Everyone who’s ever visited an online casino – hell, everyone who’s ever visited a casino, period – knows just how popular slots are. They’re friggin’ everywhere! When you open up your favorite online casino, you’re bound to see tons and tons of slots, tens of times more than there are other games. It’s really not uncommon for there to be hundreds of slots, and hell, even some bigger physical locations have rows of the machines lined up and ready to play for anyone who’s a fan of the one-armed bandits! It doesn’t seem like their popularity is about to wane in the near future, but that doesn’t mean that they’re going to remain stagnant! I mean, slots have changed a LOT over the years – I mean, until relatively recently they were still fully mechanical, and now you’d be hard-pressed not to find an electronic slot that uses a nice, big LCD or OLED screen in lieu of reels. The thought of how much slots have changed – and how much they’ll keep on changing in the future – is what got me thinking. How are slots going to look in five years? In ten? In fifteen? Twenty? Well, I did a little research, looking into both their history and the new developments, and I think I’ve got a couple of good ideas!

1. Slots Will Look Better Than Ever

Go look at an online slot released this year. I’m talking about a big-budget slot that was heavily advertised, preferably a licensed one, but any will do as long as it’s high-profile and not just some crap that nobody will ever play. Did you find one? Okay, now go find a licensed, high profile slot from around 5 years ago. When you’re done, find the oldest high-profile slot that you can possibly find! Are you seeing a difference here? Because, in a quite shocking turn of events, technology keeps evolving and changing! So while back in 2006 the best we could do were a couple of still images, today we’ve got animated characters, cutscenes and full HD graphics. It’s great! With high-quality animation becoming cheaper to produce with the advent of new tools and technology, we’re bound to see some really high-quality stuff popping up in the near future and beyond!

2. Slots Will Feature Skill-Based Games

While in other countries, such as Japan, skill-based gambling (which is gambling that’s not purely influenced by luck, but also on a player’s skill – imagine betting money on how well you do in a round of Pac-Man) are not only allowed, but encouraged, in the West regulations have stated that gambling is to remain luck-based only. Well, no more! According to new regulations meant to attract millennials to casinos, Las Vegas casinos will soon allow for skill-based bonus games to be implemented in their slots. Mark my words – the rest of the world will follow suit, because this is an idea that actually makes a whole ton of sense. Now, we’re not talking about anything as drastic as making skill-based Pachinko machines the norm, but at the very least I’m guessing that many games will now feature bonus rounds whose payouts depend on how well you do. Imagine you’re playing a slot based on the latest Hollywood action movie – you might play an on-rails shooter section, with every enemy you take down giving you some money, or another bonus (free spins, a multiplier, etc). Within the next 5-10 years, this will be the new norm.

3. Physical Slots Will Copy Arcades

In many ways, gaming and gambling are very similar to each other – I could write a whole different article about how similar their histories are. The thing is, while physical slots used to be extremely popular, their fame has somewhat diminished with the introduction of much more practical online slots. Similarly, many arcades stopped attracting customers when home consoles caught up to arcade cabinets in terms of power, thus making arcades obsolete. So what did arcade manufacturers do to attract their consumers and combat home consoles? Well, they started coming up with games that were impossible or very difficult to recreate at home! We’re talking stuff like “Dance Dance Revolution”, which allows you to play by stepping on huge buttons on the floor, or numerous light gun games where you take command of a huge gun and take down enemies on the screen. Similarly, I expect that soon enough online slot manufacturers will start crafting experiences that can only be had at a physical location and can’t be replicated at home – imagine a slot with a camera mounted on it which puts you into the narrative, or perhaps a slot with a mechanic which requires a specialized lever that replaces the standard buttons. Despair often breeds creativity, and judging by how much market share online slots are eating from physical slots, manufacturers have a good reason to be desperate!