Patent Application
20090124368
This application claims priority to Australian Provisional Patent Application No. 2007903081, having an international filing date of Jun. 7, 2007, entitled “A Jackpot Display System,” which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
[Not Applicable]
[Not Applicable]
The present invention relates to a jackpot display system. It is known to provide a gaming system which includes a plurality of gaming machines connected together and configured such that each gaming machine contributes to a common jackpot which may be won by players of the gaming machines. In general, each common jackpot is managed by a jackpot controller which receives jackpot contribution data from each gaming machine associated with the common jackpot, and outputs a jackpot amount derived from the jackpot contribution data to a display. The purpose of the display is to advertise the common jackpot to players and thereby encourage the players to play a game on the gaming machines associated with the common jackpot.
However, such jackpot display systems are relatively unsophisticated and inflexible.
In accordance with a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a jackpot display system for a gaming system, the jackpot display system comprising:
In one arrangement, the display controller is arranged to generate display data usable by the display to simultaneously display information indicative of a plurality jackpot amounts, such as all jackpot amounts.
In one arrangement, the display controller is arranged to generate display data usable by the display to consecutively display information indicative of a plurality jackpot amounts.
The display controller may be arranged to generate display data usable by the display to emphasise one or more jackpot amounts relative to the other jackpot amounts. In one arrangement, the display controller is arranged to emphasise a jackpot amount when the jackpot amount has been won by a player of a gaming machine. With this arrangement, only the jackpot amount which has been won may be displayed or the jackpot amount which has been won may be displayed at an increased size relative to other displayed jackpot amounts.
The jackpot display system may be arranged to apply video effects to the displayed jackpot amounts, such as scaling, rotating and fading in/out as the displayed jackpot amounts change.
The jackpot display system may further comprise at least one jackpot controller, each jackpot controller being arranged to receive jackpot contribution data from a plurality of gaming machines associated with the jackpot controller, and each jackpot controller being arranged to generate jackpot data indicative of a jackpot amount for supply to the display controller.
The display may be implemented using a single display device, or may be implemented using multiple display devices, each display device being dedicated to a specific area of the display.
In one embodiment, the jackpot display system is arranged to receive video data for selective display on the display at the same time as or intermittently with the jackpot amounts. The video data may correspond to any video information such as advertising information or sporting events.
The jackpot display system may be arranged to store multiple sets of video data for each jackpot amount to be displayed, each set of video data being optimised to a particular display size, and the jackpot display system being arranged to select one of the video data sets depending on the size at which the jackpot amount is to be displayed.
The jackpot display system may be arranged to receive video data indicative of a further jackpot amount from a further display controller and to process the jackpot data received from one or more jackpot controllers and the video data received from the further display controller so as to generate display data usable by the display to display information indicative of one or more jackpot amounts.
In accordance with a second aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of displaying jackpots in a gaming system, the method comprising:
The present invention will now be described, by way of example only, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:
Referring to the drawings, in
The jackpot display system 10 comprises a plurality of jackpot controllers 12, each of which is associated with one or more gaming machines such that the associated gaming machines contribute to a common jackpot managed by the jackpot controller 12.
The jackpot display system 10 also comprises a display controller 14 which is connected to the jackpot controllers 12 through a jackpot network 15. The display controller 14 is arranged to receive jackpot data indicative of respective jackpot amounts from the jackpot controllers 12 and to control a display 16 so that information indicative of one or more of the jackpot amounts associated with the jackpot controllers 12 is selectively displayed.
In particular, the display controller 14 may be arranged to control the display 16 so as to simultaneously show jackpot amounts associated with all jackpot controllers 12, or so as to emphasize one or more of the jackpot amounts, for example when one of the jackpots is won by a player by displaying only the winning jackpot amount using the entire area of the display, or by increasing the size of a jackpot which has been won relative to other jackpots.
For this purpose, as shown in
The display controller 14 may also be arranged so as to modify the number of jackpot amounts displayed, for example so as to display in sequence a single jackpot, four jackpots, nine jackpots, and so on. The display controller 14 may also apply video effects such as scaling, rotating and fading in/out as the displayed image changes.
It will be understood that the display scheme implemented by the display controller 14, in particular which jackpot amounts are displayed and the manner in which the jackpot amounts are displayed, may be selectable by a user, for example using a computing device (not shown) in communication with the display controller 14, may be implemented automatically by the control unit 18 in accordance with the programs stored in the memory 19, or in any other suitable way.
In the present embodiment, the display scheme implemented by the display controller 14 is carried out by the video generator 21 under control of the control unit 18 based on jackpot data received from the selector 20 under control of the control unit. However, it will be understood that other arrangements are envisaged.
In an example implementation shown in
The jackpot controllers 12,12′ supply jackpot data indicative of the respective jackpot amounts to the display controller 14 through the jackpot network 15 and the display controller 14 processes the jackpot data according to any desired scheme and causes the display 16 to show one or both jackpot amounts in any desired way. For example, the display 16 may be caused to display each jackpot amount in a dedicated display region 26, to alternately display the jackpot amounts on the entire display 16, or to progressively increase and decrease the sizes of the displayed jackpot amounts so that each display amount is alternately displayed in large size.
While the implementation shown in
In the present embodiments, the display 16 is in the form of one or more LCD displays, although it will be understood that any display device is envisaged, such as plasma screens and projectors.
An example gaming machine 22 is illustrated in
A top box 56 may carry artwork 58, including for example pay tables and details of bonus awards and other information or images relating to the game. Further artwork and/or information may be provided on a front panel 59 of the console 42. A coin tray 60 is mounted beneath the front panel 59 for dispensing cash payouts from the gaming machine 22.
The display 44 is in the form of a video display unit, particularly a cathode ray tube screen device. Alternatively, the display 44 may be a liquid crystal display, plasma screen, or any other suitable video display unit. The top box 56 may also include a display, for example a video display unit, which may be of the same type as the display 44, or of a different type.
The display 44 in this example is arranged to display representations of several reels, each reel of which has several associated symbols. Typically 3, 4 or 5 reels are provided. During operation of the game, the reels first appear to rotate then stop with typically three symbols visible on each reel. Game outcomes are determined on the basis of the visible symbols together with any special functions associated with the symbols, and if a function has been allocated to a reel, on the basis of the allocated function.
As indicated in
In some situations, the display controller 14 may be required to decode multiple streams of video data simultaneously. In order to reduce the processing load on the display controller 14, multiple sets of video data may be provided for each jackpot sequence, each set of video data being optimised to a particular size of display output. Video data optimised to display at a small size has less image quality, and requires less processing power to decode and display, and as a result more video data sets can be decoded simultaneously. The display controller 14 may be arranged to automatically select the optimum video data set based on quality and processing requirements.
In situations wherein it is not possible to obtain jackpot data from a jackpot controller 12, a video output from an existing jackpot display controller may be digitised and fed to the display controller 14. With this arrangement, the jackpot controller may dynamically cause the digitized video data to be encoded at different quality and/or size to optimise the video data for decoding performance requirements.
Modifications and variations as would be apparent to a skilled addressee are deemed to be within the scope of the present invention.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2007903081 | Jun 2007 | AU | national |
