Gaming Arts highlights its new VertX Grand cabinet with a trio of powerful new games

By Frank Legato

For slot-makers lately, great new games and fantastic new cabinets have gone hand in hand. Numerous of those new cabinet presentations these days are in huge formats—and game developers have utilized these giant canvases to develop some of the best new game experiences on the slot floor.

That is the way it’s been with the VertX Grand cabinet&nbsp from Las Vegas–based Gaming Arts. The VertX Grand, unveiled&nbsp last summer time, characteristics an ultra-bright, 4K 49-inch portrait monitor, theater-high quality sound, an ultra-bright&nbsp LCD button&nbsp deck, programmable LED play buttons, and consideration-grabbing LED side lights.

Developed for the duration of the pandemic shutdowns of 2020, the format is hitting its stride this summer time with 3 fantastic games that take full advantage of that bigger-than- life presentation.

“We’ve been actually pleased with the overall performance of our game titles on our VertX Grand cabinet,” says Jean Venneman, chief operating officer of Gaming Arts. “The cabinet has shown to perform effectively on the floor, and it is visually stunning. And now we’ve got 3 further new games that we think players are going to truly, truly get pleasure from.”

KUNG FU EMPRESS

The initial of these 3 has just been released and is currently extremely popular. Kung Fu Empress, based on the well-known video game of the identical name, makes use of the large VertX Grand show for an expanding reels feature to excellent impact, but that is only a single of a generous package of bonus and principal-game characteristics.

“We’re really excited about just how function-rich the game is,”Venneman says. “It offers a ton of entertainment, a ton of graphics, a ton of animations and a ton of intros and outros that are actually entertaining. The bonuses are really graphically intense—it packs a genuine punch as far as the visuals.&nbsp And then it is a great game on leading of that.”

Kung Fu Empress delivers that punch from the initial press of the “Play” button, when the main character, Chipao, does her Kung Fu move that throws one particular or far more wild symbols to the reel array. When the Chipao wild symbol stops on the fifth reel, all image symbols on that reel become Chipao symbols, significantly increasing the payouts for players.

There are random “battles” that happen throughout game play. When a “PicA” symbol lands on the reels, it triggers the “Punch Bonus,” in which the Kung Fu Empress attacks the cute “Log Man” to award bonus prizes. The bonus prizes hold coming until the enemy collapses.

A wild symbol in the base game also can randomly trigger the “Tile Break Function,” in which the player wins the prize or jackpot displayed when the Kung Fu Empress breaks the pile of tile.

In the totally free-game feature, the reels expand from four rows to eight rows, bumping the techniques to win from 50 to 100, for an thrilling hold-and-re-spin function. In the course of free of charge games, a battle appears each three spins. If you win the battle, the enemy symbol is converted to the Chipao wild symbol, and the totally free spins return to three. Filling the screen with Chipao symbols returns the Grand progressive jackpot, resetting at $five,000.The array of enemies may possibly start off modest but progress to ever-rising battle intensity along with a lot more intense payouts to the player.

“We discover this to be quite diverse from what we’ve seen in the market,”Venneman says. “Kung Fu Empress has got wonderful game play and is visually gorgeous, with endless special game characteristics. It is just an extremely exciting game to play.”

BRIAN CHRISTOPHER’S POP’N PAYS Far more

Gaming Arts, like a lot of slot producers these days, has been aided in developing popularity for new games by the new crop of “slot influencers”—YouTube stars who live stream slot play on new games, hosting their own play with enthusiastic narration of wins,&nbsp losses, bonuses and game features, with some possessing far-reaching groups of fans and followers.

The prime YouTube slot influencer is Brian Christopher, whose YouTube channel BCSlots has some 479,000 subscribers and has logged a outstanding 318 million views since its 2016 launch. Christopher himself, who has some 41,500 Instagram followers, has become a slot guru of sorts across America. Millions of fans have watched his videos—the average view time is an amazing 18 minutes— and have become familiar with his preferred slots any quantity of catch phrases he utilizes to get players excited about features of a given slot game.

The Plaza, situated in Downtown Las Vegas, even has a specific zone devoted solely to Christopher’s favored games—a space he usually utilizes to collect crowds of his fans to reside-stream new games.

On July 7, he is undertaking that with his really own signature game—Brian Christopher’s Pop’N Pays More—which Gaming Arts developed with substantial input from Christopher himself.

