Now that your feet might have recovered, do you agree with me that the 25th Anniversary Edition of G2E was the best ever? Organizers (AGA and RX) cited 25,000 attendees and 400 exhibitors, so the show didn’t seem to set any new records. But what it may have lacked in size was easily offset by content and quality.
If you somehow missed the event, here are some random observations in the form of personal awards:
Best Quote – To AGA chief Bill Miller, who said: “You can call it a sports event contract, a skill game, or a sweepstakes. You can call it whatever you want, but it’s still gambling. And if it’s gambling, it needs to play by the rules that uphold state and tribal sovereignty.”
Best New Law – Related to the quote above, across the border in California. They officially banned Sweepstakes gaming on Saturday, just before G2E opened. Governor Newsom signed the new law on October 11. It goes into effect on January 1, 2026. They join seven other states, including Nevada, that also have laws prohibiting sweeps. A handful of other states have pending legislation.
Largest Booth – The IGT/Everi merger cemented this title that may have gone to Novomatic in the past. This new IGT combined company seems like a perfect marriage and something to watch. Their reel-spinning slots may finally once again overtake Light & Wonder and AGS. Their new versions of Wheel of Fortune also looked great. Sadly (but as expected), they also won the award for eliminating the most jobs.
Smoothest G2E Registration: The win goes to Tuesday, Day 1 at the Expo. Despite the big crowds, everything went very smoothly. The kiosks worked well and the QR code pre-registrations were a big help. Reportedly, not a single attendee was heard yelling “Do you know who I am?” this year. Good job RX (RX is the new name for Reed Exhibitions).
Best Party – It was the “Zero Day” event hosted by CDC Gaming on Sunday at the spectacular 66th floor of Resorts World. They once again paired with Global Gaming Women (GGW) to honor “10 Women Rising in Gaming.”
Most Memorable (or Weird) Party – This award is not just for 2025, but maybe of all time. It goes to the Quick Custom Intelligence event held Wednesday evening at Drai’s After Hours in the Cromwell. It was to celebrate QCI’s re-acquisition of Viz Explorer. Host Andrew Cardno dubbed it the “Galactic Celebration.” It featured an alien burlesque, bubbles, live bands, body healing practitioners, live entertainment, auctions and many other strange and indescribable oddities (and attendees).
Best New Slot Machine – This was tough because there were so many good ones. But the one most slot directors were talking about was Aristocrat’s Monopoly. While they didn’t allow any photos, it was a perfect blend of the board game’s features and a fantastic sign package. Wait! What?! Doesn’t Light & Wonder (nee WMS) own the Monopoly brand? That’s old news. Galaxy Gaming now has table game rights, and ATI picked up the slots. Bally and Evolution also got a share of some online rights. That must have been an interesting bidding war.
Best New Non-Slot Machine – The win goes to Interblock’s new “Marble Run” that is part of their Amuse series. It is not yet released and is still in development, but I’d put in a pre-order now if you can. As one rep said, this game will appeal to both “streamers” and “boomers.” My pro tip is to bet on the yellow ball.
Best New Video Poker: This goes to IGT’s “Major Multipliers.” The game from Ernie Moody’s Action Poker team has been out for a while, but it is poised to really take off this coming year. It may be accompanied by a new cabinet soon. To me it was “Ultimate X” on steroids.
Best New Slot Mechanic– It first popped up last year, but almost everyone had a version of “split symbols” this year. These add even more volatility to the successful “cash on reels” element.
Best Conference Session – There was no clear winner here as many of them were great. My two favorites were the one about the 10th anniversary of “Lightning Link,” featuring legendary designer Scott Olive, and another session where three vendors talked about how to improve profitability by tweaking the basic setup options on your games (who knew??). Better yet, you can do them with no additional cost.
Worst Neighbor – Bluberi is on a roll. Not only did they sign some great free agents to join their sales and development teams this season; they just received license approval to sell their games in Nevada. At G2E they featured a five-piece live band with a vocalist playing great jazz classics. Unfortunately, they lost the Good Neighbor Award in a landslide. All the crews working in the nearby booths lost their voices as early as late Tuesday trying to yell over the noise. But the rest of us loved the music.
