I came across a new machine on my travels this week,called G-box,it is made by G-squared games,website http://www.g2games.co.uk. It has lots of different puzzle games on it (which I didn't try,apart from a game really similar to Word Up) and some 10p games for fun,and two quiz games.These I think were called Quiztal Maze and Who wants to win 50 quid.In both games (and the Word Up clone) you can buy bonuses beforehand at 20p each.In Quiztal Maze,you can choose to answer easy,medium or difficult questions (for half,one,one and a half seconds respectively) in sets of 5.In the end game,you have to grab golden and avoid silver as standard.People who are good at that (not me) will probably like this game.In Who wants to win 50 quid,you just have to answer a lot of questions.It was 20 to reach the pound and a further 10 to get to two quid (the questions were of an average standard).It may be that I was playing it in hard mode,further experience will show that.
The whole machine looked pretty impressive and contemporary really and there were quite a lot of features I liked such as a large jackpot being advertised,and a pub leaderboard and also a national leaderboard (certainly one on Who wants to win 50 quid).Of course I would like them as I've already suggested on this forum that they do that.
I'm going to stick my neck out and say that this machine is going to work and prove popular.Whether it'll be good for pro players is more difficult to assess though.
G-box
I've only seen one of these so far. According to the website "The G-Box is currently undergoing industry test", so as the one I saw was just in a normal pub, either that's what they mean by "industry test" or it had been released prematurely. In any case, this might explain two fundamental faults I encountered - on the word game, it exited halfway through a game with no explanation, error message or record of where I had got to. My cynical old mind thought that this was a deliberate move to stop someone winning too much, but it didn't reoccur on subsequent games. The second fault came on collecting my meagre winnings - it did pay out the full £5 (and, in a bizarrely nostalgic touch for those of us who go back to the early days, this was in a mixture of different denominations, including a £2 coin) but the screen then went completely blank and stayed like that so no one else was going to play it that evening - the plug wasn't accessible or I would have done them the favour of rebooting it.
As for the games, I only looked at the Millionaire clone and the Word Up/Soup clone. I thought the Millionaire one was appalling - it was five or six rounds, each with five non-trivial questions, just to get to the first £1, and that for a 50p stake plus the optional extra bonuses. The idea seems to be to turn answering questions into a purely social activity for punters - how many questions can we answer this go? can we get on the leaderboard? - without any real prospect of even getting their stake back. The basic flaw with that idea is why would you pay 50-80p a go for something you can get for free on any smartphone?
The Word Soup clone was more interesting - it is 8 or so rounds of the same basic game, with a points target to reach and a new board appearing if you clear the board without reaching your target, or if there are no playable words left. The top prize is £50, so that may well interest the real word mavens, but they would have to be prepared for what happened to me, when it exited the game with no record of what had happened (and that was after 4 or 5 rounds of the game), and obviously the targets and/or letters mix are bound to get very tricky towards the end of the prizes.
It's always nice to see a new product but I would be very surprised if this one is a success unless they (a) iron out the basic programming/mechanical faults (although I suppose none of the other companies have ever achieved that satisfactorily so why should they be any different!), (b) ditch or fix that Millionaire game and (c) add some more interesting content - what is there now isn't remotely enough.
As for the games, I only looked at the Millionaire clone and the Word Up/Soup clone. I thought the Millionaire one was appalling - it was five or six rounds, each with five non-trivial questions, just to get to the first £1, and that for a 50p stake plus the optional extra bonuses. The idea seems to be to turn answering questions into a purely social activity for punters - how many questions can we answer this go? can we get on the leaderboard? - without any real prospect of even getting their stake back. The basic flaw with that idea is why would you pay 50-80p a go for something you can get for free on any smartphone?
The Word Soup clone was more interesting - it is 8 or so rounds of the same basic game, with a points target to reach and a new board appearing if you clear the board without reaching your target, or if there are no playable words left. The top prize is £50, so that may well interest the real word mavens, but they would have to be prepared for what happened to me, when it exited the game with no record of what had happened (and that was after 4 or 5 rounds of the game), and obviously the targets and/or letters mix are bound to get very tricky towards the end of the prizes.
