It’s fair to say that online slots are still in their infancy in some ways. While some markets have had them for quite some time, in the United States only a handful of states offer real money gaming options at the moment. With a limited audience, many makers of slots for physical casinos weren’t particularly aggressive at offering those titles on online casinos.
That has been shifting, as the states with online casinos continue to see their popularity rise, and more providers are speeding up their investments. Here’s what some of the top game providers have been up to.
Light & Wonder
Light & Wonder has been among the more aggressive in getting popular titles into online casinos. Their strategy is actually three pronged, as they also carefully consider the benefit of their social casino apps as well.
Earlier this year, Matt Wilson, CEO of the company, discussed a platform dubbed “Carbon,” with a goal of being able to develop a slot once, and deploy it on a physical slot machine, in social apps like Gold Fish Casino Slots, and to online casinos. Today, those efforts have to be done in parallel.
Even without Carbon, Light & Wonder has been aggressive in getting new games to market across platforms. Recent launches like Ultimate Fire Link Cash Falls and Hot Hot Blazing Lock have found themselves in all three formats within a short window of each other, meaning many players may experience the game online before seeing it in a casino.
IGT
IGT’s catalog historically leaned on popular titles from their library, such as Cleopatra. Some games that we’ve seen across various major sites, like 100,000 Pyramid, date back a considerable amount of time from when they were in casinos.
That said, they’ve been coming on stronger more recently, with both Prosperity Link and Mystery of the Lamp titles hitting online casinos in 2024, well adapted to fit the mobile and computer screen formats.
We suspect IGT will continue to close the gap, particularly on their most popular titles, allowing the excitement generated by games on casino floors to continue that momentum online.
Aristocrat
For a long time it seemed like Aristocrat was sitting on the sidelines. However, they’ve been catching up quickly, with a wide variety of titles hitting online casinos from a mix of eras. They’ve been focused on proven titles so far, such as Buffalo Gold Collection, given their relatively new arrival to the space.
But as they continue to build out their library, it seems inevitable that their industry leadership in the physical slots space will carry into online environments.
Konami
Konami has been pretty steadily releasing their games, and this includes both classics and newer entries like the Lucky Envelope series. Some of their games have also been popping up on a variety of social casinos, but third party ones, allowing their games to be a bit more prevalent, even though they also have a dedicated social app as well.
AGS
Just as they’ve been doing in physical casinos, AGS has been pushing forward aggressively in the online world as well. Some of their more recent slots are making their way online more quickly – recent examples, Rakin’ Bacon Sahara and Rakin’ Bacon Odyssey, found their way online less than a year after their physical casino release.
They do seem to be moving faster on their 3-reel slots getting online than the video ones, which is understandable given the development speed for each. But there’s definitely signs of a push to get their marquee titles online quickly, meaning you can more easily find your favorites online.
Everi
Similar to AGS, Everi has had success with 3-reel games, and those titles are in plentiful supply online. Most of their online titles have proven themselves, and are a generation or two behind.
They’re touting the launch of Wicked Wheel Panda as we write this, whereas the Wicked Wheel series has seen a couple of generations of that series come out in physical casinos since.
Everi and IGT’s gaming business are slated to be combined as part of an acquisition/merger announced this year, so it remains to be seen what will happen from here.
Takeaway
Finding popular games from casino floors is getting easier, but some providers are being more aggressive at bringing them to online casinos quickly than others.
How this shakes out in the coming years will depend on more than just resourcing, as online casinos as a whole continue to grow in importance and revenue, but the big casino providers seem to have at least an eye on making sure they’re competitive.
