76 gaming
No longer the greatest show on earth,
but it’s still pretty damned good.
A lot of business happened this
November in Vegas
by Jon bruford*
T
here are voices in the industry suggesting that, with mable buttons – both features make it perfect for a server-based
the rise of SAGSE in Argentina, G2E Asia, and ICE in floor. Of course, with a Bose sound system installed, the audio
London, G2E Las Vegas’s days are numbered as a major quality of the games on Bluebird 2 is outstanding.
international show. Well, that’s not what we saw in Las Vegas – Also at their booth was a cracking selection of community
yes, visitor numbers are unquestionably down, but the number gaming products, including their Monopoly branded titles.
of decision makers seems to have stayed constant. Business was Novomatic’s booth was far larg-
done, in some cases lots of it, and new technology was on show. er than last year, and enjoyed
All in all, it was a very satisfying show, with a few notable stan- a good position on the
dout products. floor. Just as well, be-
Top of the tree was Shuffle Master’s iTable, which is basi- cause they had a good
cally an electronic Blackjack game. Simple enough so far, but selection of quality
there’s a lot more to this than meets the eye. It’s not fully elec- product for customers
tronic, it’s played with a card reading shoe and a real deck, plus to peruse.
a live dealer. The player takes a seat and buys in to the game, Debuting several
and their credit appears on an individual display before them. new Coolfire II game
From there, play continues as normal, but with a couple of ex- mixes designed spe-
cellent embellishments and improvements. First up, when the cifically for the North
player gets their two cards and the dealer has one face up card, and South American
the table calculates the true odds of the player winning, and it markets and presented
becomes a side bet; if the dealer has a four, for example, and in the Novo Super-Vi-
the player has 18, the odds are good that the player will win sion cabinet, Novomat-
so the side bet will pay out less. To take the wager, the player ic received a very high
must match their initial bet on the hand. As with most electronic level of interest in these
games, it’s faster as payouts are automated, so it immediately multi-game machines.
has the potential to make more profit for the operator. Novomatic’s very high-
Perhaps best of all though, the table is versatile – fundamen- ly regarded electronic
tally, it’s a card table, not just a Blackjack table. The Blackjack multiplayer games,
model can be rebooted and in just a few minutes, it’s a Baccarat displayed in a Novo
table; same shoe, same dealer, different appeal. Genius! Multi-Table Roulette
As Shuffle Master’s Kirsten Clark explains, “On our ver- configuration, pow-
sion of iTable that utilizes a specialty shuffler, we’ll be able to ered by the server
change from 3 Card Poker to a Hold’Em style game depending based Novo Uni-
on the demands of the floor. We’re launching with Blackjack ty I platform and
and Baccarat, but we’re developing the software for other games displayed on the
now. Novo-Vision Slant
WMS premiered their Bluebird 2 cabinet at the show, the Top II cabinet and
evolution of Bluebird, their mainstay for the last few years. The on the innovative
Bluebird was future-proofed, capable of working within a serv- Novo Bar (bar
er-based gaming environment, but the new cabinet seems to be top console) also
a real improvement. It uses their Transmissive Reels technology, received a lot of
where a clear screen overlays the reels, and features program- attention. Novo
december 2008
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