Here in the gaming world it can be easy to slip into a routine of playing games made by the ‘big 3’ developers.
NetEnt, Microgaming and Playtech can sometimes seem to have the market sewn up between them, particularly with BetSoft being under a bit of a cloud right now, and Sheriff/Blue Gem gaming slipping off the radar almost completely.
But it needn’t be that way — there are some great newcomers, or relative newcomers, out there.
In fact, you may have played some of their games without even realizing it.
For instance Jokerizer, one of the most ground-breaking slots of recent times, is from none of the above developers, but is the flagship slot from Yggdrasil Gaming.
Yggdrasil aren’t all that new, they’ve been around a couple of years, but nonetheless they aren’t quite as high profile just yet as fellow Scandinavians NetEnt, but based on their form so far, we can expect that to change.
You’ve probably also heard of or even played Beowulf and Big Bad Wolf, some great, albeit off-the-wall slots. They’re brought to you courtesy of Quickspin, who are also behind the exquisite Royal Frog.
But it’s not just slots that are seeing something of a revolution, but table games as well — for instance Thunderkick, another Scandinavian entity, recently brought out an innovative take on BlackJack, called ‘Player’s Choice’, where you get to choose from 5 different hands as to which you think has the best chance of beating the house.
They’re no slackers when it comes to slots however, bringing innovation with the frankly quite wacky Esqueleto Explosivo and Toki games in particular.
Finally, we couldn’t’ sign off without pointing out that there are some new developers out there from outside the Nordic region.
NextGen is a great example of this. An Australian studio, part of the NYX Gaming Group, NextGen have been responsible not only for the Judge Dredd tie-in slot, but also the legendary (in every sense of the word) Merlin’s Millions and its follow up, Merlin’s Magic Respins.
So it’s an exciting time to be involved in the gaming world. We’ll be sure to bring you news of all the slots, table games, scratchcards and more as and when these new kids on the block launch them, as well as the right casinos to play them with, so be sure to bookmark our page and never be left in the dark!