It's always nice to see a new product but I would be very surprised if this one is a success unless they (a) iron out the basic programming/mechanical faults (although I suppose none of the other companies have ever achieved that satisfactorily so why should they be any different!), (b) ditch or fix that Millionaire game and (c) add some more interesting content - what is there now isn't remotely enough.
Interesting will keep a look out.
What sort of pubs are these popping up in Nils and Muddle? Just interested if it's one chain or several as a few months back the Generous Georges that are popping up around the country all had Pub Connects in (they are disappearing now of course) so you sometimes get that, new pubs opening get their own individual machines.
What sort of pubs are these popping up in Nils and Muddle? Just interested if it's one chain or several as a few months back the Generous Georges that are popping up around the country all had Pub Connects in (they are disappearing now of course) so you sometimes get that, new pubs opening get their own individual machines.
The one I saw was indeed in a 'Generous George']The person who's behind this and who works for select is over on potty. Sure he'd appreciate the feed back on this from you guys.[/QUOTE]SoccerHQ wrote:What sort of pubs are these popping up in Nils and Muddle? Just interested if it's one chain or several as a few months back the Generous Georges that are popping up around the country all had Pub Connects in (they are disappearing now of course) so you sometimes get that, new pubs opening get their own individual machines.
He is welcome to read my comments, which are my honest appraisal after playing one of these for the first time.
Ah interesting was that the one up 'boro by any chance as that Pub Connect has been replaced in recent times much to my disgust lol so didn't even shoot a second glance at its "replacement."
Yeah you're right they are replacements for some Marstons pubs but of course not all of those had quiz machines before so possibly new machines came with the new makeover.
If I see one I'll have a little dabble, not generally too good on word games apart from PMP but I've been playing that since the Ice age or near enough!
Yeah you're right they are replacements for some Marstons pubs but of course not all of those had quiz machines before so possibly new machines came with the new makeover.
If I see one I'll have a little dabble, not generally too good on word games apart from PMP but I've been playing that since the Ice age or near enough!
No - Aylesbury.SoccerHQ wrote:Ah interesting was that the one up 'boro by any chance
As for the double posts, it may not all be cool's fault - I have been having various error messages on here for the last week or so, and things not working as usual (e.g. posts not appearing to have been accepted, when in fact they have), so I wonder if there are some glitches in the code? Anyone else experiencing this?
I'm always happy to give feedback on machines if asked (as I expect a few others are on here).I only played the two quiz games and the Word Up type of game so my feedback is somewhat limited but if it's intended to replace the quiz machine in pubs and other locations,then I think it could do with more than just 2 quiz games.Also,the Who wants to win 50 quid game seems palatable enough,but is it always going to be 20 plus question to get to the prizes? If it gets easier than that as it takes money,then fair enough,but otherwise that's probably too dispiriting for punters.BFK wrote:The person who's behind this and who works for select is over on potty. Sure he'd appreciate the feed back on this from you guys.
Also,and this might be out of control of the guy you mention who's behind it,but it did swallow a quid without awarding me credits.That would get a bit irritating if that happened with any frequency.
I'm always happy to give feedback on machines if asked (as I expect a few others are on here).I only played the two quiz games and the Word Up type of game so my feedback is somewhat limited but if it's intended to replace the quiz machine in pubs and other locations,then I think it could do with more than just 2 quiz games.Also,the Who wants to win 50 quid game seems palatable enough,but is it always going to be 20 plus question to get to the prizes? If it gets easier than that as it takes money,then fair enough,but otherwise that's probably too dispiriting for punters.BFK wrote:The person who's behind this and who works for select is over on potty. Sure he'd appreciate the feed back on this from you guys.
Also,and this might be out of control of the guy you mention who's behind it,but it did swallow a quid without awarding me credits.That would get a bit irritating if that happened with any frequency.