Table innovations were very much a focus for AGS heading into the G2E trade show in Las Vegas, led by its award-winning progressive side bet system now made available for poker rooms.
The company’s progressive system, Bonus Spin Xtreme, is a linkable side bet containing three concentric wheels that provide the ability to award one unique jackpot winner, while simultaneously awarding all participating players a community prize that John Hemberger, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Table Products at AGS, said will add incremental revenue to any poker room.
AGS’ success so far with Bonus Spin Xtreme has overwhelmingly been in the pit, where it can be linked together with various titles – Blackjack, Baccarat, Craps, Poker Derivatives, the list goes on.
“But this is a situation where, for the first time, we’re going to be bringing the product into a live poker room,” he said, “in that environment where folks are playing heads up against each other, and the property is just raking the pot as their form of income. What’s interesting here is we’re bringing the wheel.”
How does it work? Basically, a player is going to make a bet before the cards are dealt that the three-card flop is going to be a straight or better.
Anytime that happens, they’re going to be eligible to spin the wheel, and everybody at the table who made the bet is going to share in that prize that the wheel is going to deliver. And then one player, potentially, is selected to spin a wheel that has greater prizes than what everybody else wins.
“So, there’s a real community-type theme to it, but the power of that is all-encompassing in the sense that the operator is adding another game to the game, if you will, that allows them to generate some house advantage,” he said. “Equally important, from a marketing standpoint, you now have this ability to offer a progressive jackpot in your room [which can get significant, into six figures] that is quite flexible, and can even link with the games in your casino pit, or it could be a standalone progressive that you offer to your poker room players.”
So there is real opportunity for huge jackpots, plus the excitement of the wheel spinning for prizes to be awarded, and additional money to be introduced into the live game of poker as well. There are lots of compelling features to it.
“The game within a game can’t be understated for the player,” Hemberger said. “You have created this mini game for them on the side of the overall poker game where every time that flop comes it’s not just meaningful for the hand, but if, for some reason, they folded, and they’d just be sitting waiting for the next hand, they got this little mini game they’re still participating in. So, a lot of different things there that really help to raise the activity and excitement in the poker room, which, again, historically, has really been shielded or excluded from any type of product like this.”
AGS is a global company with roots firmly planted in the Class II Native American gaming market, and powered by Class II and Class III slot products, an expansive portfolio of table products, real-money gaming platforms and content, and social casino solutions for operators and players.
Following G2E, the widespread rollout of the product is now in progress. Earlier this year, AGS had been testing it, going live at a tribal casino in Northern California, on two tables.
“It’s generated very meaningful revenue for them,” Hemberger said. “There are lots of times that a poker room could be a loss leader of sorts. This has allowed them to inject some revenue into the room to help give it a chance to be profitable. That’s meaningful for the leadership of that property. It’s been a great test for us.”
Interestingly, when it comes to a game such as Baccarat, the Northern California tribal casino operators said they think their players would react positively to a wheel that spins less frequently but has significantly higher prize values on the wheel. Maybe it’s spinning three or four times a day.
“What they are saying is, when the trigger happens, even though it’s infrequent, we want it to be an event,” he said. “When they spin the wheel, they want it to mean something. The feedback from them has been phenomenal, because it creates this energy that way. It’s like one of these things where everyone knows that the wheel is about to spin, and you get people coming over, and you get a lot of activity and internal energy coming for that. It’s an event.
“That’s something that speaks to the power of the platform. It’s a scenario where we can almost deliver any flavor of ice cream that they want. They could say to us, our folks really love this particular flavor and we can say, okay, then let’s dig in and give them that flavor. And so that’s been really cool to see, not just for the poker room, but kind of across the board, that the platform can do that, keying in on what really matters to their players.”
Hemberger is not saying that a particular scenario is better than a scenario at a casino where they want to spin the wheel more frequently – it’s just that it is good to know that the platform can be tailored so that it better resonates with patrons at a particular property.
Also rolled out at G2E this October were enhancements to AGS’ award-winning STAX progressive system while also rounding out their shuffler portfolio to give operators more options.
They refreshed all their signage and graphics on the STAX side. Additionally, AGS rolled out a multi-deck shuffler (MAX 8), intended for use with Baccarat and Blackjack. That is the company’s third shuffler. Expectation for market rollout for that new product will be 2025.
“This year was a bit more of a traditional G2E for us, in the sense that development, new features, new products, various improvements, are really at the forefront of what we’re doing and what we shared with our customers at the show,” Hemberger said. “And that’s always exciting. People love to talk about what’s new, what it’s capable of, how that works for players. People get excited about being first to market with the latest and greatest.”
