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When many players think of slot machines, they think of the three-reel mechanical slots that have had a place on casino floors for decades. Slot machine stock art, emojis, illustrations and so on always harken back to that format. Visit a casino today, and you’ll likely see them still out there. And odds are many of them will have been made by IGT.
One of IGT’s most successful slot cabinets of all time was the S2000, a mechanical reel slot introduced more than two decades ago. Their ubiquity in their prime is still visible on casino floors across the country today, particularly in the high limit room, where some of their most popular mechanical reel themes have endured, a testament to the quality and ingenuity of IGT over the years.
So when it was time to develop a new generation of mechanical slot machines, there was a lot to consider – how do you keep things familiar, but still evolve to take advantage of modern technology and trends? How do you marry the time-tested and the bleeding edge?
With the DiamondRS cabinet line, IGT did just that, updating both the hardware and the games that are found on it, while not forgetting about what made things special to begin with.
We had an opportunity to speak to two team members at IGT well versed with their mechanical reels slots, and learned how they found that perfect balance, yielding impressive results that has led to a recent expansions of their mechanical reel line, including a new five-reel variation.
Keeping Players Happy is Job One
In creating a new mechanical reels cabinet, IGT was laser-locked on what players preferred, said Anthony Baerlocher, Vice President of Product Development and Innovation at IGT. Part of the reason for that was that by continuing to play these classic machines, players had kept some of IGT’s most successful games on the floor for decades, while other machines around them had come and gone.
“The reason they’re still out there is that players love them,” he said. It’s hard to get them to transfer to a new game, so part of that is trying to keep as much DNA as possible common, but then add enhancements to it.”
From the perspective of the DiamondRS, some decisions around the new cabinet were how far to push the changes. Baerlocher said, “We asked players, ‘Is there something that would make you not play this game?’ Two of the big controversies were the Digital Player Panel versus physical buttons. And the second one was a handle.
“Do we need a handle? Because traditionally they have handles, but most players don’t use them. But we asked that question and players were like, ‘No, I really like the handle.’ Do you use it? ’No, but I see other people use it and it’s part of the machine. It just wouldn’t look right if it wasn’t there, you know?’
“With the Digital Player Panel, they’re like, ‘I don’t care.’ And that opened up the ability for us to create better configurations with more variety. Now we can put a game into the high limit room, configure at a bet of 3 credits and the same game can move out to the main floor with a bet of 27 credits and not have to worry about changing the button legends. As soon as it’s set up in software, the buttons are going to be right.”
More Choices, for Players and Casinos Alike
So the handle stayed, but lucky for us as players, the switch to a Digital Player Panel means more player options for various games on the casino floor, and for casinos an easier time updating the game based on player and casino preference.
Fans of Double Top Dollar, for instance, have probably seen the new 5-line and 9-line variations that are available on this new machine, which is part of what’s possible thanks to this new machine.
Some casinos even let players choose whether they wish to play the 1-line, 5-line or 9-line versions. The DiamondRS allows this thanks to both the Digital Player Panel and the transmissive glass, a screen that overlays the reels and top box that invokes the classic glass of old school slot machines, but is actually a monitor that can dynamically update based on the selections made around line count and denomination.
As a result, Baerlocher said, it means players will find something familiar, but also something new, which keeps it fresh and fun. “We wanted that player familiarity to be able to say, ‘Hey, this is a comfortable game for me. I want to play it because it’s just like my old game.’ And then offer that extra value to both the players and the operators by adding some new mechanics and just having it look really great.”
A side effect to these updates is creators like Brian Christopher get a slot that looks great on camera, making it more fun for viewers as well. “Some influencers I’ve talked to say ‘We love the old Top Dollars and Pinballs, but on this new cabinet they record so much better’,” Baerlocher said.
An Uphill Battle to Launch
The DiamondRS came together during a tumultuous time in the world, with development and testing being done in the midst of the recent pandemic.
“We built this cabinet during the peak of COVID,” Baerlocher said. ”So that added a whole other level of complexity trying to get people into the office, staggered because we weren’t allowed to be together, to look at samples that would come in. Then another complexity was just how long it would take for samples to get built and then shipped. If you recall, there were boats lined up in Long Beach trying to offload goods.”
Hundreds of prototypes were ultimately tested, finding the right balance of everything from lighting behind the reels to how the reels are framed. In the end, the efforts were worth it, Baerlocher said.
“We’re extremely proud of the effort, and especially overcoming the circumstances of COVID development. Now we have a great product,” he said.
Expanding the Line to New Areas
The DiamondRS line now features four different options, including a new five-reel variation, which Royall Freestone, Product Manager, Mechanical Reels at IGT, said was based on IGT’s previous success in this area, as well as the current trends on the casino floor.
“Some of our top themes are five reel, and some of our longest lasting top themes, more importantly, are five reels,” she said. “If you look at Eilers reports, or any of the top reporting slot companies, you’ll see that our Hot Hit themes have lasted for a very long time.
“The five reels also allows us to do some more innovative things. For example, we have some new themes coming out after our launch titles that allow us to do stuff that we can’t necessarily do on the three-reel cabinet. The development studios also like working on the five reel cabinets because it allows them to be a little bit more innovative.”
