No masks, no restrictions, full travel. For the first time since 2019, the Global Gaming Expo returned last week in full force, and the exhibitors did not disappoint a crowd of attendees that approached the numbers of the last G2E prior to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The attendance for the 22nd edition of the global convention came in at just under 25,000, nearly doubling last year’s total of 13,000. Over 350 companies and exhibitors displayed the latest and greatest in gaming innovation, which is in an increase of over 40 percent from 2021.
Additionally, more than 80 keynotes and panels were conducted, with leaders from all sectors of the industry coming together to discuss gaming’s biggest trends and topics.
Bill Miller, president and CEO of the American Gaming Association (AGA), the event’s presenting sponsor, said in a release that “G2E 2022’s pre-pandemic atmosphere is a milestone for our industry and a testament to our collective excitement around gaming’s future.”
G2E’s Event Vice President Korbi Carrison added, “The energy and excitement at this year’s show announced that gaming is all the way back and made it the most impactful G2E yet.”
Pointed Discussion
Always a staple at any G2E is the education program that stretched over three days this year. Topics ranged from cashless gaming, to stopping illegal gaming to the potential for growth of gaming, both online and land based.
Emergence of Urban Design
Now that gaming is expanding like never before, space is starting to become limited, which means that architects and designers are tasked with doing more with less. On Monday, three of the most prominent figures in gaming architecture—Cuningham Principal Brett Ewing, JCJ Principal Bob Gdowski and MGM Resorts’ Vice President of Design Suzanne Couture—met to discuss the emergence of urban gaming, and how stacked development will become key for casinos in busy markets.
Each heralded the success of the Cosmopolitan Las Vegas, and how its once-mocked design is now a marvel of urban development that will be replicated moving forward as a prime example of a stacked project.
The trio also touched on the arduous process of building a casino from the ground up, and how operators, designers and local municipalities must work together to keep things running smoothly. “When you’re introducing a casino to a city,” said Gdowski, “it’s always a bull in a china shop, no matter how big or small.”
Growing the Game
Poker has long been considered to be a man’s game, but the number of female players is on the rise, thanks in part to Poker Power, a company that aims to teach women valuable leadership skills through the game of poker.
The company’s Managing Director Erin Lydon, is a former Wall Street banker who knows how hard it is to succeed in male-dominated environments. Poker Power offers a female-focused app that teaches the game in 12 steps, with a life lesson to go along with each.
Through a partnership with the Women’s Poker Association, Poker Power also offers a list of rooms throughout the country that are considered to be female-friendly. “Women are very perceptive,” said Lydon, which can be a huge advantage in a game like poker, where emotions and social cues are of the utmost importance.
Integrity Above All
Sports betting is without a doubt the fastest-growing sector in the gaming industry, and with that comes added responsibilities in terms of regulation and game integrity.
Representatives from all sides of the issue, including the NJDGE’s Deputy Attorney General Michael Golub, Kambi’s Senior Vice President of Risk and Compliance Oliver Lamb and Matt Fowler, director of integrity for the International Betting Integrity Association, met Monday to discuss the ins and outs of identifying and preventing instances of match fixing and other integrity issues.
Golub explained how regulators act as the “quarterback” of integrity matters, in the sense that they work with all parties involved to facilitate the process. Lamb noted that Kambi investigates two or three suspicious activities per day, and every week two or three of those instances get investigated further. Fowler emphasized that sports betting is a global market, and oftentimes red flags can be found in countries outside of where the sporting event is taking place.
“Not Today, Colonizer”
The battle between California’s sports betting measures, Props 26 and 27, has reached legendary proportions, and it appears neither will pass next month, which would represent a huge victory for tribes and a huge loss for out-of-state operators.