Thickest Book at G2E – The American Gaming Association (AGA) issued their “2025 Responsible Gaming Regulations and Statutes Guide.” It measured nearly 1¼ inches and 459 pages. However, the award this year goes to Quick Custom Intelligence for their 14th book titled “The Math That Gaming Made.” It hit the tape at 1¾ inches, winning by half an inch and 278 more pages.
Most Interesting Booth I Hadn’t Seen Before – With all the bonuses and carnival game variants in today’s table game pit, dealers have to know a lot more than how to count to 21. At WYSR, they showed training software that was self-paced for dealers to learn the many new and classic games. They even built in testing to verify that the lessons were learned. Bill Zender liked it, and that’s good enough for me.
Booths That No One Saw Before – It seemed to be the year of podcast booths. There were several of them interviewing or streaming from the show floor. Most were located in Hall D. They ranged from veterans like Roger Gros to the newer Hillary McAfee who brings a fresh and entertaining perspective to gaming as part of the MaxBet crew.
Worst New Job Description – I thought the days of trendy job titles were over. Not so! The latest one we spotted on several badges was “Sales Enablement.” (???). I believe the mega company Salesforce (using Agentic AI) was the first to come up with this one.
News I Somehow Missed Unti Now
- Merkur, the giant European slot provider, acquired Gaming Arts (it happened in September). The Nevada Gaming Commission has now approved them for a state license.
- Novomatic tried but failed to take over all of Ainsworth in August. It failed due to an Ainsworth family feud. But Novo still owns 52.9% of the company.
Two prominent slot men passed this last year.
- Marshall Fey, the grandson of Charlie Fey, the inventor of the Liberty Bell (the first true automatic pay three-reel slot), died last November. At one time, Marshall had the world’s largest collection of antique slots crammed into the booths and attic of his Liberty Belle restaurant in Reno. He was also the author of six editions of “Slot Machines.”
- More recently, Clair Rodgers died. He was a close friend, a great slot and system salesman, a UNLV super fan and a talented pro scout for various sports organizations. RIP my friends.
Everyone Was Shocked at Another Sad Passing – Rossi Ralenkotter (the CEO at Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority) wasn’t a slot man, but he’ll always be remembered for working with R&R advertising to coin the phrase “What Happens Here, Stays Here.” He served 45 years with the LVCVA. He died the Friday before the show began.
Best Show Improvement – This goes to the team running the underground parking garage at the Venetian Expo Center. During peak times they posted helpful human attendants at all the ticket kiosks. In addition, there were also Las Vegas traffic police at the entrances/exits on Sands Avenue. Great job!
Best New Event – No question. It was the debut of the Three-Day Dealer Championship. You can read other stories about it elsewhere, but it generated more excitement from the crowd than anything in recent G2E memory.
Worst New Trend – Considering the fun and involvement of the competitors at the Dealer Championship, let’s hope the device pictured below from BCM Advanced Research doesn’t catch on anytime soon.
Neat Stuff Just Released or Coming Soon –
- Acres Manufacturing demonstrated a small LED screen that contained a QR Code. This display was small enough to fit into, and next to, most player tracking brackets. This will pave the way to making future cashless transactions easier on your mobile phone.
- Konami floated an idea to show past slot jackpots on an attached LED screen. This is a great idea to let players know that dozens and dozens of the machines do pay off. It used display technology to solve the ancient problem of how to celebrate winners.
- A number of vendors previewed new facial recognition or near-field communications (NFC) technology that may someday help us track (or at least better understand) non-carded play.
- Several old themes were re-born at the show including Millioni$er, Jackpot Party, Piggy Bankin, a cartoon-like version of NFL with lower fees, and Bomberman (which will be launched on slots after being a long-time in Konami’s video game empire).
Best Overall at the Show – This award goes collectively to all the signs shown by several vendors. If I had to pick just one winner, Zitro had the greatest variety of impressive new slot signs in their booth. I’ll conclude with some of my iPhone snapshots from various vendors across the floor.
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