max-coin. Win or lose, the player would get those 75 hands. The credit meter could actually go below zero, giving the player a chance to recover without losing all his money. If the player decides to cash out early, he simply forfeits the remaining hands.
While this setup is not likely to generate much excitement among the video poker elite, I think this game is perfect for the video poker novice. If you’re not good at strategy, this can give you a chance to hone your skills without losing your shirt.
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