Three tribal leaders—Jacob Mejia, director of public affairs for Pechanga Development Corp., James Siva, chairman of the California Nations Indian Gaming Association and vice chairman of the Morongo tribe, and Sara Dutschke, chairwoman for the Ione Band of Miwok Indians—discussed why the high-powered Prop 27 was not enough to defeat a united front of California’s tribes. The session was moderated by Pechanga.net’s Victor Rocha.
The biggest error that the operators made, according to the trio, was their attempt to pit gaming and non-gaming tribes against each other. Mejia explained how it has become common for operators to pick a state’s most pressing issue and promise to fix it through tax revenue shares. In California, it’s homelessness, but now that it looks to be headed for defeat, Siva is confident that bookmakers “will never underestimate California tribes again.”
Slots Galore
There were new cabinets, new game styles, and new versions of favorites from all the slot manufacturers. There were, from each supplier, unique applications of the most popular game mechanics of the day, from hold-and-re-spin to cash-on-reels to bonus wheels and picking bonuses.
There also were a few products that stretched the definition of a slot machine, from replicas of arcade and carnival favorites to a shooter game on a multi-player console. Here are some of the highlights of the triumphant return of the slot-makers to the full version of gaming’s most important trade show.
- AGS highlighted its entry into the high-denomination space with games offering the player the choice not only of denomination—they range from quarters to $5—but in the payline configuration. Players can choose a single payline, three lines, five lines or nine lines, with video extras like coin showers and multiplier watermarks added to a traditional mechanical-style game.
AGS launched three new high-denom games (quarter, $1, $2 or $5, player selectable) at the show. Diamond Boost is a traditional three-reel, nine-line game with multiplying wild symbols. When a Diamond Boost symbol lands on the reels, all payouts for “7” combinations on the pay schedule are increased. Three progressives are won through combinations of wild symbols and boost symbols.
Also in high-denom, AGS launched new games at the show including Platinum 8X8X8X and 8X Crystal Bells. Both are supercharged versions of the wild multiplier games that have been a staple of the traditional slot machine.
AGS also launched a new cabinet at the show. Called Spectra, it is a 43-inch upright cabinet, to complement the 43-inch Orion Portrait, which is a slant-top. Launch titles are new versions of popular AGS titles—Rakin’ Bacon! Sahara and Rakin’ Bacon Odyssey—and Prize Spin, a cash-on-reels game.
Finally, two game families were launched on the Starwall and Orion Curve Premium formats. Pillars of Cash features a unique mechanic in which cash-on-reels symbols cause pillars to rise toward the top of the screen. In the free-spin feature, they can rise to trigger one of five progressives. River Dragons Jade and Sapphire reprise the River Dragons theme with beautiful graphics and a “Prize Surge” feature that awards all cash-on-reels and progressive symbols (except for the top jackpot) several times during a hold-and-re-spin bonus.
- Ainsworth went the opposite direction in its G2E display, adding low-denomination, Australian-style games to its high-performing stable of high-denomination titles.
Ainsworth displayed several games carrying a player-selectable multi-denom of 01/.02/.05/.10, which represents a return to the supplier’s roots. Highlighted were Treasure Spirits, Ca$h Stacks Gold and Ultra Shot Gold. All were developed from games that have done well in the tough Australian market.
Treasure Spirits is a collection of three 243-ways-to-win games. All feature the “Hold ‘n Stack” bonus. The player is awarded five free spins in which to keep collecting coin symbols. There are frequent extra spins added along the way. Above each reel is a credit award. If the reel fills up with collected coins, that amount is immediately awarded. The awards grow larger the further on the player gets in the feature.
Ca$h Stacks Gold, with four inaugural titles, features instant wins in the primary game up to 800 times the bet, as well as multiple progressives and bonuses available on a single spin. It also features the Hold ‘n Stack bonus. The base game has five, 25 or 50 paylines, depending on the denomination. The title adds the $1 and $2 denomination to the four lower ones, and for the higher buy-in, the Hold & Stack feature can be particularly lucrative.
