My subjective choices for the 10 best games in the manufacturers’ new model year
Normally at this time of year, I would be writing on the best games displayed by the slot manufacturers at the Global Gaming Expo. Absent the pandemic, at the time of this writing, we would be in the middle of the first exhibit day of the trade show.
Later this month will be the Virtual G2E show, at which manufacturers will be given the opportunity to display their new games in video. However, as I’ve been doing since the early 1990s, I toured the slot manufacturing plants in August and reported on the new games planned for launch by the end of this year or early next year. As is the case every year, I recently reported on them in a special section of Global Gaming Business.
Thus, I’m going to continue a tradition I have done in the past for CDC Gaming in offering a subjective opinion, based on nothing more than 36 years writing about slots, on what I feel are the strongest offerings in the slot sector for the coming year. Based on my research and what I’ve seen, I’ve compiled a Top 10 list of what I feel are the games likely to be hits over the coming year.
These are in no particular order, and there are no guarantees that they will, in fact, be hit games when they reach the casino floor. These choices do, however, represent the top echelon of creativity from the industry’s slot supply sector in a year that has been like no other.
The list:
Crazy Rich Asians, Aristocrat
This is one of several favorites being launched in connection with a new cabinet. In this one, the star is the Neptune Dual cabinet, a behemoth structure billed as the follow-up to the dual-portrait Arc Double.
The Neptune Dual overpowers the player with stacked, curved 49-inch monitors, angled in a way that the player can look straight up and see the top progressive meter, when seated in the custom-designed chair. This format totally immerses the player in the experience, the first being Crazy Rich Asians.
Based on the 2018 romantic comedy hit from Warner Bros. about a Chinese-American professor and her boyfriend’s rich family in Singapore, the new game uses those stacked 49-inch 4K monitors to deliver remarkable quality in footage from the film through primary game play and bonus features that include 2X symbols, a wheel bonus and a pick-em progressive bonus aiming at that big jackpot you see when you look up. This is a category-killer.
Casino Wizard, Gaming Arts
This game couldn’t have come out at a more opportune time. With casinos limiting capacity on table games and many players hesitant to even play community ETGs, Gaming Arts has released this stand-alone multi-game terminal offering video versions of blackjack, baccarat, craps and roulette, with the same rules and game play as the live table games, and with operator-configurable elements such as craps odds, blackjack rules and single, double and even triple zero for roulette.
Casino Wizard not only provides an alternative to more crowded casino activities, but allows you to play several table games in high-definition video without moving from the slot chair.
Mad Mountain Riches, Aruze
Aruze created this wild animated volcano character for a previous video format, but it flourishes in the Muso Limited presentation, with its multi-terminal display formed by adjacent 55-inch LCD monitors. It’s the same format used with Aruze’s hit games Paradise Fishing, Amazon Fishing and Hawaiian Fishing.
Those games all had a community fishing bonus on the giant display formed by the adjacent monitors, using custom fishing rods to “catch” fish for bonuses. This new version does not have community bonuses, but when individual players hit a bonus, the combined monitors come alive with the animated “Mad Mountain” character.
During primary game play, the “Mad Mountain” character will spew “Lava Rock Wilds” that land on individual player screens. Randomly, the Mad Mountain will erupt in a lava flow that sends a “Collect Feature” to an individual screen, initiating free spins during which the object is to collect emerald symbols, each bearing a credit amount. There also is a wheel bonus, initiated by three wheel symbols on the reels. This feature increases in value as the player wagers more—higher wagers add pointers to the wheel for multiple credit awards.
Gold Standard, Everi
It’s no secret that one of my favorite new slot games to be released over the past few years was Everi’s Cash Machine, that simple three-reel game with the “what-you-see-is-what-you-get” pay scheme. The symbols on the three stepper reels are numbers, and the cash amount spelled out by the three reels is the payoff. For instance, 10-5-00 on the three reels returns the top $10,500 jackpot on the dollar game.
The encore game to Cash Machine is Gold Standard, which offers the same simple three-reel stepper game, with an added wheel bonus. On the Skyline Revolve platform—that’s the Skyline setup with a top bonus wheel added, home to past hits Casablanca and Penn & Teller—Gold Standard uses the same numerical reel results as Cash Machine. The added wheel bonus in this game returns credit amounts or one of three progressive jackpots. Here’s hoping they keep these games coming at Everi.
