20+ years in the gambling industry including 13+ years playing and reviewing slots.
OLBG’s Chris Taylor spoke to Phil O’Toole, Director of Content at IGT PlayDigital, for a general Questions and Answers interview.
IGT PlayDigital is the online arm of the land-based giant (IGT) who are known for slot games such as Cleopatra and Da Vinci Diamonds. Available at most UK slot sites, you’ll also find their games in Las Vegas casinos and all around the world. A true global leader in gaming, they offer unrivalled gaming experiences and provide best-in-class content to the regulated gaming industry.
OLBG’s Q&A with IGT PlayDigital looks at IGT’s online journey, how new games are produced, what their most popular titles are, how land-based favourites are chosen to become available online and the new Mystery of The Lamp Treasure Oasis slot game.
Q: Can you describe IGT’s online journey to date?
PO: “IGT has been actively involved in the regulated online casino markets since their early days, having launched first in European jurisdictions with iconic games like Cleopatra, Cats and Da Vinci Diamonds: games that are still popular with players today.
We have since grown to become one of the leading online game providers in the world, having become a partner-of-choice to the majority of operators. In more recent years, we have also been heavily involved in the North American markets where we are active in each jurisdiction as one of the top providers, along with having the number one slot game across both the U.S. and Canada in Cash Eruption.”
Q: How are new slot games created? What’s the process?
PO: “The processes involved in making new slot games can be varied depending upon the type of game being produced. Our brand new, original game concepts will go through several ideation and prototyping stages to ensure that they are suitable for the specific player audience and offer an entertaining experience.
Our online conversions of IGT’s top-performing land games will have each been selected based upon their proven performance in brick-and-mortar casinos. They will also have been carefully adapted to best suit an online player’s expectations and preferences. For example, we might need to change the art within the game so that something that has been designed to look good on a large 43-inch screen on a physical machine on a casino floor looks just as good on a small mobile device.
In each instance, whether we are converting a strong land-based title or designing a new slot or table game, we will use our experienced team of experts from around the globe to brainstorm and provide invaluable feedback to ensure that our new games will be fun to play.”
Q: What are IGT PlayDigital’s most popular slot games? Are there any that are particularly popular only in the UK?
PO: “IGT PlayDigital’s Cash Eruption is one of the most popular and successful online slot games of all time. According to the October Eilers-Fantini Online Game Performance Report’s for both the U.S. and Canadian markets, IGT’s Cash Eruption generates more revenue for operators than any other game at more than 2% of the GGR for all games combined.
The classic 20-line Cleopatra game is our most popular game in the UK. While most of our games perform well in all markets, we tend to find that our games that have a lower entry bet (like the well-known Cleopatra, Pixies of the Forest and Da Vinci Diamonds) and a more volatile ride resonate the most with UK players.
Games with a certain, vibrant and playful look to them tend to do very well for us in the UK market too. At the moment fun, pigs are very much on-trend as a theme. So we’re expecting our new Cash Eruption Hoggin’ Cash game to be extremely well received in the UK as well as in most other regions.”
Q. How are land-based games chosen to become available online?
PO: “IGT PlayDigital dedicates a good portion of its roadmap to developing dynamic online original games. But we are also very well-known for our land-based conversions of the most successful land-based casino games in the industry.
We stay very connected to our land-based counterparts within IGT and we also follow land-based trends very closely. We always have a high degree of confidence in our land-based selections because they have either already proven themselves to be extremely popular or we have identified them as the games in our land-based portfolio that have the highest-potential for upcoming success.”
Q: What % of players play on mobile vs desktop/tablet devices?
PO: “While we feel it is important to cater to all types of player preferences and all device types, our observation is that, in general, significantly more play occurs on a mobile phone than a desktop. Relatively speaking, not a whole lot of play occurs on a tablet anymore. At a high level, this probably isn’t a big surprise. But there are geographical as well as game-type differences that account for some of it too.
For example, IGT is well-known for its range of successful video poker games, such as Ultimate X, in addition to its video slots. Video poker tends to have a much higher rate of desktop play than video slots and some of this is because the average video poker player is a little older than the average slots player, and part of it is because some people simply find video poker easier to play when using a tactile keyboard, that can mimic the buttons on a physical video poker machine, than using a touchscreen device. That said, mobile play is more prevalent across all of our game types, even video Poker.”
Q. Do you have a particular favourite slot from IGT? If so, why?
PO: “I have two equal favourites at the moment. One is Cleopatra Hyper Hits. It is a great evolution of the Cleopatra brand that combines the well-known Cleopatra doubling symbol with a new Hyper Hits symbol for instant prizes of up to 2,000x in the base game and up to 10,000x in the Free Spins.
But my other favourite right now has to be Mystery of the Lamp Treasure Oasis. It is one of the best examples of a strong land-based conversion that has all of the contemporary features that players love at the moment – It has three collection pots that grow in size to add exciting anticipatory moments throughout the game, and each pot is connected to an exciting variation of a Hold & Win bonus that can either be won individually or in combination with any one or two of the others. With this game, there’s an exciting potential to trigger one of seven different bonus styles, and this variety keeps things engaging and fun for players.”
Q. Regarding Mystery of the Lamp Treasure Oasis, what is the inspiration behind it?
PO: “The inspiration behind Mystery of The Lamp Treasure Oasis was, first and foremost, to bring an award-winning game from our land-based portfolio to the online world. Mystery of the Lamp is worldwide hit with casino players, having been recognized as the "Top Performing NEW Premium Game" at the industry-renowned 2024 EKG Slot Awards Show.
The original inspiration behind it was to create a game that took the popular Hold & Win bonus to the next level, and it has certainly done this in a very creative and fun way that we believe will resonate with online players as much as it has with global brick-and-mortar casino players.”