Ultra Shot Gold is a game packed with bonus features including the Ultra Shot hold-and-re-spin feature, which can progress through three levels, with the collectible coins increasing in value at each level. “Leveling up” gets the player 2X and 3X multipliers, and at the top level, the four progressives are in play, including the top Grand jackpot.
- Aristocrat showcased its largest G2E collection yet, with 100 percent new games on the for-sale side and 70 percent new games on the lease side.
The big highlight was the launch of NFL-themed video slots. All 32 NFL teams are included in multiple game types, including hold-and-spin, licensed themes and stepper games. The great feature here is that players pick their favorite team at the beginning of the game, and all symbols, bonuses and icons reflect that team, even as far as icons of the particular city, like the Philly Cheese Steak for the Eagles.
The launch game is Super Bowl Jackpots, which offers a combination of features originally seen in popular Aristocrat games Crazy Rich Asians and Bao Zhu Zhao Fu.
Also prominent was the new Neptune Single cabinet, which replaces the stacked 49-inch monitors of the Neptune Double with a single, 48-inch monitor in a much more location-friendly format. The launch game family includes Jackpot Carnival, with three five-reel, 1,024-ways-to-win base games featuring funny hurdy-gurdy carnival music behind the reel-spinning.
The common bonuses are the Clown Feature, the Hammer Feature and the Jackpot Carnival Feature. There also is a free-game feature that differs between the three base games.
In the Clown Feature, the screen displays a carnival-style game board The player spins for four Bonus Balls that can award multipliers up to 25X. The player presses the Play button to drop a ball down the screen and into one of five prize buckets.
The Hammer Feature is a take on the test-your-strength hammer-and-bell games. Players strike a hammer on the bottom of several rows to generate credit awards and multipliers rising to a maximum of nine rows. In the Jackpot Carnival feature, one free spin is awarded with at least one Jackpot Carnival symbol on each reel. Players are awarded cash-on-reels values for those, as well as the opportunity to win one of four progressives, the top resetting at $8,888.88.
Also on the Neptune Single was the Tarzan Link, a premium, two-game series that combines the player-favorite Tarzan with Aristocrat’s Hold & Spin mechanic; and Lightning Buffalo Link, designed by Hall of Fame game developer Scott Olive, who created the venerable Lighting Link.
Lightning Buffalo Link combines Dollar Storm’s rapid-hitting, $50,000 multi-site progressive with the successful Buffalo Link product, a game that introduced the player-favorite Dragon Link Hold & Spin Feature to the iconic Buffalo brand. Neptune Single also hosted a new for-sale version of Wonder 4, the popular game setup that presents four separate reel arrays on which the player can wager simultaneously. In this case, they are Buffalo, Black Panther, Fire Light II, and Pompeii.
- Aruze highlighted new games in its Activ-Play series, which began last year with the innovative Go Go Claw, an arcade-style game that applies slot math to the classic claw machines everyone remembers from arcades, bowling alleys and other public places.
Aruze introduced new games in the Activ-Play series, beginning with Rock, Paper, Scissors, a wagering version of the childhood game in which two players reveal a rock with a fist, scissors with two fingers or paper with an open hand. The slot version has an LED hand in the middle, and the player presses a button to pick one of the three choices. The hand then reveals a win or a loss.
Also in the series, Aruze showed Wacky Gator, an electronic simulation of the classic whack-a-mole game using an alligator instead of a mole. Three gators take turns lunging toward the player, who must decide when to send a hammer down on the gator by pressing a button. If he hits the gator, it stuns the character, and the player can then rack up credits by repeatedly hitting the hammer button until the gator is “finished.”
On the ETG side, Aruze revealed the new version of its popular Shoot to Win Craps, in which players press a button to juggle large dice within a cylinder-shaped chamber. While the original is still popular 11 years after its release, the new version is on a more modern platform. An LED informational display was added above the dice chamber, and several side bets have been added to the original.
