A subjective evaluation of the best the slot manufacturers displayed at the Global Gaming Expo.
As a gaming journalist specializing in the slot machine, I’ve covered new slot offerings launched at trade shows for 37 years and counting. Every year, I am called upon to give my opinion on what I felt were the best games launched at the G2E and other trade shows. Therefore, I have sought to present a “Top 10” G2E slots every year.
This year, I decided to split this Top 10 into two installments, so as to leave room for illustrations and descriptions of each game. Last month, I gave you Part 1 of my list of top games from G2E 2021. Here is Part 2.
Please note that these choices are completely subjective opinions on what I considered the best on display at the show from the slot manufacturers. This list does not purport to predict that these games will earn more than other games on display at the trade event. Only time in the field can reveal those results. However, these are the games which, in my opinion, demonstrate the innovation, flash and advanced features that will give them a chance to be among the top earners on the floor.
Cash Machine Jackpots
Everi Holdings
The Everi hit game Cash Machine was named Top Performing Core Mechanical Reel Game in the Eilers & Krejcik Gaming Awards last year. I’ve always loved this game for its simplicity, and its “what-you-see-is-what-you-get” reel setup. This year, Everi has launched Cash Machine Jackpots, which reprises the winning formula with a wheel bonus that includes progressive jackpots as wheel slices.
Cash Machine Jackpots is presented on Everi’s Skyline Revolve cabinet, which places a physical bonus wheel on top of the company’s core stepper cabinet. The bonus feature reprises the simplicity of the original game—land a “Spin” symbol on the third reel, and spin the wheel, which includes credit awards ranging from 80 to 1,000 and the three progressives. It’s a multi-denomination setup with high denominations ($1, $5 or $10), which makes not only for lucrative line jackpots but big progressive prizes, the top resetting at $15,000.
The rest of the game replicates the original, with the same numerical reel results as Cash Machine—for instance, 10-5-00 on the three reels returns the top $10,500 jackpot on the dollar game. Great setup.
All Star Poker III
IGT
IGT’s latest multi-game video poker platform, All Star Poker III on the CrystalSlant cabinet, features a menu of 10 games, including all of the time-tested favorites. But what makes this one of my favorites is the variety of the lineup, which, in addition to the traditional game, includes several of IGT’s newer specialty-bonus video poker games.
These include some of the greatest of IGT’s specialty games. There’s the popular Powerhouse Poker, which awards bonus hands with multipliers on paying hands in exchange for a 10-credit per-hand bet.
There’s Ultimate X Bonus Streak, which, for an extra per-hand ante, awards multipliers that apply to a pay table hand and stick for a random number of hands.
IGT is always coming up with new specialty video poker games, so we can expect the All Star Poker Menu to be augmented at some point with games like Lucky Suit Poker, in which the player picks a “lucky suit” at the start of a hand and receives a multiplier of up to 12X whenever the first card dealt matches the suit; or Super Triple Play, in which a one-credit ante doubles the pay for four of a kind.
Monopoly Cheaters Edition
Scientific Games
This latest in Scientific Games’ long-running game franchise based on the classic Monopoly board game is one of my favorites in the series. It has all the normal features you expect on a Monopoly slot, including a simulation of the tokens advancing around the board.
The cabinets in which the game resides help bring the bonuses to life—the Wave XL, with its 49-inch 4K Ultra High Definition display; or the Gamefield 2.0, with its game field that flows from a nearly horizontal front display to the vertical main monitor. The entire experience is nicely done on these formats.
But it’s the gimmick of the game that puts it on this list. Monopoly Man, the bespectacled character that once was known as Rich Uncle Pennybags, appears randomly throughout the game, awarding wild symbols and multipliers, and, as the company says, “helping you cheat” in the game to win more money. For instance, during the board-game bonus, he might take the dice away and give you higher-scoring dots, or move you further up the board. It’s a fun twist to the game.
Reels of Steel
Bluberi
This game is the first product of a partnership between Bluberi and gaming legend Stephen Weiss. When Andrew Burke, CEO of Bluberi, was in charge of slots at AGS, Weiss and his Colossal Gaming (now part of AGS) designed the giant cabinet Big Red. After Burke took over at Bluberi, he commissioned Weiss to design a giant slot for his new company.
The result is a massive stepper cabinet called “Big Mech,” and Bluberi’s first offering on it, Reels of Steel, is an impressive technological achievement. A traditional three-reel, single-line game, the reels themselves are fully stenciled metal, as opposed to Mylar or other plastic compounds used in modern slots. The cabinet is set up in a see-through design, with colored LEDs behind the oversized reels bringing a light-show effect to the reel-spinning.
The game itself is a highly volatile three-reel game, but with a free-spin feature and the LEDs behind the reels combining with the reel symbols to create a cash-on-reels feature. Smart additions to the traditional reel-spinner, and a killer presentation.
Casino Wizard
Gaming Arts
If you refer to the last Top 10 I did in this space, you will find Casino Wizard, a multi-game unit that includes electronic versions of four different table games. It is a single-machine, multi-game electronic table game, released at precisely the right time, at the height of the Covid-19 crisis and its shutdowns. As casinos reopened, players flocked to Casino Wizard, from a combination of pent-up demand, hesitance to return to crowded table games, and great presentation and game play in the machine itself.
The reason Casino Wizard is back on the list this year is the new cabinet on which it has been relaunched, the Vert-X Grand. An ultra-bright, 4K 49-inch portrait monitor, theater-quality sound, and bright LED side lights give the electronic table games great visuals and an immersive feel.
