Common Ground
by James J. Hodl
August 1, 2008
AC Coin & Slot has found success adding communal game play to established machine themes such as Slingo.
Community-based gaming systems are creating a new competitive atmosphere as players interact and work together to earn bonuses
Casinos
have long stressed the individual versus the house aspect of gaming. But with
the recent introduction of some innovative new game designs, slot and table
game manufacturers are creating a new competitive gaming atmosphere in which
community-based games are allowing players to interact with each other and to compete
for and share in bonuses and jackpots.
This is not to say that
gaming has not had a social aspect in the past. Games like craps, where players
take turns rolling the dice while making wagers on the outcome of each roll,
have been around since time immemorial. Table games, where dealers engage
players in conversation as the cards are distributed, also have a social
aspect.
What the new communal
games aim to do in some cases is put all players on one side against the house
or the machine to jointly work to win payouts, which are then doled out based
on the individual player’s play and wagering volatility. With slots games, the
communal aspect is created by interaction between all players on one bank of
games (up to 10 play stations), some of which are arranged in a circle. These
banks of machines may also be linked for area-wide slots
tournaments.
“The success and demand
for community-based games and the player experience they create is growing by
the day,” claimed Robert Bone, vice president of marketing at WMS Gaming, Waukegan, Ill.
According to Bone, WMS
introduced its debut product in the community gaming category — Monopoly Big
Event — back in October 2006. Since then WMS has added Press Your Luck Big
Event and Bigger Bang Big Event, all with multiple support themes that have
resulted in well over 2,000 units placed.
“These machines generate
some of the highest coin-in levels in our product library,” Bone
added.
Both Monopoly Big Event
and Press Your Luck Big Event tie players’ base game experience to a common
server that is initiated in a certain frequent time interval. Players that make
the “Big Event” bet on each spin are eligible for up to five different communal
bonus rounds. Once the outcome of the communal bonus round is determined, this
amount is multiplied by each individual player’s “Big Event
Multiplier.”
This multiplier is
custom to each player and increases based on the average bet, spin rate, and
how long the players are at the game themselves. The benefit of this multiplier
is key as it can take a volatile common bonus round outcome and increase it
further in more specific ways for each individual player, Bone
explained.
In addition to these
products, WMS is in the process of launching Bigger Bang Big Event. This series
of community gaming products leverages the technology of WMS’s Transmissive
Reels gaming category, which provides a 3-D overlay of real-time animations
around and over the mechanical reels. This technology also enables the game to
offer new bonusing opportunities. These include multiple communal bonuses, two
of which are competitive in nature where players can compete for winnings
against the other eligible players on the bank of games, Bone
said.
“The early performance
numbers on Bigger Bang Big Event are extremely encouraging,” Bone
added.
WMS will introduce four
other community gaming products in 2009, Bone said. On these games, players
will be able to compete against each other for bonuses and jackpots, and
collaborate on how outcomes are awarded to eligible players. WMS will also
apply its community gaming technology to other product categories, such as
poker, where players can play their favorite poker payable and also be eligible
for a frequent and meaningful communal bonus round, he
explained.
“Community gaming is
much more than just providing a communal/shared bonus,” Bone said. “WMS will be
pushing the limits of differential game mechanics to enable players to engage
and win with one another in multiple ways.” .
Web inspiration
Reno-based IGT also is
building on existing products to create community-based
games.
“We noticed that our
Super Spin slot games were already creating a community environment, as every time
the bonus wheel began to spin, non-players would stop to root on the players,”
said Tom O’Brien, director of MegaJackpot product management at IGT. “Our
community-based games retain these excitement-creating features while adding
features that the unite players in a quest for a common
bonus.”
IGT’s latest community
gaming product is eBay, which links 10 slots-playing stations (five each,
back--to-back) under a 15-foot-long eBay sign and four giant LCD screens with
music, lights and sound. The system also has a free-spin community bonus event
where players play together on big overhead screens that mimic the bidding
action on the Internet auction site for which the game is named. In these bonus
rounds, players are rewarded based on their wagering levels, O’Brien
noted.
Coming in the fall is a
new IGT community gaming system with a Star Wars theme.
“This one will have
phenomenal graphics and other effects, in which players qualifying for a bonus
round will go on a space bike chase,” said O’Brien. “The winner of this race
will get a prize while runners-up will be awarded improved multipliers for
their winnings based on their previous play.”
Building on success
Monopoly Big Event from WMS showed communal game play could succeed on a slot machine. .
“We found that most casino patrons want a more and better gaming experience, and want to be entertained in the process,” said Chris Strano, vice president, sales and marketing at AC Coin. “This entertainment factor is increased when you add the social aspect where players play against and with friends and strangers in the same gaming community. Stoked by create graphics and music, emotions run wild.”
Introduced in mid-2007, AC Coin’s Super Slotto Celebration has players engaged in their own video slots games on the system’s eight play stations. These games offer IGT’s most popular pay tables. When one player triggers a bonus event, giant Slotto balls spring into action under an immense clear plastic dome to determine the winnings of the bonus player in an action resembling a lottery drawing.
In creating successful community-based games, certain criterion is important, Strano said.
“These games must be simple to understand, inclusive and they must play well. And they require a certain level of volatility; enough to make them exciting and unpredictable, but not too much that the game becomes confusing,” he noted.
Communal approach
Las Vegas-based Bally
Technologies is promising to release several community-based gaming systems in
the near future. And while Bally is not providing information on the themes of
these games, some details are emerging.
“Our community games
will include both groups of linked games and banks of games that can be linked
with other banks to create community competition across the gaming floor,” said
Bryan Kelly, vice president of advanced development for
Bally.
According to Kelly, the
Bally system will create more options for community gamers, in that one person
in a community-linked system will be able to trigger a bonus round at any time.
When such rounds are declared, other players linked to the community will have
the option to opt in by hitting a “yes” or “no” pad. Those who participate in
the bonus round will then play to build up the largest communal score they can,
which will determine the final pot of winnings. The person triggering the bonus
round will get a slightly bigger slice of the winnings.
“The goal is to get all
community-linked players to feel, ‘We’re all in this together,’” Kelly
said.
Bally community-based slots games will also offer
individual bonusing situations to reward players for their past play on the
game, their wagering level, and loyalty to the casino.
James J. Hodl
is a Chicago-based freelance writer covering the gaming industry. He can be contacted at +1 773 777 5710; or by e-mail at j.hodl@worldnet.att.net.
Did you enjoy this article? Click here to subscribe to the magazine.