- Bluberi displayed its Devil Locks game on the Novus b49 cabinet, which won the Silver Medal in this year’s GGB Gaming & Technology Awards, as well as new games on the format including Xing Fu 888, which takes the original Xing Fu Stacks game and substitutes multipliers—8x, 18X, 88X and 888X—for the progressive jackpots in the original in the cash-on-reels hold-and-re-spin bonus. When the bonus is triggered, a big wheel spins to reveal the multiplier that will be applied to all coins gathered in the feature.
Bluberi also added a “Lucky Spot” that applies a multiplier instantly to any coin landing in that reel spot.
Also highlighted was Rocket Rumble, which adds the Bluberi logo character as a host of the game, which includes a “Rocket Wheel” triggered during a free-game feature; and Reels of Steel Fortune’s Forge, a new version of the game on the cabinet launched last year, Big Mech—the giant stepper cabinet with colorful back-lit reels and a see-through front. The oversized game is a three-reel, single-line game with a bonus wheel added. Spots on the reels can award multipliers, cash-on-reels awards, or a wheel spin. A nine-line version will be released next year.
- Eclipse Gaming Systems highlighted its IMPACT 49 cabinet, featuring a 49-inch portrait monitor and multiple pod configurations. As for games, the company showcased its new Cash Arcade family with The Big Shake series, featuring a virtual replication of the classic arcade and casino coin-pushing machines.
Central to the game is a bonus wheel, which dumps its awards onto the main video replica of a pile of gold coins under mechanized pushers that continue to push the pile to spill credits to the player’s meter. It is a remarkably authentic replication of the player-favorite arcade game, which uses “real-time physics” to replicate the gravity of the coin spills.
Other Eclipse games highlighted at G2E were Riches of the Gods and Bison King. The Greek-themed Riches of the Gods game takes the player to the foot of the mountain where the gods live, complete with multipliers, free games, and a wheel bonus that awards multipliers or a spin on an upgraded wheel. The wheel awards can be upgraded three times during the wheel-spin feature.
Bison King features the “Cash Stack” bonus, in which all five reels display cash-on-reels symbols that appear as stacks of cash. Free spins aim for more cash stacks—the accumulated totals of the cash-on-reels symbols are awarded when the stack reaches the top of each reel.
- Everi held its first charity slot tournament at its booth since 2019 on its TournEvent system, with members of the media joining several slot influencers to compete for prizes that went to their favorite charities. The winner was top influencer Brian Christopher, who won $5,000 for his charity. Second place sent $1,000 to the winner’s charity, and Everi sent $500 to each of the other participants’ designated charities.
On the game front, there were a variety of new entries in each of Everi’s categories, and on each cabinet. On the cinematic Empire DCX, the company featured Little Shop of Horrors Director’s Cut, with bonuses and reel symbols recalling the characters and situations of the 1986 comedy starring Rick Moranis. But this game went beyond that to include game features based on deleted scenes of the film, seen for the first time (in art-enhanced versions) on the new slot.
Other standouts from Everi included Fruit Ninja! Frenzy on the Empire Arena format, the new version of a game first introduced on the TournEvent system that features a “Frenzy Mode” in which players use their hands to slash at fruit flying across the screen to win credit awards; and the sister games Rocky and Bullwinkle and Boris & Natasha on the Skyline Revolve stepper cabinet—a hilarious take on the 1960s cartoon series that includes spot-on imitations of all the characters in voice-overs.
- Gaming Arts showcased its new Vert-X Grand cabinet, featuring an ultra-bright, 4K 49-inch portrait monitor, theater-quality sound, an ultra-bright LCD button deck, programmable LED play buttons, and attention-grabbing LED side lights. The prominent game on this format is Brian Christopher’s Pop’N Pays More, based on the famous YouTube influencer and his live-streamed game presentations.
Christopher was on hand at the Gaming Arts booth for two days during the show to host slot tournaments on the game, with winners given a free Carnival cruise for two.
