CDC Gaming was invited to IGT’s stand at this year’s ICE London, where the supplier talked us through some products that were making their debuts at the show or are soon to launch in Europe.
IGT PeakCurve™49″ Cabinet
Phil O’Shaughnessy, IGT’s Vice President Global Communications, Events and Sustainability, gave us a demonstration of IGT’s PeakCurve™49-inch Cabinet and UNITE bundle:
PeakCurve™49″ Cabinet
What O’Shaughnessy had to say about it:
Our Peak Curve™ 49-inch cabinet is debuting here at the show. This offers bigger screens and a larger dynamic player panel, all within the same footprint as previous curve-screen cabinets.
In the past couple of years, IGT has really made a concerted effort to improve its presence in the multi-level progressive category. Games like Prosperity Link have inspired games like Mystery of the Lamp.
Our test bank process for cabinets like this is very rigorous. We put games in the field for 90 days. We chart the progress based on the last 30 days of that period, so that we avoid the new game heat. That last 30 days tells us an awful lot about how we expect the game to perform.
Phil O’Shaughnessy, IGT’s Vice President Global Communications, Events and Sustainability
We are testing the games in casinos all over the United States, but we make sure they are tested in different types of casinos and environments. We can then gauge how they perform against the house average.
Market-specific content
Peak Curve is an example of a product that’s been successful in several regions, but we’re also going to make exclusive content for particular territories like Spain. If you want to play Diamond Mania for example, you will play it in AWP Spain configuration. That makes the operator feel we are doing something special for them. Competing games around it could have various other configurations in other casinos, but this is our way of trying to honor a sector with exclusive content.
This is a multi-pot configuration that has been popular with players. We’re very in-tune with global markets because of IGT’s vast global footprint. If you see our content in Macau, we will have people in China that cater to that region. This is an example at ICE London where we want to come out with a market differentiator.
IGT UNITE bundle
UNITE bundle
A couple of games that have done exceptionally well are Prosperity Link and Mystery of the Lamp. They’re doing amazingly in North America. If you go to the Hippodrome here in London, what you’re going to find is a multi-gaming partner. People are very familiar with IGT’s USwitch™ multi-game bundles. If you want to play Cleopatra or Lucky Larry’s Lobstermania or Dreams of Egypt, people have been accustomed to doing this. These are great games, and what they enable us to do is offer multiple slot machines within a slot machine.
Players scroll through and that really allows us to maximize that footprint. It’s not like in Vegas where you have a theme on a box. We’ve had so much success with multi-level progressives, and we wondered how we now bring this to the U.K. and Eastern Europe. We’ve made it part of the IGT UNITE ™bundle. UNITE is something we’re launching here at ICE London. We’re able to tell operators here we have thousands of these games placed, and they’re performing exceptionally well. We’re able to present with conviction and say they will perform well in the market.
IGT Mesa™ 4K Terminal
Kevin Parker, Director of Electronic Table Games, explained the multiple game options within the Mesa™ 4K Terminal:
Mesa™ 4K Terminal
Our Mesa™ 4K Terminal allows us to offer up to four high-definition games at once in the U.S. market. You can play each one of
Kevin Parker, IGT Director of Electronic Table Games
them at the same time with the same credit meter. Once the hands start clearing, you can play all of them. The game will let you know when you need to make an action, so you can go back and forth. It’s a similar concept to playing multiple tables in online poker.
Our new podium is 7 inches shorter than most, which allows us to look down into the wheel, and that’s really what a roulette player wants. There are four different adjustments, so you can adjust it to whatever you need.
We have live, automated and video content for blackjack, baccarat and roulette. We’re now bringing this terminal into Europe. We’re going to do trials in four countries in the next year. We’ll then start expanding out into more markets.
We also have live dealer connect, where we can transmit from the table to as many terminals as they want. We can provide up to 100 terminals before we need another piece of equipment, but if you just want to use a video product, you can do that.