“We are genuinely appreciative of Brian and what he does,”Venneman says. “We were a quite young slot supplier when we launched the original Pop’N Pays series in 2019.Brian located the game, loved the game and genuinely helped market the game on his channel. We feel that he actually did help and help in acquiring that game out into the marketplace and added to its accomplishment, by displaying his enthusiasm for the game.”

When it came time to move the Pop’N Pays&nbsp series—a loved ones&nbsp of games distinguished by exciting themes and entertaining features—to the new VertX Grand cabinet, it was a no-brainer to create a Brian Christopher&nbsp signature slot. “We’ve collaborated quite closely with him to develop a game that he loves,” says Venneman, “and to use his brand in a superb way that I believe his player base will truly take pleasure in. It has endless voice-overs employing several of his well-identified sayings, and a lot of the imagery that’s related to him and his brand.”

Christopher says he was involved in designing the game from begin to finish. “Pop’N Pays was already a hit amongst my fans, so when they asked me about partnering on a new version, I jumped&nbsp on it,” he says. “They had already worked out what they wanted for their other iterations of Pop’N Pays More—Piñatas Ole and Big Top—and despite the fact that you will notice a lot of variations among them and my game, all 3 games in the series are exceptional.

“I provided up methods to add far more attributes, and a ton more interaction. I was able to offer input on the music, the wording, symbols, sounds and performance. Nothing at all was off limits, so long as it kept to the Pop’N Pays brand.”

The Brian Christopher slot, with 1,047 approaches to win in the base game, has a feature that expands reels 2–5 up to eight symbols higher. At full expansion, there are 16,384 methods to win on each and every spin. There is a free game function supplying up to 15 totally free games with frequent re-triggers.

All through game play, Brian Christopher’s avatar pops up as cash-on-reels symbols. And he essentially hosts his own game, utilizing his most well-known catchphrases. “Oh Nelly!”&nbsp following a huge win. “Line it UP!” in anticipation of a winning spin. “Do it to it!” “It’s all about timing!” And one of the most clever and frequent: right after a close to-miss where a symbol lands just short of a combination—“Rude!”

“Aside from a few hidden Easter eggs that I’ll permit my fans to uncover, the Brian character can be super generous,” Christopher says. “If you are missing a single bonus symbol, Brian can say his catchphrase ‘Rude!’ and supply the third bonus symbol! If you have a complete row of popping Brians but are missing an essential one, Brian can place an additional one particular. In the bonus, the popping Brians can place up two or even 3 fingers to signify two or three prizes alternatively of the usual 1 in normal spins.”

“We’re really excited about operating with Brian,” says Venneman.“&nbsp He’s been an amazing partner to work with, so we’re hopeful that his fans and players alike genuinely take pleasure in this thrilling new game.”

“We’re a ideal match,” adds Christopher.&nbsp “We are both super innovative and forward considering.&nbsp As my fans currently loved Pop’N Pays due to its continuous action, enjoyable bonuses and catchy music, this was the apparent decision.”

CASINO WIZARD VIP

As&nbsp the planet recovered from Covid-19,&nbsp Gaming Arts launched its special Casino Wizard electronic table game, which is the world’s most sophisticated electronic table game featuring table game favorites blackjack, roulette, craps and baccarat along with new side bets. It gained instant reputation from coast to coast.

This August, a super-charged version of Casino Wizard will launch on the VertX Grand cabinet. The large monitor and intense graphics make the 4 original games pop like never prior to. What’s much more, Gaming Arts has doubled the quantity of games on the multi-game unit. The new Casino Wizard VIP adds Pai Gow Poker, Super Huge six Wheel, Swap’Em Poker and Triple Card Poker to the original four selections.

According to Venneman, there also are a great many enhancements to the original 4 games such as more side bets and many revolutionary progressive jackpots.

“There’s just a lot of a fantastic variety of entertainment and fun within this one particular machine,” she says. “Whether players are playing our game since the tables are complete, the minimums are as well higher, or players find traditional table games as well intimidating, we’re hoping table players and slot players will expand their horizons and take pleasure in far more range and the beautiful video presentation on the huge screen.

“These 3 new titles, along with a lot of far more, thrive on the VertX Grand format.”

And it could be the start off of something… well, massive, to say the least.

The ideal assumption is that you can make no assumptions

By John Grochowski

Ever have an “oops!” casino moment, 1 of those times when factors have gone incorrect and you know it’s your own fault since you didn’t verify the game guidelines or assumed a small too much?

