As a site that began life an affiliate offering free demo games and slots tournaments before moving into real-money play in the UK, Slots Temple has built up an extensive player base of very loyal, highly engaged slots fans.
Our sample size of slots players puts us in a great position to examine changing tastes over the past few years. It also helps us keep on top of current trends and extrapolate wider insights into the direction the industry is headed.
So, which games are topping the charts among our community of discerning aficionados?
Perhaps the biggest trend in recent years has been the explosion in fishing games. Titles like Big Bass Splash (Pragmatic Play), Fishing Frenzy (Blueprint Gaming) and their various sequels and spinoffs are currently dominating the charts.
What’s striking is that these games are popular across all adult age groups. This suggests traditional slots, such as the simple, classic fruit slot, which may previously have been popular with older players, are being replaced by a wave of feature rich, often high-volatility games that appeal to younger and older adults alike.
For our players, these include games like Extra Chilli (BTG), Sweet Bonanza (Pragmatic Play), Ancient Tumble (Relax Gaming), King Kong Cash (Blueprint Gaming) Razor Shark (Push Gaming), and Money Train 4 (Relax Gaming).
In each case, these are titles that to a degree mimic the experience you might get from playing in a video arcade or on a social game on your phone, but within the confines of the mathematical rules and game dynamics of a slot machine.
A decade ago, there was a lot of talk in the industry about future proofing. How could operators find ways to reach the Millennial generation whose members eschewed the traditional slots so beloved by their Uncle Rons and Auntie Pats.
At the beginning of the 2010s, slots had acquired features like cinematic cutaways and explosive soundtracks, but little had changed about their core dynamics since mechanical one-armed bandits first appeared in the sawdust bars of late 19 th century New York.
We believe the industry has successfully addressed this concern. Today, most slots contain the same ingredients: reels, symbols and win lines, but they vary wildly in their configurations. Reels can be formed in honeycomb structures, for example, or by clustering symbols combined with cascade functions.
Elk Studio’s Rogue Rats somehow manages to dispense with reels altogether while retaining core slot dynamics. Instead, we follow a robot rat driving through the desert collecting symbols as he goes. It’s very clever, and a big hit with our demo players.
The biggest game-changer was perhaps the Megaways mechanic, introduced by Big Time Gaming in 2016. And we can see there’s still a hunger for new mechanics – for players to experience the next new thing and for game studios to come up with the next ‘Megaways’.
Sometimes, it’s a case of the whackier the better. One game that’s hugely popular with our players is Octo Attack (Hacksaw Gaming) with its “Eye of Otto and Tenta-Grab mechanic,” which involves a malevolent octopus’ tentacle bursting through the grid and grabbing symbols.
We believe player tastes are changing and we’re seeing a move away from cliches like leprechauns with their four-leaf clovers and pots of gold. Meanwhile, game studios are exploring increasingly unusual themes, delving deeper for their inspiration into everything from obscure science fiction to weird medieval folk tales, and storytelling is now a big feature of many modern slots.
The fact that Print Studios decided it would be a good idea to make a slot about Tarasque, a fearsome creature from medieval French folklore – and it became a hit – tells you a lot about how the market has changed.
It’s so different from the way the industry was perhaps 15 years ago when most games were being created by a handful of monolithic software giants, and the tech was creaking and crying out for disruption.
Over the past few years there has been a boom in independent game studios and they’re all trying to come up with the next explosive new feature. These studios have to grab your attention, otherwise they get lost in the crowd. They’re not afraid to be different, experimental – avant garde even. And that’s what our audience wants.
Having a more comprehensive range of games with differing features and playstyles allows casinos to market themselves to a much wider audience. Fortunately, today’s games have never been more diverse, leading us to conclude that the online slot industry is in robust health, both creatively and commercially.
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