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Ainsworth Game Technology
Ainsworth Group General Manager Strategy and Development Scott Clarebrough thought the overall mood of the show was great and attendance was up, iterating a view held by many other exhibitors and attendees. “Visitors to the booth are clearly

impressed at how Ainsworth is always producing a quality pipeline of must-have, high-performing games,” he said. “The success of our brands combined with our continued commitment to providing cutting-edge games is sure to deliver A Winning Play.

Ainsworth had a number of exciting new games on display, including the company’s first ever licensed video slot. Through an agreement with Metro Goldwyn Mayer Inc., Ainsworth was able to bring legendary classic The Magnificent Seven™ to the gaming floor. Presented in a state-of-the-art A560® Wide Boy cabinet, Ainsworth brings The Magnificent Seven to life with high-definition graphics encased in a 32-inch LCD top box. Players can immerse themselves in the Wild West with their favorite movie characters: Chico, Harry, Bernardo, Lee, Vin, Chris and Britt. This title incorporates three incredible action-packed feature games: Burning 7 Feature, Sheriff Rewards Feature and Shoot-out Feature.  There is also a unique bonus prize Wheel Feature that spins to build anticipation, as five-of-a-kind line-wins trigger jackpots. “The Magnificent Seven is sure to be a hit with players as it rewards four levels of stand-alone progressives featuring a $5,000 (penny) grand progressive jackpot. “We are extremely excited to launch this licensed video slot The Magnificent Seven™”as an important addition to our product line,” Clarebrough said. “The Magnificent Seven is packed with exciting features that will appeal to all players.”

Ainsworth is also set to extend the phenomenal multi-win multi-game entertainer range that includes an exciting mix of titles from the extensive GamePlus™ library. The GamePlus library will premiere several new winning titles for the outstanding brands: Quad Shot®, Double Hit®, Triple Shot™, Play 00Lines/50Lines/40Lines™, High Denom™ and Keno King™. Additionally, three new eye catching brands, Wheel Winner™, Bonus Bonanza™ and Crazy Ways™, were debuted at this year’s G2E. 




American Gaming Systems (AGS)
G2E was a great show for American Gaming Systems (AGS) as it continues to grow and unveil new and innovative products for its customers. “We’ve been a little guy for so long, and this G2E show has really been all about AGS growing up,” said Andrew Burke, senior director of product management. He also noted along with the extremely positive mood of the show, the gaming space is in a good place right now, and there has been great feedback from customers.

At the show, AGS featured its It Pays to Know™ series of games, which includes the Ripley’s Believe it or Not® and Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader® games, which allow players to answer trivia questions and win cash prizes.  The next game in this series, Family Feud©, is slated for a 2014 release.

When asked if he had a G2E highlight, Burke said, “I had one of our competitors come up to me and just say ‘Hey, that Family Feud game looks absolutely fantastic,’ which I thought was just awesome to hear.” He went on to say that while the gaming industry can be a competition at times, it’s always a friendly fight.




Aristocrat Technologies
Aristocrat definitely wowed G2E attendees at this year’s show. From the exciting new games and new virtual casino solutions, the company had a number of jaw-dropping, innovative products at the booth. “At G2E 2013, we transformed the game,” said Dallas Orchard, vice president of gaming operations. “Our customers were very impressed with our new themes, new game-play mechanics, our new game category E-SERIES™ and other immersive themes. We presented a wide range of new ways to keep the games fresh, the excitement intense and the engagement high, and the customer response was very enthusiastic.”

The excitement was certainly intense around Aristocrat’s new The Walking Dead™ Slot Game. Attendees could not miss the terrifying zombies that took over the show floor on Tuesday and led everyone’s attention straight to the Aristocrat booth. Based on AMC’s hit TV series, this new game grabs players and puts them right in the middle of the TV show’s gritty post-apocalyptic world with a chance to escape with some major jackpots. Although the game is grounded in “The Walking Dead” show, the game creators wanted to ensure that the game would also appeal to persons who aren’t part of “The Walking Dead” following.

Attendees were also impressed with Aristocrat’s new E*SERIES (Entertainment Series) game category, designed to reach a segment of players who enjoy a more entertainment-based experience, where lower volatility, bonus rounds and other features provide a different kind of entertaining gaming experience. The new E*SERIES delivers games custom-designed to be fun, visually alluring and perfect for this under-served market.

