Games Media Juice Machines
Games Media, the creators of the Juice gaming terminal have made large inroads in to the British gaming market in recent years. With their recent acquisition of Barcrest from IGT towards the end of April 2011 for £33m, this trend will likely continue, and with the right management they will likely become the major supplier of gaming machines in the U.K. Within 10 years.
Good news for gamers? Time will tell, but Juice have treated us OK in the past, and at least with their multi-choice terminals, we won't have to put up with Deal or No Deal in every pub in Britain.
Juice are unique in that they have only created touch screen based fruit machines. This concept has many advantages and disadvantages for the player and the supplier.
Machine updates are mostly instantaneous and the majority of the terminals payout in the form of a printed ticket which cuts down the risk of defrauding the machine currently by 100%.
Long term play is limited on touch screen games because they ache the arms, there is also a lack of trust from players. The games actually run on individual percentages, but many pub players will not believe this.
Games Media are attempting to bridge the gap between £70 and betting shop £500 jackpot slot machines, this is obvious in several of their games, and of course the printing of the tickets. This is obviously a long term strategy and shows forward thinking by the company.
The days of putting your beer change in a machine for a game have long gone!
The games update fairly frequently and the cabinets look good. The touch sensitivity is responsive enough for the games to work, and of course there are no problems with bulbs going out in strategic places.
Some of the buttons are a little to small on some of the games, but pressing the wrong one is unlikely to be a problem.
Good news for gamers? Time will tell, but Juice have treated us OK in the past, and at least with their multi-choice terminals, we won't have to put up with Deal or No Deal in every pub in Britain.
Juice are unique in that they have only created touch screen based fruit machines. This concept has many advantages and disadvantages for the player and the supplier.
Machine updates are mostly instantaneous and the majority of the terminals payout in the form of a printed ticket which cuts down the risk of defrauding the machine currently by 100%.
Long term play is limited on touch screen games because they ache the arms, there is also a lack of trust from players. The games actually run on individual percentages, but many pub players will not believe this.
Games Media are attempting to bridge the gap between £70 and betting shop £500 jackpot slot machines, this is obvious in several of their games, and of course the printing of the tickets. This is obviously a long term strategy and shows forward thinking by the company.
The days of putting your beer change in a machine for a game have long gone!
The games update fairly frequently and the cabinets look good. The touch sensitivity is responsive enough for the games to work, and of course there are no problems with bulbs going out in strategic places.
Some of the buttons are a little to small on some of the games, but pressing the wrong one is unlikely to be a problem.
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The printing of tickets has its obvious benefits, no change to carry around for one. But will people be bothered to collect 50p or £1? This may have a negative effect in the long run. Also you have the bar staff and customers making comments about the money which can be annoying, and I have had on two occasions instances of not being able to afford to pay me straight away.
From an operators point of view, you are likely to lose income installing these machines despite Games Media’s claims of up to a 20% increase in revenue. This is because older people (over 30s) are unlikely to play them. I have seen many pubs site these cabinets on a trial and go back to 'traditional' fruit machines. If you own or run a pub frequented buy 17-24 year olds, then a Juice machine is probably a good bet. There is a reason why the vast majority of Juice machines are sited in what many would consider to be unsavoury pubs.
All in all, there is a good variety of games for all types of player, and they are certainly not as bad as some of the games currently on the market.
They have a good chance of succeeding in the long run simply due to the lack of competition. If their ultimate goal is to get the younger players interested and crossing over to their £500 betting terminals, they may have a chance at this in 6 – 10 years.
For individual playing guides for these machines, please use the drop down list in the links above. To comment about this article please post below.
