Not everybody has “Moves Like Jagger,” but a new video slot machine at San Manuel Casino does.
The Highland casino recently announced the addition of IGT’s Adam Levine Video Slots to its gaming floor. The game, located in the Rockin’ Casino area between Just Barbeque (JBQ) and Rock & Brews, not only lets fans pick from a selection of the singer’s famous hits as they place bets — including tracks such as “Sugar” and “One More Night” — but it also includes a “Guitar Hero”-like bonus round where fans can hit symbols in the rhythm of an Adam Levine song as they come down a guitar neck.
The game is just the latest pop culture-related slot to come to San Manuel; others have included slots themed after Madonna, the Rolling Stones, Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. The casino also recently announced the addition of a Sir Mix-A-Lot-themed slot machine, “I Like Big Bucks.” They’re the kind of games that a small team of people at San Manuel gamble on regularly. Part of the reason is that gaming technology companies have produced lots of pop culture slots in recent years, but that’s not the only reason.
“We also try to get the stuff we know is going to work,” said San Manuel Casino’s Director of Slot Performance Allen Schultz. “We kind of had a good reception of pop culture and music style themes over the last couple years so we’ve kind of decided to take more chances.”
Schultz said the casino tracks the performance of its slots to see which ones are doing well, which ones are not, and which ones are starting to peter out in popularity. If a particular slot machine with a certain kind of theme or game mechanics performs well, the casino tries to get similar kinds of games to strike the same kind of success. However, the casino occasionally takes risks with games and picks them not on the basis of what’s done well in the past, Schultz said.
Many of the pop culture and music-themed slot machines are available for lease instead of ownership, Schultz said.
“There’s a positive and a negative side to that, of course,” he said. “If it’s great we’d rather own it, but if it’s not great, we get the ability to fall back and have the manufacturer replace it at no cost or anything, so we get to cycle through the content pretty regularly.”
The Adam Levine Video Slots game is one of a number of games that company IGT has done in partnership with singing competition “The Voice.” Levine is a judge on the program.
In the same spot the casino had hosted a game themed after the show itself, followed by a Blake Shelton-themed game until each of those eventually stopped being as popular. Schultz said each of the IGT games has “actually done very well for a good amount of time so it’s been very fun to cycle through that content.”
In addition to the prior popularity of “The Voice” and Blake Shelton slots, there were other reasons San Manuel wanted to bring the Adam Levine game to the floor.
Schultz said the game offered a good price point for its intended location, with a minimum bet of $.75 and a maximum bet of $3.75. He also cited the bonus round where players select symbols on a guitar neck — one of three bonus rounds total — as another interesting aspect of the game.
“It gets you engaged and you’re not just slapping a play button,” he said.
Members of the casino’s player’s club, Club Serrano, will have a chance to test out the game for free by attending a slot pull event between 5 and 7 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 23. Players who have earned at least 100 points between 3 and 7 p.m. the same day will get two pulls — valued at $3.75 each — and will be able to collect whatever winnings they get. The casino will also toss out some swag during the event.
Adam Levine Video Slots
Where: San Manuel Casino, 777 San Manuel Blvd, Highland (second floor in the Rockin’ Casino).
Bet: $.075-$3.75
Information: sanmanuel.com/events/gaming/adam-levine-slot-pull