Aristocrat’s most popular game, Buffalo, is bigger and better in the all-new Buffalo Stampede™. Available in the VERVEhd™ cabinet, Buffalo Stampede features progressive jackpots, free games, higher multipliers and expanding reels, all while maintaining the essence of the original groundbreaking hit game.

G2E attendees were no doubt intrigued by nLive™, Aristocrat’s virtual casino solution. A custom B2B online gaming solution with fun and exciting online wagering, social gaming and managed services, nLive was designed to match the branding of a casino. Aristocrat’s nLive virtual casinos feature a perfect mix of the best slot and table games, a new relationship between Aristocrat and Ongame poker network and an established RGS allowing for future superior content integration.

“These and our other new creative offerings, like the Batman™ Classic TV Series Slot Game powered by Wonder Wheels™ and the E*SERIES signal a new era at Aristocrat,” Orchard said. “Adding to the company’s outstanding creative and technical talent, Aristocrat has recently recruited industry-best designers, the minds behind our newest innovations, who are helping us reach new player segments, a vital component of Aristocrat’s growth strategy.”




Aruze Gaming America
At this year’s G2E, Aruze Gaming America celebrated its 30th year designing, developing and manufacturing devices for the gaming industry. The company had a large booth and was showcasing many innovative products. 
Aruze debuted several new products to the gaming industry at G2E, including a new member of the Innovator™ series, Golden Frontier™ and SINBAD™, a 2-player G-LINK® title.

Paul Omohundro, director of marketing, was very excited about a new member of the Innovator series, Golden Frontier. The 4+1 reel game features several hundred lights, variable movements and reel speeds ranging from 3 to 200 RPMs, enabling the game to engage players in a whole new way and the EXTRA REEL™. Omohundro said Golden Frontier “is the first 4-reel base game where the fifth reel is used as an extra reel strictly for bonuses. That has never been done, and that’s why I’m mostly excited about this game.”

Another new game showcased by Aruze was SINBAD, a G-LINK title featuring a 60-inch communal overhead monitor. Within the game, players are able to participate in head-to-head competition-style gaming. The video style game requires players to quickly press a button to battle monsters and complete other quests. It will likely resonate well with younger players, as it has the look and feel of an arcade game but the payouts of a well-designed slot machine.




Bally Technologies
Bally Technologies lived up to its G2E theme—Connect Your Gaming World—with a plethora of system products designed to do just that.

They included the Bally Enterprise Progressive System™, which lets casinos manage their progressives from one central location. Bally also showed DM Tournaments Bonus Tournaments™, a new Elite Bonusing Suite offering that allows casinos to run floor-wide tournaments in which patrons can play the base game and the tournament at the same time, eliminating interruption in wagering activity. Bally also featured i-gaming and mobile solutions designed to offer a single view of the player among online, mobile and traditional brick-and-mortar gaming platforms and provide a cross-platform gaming experience for both free play and wagering.

Bally delivered plenty of new games, including several stunning must-see products, including The Magic of David Copperfield™, ZZ Top Live from Texas™ and the TITANIC™ video slots.

The cinematically gorgeous TITANIC game, which features scenes and songs from James Cameron’s “Titanic,” the second highest grossing film of all time, drew crowds of attendees. The game integrates Bally’s proven play mechanics, three mystery features and a wide-area progressive top award. Its U-Spin Bonus Wheel, resembling a ship’s helm, awards credits as well as one of three guaranteed features—Heart of the Ocean Free Games, Make It Count Free Games or The Safe Bonus.

“It really connects with that 45- to 60-year-old female player, and the game’s all about that epic love story,” said Mike Trask, Bally communications manager. “We think that it just really hits home with that demographic that loves to play slots.”
Attendees also came away impressed by the groundbreaking ALPHA 2™ Pro Series™ Wave cabinet with the industry’s first 40-inch concave LCD.

“What’s really cool is not only did we develop some new games with some great graphics for this, but this will handle any game from our Pro V22-22 and Pro V32 game collections, so it’s a cabinet that’s coming basically filled with a large library of games,” Trask said.




Cadillac Jack
Unity is an apt word to describe Cadillac Jack’s presentation at this year’s G2E. As a subsidiary of Amaya Gaming Group, Cadillac Jack joined forces with Amaya in an eye-catching booth to present a powerhouse product line-up of land-based slot products commingled with Amaya’s online gaming suite.

