Inside Asian Gaming

March 2015 inside asian gaming 37 Tech Talk At MGS it was displayed in tandem with a new four- level progressive jackpot game called Sheng Xiao Chuan Qi (“Chinese Zodiac,” roughly translated), the Shanghai team’s most potent graphics package yet. For starters, players get to choose a personal “Wild” symbol from any of the 12 animals of the Zodiac. The interactivity extends also to a feature called Win Track, a win-loss history indicator that encourages players to follow hunches to alter their bets up or down. There’s also a mystery “Neighbor Jackpot” that kicks in during the jackpot round and features a “Flying Dragon” that delivers a random prize to another lucky machine on the link. Last but not least, all five-reel winning combinations are sweetened with additional payouts courtesy of a special “6th Reel,” an innovation first introduced with Fortune Cats. “What we wanted to do is add some anticipation,” explains Mr Payne, “to allow you to see what’s happening, and then, bang, see if it has any effect on anything else. This can be a multiplier, multiplying your total bet, so it’s not dependent on any win [on the main screen]; it can activate a pay right to left, so any symbols that would not ordinarily be a winner could be a winner if we’re looking at reels 5, 4 and 3; we also have expanding ‘wild’ features.” What’s doubly interesting about Sheng Xiao Chuan Qi is that it’s not confined to the casino floor. Every game Aspect develops can be played online, either as a cash or free-play proposition, depending on the jurisdiction and the regulations that apply, on the company’s Grand Orient Casino, which is available in Facebook, iOS and Android versions and also offers roulette, blackjack, baccarat and Texas Hold ’Em. Grand Orient is one of a number of bold initiatives Aspect has launched with a view to positioning itself as a leader in the convergence of land-based and online gaming. “It has given us great distribution because, based on our surveys, those who play free-to-play games, when they go to a land-based casino they’re going to play them there,” says Christina Hsu, vice president, Products, Social Games. On Kickin’ Kash , every time the game’s “girl fighter” symbol lands on Reel 1, regardless of whether it’s a winner, the player who has chosen her increases his or her free games by up to three. Grand Orient is one of a number of bold initiatives Aspect has launched with a view to positioning itself as a leader in the convergence of land-based and online gaming. Ms Hsu came to Aspect from the Game Development Group of Gigamedia’s FunTown Branch, where she helped develop, maintain, and operate more than 40 in-house titles for various mobile and online platforms. Joining her is Sean Yu, who heads up a strategic play called Parley, a social media platform currently in private beta testing that aims to blend points-based game play with an almost limitless, and still largely untapped, array of lifestyle and crowd-sourced content to deliver a breakthrough experience of merging mobile Internet with traditional broadcast television. Mr Yu was a senior manager at eBay prior to joining Aspect. At eBay he was instrumental in facilitating cross-border ties between Chinese merchants and online consumers, the very model Alibaba has built into a global powerhouse, and Mr Yu was in fact an early member of Aliexpress.com , Alibaba’s first international transaction site, where he helped found its payment and risk management teams. For a slot-maker to be reaching out to such diverse realms of experience is “a good indicator of both our advantage and our game development strategy,” says founder and CEO Justin Nguyen. “We’ve got some extraordinary people who have come to us from the mobile and console game industries and bring a wealth of knowledge and alternative perspectives with them. We’re all part of a bigger ecosystem delivering entertainment.”