Atari and Nintendo started selling their first home video game consoles in the late 70s, and just in the span of a couple of years, the newfound industry saw a great rise in commercially distributed video game products. The Atari 2600 was especially responsible for popularizing games stored on swappable ROM cartridges.

While Nintendo’s first home console was released in 1977, the company’s first major gaming console, the NES didn’t come out until 1983. Nintendo Entertainment System today is tied to every retro gamer’s nostalgia, it is also the console that introduced the gaming world to many.

This era steered away people from arcade games that were enjoyed at malls and casino establishments to gaming at home. Many game developers of that time used this to their advantage and started creating casino games for portable and home consoles.

Classic Games

Caesar’s Palace, Hot Slots and Vegas Dream are some of the notable classic games on the NES that emulated glamor of Las Vegas. Hot Slots released in 1991 focused primarily on slot machine action, whereas Ceasar’s Palace and Vegas Dream were a complete gambling package that included blackjack, roulette, and poker alongside a selection of slots.

Seeing the success of these games, many developers started including slot machines as mini-games within their titles. For instance, Super Adventure Island II (1992) and New Zealand Story (1994) are action platformers featuring slot machines that offer players the chance to earn extra lives.

With the introduction of 3D graphics, CD-ROMS, and the arrival of PlayStation and Xbox, the arcade market had greatly weakened. This was another opportunity for video game developers to capitalize by providing even more engaging games that allowed players to have an arcade-like experience at home. Gamers were now able to play arcade-quality or better without leaving their home.

Another great example of a classic title featuring slot machine mechanics is the 1997 game, Final Fantasy VII, a game widely renowned for being one of the most influential RPGS to date. In the game when the player triggers the “limit break” mechanic, it supersedes turn order even if enemies are about to attack.

This skill set is unique to every character and can massively change battle in the player’s favor. Each character has a limit gauge which fills up as they are attacked by opponents, and once filled, characters can perform limit break.

What does this have to do with slots? Well, two of the playable characters in the game, Cait Sith and Tifa Lockhart have slot machines as their limit breaks. Slots is Cait Sith’s level 2 limit where the slot machine determines the effect. These effects can boost the party damage or damage the enemy but can also land effects that are devasting for the player.

Fallout (1997), Final Fantasy X (2001) and Grand Theft Auto Vice City (2002) are some of the well-known games that incorporated popular online slots mechanics to provide various in-game rewards to players, similar to randomized slot payouts. Such inclusion of slot machines in various different genres of games indicates the ever-growing love for gambling and game developers never failed to deliver on it. We see this even today in modern AAA titles such as Red Dead Online.

Catching up to modern ways of gaming, most casino establishments took their business online. This was a necessary shift in the industry to appeal to the audience who got used to gaming from home. Nowadays, slot games feature a variety of themes, and it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that some of them take inspiration from video games.

Modern Games

This article would be incomplete without the mention of Diamond Casino & Resort DLC of GTA V Online, here slot machines offer a 98.7% payout to winners. The idea of gambling and casino is executed perfectly in this update and slot machines available in the game got the same love.

This has further fueled fan expectations of the long-awaited Rockstar title GTA VI which is rumored to be released after the first quarter of 2024. Talking about modern games, Cyberpunk 2077, Yakuza Kiwami 2, Fallout: New Vegas and Borderlands 2 offer players a window to slot gambling as a mini-game.

Atlus’ Persona 5 Royal has a level known as Casino of Envy (Niijima's Palace), where the player has to go through an entire well-built casino in order to progress the game’s story. When the characters make their way to Slot Room after passing through Dice Game Area, they are met with 8 playable slot machines that come with a minigame.

The characters must complete several sub-levels within this casino to unlock the final boss of the palace. This JRPG and other games mentioned in this article are a demonstration of various creative ways slots can be incorporated in an ever-growing world of video games.