For Williams Interactive, delivering new slots is not simply a matter of slapping another shiny wrapper on the same old game. The company’s Robin Littleworth talks to iNTERGAMINGi.
WILLIAMS Interactive has access to a vast array of tried-and-tested games franchises, courtesy of its land-based sister company WMS Gaming.
It would be all too easy to drop new skins onto old games engines and, thanks to the existing licensing agreements within the Scientific Games stable, ride on the coattails of big sister WMS.
But the developers at Williams Interactive are nobody’s fools. Titles don’t simply plop off the WMS production ready for a bit of coding – Williams Interactive carefully selects the titles that will best serve specific demographics and also develops games of its own.
The company continues to rebel against the basic five-reel slot with a range of clever mechanics. Balanced with some of the biggest and best franchise deals in the business, Williams Interactive has quickly become a force to be reckoned with. So which mechanics are selected for which games? Do different games engines really make such a difference to the player experience? And if so, why? It seems to iNTERGAMINGi that Robin Littleworth, Williams Interactive’s senior director of game development, might have some of the answers.
INTERGAMINGi: Williams clearly works hard on developing a range of game engines - how important do you think these mechanics are in differentiating your games from the competition?
RL: “It’s quite important - for us it is the essence of who we are as a company, and how our sister company WMS Gaming has been viewed for two decades in terrestrial casinos - the most innovative slots developers on the market today. “By providing these unique mechanics we give our operators the tools they need to acquire players through innovation as well as provide a differentiated experience for those players. We believe players today are starting to tire of the same game with minor variations in graphical themes and features.
Read the full article in the issue 4 of iNTERGAMINGi