I certain have. I’ve been going to casinos because the 1980s, and I’ve pulled some doozies. One particular came at an Indiana casino a even though ago, back when most machines were nonetheless set to a single coin denomination. The casino was a single of the Midwest’s initial to offer SuperTimes Pay.&nbsp I like the game very a lot, and have no qualms about playing SuperTimesTriple Play on a quarter machine with a decent spend table, even although the $7.50 maximum bet is double that on normalTriple Play, and six occasions the $1.25 on a common single-hand quarter game.

Problem: I assumed this was a quarter game.&nbsp A natural sufficient assumption, considering that my wife was on a quarter machine 1 spot to the appropriate. It wasn’t. When I hit the max coins button, it deducted $30 from my $one hundred get-in. Turns out my wife and I were on opposite sides of the dividing line among quarter and dollar games. This wasn’t the game for an individual of my modest signifies. I cashed out the rest and moved on to something far more bankroll appropriate.

Oops!

I witnessed one of the wonderful “oops” moments in Las Vegas in the early 1990s.The Tropicana at the time had a bank of massive-funds quarter progressives close to the entrance, with a 3-coin maximum bet and a jackpot that often reached $250,000.

One particular morning, I got off the elevator and walked into the casino to be greeted by a host I knew. He directed my focus to a player who was just sitting and staring at the reels on one particular of the progressives, so motionless he could have been a mannequin.

“See that guy?” the host asked. “He just hit the blue 7s. And he only bet one particular quarter.”

I asked how significantly he’d won.

“Oh, a few hundred quarters,” the host mentioned, shaking his head at what saving 50 cents on the bet had price in the finish.

I didn’t verify, and that might have been an exaggeration. Maybe it was thousands of quarters and not hundreds. But still—oops.

I put it to other players, asking about some of their “oops” moments:

DAN

I have a couple for you, both on video poker. I typically play dollar video poker but occasionally I go into the high-limit area and play 1 coin on a $5 machine. I’ve had accomplishment at hitting 4 deuces. Properly, I hit a royal about six months ago. I believed I had hit for $four,000, given that that is what a $5 bet would have been on a dollar machine. Envision my disappointment when I realized the payout was only $1,250. I assumed the identical bet size would bring the identical payoffs, but you have to bet max coins or else the royal is only 250-for-1. It was a good payout, but I discovered a lesson about not playing max coin in! But at the same time, I can’t afford $25 a hand.

The other issue is, when I get up from a machine to go to the men’s area, I often cash out, but leave my players card in the machine and cover the screen. In January I came back to my machine and started playing again. I hit four deuces for what I thought&nbsp was for $1,000. It turns out the machine had a max 25-coin play as an alternative of the usual 5-coin max, and I had forgotten to limit my play to five coins, or $five. So, I ended up with a $five,000 payout alternatively of the thousand.

That time, I was grateful for the mistake, but by no means am I going to play $25 a hand on my bankroll!

MARGARET

Mine has to be the first time I played video slots. I was utilized to constantly playing max coins on the reel slots, and I figured I ought to do the very same on video.&nbsp I feel it was Reel ’Em In, although I can’t remember after all this time. It could have been Jackpot Party or one of the other individuals.

I didn’t play the videos at 1st. I loved my reels. But my girlfriend convinced me to give it a try. It was a nickel game and had nine lines. I figured, OK, this will be a cheap try, 45 cents to play all the lines. I didn’t know it would take five coins on every line. I hit max coins, and didn’t notice proper away how significantly it had taken. So I hit max coins once more, and then again, just before I ultimately noticed that my credits have been receiving awfully small. I wasn’t betting 45 cents, I was betting $two.25! It took a couple of months prior to I’d try that again, this time at one coin per line!

CARLA

I don’t know if this counts, simply because it is not playing or approach or something, but it was in a casino and it embarrassed me. I’d only played in Las Vegas, and was utilized to the waitresses bringing cost-free drinks. So I was playing the slots, and the waitress came by and I asked for a beer.

She came back, and said it would be $five. I was shocked, and I was unprepared. I only had $20 to start with, and that was in the machine. My husband and I figured we’d get money when we got to the casino, and he hadn’t come back from the ATM but.

Anyway, while I was fumbling by means of my purse trying to come up with $five in loose change to spend, my husband identified me and handed me some cash. I paid the waitress and apologized for keeping her. Yet another couple of minutes and I’d have had to inform her I didn’t want the beer soon after all. Oops!

