Las Vegas-based bingo and slot supplier Gaming Arts announced a few milestones last week on top of its most recent game installation, the first sale of its “Pop’N Pays” series of video slot games to California’s Valley View Casino & Hotel.
The announcement noted that “Piñatas Olé” and “Big Top,” two popular games in the Pop’N Pays series now at Valley View, are among the titles that allowed Gaming Arts to roll up 100 total units in the field, along with another milestone—100 total licenses to sell Class III slot games.
The reason those milestones are particularly significant is that they both occurred within an 18-month period after Gaming Arts began producing video slots.
The company has long been a major supplier of technology and equipment for live bingo and keno in casino markets, most recently with its SuperBingo and Ultimate Bingo brands.
SuperBingo is a one-card, four-card or nine-card coverall bingo game that offers multiple pay tables and play at rates of up to 1,200 games per hour. Ultimate Bingo offers similar game mechanics and includes a four-level “MegaProgressive” jackpot awarded for filling various numbers of spots on the cards.
Early in 2018, company founder and CEO David Colvin launched an effort to turn the company’s technology in the direction of Class III slots, bringing in former Ainsworth North America President Mike Dreitzer to create a video slot division from scratch.
As president of Gaming Arts, Dreitzer quickly assembled a dream team of slot professionals, including some of the industry’s most prolific game developers, headed by longtime IGT and Scientific Games slot designer Jean Venneman and former Bally Game Development Director Keith Kruczynski. Other veterans were added to a remarkable combination of talent for what is essentially a slot start-up.
“We’re very excited because, literally, about 18 months ago, with video reel slots, we started from scratch,” Dreitzer told GGB News. “In that period of time, we’ve been able to develop games and get them approved, get them out in the field, and we now have made the first sales to Valley View, where the games have been a tremendous success.
“We’ve gone through the entire cycle in 18 months, which everyone will agree is pretty quickly.”
He credits that dream team of executives. “We’ve put together a very experienced team,” he said, “and we benefit from that experience in a product that’s performing very well, at Valley View and everywhere else.”
Dreitzer said many of the 100 units now in the field are on field trial, and he says the results are consistently positive, which bodes well for the company’s ongoing expansion. The 100-license milestone is only the beginning, he said. “Our addressable footprint grows month over month, across not only the U.S. but all over the world. We have 100 licenses, but there’s many more to get—we’ve only just begun. That includes tribal licenses as well as commercial licenses. We continue to grow.”
Pop’N Success
The product leading the charge for Gaming Arts is Pop’N Pays, one of three series of video slots the company unveiled at last year’s Global Gaming Expo as its inaugural video slots. The other two groups—the “Da Fa Ba Series” of Asian-themed games and the “Dice Seeker” group of games featuring dice bonuses—are close behind.
According to Dreitzer, the rollout has consisted of releasing the game in strategic geographic markets to compare early results. “It was important to see results from different regions,” he said. “So, we have product in Oklahoma, we have product in California, Kansas, Florida, Oregon and Connecticut. We picked geographically diverse areas, and we have been very pleased to see that the results across the board have been very strong, throughout all areas. Pop’N Pays is a very good game out of the box, and we have many more games to follow up after that.”
Dreitzer said the video slots’ Nevada field trial is nearly complete, with regulatory approval expected in the fourth quarter—just in time for the G2E show. Nevada is one of many jurisdictions where Gaming Arts had no need to become licensed as a supplier; the company was already well-established as a bingo and keno supplier. The company’s video slots are on the same platform as its SuperBingo product, currently on field trial in Nevada. Once that platform is approved, the company can begin rolling out video reel slots.
“Our theme leading up to G2E and at G2E is ‘Play Now.’ That is, Gaming Arts is ready,” said Dreitzer. “We have product performing in the field, and performing well, ready for our customers’ players to enjoy. So, we have a whole host of games coming out over the course of the next few months. ‘Play Now’ means we’re here, and we’re showing the market we have product that can perform.”
Meanwhile, the company is concentrating on growing its product library. “We’re very much in growth mode,” Dreitzer said. “We are building our team, focusing on quality and experience over quantity. We are also leveraging third parties for potential content partners. We’re doing all the above, and from an operations standpoint, we have ramped up what I call the engine to deliver an increasing number of games month over month.
“It’s all in the playbook for a growing gaming manufacturer who has product in demand. We’re growing to meet that demand.”