Baerlocher also noted IGT’s previous success in five-reel offerings, something that IGT has historically led, and that by offering variations of the mechanical reel machines on a unified framework like DiamondRS, it makes it easier for slot techs and other casino employees to configure and maintain the machines.
“There’s a lot of commonality and familiarity [within the DiamondRS family] which lowers that barrier by just doing an extension in the DiamondRS series. We’re very confident in the performance of our past games. So we’re trying to leverage recognizable brands, recognizable mechanics to offer the players what they want,” while also giving casinos an easier product to maintain.
Freestone added, “We really want something for everyone on the floor. We launched the DiamondRS in a traditional three-reel format. Then we introduced the DiamondRS 27, that’s more of a high-limit version with lower sightlines. The DiamondRS five reel allows us to go into different spaces on the floor as well as to be up against a video slot a little bit. You’re seeing Diamond RS Premium as well. So just different strategies for different places on the floor and different players” are being served by each variation.
Finding the Right Themes
With so many successful titles over the years in IGT’s library of mechanical reel themes, it also requires some consideration as to what will work today. While some players will have a fondness for certain classic games, it’s not a lock that bringing them back will work.
When the DiamondRS cabinet came out, they began with proven performers. “Double Gold and Pink Diamond were two of our first games we had on our Diamond RS road map because these were two huge performers year after year after year in high denomination,” Freestone said. “Double Top Dollar was right there behind them.”
But while they made sure to have the original versions that certain players especially loved available to meet player demand, they didn’t lose track of the opportunity to innovate as well. “What we’re learning is that the original games might do well, but we might need to make some changes to the line variants of them” to also reach other audiences.
Old Favorites with New Wrinkles
Double Top Dollar is a great example of this approach. For Baerlocher, this is a game near and dear to him, as he did the original math on the version that first hit casino floors. The new version is faithful in many ways.
For instance, when you encounter the single-line Double Top Dollar on the DiamondRS, Freestone noted that Baerlacher “worked very diligently to make sure that when we brought over the one-line versions that they were created exactly the same, including sounds, visuals, the voiceovers that are on there, the animations, the math” are all carried directly over from the original.
But to offer 5-line and 9-line versions on the cabinet, they opted to use the same reels as the 1-line version, which meant getting to envision a new variation of Double Top Dollar. Baerlocher said it “gave us an opportunity to create a new version that is more attuned to today’s players and what they expect in a 5-line game.”
He also said that having a multi-line version opened more possibilities. “Being a big Top Dollar fan and very passionate about the brand, part of the vision behind this also was exposing the game to more players. , It felt like it was getting constrained to the high limit rooms. You see a lot of $25, $10, $5 bets because it’s only two or three coins. That means it’s not accessible to a majority of the people who go to the casino. Sure, Brian can go play that, but not everyone plays like Brian, right?
“So we wanted to create a 9-line version that could go out on the main floor, still drive a big enough bet to be competitive, but not too expensive, so that it’s accessible to most of our players and expose that great game. Let people play it for themselves rather than having to just watch videos of it.”
One Coin, Lots of Potential
One of the core elements of Double Top Dollar is that you cover your lines, and then it’s one more coin to activate the bonus. That structure is kept in the multi-line version, and despite that one coin potentially being a lower denomination (say, 1 25 cent coin on a 9-line version vs. 1 $1 coin on a single-line version), the bonus can still deliver at a similar level for a similar bet.
Baerlocher said that’s by design. “The monetary offers are about the same, but the number of credits are very different, right? Because you’re betting 10 credits, we can give you more credits back. It’s just usually when you add the denomination to it, it kind of levels that out because most people playing that game are at a lower denomination.”
The comparison is if you were doing a $10 bet on a single-line version (two credits, $5 denomination) vs. a $10 bet on the 9-line version ($10 bet at $1 denomination), the offer in credits will be bigger, but the overall monetary offer will be pretty close, so the potential on either version is similar accordingly.
There’s Still More to Come
If you ever read about video game consoles, game developers will tell you there’s a period when it first comes out, and game developers figure out new things you can do with this impressive new device. For the game makers inside IGT, the same is true for the DiamondRS series.
Of course, there are the new benefits that they aimed for with the machine’s design. Freestone noted that with the DiamondRS and its “Dynamic Player Panel, we can now have a one to five and a 9-line game by the click of a button, which is a huge win.”
More denominations are supported on one machine than on previous mechanical reel options.
Then there’s that dynamic transmissive glass panel, which (like the Dynamic Player Panel) since it doesn’t have to be static, opens the door to new options. “We can have them play bonuses on the transmissive glass on games like Fortune Coin Extra,” she added.
Even things like the pay table, which on many mechanical reel slots were baked into the glass, can now dynamically update based on the version of the game you’re playing, since a higher line game may have some tweaks to the rules (for example where a bonus symbol can land to trigger, such as on Double Top Dollar).
And then there’s progressives. Previously, a separate digital display was placed atop the machines when a progressive (and usually, just that one progressive) was involved. Now, Baerlocher said, it opens the door to more possibilities. He said it allows for variations where one version “may only have a single progressive meter, while another version might have eight progressive meters. You can do that all digitally.”
In the end, it comes down to striking that careful balance “of keeping things traditional and old school, holding on to our core players, but then also evolving them and bringing in new players,” he said.