The greatest assumption is that you can make no assumptions

By John Grochowski

Ever have an “oops!” casino moment, one particular of these times when things have gone wrong and you know it’s your personal fault simply because you didn’t verify the game guidelines or assumed a small as well significantly?

I sure have. I’ve been going to casinos given that the 1980s, and I’ve pulled some doozies. 1 came at an Indiana casino a while ago, back when most machines have been nonetheless set to a single coin denomination. The casino was 1 of the Midwest’s first to offer SuperTimes Spend.&nbsp I like the game really a lot, and have no qualms about playing SuperTimesTriple Play on a quarter machine with a decent spend table, even even though the $7.50 maximum bet is double that on normalTriple Play, and six occasions the $1.25 on a standard single-hand quarter game.

Dilemma: I assumed this was a quarter game.&nbsp A organic adequate assumption, given that my wife was on a quarter machine a single spot to the correct. It wasn’t. When I hit the max coins button, it deducted $30 from my $100 buy-in. Turns out my wife and I have been on opposite sides of the dividing line amongst quarter and dollar games. This wasn’t the game for someone of my modest indicates. I cashed out the rest and moved on to anything much more bankroll suitable.

Oops!

I witnessed one of the excellent “oops” moments in Las Vegas in the early 1990s.The Tropicana at the time had a bank of huge-money quarter progressives close to the entrance, with a 3-coin maximum bet and a jackpot that typically reached $250,000.

One morning, I got off the elevator and walked into the casino to be greeted by a host I knew. He directed my consideration to a player who was just sitting and staring at the reels on one particular of the progressives, so motionless he could have been a mannequin.

“See that guy?” the host asked. “He just hit the blue 7s. And he only bet one particular quarter.”

I asked how considerably he’d won.

“Oh, a handful of hundred quarters,” the host said, shaking his head at what saving 50 cents on the bet had cost in the finish.

I didn’t verify, and that could have been an exaggeration. Maybe it was thousands of quarters and not hundreds. But still—oops.

I put it to other players, asking about some of their “oops” moments:

DAN

I have a couple for you, both on video poker. I normally play dollar video poker but sometimes I go into the higher-limit location and play one coin on a $5 machine. I’ve had achievement at hitting four deuces. Well, I hit a royal about six months ago. I believed I had hit for $four,000, given that that is what a $5 bet would have been on a dollar machine. Envision my disappointment when I realized the payout was only $1,250. I assumed the very same bet size would bring the identical payoffs, but you have to bet max coins or else the royal is only 250-for-1. It was a great payout, but I learned a lesson about not playing max coin in! But at the same time, I can not afford $25 a hand.

The other issue is, when I get up from a machine to go to the men’s room, I always cash out, but leave my players card in the machine and cover the screen. In January I came back to my machine and began playing once again. I hit 4 deuces for what I believed&nbsp was for $1,000. It turns out the machine had a max 25-coin play instead of the usual five-coin max, and I had forgotten to limit my play to five coins, or $5. So, I ended up with a $5,000 payout as an alternative of the thousand.

That time, I was grateful for the error, but by no signifies am I going to play $25 a hand on my bankroll!

MARGARET

Mine has to be the very first time I played video slots. I was utilised to usually playing max coins on the reel slots, and I figured I must do the very same on video.&nbsp I believe it was Reel ’Em In, though I can’t remember soon after all this time. It could have been Jackpot Celebration or one particular of the other individuals.

I didn’t play the videos at initial. I loved my reels. But my girlfriend convinced me to give it a attempt. It was a nickel game and had nine lines. I figured, OK, this will be a inexpensive attempt, 45 cents to play all the lines. I didn’t know it would take five coins on every line. I hit max coins, and didn’t notice right away how much it had taken. So I hit max coins once again, and then once again, ahead of I lastly noticed that my credits have been obtaining awfully little. I wasn’t betting 45 cents, I was betting $two.25! It took a couple of months ahead of I’d attempt that once more, this time at one particular coin per line!

CARLA

I don’t know if this counts, because it is not playing or strategy or something, but it was in a casino and it embarrassed me. I’d only played in Las Vegas, and was utilized to the waitresses bringing totally free drinks. So I was playing the slots, and the waitress came by and I asked for a beer.

