(Credit:
TouchTable)
If Microsoft's "Surface" becomes a casino fixture next to the slot machines, the touch-screen table computer will find plenty of company. Not only are digital poker tables being developed--complete with "peel up" card corners so players can read their hands discreetly--but even touch-sensitive roulette games are on the way.
The "MultiPlay Roulette" system is the latest from Sweden's TouchTable, featuring a 56-inch touch LCD with 3,840 × 2,160 resolution. The table can accommodate up to seven players and, thanks to the company's proprietary technology, it can identify each person's bet.
Like other digital casino products, the idea is to speed the pace of play and reduce the chances of discrepancies or cheating. Because, as some of us have learned painfully over the years, fast play always favors the house.
(Credit:
IGT)
Thanks to cues from the game industry, certain areas of today's casinos can sometimes resemble arcades. But most of the digital advances to slot machines and the like so far have been limited to the individual units, not elaborate networks.
That doesn't make a whole lot of sense, given the boom in multi-player popularity for online games involving wagers or otherwise. So casino gaming developer IGT wants to cross that bridge with its M-P Series of multi-player table games, which would link 12 machines for communal competitive play, according to BornRich.
We're not sure how popular this would be on the casino floor, given that a lot of people would probably just as soon play cards the old analog way face to face, especially when trying to read each other's hands in Texas Hold 'Em. But the development of IGT's idea could lead to awesome multi-player systems for team console games, providing that you have the space--and the money--to get one of your own.
(Credit:
WMS Gaming)
How to bring an $86 billion older-than-old-school industry into the present? WMS Gaming, a company that makes 80 slot machine games for casinos a year is mixing mechanical slots with digital tech. At DemoFall they showed off a new Monopoly Money Grab game.
Most of the thousands of slots on casino floors with old-school handle, which has basically remain unchanged since late 19th century. Mechanical slots are more trustworthy to people, says WMS. So they decided to combine the two--transparent display technology over traditional mechanical slots. The benefit is there are more mathematical outcomes with digital reels.
The company is also looking to add networking to casinos for new ways to have players interact, make them multi-player games, and save games.
License to kill HD-DVD?
(Credit: Amazon)Say what you will about PS3 sales, but it seems clear that the game console is having an impact on the next-gen DVD war. This week the Blu-ray version of Casino Royale broke into the Amazon top 10 for DVD sales and four other Blu-ray titles sit in the top 100. On the other hand, the top title on HD DVD, Happy Feet, is currently ranked at No. 117.
In a recent column, I suggested to readers that they should keep an eye on The Departed--it's a Warner release and therefore available on both HD DVD and Blu-ray--to get an idea of how the war was going. While the HD DVD currently sits at No. 195, the Blu-ray version of The Departed is at No. 75. To be clear, these numbers change hourly, so by the time you read this the rankings may be significantly different, but the overall trend seems clear. As several new Blu-ray releases have hit the market in the last few weeks, owners of PS3s (and the handful of overpriced standalone Blu-ray players) actually seem to be buying a movie or two.
With the PS3 geared toward a somewhat older, male-oriented demographic, it's not surprising that Bond would be a popular buy, but what's a bit of mystery is why the Casino Royale Blu-ray is ranked No. 17 on Amazon's U.K. site. Not only is the PS3 not yet available in the U.K., but Sony is bundling a Casino Royale Blu-ray with the first 500,000 PS3s it sells in Europe. Go figure.
For a full list of up-to-the-minute Amazon Blu-ray and HD DVD bestsellers (U.S. only), go to the HD Game Database.
- prev
- 1
- next
