Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | January 2010 32 [the US state of] Missouri and Singapore. In those cases, where a machine to be tested is physically delivered to the Las Vegas lab, it is assigned to a ‘pod’—a closed off area to the side of the 80,000 square ft. laboratory floor. At the pod, a small team of engineers examines the machine. Ian Hughes explains: “We want to do everything we can tomake the regulator feel the most comfortable with the testing we are doing for their individual jurisdiction.” Inside the pod “In each of the ‘pods,’ we have eight to ten machines,” says Mr Hughes. “The pods are pretty much identical. We can configure any pod pretty quickly by unplugging the interface from the machine, and then via a system of overhead routing across our lab floor, connect it back to one of the systems. We have the management systems of all the major slot manufacturers on site. “Typically, the engineers will have their gaming machine or target platform in their cubicle, along with all the development tools they need to interrogate and test the game,” reveals Mr Hughes. “Theywill run through theprescribed test scripts, which are all ISO1725 [International OrganizationforStandardization]accredited, and it’s all done online. “The device submission is entered in our database, and our QA team in New Jersey, along with any one of our offices and the supplier, can see it. We also do concurrent testing, so if, for example, a manufacturer has complicated communications in their equipment, mathematics and pay table, we can actually split those functions off to three different groups, and those engineers can be working on the same submission package at the same time. This has allowed us to significantly reduce the time the product is in GLI.” Main laboratory “Our main laboratory floor has two purposes. We do device testing here for some of the larger terminals, including multiplayers and tables that can’t physically fit in the cubicle,” explains Mr Hughes. “You will see a lot of the larger multi terminal machines stationed around here. The engineers are actually performing device testing. They will come out of their work spaces onto the machine.” Compliance plus Some of the work GLI does in this testing phase is ‘nuts and bolts’, i.e., checking whether a machine pays out correctly. Other parts of the work relate to new challenges and opportunities that have been created by digital technology. “Regulators and operators want to make sure that machine pays out correctly to the player. That’s always been the case,” states Ian Hughes. “I, as a player, want to know that if I put ten dollars in I have a fair chance of winning that advertised prize that’s on the pay glass. Interoperability—a hot topic “As well as that aspect of regulatory compliance, interoperability is becoming more and more important to the industry. It’s the area of most risk for the operators, because as you’ve got more and more player accounts on membership cards, or held via ticket in ticket out systems, any failure in communication caused by interoperability issues can have a direct impact on an operator’s bottom line. It can also have regulatory implications in regard to the operator’s duty of fairness to the player,” adds Mr Hughes. “With feature-rich immersive technology, increasingly on a single cabinet, games can be played within the basic game. Not only that, but with player loyalty card technology, it’s nowpossible for game content and preferences to be ported from one machine to another. That means there’s increased connectivity between the machine and the back end server. That makes interoperability testing a really key part of compliance testing. There are two ways that we test that: the first is protocol testing,” continues Mr Hughes. Game to System “That’s about making sure it complies to the published communication protocol. The G2S [Game to System] standard [developed by the Gaming Standards Association] is approaching 2,000 pages of information, so we have to go through that and make sure the device complies to each of those standards. We are the only independent test laboratory certified by GSA to test and certify G2S protocols.” “GLI is the only independent test lab certified by GSA to test to G2S standards, in the world. It’s a very tough process to go through. We had to prove that our engineers really knew what they were talking about with G2S technology and that they’re involved in every facet of its design. We are very happy to have that skill set available, and it’s increasingly relevant. G2S is what’s going into CityCenter [MGM MIRAGE’s new Las Vegas property],” adds Mr Hughes. Interoperability—the testing process To test for interoperability on a piece of equipment, GLI must plug the submitted device into a test board linking it with the machines hardware, software and systems of all the major gaming manufacturers. “WehavethetypicalSAS[SlotAccounting System] environment on the lab floor that you would see operating in any casino in North America. We have on site over a dozen online systems used by the suppliers,” explains Ian Hughes. “We take an interface board, which normally fits inside a slot machine, and we hook it up to the machine to be tested. We don’t actually put it physically inside the body of the cabinet, in order to make the testing process easier “For example, if we have a Bally machine on a Bally system, we will make sure that all the other suppliers’ systems can ‘talk’ to that Bally machine and system. It’s then a question of going through the list of suppliers. We plug in an IGT interface board to the Bally machine, and then a Konami board, and so on. “So we’re leaving the machine that’s being tested exactly where it is, and the system where it is, and just putting it on a new board. It keeps everything nice and secure and means we don’t need to move stuff physically around. We do that GLI