She came back, and mentioned it would be $five. I was shocked, and I was unprepared. I only had $20 to commence with, and that was in the machine. My husband and I figured we’d get money when we got to the casino, and he hadn’t come back from the ATM but.

Anyway, even though I was fumbling through my purse attempting to come up with $5 in loose adjust to pay, my husband found me and handed me some cash. I paid the waitress and apologized for maintaining her. Yet another couple of minutes and I’d have had to inform her I didn’t want the beer soon after all. Oops!

Can you determine what slot payout percentages are on any offered machine?

By Frank Scoblete

The lament amongst some slot players, a lot of other casino players and most gaming writers is the reality that slot machines do not inform you what their percentage returns are except in situations exactly where an area of machines has signs saying anything to the effect that “these machines return a minimum of 98 percent” or the like.

You play a machine and you have no idea of what percent of the funds it will return. That is correct. But what is also true is that the casino tells us no info about the return of any of its games.

That is right—no casino explains what the returns are at their games at any of their games. Appear at a machine and it tells you nothing at all, that is true, but appear at the blackjack table or craps table or roulette able or at any other game’s table and nowhere does it tell you what the return is.

So how is it that we gaming writers can confidently tell individuals in articles about all the other games and what their returns are? There are no indicators at the tables telling us this info. There are no indicators on video poker machines telling us this details either. But, we know what the video poker returns are.

So how do we know?

The casino does not make a point by telling us something about what we can anticipate to get if we play any game. However, we talk and act as if the casino does such a factor. Once more, it doesn’t.

How do we know what the percentage return at each craps bet is but we don’t know what the return is on Fortunate Slots Entertaining?

Expertise OF PAYOUT PERCENTAGES

We know payout percentages at practically all games simply because the casino tells us at every game but slots what a bet pays us.

Adhere to this now: We know how usually that decision comes up, what it pays and what it ought to pay if the game had been a fair contest.

We know in craps that the pass-line bet pays even funds and that the casino will win 251 decisions and the player will win 244 decisions on that bet. We know for that reason that the home edge is 1.41 percent. We are expected to drop $1.41 per $one hundred wagered more than time.

We know the relationship of every number at craps to the 7 or to producing it as a one-roll bet. We know the percentages and how these percentages relate to cash.

One particular far more instance: Roulette has a house edge of five.26 % on the American roulette game that has a and a 00 as two of its 38 numbers. Make a bet on this game and you have a one particular in 38 opportunity of hitting the winning quantity. The payout is 35-to-a single, which indicates the casino shorts you by two units on a win. A fair game would pay out 37-to-a single.

We can then figure how a lot of a percentage edge the casino has at a roulette game by knowing these numbers. The casino does not post this on the tables we have to do the figuring to come up with the percentages. You can read this details in a publication such as this but you won’t find it posted on the table.

The casino prefers not to inform us something. On most games, nevertheless, we can figure every little thing out. Not at slots.

THE SLOT MYSTERY

The casinos know how considerably an person slot machine returns but the players do not. There is no way we can find out without having getting provided privileged info.

Yes, we can guess but those guesses are just that—guesses. Okay, how do we guess? And can we in fact have “smart” guesses?

Most states have laws that tell the casinos they need to show the return percentages on their slot machines, normally primarily based on the denomination of those machines. Consequently, we can locate out what the 5-dollar machines return, what the dollar machines return, what the twenty- five cent machines return and so on.

Sadly, these are just averages. It may be correct that the five-dollar machines are returning 95 % of the funds played in them but we don’t know if the certain machine at which we are gazing actually returns 95 percent or 92 or 98 %.

But we can say with some self-assurance that a 5-dollar machine will return more to the players than a dollar machine, whose typical is about 91 percent. Is this an absolute statement? No. It is a guess an informed guess, yes, but it is not definitely a accurate statement.

We are seeking at averages and creating our guess primarily based on these. We just don’t have the figures available to us and we can’t figure everything out the way we can at games such as video poker, blackjack, roulette, craps, and so on.

We will usually be guessing at person slot machine percentages simply because the programming is a secret in between the producers and the casinos. The player is an outsider in this case and truly has tiny capacity to ferret out the right percentages on any provided machine.

Guessing is the best we can do. We do not have figures as we do with the other casino games so, okay, point to a machine and take your greatest guess!

All the very best in and out of the casinos!

&nbsp

Frank Scoblete’s website is www.frankscoblete.com. His books are obtainable at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, Kindle, e-books, libraries and bookstores.