Another highlight for Gaming Arts was its “Go” family, with Jackpot Go and Tic-Tac Go.
Jackpot Go features a hold-and-re-spin bonus and a progressive bonus in which “go” symbols on the reels collect to potentially win different progressive jackpots. Tic-Tac Go features a persistent bonus in which the player collects “X” and “0” symbols on the reels, which travel to a tic-tac-toe board on the top screen. Whenever the player forms a tic-tac-toe win on that screen, a bonus is awarded.
Other highlights for Gaming Arts included the Winning Wings hold-and-spin series and a unique, funny game called Big Fat Dragon. The bonus is what distinguishes the latter—icons are thrown at a game board, consisting of shields and various food items. The shields stick, but the food items fly down to the fat dragon character, which chomps them to award credit prizes in a hilarious sequence. Food items continue to be chomped for an accumulating bonus until only shields are on the game board.
Finally, Gaming Arts displayed a radical new multiplayer game called Ocean Phoenix. It is a flat table covered by a giant monitor displaying various sized fish swimming under the water. Players sit around the table with joysticks and buttons to shoot at the fish for prizes, in an excellent accomplishment of perceived skill.
- IGT used the G2E show to introduce Let’s Make A Deal, a new high-denomination ($1, $2, $5, $10) premium slot on the large-format Peak65 cabinet. The game takes cues from the famous game show for all its bonus features. For instance, bonus features typically end when the player lands a “Zonk,” which is the word that has always signified a “bad deal” on the game show.
The base game uses a four-by-five array, but that changes to five-by-five for the Windfall Free Spins bonus round. The free spins are plugged as “unlimited,” which means they go until the player lands his last Zonk symbol on the reels. Initially, there are three Zonk symbols above the reels, indicating that free games will last until the third Zonk lands. However, a special pyramid-shaped symbol landing on the reels can award additional Zonk chances, as well as wilds or multipliers.
The main bonus is the “Big Deal of the Day,” a simple picking bonus—the player picks Door No. 1, Door No. 2 or Door No. 3. The game reveals the results behind the two doors not picked before revealing the player’s prize, which can be credits, multipliers or one of four jackpot “deals.” The Grand Deal returns a wide-area progressive resetting at $500,000.
The company also displayed its new PeakBarTop unit that includes a sports betting function. With a touch of the screen during any video poker or slot game, a sports betting interface appears showing odds and spreads of games in several different sports.
- Incredible Technologies launched the first-ever electronic, multiplayer roulette game for Class II. The company is the first to calculate the math of the ETG to accommodate Class II rules. Class II Roulette includes an RNG-driven physical wheel, with each ball launch mapped to bingo cards visible in the corner of the player-station monitors. Other than the bingo cards on the player display, the progression of the roulette game is seamless to the player.
The player display even shows statistics for the recent history of the wheel—percentages of even/odd, red/black, most recent numbers, etc. The product is launching at the Angel of the Winds casino in Washington.
IT also showed a new round of games for its innovative Prism VXP Elite—the cabinet with the 55-inch moving flat-screen monitor that physically rises and lowers according to game events triggered by a main 27-inch 4K landscape monitor. The highlight game was Dragon Rush, featuring a hold-and-spin bonus triggered by six collected golden eggs.
- Konami Gaming featured new games on its Dimension Top Box presentation, which stacks a 49-inch flat-screen monitor on top of a 27-inch main game screen. At the forefront was Cash Parade, a game series designed to make the most of the cabinet display with a synchronized “parade” that travels across the top monitors in a bank of machines.
In this game’s “Parade Bonus,” the player is given three “tickets” to the parade. For each ticket, a parade of floats moves across the screen, each float dropping a credit award. This continues until a float releases the message “Next Ticket,” which begins a new parade of floats. The bonus continues until all the tickets have been used, and the feature can last a long time, with the accumulated result quite lucrative.
