By Samantha Williams

Playing new slots online will probably mean you are the first to play these much loved random number games. This is chiefly because the online casino industry is very aggressive; aggressive in terms of it is required to respond to market demands very quickly. Much faster than in any land casino!

Trends change incredibly quickly online and all players want the best new Christmas, Easter and Halloween games first, and they want them fast, they have come to expect this! Online slots software designers have the most incredible opportunity to see what the market responds to best and we, the online player, get to enjoy some unbelievable games. Games you would be hard pushed to find in a regular casino, and with prizes to match. This sees software development companies competing against each other to offer the best games with the biggest prizes and the people who luck out are us, the players!

When Microgaming releases a new and even more innovative slots game, RTG has to respond with something even better, then Playtech, say, “heck, we are falling behind” and they get some new ideas on the drawing board, and this is how it goes. As we know, this type of competition is very healthy in any industry, and it just makes things that much more beneficial for online gamers.

The same concept goes for prize money too and we see massive PJP’s and huge multipliers featuring in some of the most exciting slots games around. Take for example the well known “Clover Rollover”, this is a game which features at many online casinos and bingo sites in the UK, it is well known as being a “Millionaire Maker” and since its launch I have seen two or three huge wins on this game. Not least of which was one Mecca Bingo player who won 1,201,233.77 pounds!!

This game is from the Virtue Fusion software platform, and is a relatively simple five reel, five pay-line game with a “Luck of the Irish” theme. Just drop five “Lucky Shamrocks” onto the right pay-line on a maximum bet and it’s all yours. It is a light hearted game to play, but the PJP (progressive jackpot prize) resets at £10 000 when it is won, so we are talking about serious money. It is also a networked game, which means all sites on the Virtue Fusion network get to play it and they are all also responsible for the growth of the PJP. Every night at midnight the prize money rolls over and the new PJP is available, it’s just a case of “who is feeling lucky today?”

Similarly themed slots include Emerald Isle, Golden Shamrock, Irish Eyes and Luck of the Irish amongst others.

By Samantha Williams

Online casino games provide players with a huge variety to choose from, and some sites have more than others. What you will find as standard however is a good cross selection of all the various types of games, and by this we mean, roulette, blackjack, baccarat, craps, poker, classic slots, video slots, video poker, bingo, keno, scratch cards and even skills and arcade games. Each of these categories of games has their own following of players, but generally speaking most people who gamble online have a few different games they enjoy, while some players will try anything.

Casino games software providers go all out to ensure that new games are offered to players sometimes once a month, sometimes less. But we do find a discrepancy in games spread amongst some of the providers. For example a Microgaming site may have more than four hundred games while a Rival Gaming site has only has sixty.

Just because Microgaming offers more casino games than Rival for example doesn’t necessarily make them better. There is a historical difference in these two companies and one has been around for a good deal longer. Rival is only a couple of years old while Microgaming has been in operation for over a decade. The same applies to other software providers too, and historical basis makes a difference as does the amount of new games being added to their portfolios and when.

If you think about it, more than 400 games is vast and having this degree of selection can be confusing. A bit like me in a shoe shop, if I find two pairs of shoes that I like and can’t make up my mind, I won’t buy either pair and I go to another shop. However if my mother is with me, she will say, buy both pairs and not go to another shop. People are different and this is also true of online gamers. They may see 400 games at a Microgaming site say yay like a kid in a candy shop, or say no, too much choice and go for Rival Gaming or a happy medium, such as Cryptologic which has 200 different games.

Some people prefer the classis slots games like the old fashioned one armed bandit, while others prefer the video slot with 20 or 30 pay lines. As long as the site they choose has the options they like they will play regardless of how many other games are available. It’s all in the people really! Still it is up to the software providers to ensure that casino games players are kept happy; they are the ones who are going to be spending their money, and providers really do work hard to keep up with demand. One thing is certain, no matter what type of player you are, you will find something you love playing online.