GAMING1

About the Company

GAMING1 is a casino software development company based in Brussels, Belgium, and St. Augustine, Malta. The company was originally launched under the Circus banner in 1992 when the two founders opened their first gaming room in Liege in concert with the Bosquin family of Belgium.

The company now employs over 1,000 including about 300 in Liege.

Prior to acquiring the prestigious Namur and Spa casinos they formed a web agency and then in 2011 Gaming1 was launched to combine the synergies of technology development and gaming operations. The first online casino, Circus.be was launched to immediate success.

Casino777.be and pokerstars.be were launched as well. All online facilities are operated with partners then and today, except the Circus brand. The next year they launched eight more websites in Belgium including Blitz and Magic Wins.

By 2014 the ever-expanding company set up shop in Malta to be on the cutting edge of bringing land operators online and to manage their global operations, including their first casino in Spain.

The Ardent Group was formed in 2015 bringing in all parts of the company to one family and the next year saw them expand into France, Romania, Serbia, Spain, and Portugal as gambling laws were liberalized, regulators were put in place, and the opportunities arose.

While the acquisition of Casino de Spa, est. 1763, nearly a decade prior would have been any entrepreneurs crowning glory, but this concern went full steam ahead, opening 10 new gaming rooms in Flanders, acquiring a piece of the exquisite Davos casino in Switzerland, inking a deal with Casino Jao, Montrond-Les-Bains, Rhone-Alpes, France, and breaking out into online operations in Colombia as well.

The corporate structures were changed again in 2018 to bring all of the Ardent Group's gaming activity under one umbrella as the Gaming1 Group. The next year saw a Circus Club open in Paris, a takeover of the Casino D'Allevard, and launch of an online site for JOA. This cemented their French operations along with the acquisition of Casino de Vals-Les-Bains.

The Ardent Group comprises four investor families. In addition to gambling concerns, activities include real estate, computer development, energy, led display, energy, and beer.

Today, the company operates online and land-based casinos in over half a dozen countries. In their homeland of Belgium, their software and technology support about a dozen sites including Circus, 777, PokerStars, Carousel, Blitz, Casino333, CasinoBelgium, Family, Golden Vegas, Lucky Games. Magic Wins, and Panache with more than half a dozen land locations.

In France, they support Circus and JOA online and have six clubs.

Switzerland hosts one land and virtual gaming site, Spanish customers can play at sites online. Portugal, Serbia, Colombia, and Peru each have one online operation, some under the Circus and other under local brands such as ESC and Zamba in Portugal and Colombia respectively.

Software and Games

The company provides a complete casino solution that is completely customizable by the operator so players will not notice it's a casino in a box. Bonus management, CMS, Loyalty schemes, slots tournaments, a live notification system, risk scoring, and full player tracking are available.

Along with third-party providers the system can deliver over 1,200 games with more than 150 of them Gaming1 creations. Live casino and sports betting solutions are also available. Responsible gambling tools are included as part of a safe and secure gambling space. In specific markets loyalty points can be earned and redeemed in either type of establishment, online or off.

All of their online games are instant-play for use in any browser on the web. The platform provides games developed and deployed in HTML5. The content first broke into the main markets in 2017 when they provided their portfolio to NYX for distribution on the OGS platform to over 200 operators. Since then, many other developers including Tom Horn, Booming Games, and others have agreed to distribute their games on the GAMING1 system.

The games

In addition to slot provenance, the company also has a small library of table games like blackjack, roulette, dice "slots", and dice games that are popular in their local markets and catching on elsewhere.

Banca Francesa is licensed in Portugal by Regulação e Inspeção de Jogos - SRIJ.

Roulette comes in several iterations including single and double zero, VIP, and even a vertical model.

Some branded games such as Deal or No Deal, come in a variety of gambling formats like a slot game, a dice slot, and a dice box game.

Slots

Look for a good variety of titles, themes, volatility levels, and return to player percentages as well as configurations. All games are designed for fun.

Faelorn is an adventurous quest game that has a slots component. Choose a hero, defeat enemies, enter bonus worlds with games like card matching, spin for slot wins, - each journey having different mechanics and features, including exploding wilds and colossal wilds cover 9 fields of the three central reels.

Karak Forge is a work of art and an experience unto itself. This highly interactive slot will impress from the moment it loads on your screen. Plan on a good bankroll and small bets to make sure you make it through all of the levels of intensity this game has to offer.

As you play, certain events will help you collect cards. These are your powers when you reach the unique Battle Bonus game. Collect, Combine, Win is the tagline for the game. Another item to collect over time is gemstones.

The card battle has over 1,000 potential combinations that will affect game results. There are Spin Quests and a free spins feature. The Spin Quest is a built-in gamification feature to the game that lets you play at your own rhythm and collect rewards.

Athereal Fortune is a 5 reel, 10 pay line slot with a scatter, wilds, and expanding wild symbols. Scatters trigger bonus spins. Trigger the Expanding Symbols bonus by collecting three bonus symbols. Activate the wheel and select a random symbol that will expand during the free games. These are the only paying symbols in the bonus game. Free spins can be retriggered.

The Final Analysis

With about a decade of online experience and a lot more in the land-based industry, GAMING1 has grown steadily and purposefully. Their global footprint is getting larger year after year and the name and regal logo are becoming more well-known by the day.

The games they produce are unique and some rise to the level of a masterpiece. 

The Belgian dice games should be a hit in the Latin American markets and the slots with built-in gamification should continue to appeal to a new generation of players online.