Also highlighted on the format was Fortune Streak, which features a unique twist on the hold-and-re-spin bonus: The standard hold-and-spin is conducted as a free-spin round, without the cash-on-reels symbols being locked in place. The bonus simply continues as long as at least one cash-on-reels symbol lands within three spins, the spin count returning to three with each symbol. The player is paid the cash-on-reel amounts each time they land.
On the Dimension 49J cabinet, Konami highlighted the Bull Blitz series. The main feature is the Bull Blitz Bonus, a hold-and-re-spin event featuring gold coins as cash-on-reels symbols. Gold coins on the triggering spin lock in place, and the free-spin meter starts at three. The added twist to this feature is the “Xtra Hit” symbol. Any time that lands during the Bull Blitz spins, the player is awarded the accumulated balance of all locked coins, in addition to the total of the coins in place at the end of the feature.
Finally, a new game previewed at the show, Buzzr, features a bonus designed around three classic game shows, with video footage from each show. While the game was a prototype that is still being refined, bonuses will eventually be based on the classic shows Beat the Clock, Family Feud and Wheel.
- Light & Wonder launched a new cabinet it had kept under wraps until the show, with great new games. The Cosmic cabinet features a 49-inch portrait screen on a 28-inch base—the same base and depth as the original Bally Alpha Pro Wave cabinet, allowing much flexibility for operators in placing the new giant-format presentation. Accenting the edges is a fused display of fiber optic tubes.
L&W showcased the first of two inaugural games on the cabinet, Frankenstein. The follow-up will be Dracula. Frankenstein uses that substantial real estate with great animation of the famous monster, complete with instantly recognizable sound effects. When “It’s alive!” covers the first reel and the wild monster symbol covers the fifth, credit awards zap in lighting to the monster. (His reaction to the zaps is priceless.)
On the giant Mural cabinet, L&W launched Dragon, a new game on a five-by-five reel array that features cascading coin symbols and free spins on expanding reels that rise toward progressive jackpots. Also on the Mural is The Wizard of Oz Yellow Brick Road, which masterfully uses the large format to offer a beautiful representation of the well-known characters and scenes of the classic 1939 film.
- Novomatic Americas introduced its Thunder Cash X progressive link, headed by the spooky Candelas De Los Muertos game series. The main characters in this lock-and-spin game, Señorita Suerte and Senor Muerte, are huge on the large top monitor, with intense animation that keeps all eyes on the screen.
Also on the Thunder Cash X link is a new game for the Money Party series, Yummy Yummy. This is a follow-up to the first two games in the series, Fruity Fruity and Juicy Juicy. All are versions of the classic fruit games Novomatic has popularized in European markets.
Another highlight of Novomatic’s booth was its sports betting kiosk, which simplifies wagering on any of several sports with all the latest lines and odds laid out in an easy-to-use display.
- Zitro highlighted its new Altius cabinet, featuring a 55-inch Ultra 4K monitor on top of a 27-inch main game monitor, with the launch game family Wheel of Legends. The game family features exotic, giant-sized characters displayed in beautifully intricate animation across the huge top screen—it is an attention-grabber from across the room.
The game family features all the popular game features, with unique twists. For instance, when the hold-and-spin bonus is triggered, the screen switches to scroll-like reels. The spins reveal cash-on-reels symbols, and filling the screen leads to a wheel bonus.
At G2E, Zitro showed the follow-up game family on the cabinet, Fu Shou. In the free-spin feature, landing cash symbols that are pots of gold unlock up to three additional reel arrays. At the maximum expansion, the player collects on all the gold pots on four reel arrays.
Other games highlighted by Zitro include Seven Chests, including a key-collect feature in which keys unlock seven treasure chests on the screen, which can burst to trigger a wheel feature; Light Temple, on which “Boost” symbols increase the progressive jackpot levels; and Mega King, in which increasing the denomination both increases the progressive levels and causes the main hold-and-spin event to occur more frequently.