Some of Cadillac Jack’s hottest new products on display included the iconic Dragon’s Lair®, a multi-bonus game with interactive challenges that engage the player, and the new Stratos cabinet, which attracts players from across the floor with its dynamic light display surrounding a 32-inch high-definition LCD monitor and impressive overall stature.

Attendees were also enthralled by the Goddess Treasures multilevel progressive add-on for the stunning Goddess series, which includes Phoenix Goddess, Goddess of the Hunt, Storm Goddess and Goddess of the Woods.

Gina Lanphear, senior director of marketing for Cadillac Jack, indicated that there was tremendous energy and excitement from visitors to the booth. “Our customers are quite impressed with Cadillac Jack’s dynamic and high performing portfolio of new games, and they have been pleased with the Amaya-Cadillac Jack solution that can provide them with both land-based and online gaming,” she said.

“In addition to launching [an] innovative new game series and our new Stratos cabinet, we believe that the Dragon’s Lair game appeals to a player’s sense of nostalgia, fun and desire for challenges,” Lanphear added.

Based upon the legendary skill-based video arcade game, Dragon’s Lair features original as well as new animation created by renowned Dragon’s Lair animator Don Bluth.




GTECH formerly SPIELO International
Looking around the booth, Victor Duarte, GTECH senior vice president of gaming and content, commented on the steady steam of visitors at the booth this year.  “We’ve seen very good traffic from customers throughout the show and received great response to our new products.” It’s no surprise the GTECH booth was packed. Between the news surrounding the company’s rebranding and the release of its new 3-D game, visitors had lots to see and a number of questions.

Duarte explained the reasoning behind the recent name change, answering a question that has been on everyone’s lips. “SPIELO International is taking its parent company’s name to show that GTECH is a single source of complete gaming solutions across all channels,” he explained. “We spent a lot of time researching what would be the best overall brand for the company, and although SPIELO is known for its gaming products, GTECH is known as a market leader globally. It’s the brand that has the most global recognition, so it made sense to join our four brand segments—interactive, sports betting, gaming and lottery—under this well-respected name.”

Duarte further explained that the consolidation was driven, in part, by customers and their needs. In today’s fast-paced world, customers now overlap into the different segments of gaming operations and have started offering integrated product portfolios. The company recognized that it needed to change, too, and improve the way its services and products are aligned to provide customers with one name for a variety of gaming needs. “Our aim is to now further grow the brand and make it known across all markets,” Duarte said.

The brand certainly made itself known at this year’s G2E with the reveal of the Sphinx 3D™—a game that presents players with a genuine 3-D interface and that is the first title in GTECH’s new True 3D™ product line.

An interview with Senior Product Manager Donovan Francis shed some light on the mechanics of the game and the idea behind it. “The first question we asked ourselves was ‘How do we incorporate 3-D technology that doesn’t require glasses?’” he said. “We aimed to create a product that does not require any objects on [a] person to create the 3-D experience. It is based on lenticular lens technology, combined with cameras that track a player’s eye movements.”

The game utilizes the patented, glasses-free 3-D technology by SeeFront, designed exclusively for GTECH for the gaming industry.  It is to be expected that such a cutting-edge product would not be cheap, but that won’t pose a problem for casinos. Francis explained that the game will not be sold outright.

“This is a premium product and will be offered in a unique product packaging that will provide high recognition value and player attraction, driving strong traffic. We’ll offer this product on a recurring revenue basis for the North American market.”




Incredible Technologies
For Incredible Technologies, this G2E was a landmark moment in the company’s development. Showcasing in a bigger booth with more games than ever before, the company aimed to show attendees that it is committed to its theme, “Change the Game.” “Little did we know when we selected the theme that the G2E show planners would choose something very similar,” President and CEO Elaine Hodgson said. “Despite the overlap, we decided to leave our theme because we believe it and live it at our corporate core. Incredible Technologies is still a small, upstart slot manufacturer trying to make [its] mark by creating exciting slot experiences.”

“It’s probably been the best G2E we’ve ever had,” said Dan Schrementi, vice president of gaming marketing. “We’ve had positive earnings for the past few months, and now people can see those earners; they’re excited. We’re having more meetings than ever before this year.”

Among the games on display were the King of Bling® and its recently released sequel; the Crazy Money® follow-up, Money Inferno®; and games based on the math model of one of Incredible Technologies’ most successful slots, The Herd®. Schrementi expects that Wolf Pack®, Leonidas® and Beautiful Storm® will be popular with fans of The Herd.

