Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | December 2010 26 There’s also our Lucky BigWheel. It’s a Big Six version of the game where the people that are betting actually pull the handle to make the wheel spin. That’s another example of giving that extra angle, that extra flair on the gaming floor. Gaming is no longer just about winning combinations and presenting the result. Gaming is more about the complete entertainment experience. “Our chairman has no compromises in terms of what product goes out the front door. Even if we’ve sunk a significant amount of money into it he’s very happy to stop the development of a project until it reaches the quality where he’s proud of putting the Aruze logo on the product.” Are you going after particular competitors with this entertainment strategy? We’re looking to carve out our own niche on the gaming floor. Or you could think of it as a beachhead, so-to-speak. We get known as a provider of high value high entertainment engaging games, and we start to expand our market share around the globe. A number of our competitors are experiencing momentary identity crises. What do they want to be, how do they want to do it?When there’s turmoil [in themarket], there’s opportunity to move in and carve out your own niche. We have a very strong visionary leader [KazuoOkada] and he’s been featured in your magazine as such. He’s got a clear vision of providing greater value back to the players and thus generating greater value for the enterprise. I think we’re demonstrating that here with a lot of the products that we have, in terms of the potential for interaction, the stories, the engaging nature of the games. Tell us about the recent installation on the floor at The Venetian Macao. We’ve actually carved out an Aruze ‘area’ where we’ve banked into that area our multiple bonus games, some of our standalone product, some of our classic free game style games with the features, and we’ve moved in some of our Lucky Sic Bo and some of our Shoot to Win Craps. The bottom line is you’ve got an amazing area that’s dedicated to Aruze product. And when people are waiting to play one style of game, they’re easily entertained by another style of game. It’s really lifted up the performance of that area from a banking and a grouping perspective. How did that strategy come about? It was just about getting to know and understand your customer. It’s something I would advise for all operators that read your magazine. Have that dialogue with your general manager to discuss what the needs are for your casino floor. Somebody is going to be able to fill those needs. We at Aruze have a broad portfolio. In this case we looked at the situation and saw there was an area of the floor that wasn’t performing as well as it might. We knew there were a few products that could bring some traffic to it. Once we bring traffic to it, what do we do with the overflow? That was another question. That’s exactly what we identified in this case. At the start the hook was Lucky Sic Bo but now the multiple bonus games are having a life of their own. And why should we let Lucky Sic Bo’s popularity benefit another manufacturer’s game if it happens to be nearby? If you look at what Aruze can offer a casino from a catalogue perspective, we’ve got the link games, we’vegot the standalone games, we’ve got the entertaining bonus games, we’ve got systems technology that we’re working on for currency and credit delivery. We’ve got a variety of multi-station games from a random number generator to an electro-mechanical random number generator. We really cross the gamut of what Aruze as an organisation can provide to an operation. It’s almost like we’re a best-kept secret ‘diamond in the rough’. But as that ‘diamond’ gets discovered our popularity grows. Aruze Chairman Kazuo Okada—no compromises when it comes to product quality Loyal following—Bow Wow Bucks™, a G-DELUXE multiple bonus game Aruze Gaming