Wheel Surge, AGS
AGS recently launched its Orion Rise cabinet, an 8-foot-high dual-screen cabinet featuring a dramatic 55-inch 4K Ultra HD LCD portrait monitor over a main lower 24-inch HD LCD touchscreen monitor for game play. It features an ergonomic 10.1-inch multi-touch button deck. One of the inaugural games for the format is Wheel Surge, which uses the oversized portrait display for a wheel bonus that involves several stacked horizontal spinning wheels.
This enables a tiered wheel bonus in which players seek to move up to higher levels with larger bonus amounts, including the four progressive jackpots.
AGS has paired this unique wheel setup with a game called Blazing Wheels, which uses a dual-wheel setup for credit awards, multipliers and progressives.
Regal Riches, IGT
On IGT’s CrystalCurve cabinet is a unique new wild-symbol game called Regal Riches, which introduces the new “Progressive Wilds” game mechanic. In the base game, Blue Gems increment the Guaranteed Wilds feature, which randomly can fill the main video screen with wild symbols.
In a free-spin feature, special gem symbols increment the number of wild symbols in Minor, Major and Mega Free Games pots. When triggered, the feature will award the corresponding number of wilds for that pot, and distribute these wilds across 10 free games in an explosion of wild placements that can result in huge wins.
Buffalo Chief, Aristocrat
The Helix XT cabinet, the portrait cabinet with the curved 4K monitor released in 2018, this year hosts a new game in Aristocrat’s most iconic brand, Buffalo.
Buffalo Chief adds a white buffalo symbol to the brand. The game features “Supercoins,” which trigger the “Buffalo Chief Collection” feature during free games, when every Supercoin triggers a wheel bonus to determine the number of the top-paying white Buffalo Chief symbols that will be added to the reels for the remaining spins—up to a total of 250.
Buffalo Chief also features a random “Stampede” feature in which the middle three reels expand up to 10 rows high, creating a reel array with up to 16,000 ways to win on each spin.
All Aboard, Konami
This game showcases Konami’s new 49J cabinet, which features a J-shaped curved 49-inch portrait monitor.
All Aboard is the inaugural 49J title. Base games Dynamite Dash and Piggy Pennies feature a free-game bonus and a persistent hold-and-spin bonus feature, the latter tied to the linked progressive jackpot.
The main feature in both games, the All Aboard feature, is triggered by six or more scattered train symbols. When the feature is triggered, all the train symbols transform into credit awards. After the win is registered, the credit awards remain in place on the reel array and all other spots become independent reels, re-spinning for three free spins.
Each time an additional train symbol lands, it reveals a new credit award, and all of the credits on the board are awarded again. The free-spin count returns to three, and the feature continues, re-awarding the total credits on the board with each new train symbol.
The feature continues until no free spins remain, or until the entire screen is filled with credit awards. If train symbols are landed on all 15 reel spots, the player is awarded the linked Grand Jackpot.
Ultimate X Gold, IGT
IGT continues the Ultimate X Poker franchise this year with Ultimate X Gold, a follow-up to one of its most unique video poker games.
The original Ultimate X applies a random multiplier to one hand, for which the payoff is multiplied on any win. Ultimate X Gold adds a persistent feature. Instead of applying the multiplier to a specific hand, it applies the multiplier to a hand on the pay schedule, and the multiplier sticks until it hits.
Cash Burst, Scientific Games
This new game series features a four-level jackpot won by a picking bonus, plus a unique free-spin feature that awards random bonuses. The two inaugural base games, Force of Babylon and Orb of Atlantis, differ only in theme and artwork, with the main game features the same. The games are featured on SG’s TwinStar J43 cabinet, with its 43-inch curved screen.
The base game is a five-reel video slot. Before the spins initiate, a number of positions on the reels will randomly be replaced with a mystery symbol. During the bonus, an orb symbol may randomly appear on the reels, off the reels, or partially on the reels. Each orb symbol displays a credit prize up to 20 times the total bet, the Mini jackpot (a static $10), or the Minor jackpot (a static $50).
During the free spins, if a “Cash Burst” symbol lands on an active payline occupied by an orb symbol, the displayed prize on the orb is awarded. For each free spin, the orb symbols shift up one row, until off the reels completely.