Although the company is delighted with the number of new games it has released, Hodgson said that it’s the quality of the games that they’re most proud of, not the quantity. “We’re happy with the strategy and experience that has gone into building these new games,” she said. “For the first time, we’re able to leverage our own prior success in game math, brands and features. New feature sets including a series of games with stand-alone progressives [were] also introduced, as well [as] a new Sidewinder Reels™ slot called Car Nation™.”

When asked to share the company’s goals for the coming year, Hodgson said that company officials plan to analyze the successful products and build on them. “We will target key market segments and build our brand based on the enjoyment and trust of these players,” she said. “Our aim is to expand into a few key regions while making sure we support the regions we are in with products that earn. We plan to continue designing new features that set Incredible Technologies apart and pursue our i-gaming initiative.”




International Game Technology (IGT)
International Game Technology (IGT) debuted the new face of its brand with the G2E theme “Out of the Blue!” The company certainly pulled out all the stops with its new brand positioning and product announcements.
Chief Creative Officer Darrell Rodriguez said that with a new logo and new voice, IGT will continue to inspire innovation and bring ingenious products to the market.

“With a new brand positioning launch, innovative industry-first solutions and exciting game titles, we are confident that we will generate a great amount of excitement in our booth this year that will carry us throughout the year,” he said.

IGT introduced industry-first products at G2E, such as the Crystal Core Cabinet, which houses the James Cameron’s AVATAR™ Treasures of Pandora slot that gives players 7,776 ways to win. Senior Global Communications Manager Mariya Barnes revealed that the AVATAR game had already been recognized as a best slot product prior to its launch on casino floors.

Bridesmaids™, a game new to the MegaJackpots® lineup, allows fans of the movie to pick which character they want to represent them on the spinning reels. Barnes said the company has also gotten a lot of feedback on its Atari game for which Atari engineers were brought in to make sure the game played, sounded, looked and felt like the original arcade game.

Looking back on the event, Rodriguez was pleased with their packed booth, new gaming products and positive feedback from customers and attendees.

“I think [the] mission [was] definitely accomplished,” Rodriguez said with a smile.




Konami Gaming, Inc.
Konami Gaming, Inc.’s G2E 2013 theme was Fungineered for Performance, reinforcing the company’s message that it is born from fun and built to perform.

Konami displayed a range of gaming products, including the Dragon’s Law™ video slot, an Xtra Rewards™ game on Konami’s next-generation 3-D compatible platform; the Titan 360™; and Podium Monument™ and Podium Goliath™ releases in Konami’s popular Podium video slots cabinet line.

Titan 360 attracted crowds who watched or played the huge multi-station game with its larger-than-life mechanical bonus feature. The limited-release game was designed and released to highlight Konami’s ability to leverage its amusement and arcade heritage.

“People want entertainment. People want to come and have fun,” said Matt Reback, vice president of marketing at Konami Gaming, Inc. “You can’t create this online. You have to go to a casino to have this experience.”

Podium Monument, the newest member of the Podium family, features a 22-inch touch-screen LCD for base games and a 32-inch vertical top box. It will be available with a full library of KP3 Games as well as a new 4-level progressive called Quick Strike Quad. Other themes will include Snow Stars and Rock Around the Clock, which will deliver eye-popping entertainment on the vertical top box.

Konami also showed a new mystery progressive wheel product called Gigantic Wheel of Winning on the Podium Goliath. The 2-level, stand-alone progressive product works with most KP3 video titles, and the 3D wheel progressive bonus is randomly triggered during the base game. It offers an operator-configurable double-or-nothing feature.

Also on display was Konami’s True-Time Tournaments product offered through the company’s SYNKROS™ system. True-Time Tournaments lets casinos configure on-demand slot tournaments. This year, Konami unveiled a synchronized start called SynkStart, giving operators the flexibility to offer group-start invite slot tournaments.



Merkur Gaming
Merkur Gaming stands for quality with a complete range of products for the gaming industry. Jackpot Rain, a new multilevel mystery jackpot, confirms that with the use of an enhancing mystery jackpot. Daniel van Marissing, director of sales, explains the so-called “rain” function as follows: Not just one player gets the benefit of a hit, but the players next to the winner will get their share of luck from the jackpot too.

