When you’re a smaller slot manufacturer trying to compete with the likes of IGT, Bally, WMS and Aristocrat, you need to be nimble, creative and innovative.
Multimedia Games has been all of that, and expects to keep bringing the innovation now that it has been acquired by Global Cash Access. The new company is in the process of rebranding, and will reveal a new name in late August.
Meanwhile, one of Multimedia’s innovations is just starting to make an impact, and opening new possibilities with Twist & Win.
Twist & Win can turn losing spins into winners – even big winners – by taking a segment of the screen and rotating it. Vertical columns can become horizontal rows. Currently available on a game called Sparkle & Shine, the Twist & Win feature soon will be incorporated into other Multimedia games.
Sparkle & Shine is a six-reel game, played on a grid six symbols across and four symbols deep. Symbols include gems, sparkly wilds, and A-K-Q-J-10-9.
An online demo shows a losing spin with a stack of three wilds as the bottom three symbols on the fifth reel. The word “Twist” to the left of the reels starts to shake, as do “& Win” on the right. A rectangle is drawn, four symbols across and two deep, enclosing the second and third symbols on reels two through five.
That rectangle is then rotated 180 degrees, and the two wild symbols that were on the fifth reel and now on the second, helping to form winning combinations.
The smallest possible rectangles to be rotated are two symbols across by three deep, or three across by two deep, but it’s possible for the entire grid to be rotated. Rectangles can be rotated 90 degrees in either direction, or 180 degrees.
Many of the rotations will bring small wins, but the big twist comes when you have a stack of four wilds or four big-paying gems. A 90-degree rotation could give you four of the big payers across the same payline – a nice surprise bankroll booster.
