Behind The Slotlist – How Chicken Blast Took off

“When we get the minds that we have in this company together, some really exciting stuff can come from it.”

That’s Theo Masson, Senior Product Specialist Slots, at Flutter Studios, speaking ahead of the launch of the much-anticipated Chicken Blast slot, which will kick-off PokerStars Casino’s new The Slotlist on September 29^th.

Those various “minds” Theo mentions came together at a Flutter workshop just last year to brainstorm new slots ideas.

“Every year we have this ‘Create and Connect’ session”, begins Theo, “which is basically where the studios get together and kind of discuss all games that we’re building and how the future of the games is going to look, so we’re all on the same page and agree on the games we’re making.”

He continues: “So that session happens once a year and within that two-day workshop there was one session where we were all split into the different groups and left to our own devices to build the game, and the plan was for one of those games to end up getting developed.”

The initial idea for Chicken Blast hatched quickly that day and was a hit with the group almost immediately.

“It was just, ‘alright, what could be fun?’”, explains Theo. “Can we have a chicken – an Evel Knievel-style daredevil – venturing through space in a spaceship? Dodging space mines, hitting space cash diamonds?.”

Theo goes on: “And then from there, we kind of fleshed that idea out; it needs to be a slot first and foremost, so how can we have that slot element as the base, and then this core feature within the game.”

Studio Collaboration

With the idea locked, the game creation process can begin in earnest. The collaboration with studio designers got underway quickly, according to the Senior Product Specialist.

“Then we work with the studio to make that come to life, looking at a bunch of different sketches and working with the team to kind of see, okay, yeah, this looks fun. This is what we have in mind for this one, and yeah, go from there.”

Of course, the visuals are key, but, as Theo puts it, there’s a “much less-flashy” part which needs to be considered almost from the off.

“The first thing we wanted to get right is the maths of the game. So, obviously, the whole chicken blasting into space is the core feature of it [and] we wanted it to be a feature that the player is going to see fairly often for a slot game.”

Theo explains further: “So when they enter the game it doesn’t take too long for them to trigger this feature and see what this game is all about. So, the maths actually ended up being the first thing we wanted to agree on.

“To make sure that this would have been a nice playing experience, and how we can then balance a game like this one, where players can choose to cash out what they might win, or keep going,” he adds.

The Vision

Theo’s official title is Product Specialist, but he describes himself more as ‘the middleman’ between the studio and his team. What does that look like in this case?

“We obviously brought the idea of the game to the studio, and you would have seen from the sketches and other things that the studio kind of starts getting the ball rolling; sending some sketches to us, and then my role is to work with the team.

“To kind of see and present these ideas, and see what we like the most and then go back to the studio to say, ‘oh, this is the vision we have for it’ and slowly but surely building every kind of aspect of that game, and making sure that the team know what they’re talking about; they’ve got their insights that they’re able to share to build this one, and with their experience of what they know is going to work for the player,” he explains.

“So, when we get the artwork, I’ll work on it with the team, and when we get the maths, I’m trying out the different maths models that we have and working as well with the team to see which ones they like the most. So, kind of making sure they’re constantly involved through every step of that game, as it gets built, essentially.”

So far Chicken Blast sounds like a dream to work on. Not quite, according to Theo. Near the end, as testing began, something was spotted which might have derailed the whole schedule.

“During certification last month, as it was with the external company, which essentially means we’re not supposed to touch the game at this stage, I had a few content managers from the brands reviewing it; so from Paddy Power, from PokerStars, and other brands reviewing the game, and they pointed out that one of the features was not going to be a great player experience, which is that some of the cash diamonds were kind of going over the rocket, but they weren’t counted as a win and they pointed out that this is not going to be a great player experience.”

Getting the thinking caps on, Theo and the team came up with a solution.

“Thankfully we were able to make changes to the game’s frontend and not the backend, which doesn’t change anything about the game mechanics and how it plays, but it was just visually, then that wouldn’t occur anymore.

“So, we were able to fix that, otherwise, it would have been very tricky for the brand to take this game. But we worked with the studio to make the changes and implement them and not impact the certification time of the game. Not having it to go through recertification, which takes another six weeks.”

Growing Support

With any game there needs to be people who will embrace, but also sell, the idea of the game to generate and swell interest, both within and without. For Theo a few people and teams come to mind in this regard.

“Louise Burt was a big help for this one in the business operations team, as was Paola Di Ridolfi. They were just huge champions of the game to help pitch it to the brands, and really sell the game, and just really sell that excitement, share that excitement that they had for the game to the brands.”

Elsewhere, within PokerStars Casino, Ed Fogarty, Associate Director Casino Commercial and his team “got fully behind the game”.

Theo explains: “he got his team to invest their time and resources on the marketing campaigns, which I’m really excited to see what they’re going to look like.”

There’s also Chelsea Coburn and Adam Coogan, who Theo states, made sure Chicken Blast was ready on time and proactively sought solutions on any potential problem during certification.

And, of course, the Stars Studio team who, he adds, were a constant support throughout all development stages of Chicken Blast from design to gameplay.

The Chicken Theme

But now to the most important question of all, one which has confounded this writer for some time: why do people love chicken games so much?

Theo smiles and offers a theory: “It’s a good question, to be honest, and this probably maybe goes back to before the time I got involved in iGaming and casino games in general. We know Italy loves chicken games, for example.

“I think the good thing about a chicken is that it’s kind of flexible in how you want them to look. They’re kind of like an easy animal to animate in a way.

He adds: “especially the Chicken Blast character, the whole Evel Knievel, daredevil-thing. I’m not exactly sure how it was settled on a chicken for this one, but I think it’s just, you know, kind of think of an animal that’s easy to play around with, to make it look like how you want the game to reflect that and chicken characters just seem to be a perfect fit for that.”

It’s as good a theory as any, in fairness. But it also reflects the creative side of the iGaming industry right now, according to Theo.

“You know, the good thing about this industry is there’s no ideas that are too crazy. Like, I’m sure when they thought about this one, they were like, ‘alright, now we’re getting a little bit too kind of wacky’, but, you know, that’s the fun thing about this industry and the world of slots, there’s no ideas too crazy to see the light of day. As long as you find a way to bring it to life then that excitement gets passed on to the players.”

Chicken Blast combines classic slot aspects and the much-loved crash-style feature. It’s a game that, understandably, Theo has much love for.

“I think this one is just such a unique game. We’ve not seen any games like this before that combine a simple, real element with a crash feature. Players are really able to play this one how they want to play.”

You can check out more on The Slotlist HERE.