Merkur Gaming is part of the globally active Gauselmann Group from Germany. “It does not limit the company to one particular market or product,” van Marissing said. “The fact that we are a group of companies allows us to develop and manufacture a large variety of products for the gaming market.”

This year, visitors of G2E were more diverse and had greater potential, which are qualities a company like Merkur Gaming took full advantage of. The professional level of the visitors made the 2013 edition of G2E really worthwhile for the company.
As the gaming industry experiences a “quiet” revolution both from the technical point of view as well as the player’s point of view, manufacturers orientate and develop emerging technologies to stay in pace.

New challenges create new opportunities, and Merkur Gaming is ready.



Multimedia Games
With its major theme this year being This is How You PLAY LOUDER™, the biggest story for Multimedia Games at G2E was the National TournEvent of Champions (NTOC), with $100,000 up for grabs. The first national slot tournament, which used the company’s TournEvent system, had 60 participating casinos from 20 states. Out of 88 participants, the winner was crowned during night two of G2E at Lagasse’s Stadium at The Palazzo. The adrenaline from the players and the energy from the crowd were intense!

Mick Roemer, senior vice president of sales, said the company is really looking forward to kicking off NTOC 2014 in the upcoming months. The next time, there will be more than $500,000 in cash prizes and two TournEvent of Champions busses making stops at participating casinos across the country.

Something else to look forward to from Multimedia during its 2014 fiscal year is the Maximum Player Experience™ (MPX™) cabinet, an addition to its Player Series, which is a new game that’s “hiding in our little back room that’s a secret, but everybody knows about it,”, Roemer said.

A highlight for Roemer was the TournEvent and seeing people’s positive reaction and enthusiasm for what Multimedia has to offer at G2E and for the products. “G2E is a chance for our customers to see how we’ve continued to grow as a major supplier by not only showing them how we’ve increased our output, but also that we’ve improved the quality of our games and systems,” Roemer said.



Video Game Technologies (VGT)
It’s alive! It’s alive! The Frankenstein™ and Lizards on the Loose™ games from VGT’s XSpin™ platform have just had their first install and have performed great, according to Ryan Cuddy, vice president of game design.

Lizards on the Loose is cartoony, said Cuddy, and players laugh and comment how cute the lizard is. The lizard gives players additional wins, eats a bug that becomes wild and attempts to lick symbols, but his tongue slaps him onto the reels that in turn transitions the players to free games. Frankenstein is very unique compared to what’s out today, Cuddy said. It’s based on a more horror film type of feel, and the Frankenstein monster actually gets electrocuted, which elicits a fear factor within the game. 

“There [are] a lot of games out there where you’re just playing the math, or you’ve got some more cookie-cutter production house graphics going on, and we’re really focused on the whole package, so for that player it is more than just playing the math,” Cuddy said.

These games present more of an integrated experience than what players traditionally see, which is very important to VGT.  It’s not about quantity, or how many bells and whistles a game has, Cuddy said. It’s about a real marriage of the math, graphics and operations of the game.

“We’ve transitioned from a company of showing potentially what might be to bringing it to the show and having those discussions about deployment and delivering to our players, as well as bringing an extra level of entertainment,” Cuddy said.



WMS
Phil Gelber, senior vice president of product development for WMS, said he’s happy the company has found its stride again.

One of the most exciting things launching at G2E was the 3-reel mechanical Blade Stepper, which is available at high-denomination, a quarter of a dollar and above, and a penny for the low-denomination. The Blade platform blends the traditional 3-reel mechanical with the modern technology of the CPU-NXT®3 operating system to feature new innovation series.

“We set out to build this modern cabinet, but still a little bit old-school, and [customers] think we nailed it on the head, and they really like the innovative game designs that we’ve put on that platform as well,” Gelber said.

Gamefield xD™ launched last year, and some games on that platform are Monopoly™ and The Wizard of Oz™. Other exciting new products include  Iron Man™, Beetlejuice™ and the new Clue™ product “that really leverages those two 32-inch screens and gives the player a new experience that they haven’t seen before by enabling the cool things you can do with the hardware,”  according to Gelber.

“Obviously we’re going through a transaction with Scientific Games, but looking at the products out there, people can see the WMS brand will continue to innovate, continue to do everything that we’ve done in the past for our customers,” he said. “And just because the owners are changing doesn’t mean the spirit or the innovation of WMS is going to change. We’re going to continue to think outside the box and deliver high quality products, and do cool new things.”