Like it or not, one of the few constants in the world is that things change. Once popular TV shows, products, and even people can fall out of favor with a world that once held them aloft as champions of their respective fields. Of course, embracing this inevitable change early enough can also help something secure a future for itself among a brand-new generation.
A good example of the latter is bingo. Once a game played largely by an older, working-class demographic, bingo has evolved to cater to all sorts of different playstyles and tastes. The online bingo at Paddy Power has rooms that start every two minutes or so, as well as support for mobile play. Unique games like Paddy’s Pad, Paddy’s Full House, and Paddy’s Speed Trap help distinguish the site from other, similar providers.
On the flip side, it’s not hard to find companies in tech that failed – like Nokia and Blackberry. While Blackberry’s case is easy to explain (the company didn’t embrace the smartphone revolution fast enough), Nokia’s demise is a bit more of a mystery. Before the company’s purchase by Microsoft, then-CEO Stephen Elop stressed that Nokia hadn’t made any major mistakes but “somehow, we lost”.
Games and digital products are obviously much easier to adjust and amend as the years pass but many developers have only ever made minor adjustments to their products. Slingo, a portmanteau of the words “slots” and “bingo”, was invented all the way back in 1994, well before the internet was as widespread as it is today, yet its core gameplay has remained largely unchanged.
Slingo Inca Trail
So, what can we attribute its longevity to? Slingo regularly piggybacks off other games and franchises to increase its audience reach. Slingo Rainbow Riches and Lucky Larry’s Lobstermania Slingo are collaborations with two different slot games, for instance, while Slingo Racing incorporates a horse racing theme but otherwise retains its own classic gameplay as a base.
As this kind of partnership only works on people who are fans of both games, Slingo has had to come up with a few original themes of its own. Slingo Inca Trail is a largely cosmetic remix of the original Slingo but with a journey to the village of Machu Picchu included. The game rewards the player with one of six artifacts if they manage to reach the famed Peruvian ruins at the end.
Slingo Wild Adventure is much the same kind of experience, albeit with the backdrop of a medieval kingdom. In this game, the player can meet a king, queen, prince, and devil in a five-reel slot machine. The standard Slingo grid remains, meaning that Slingo Wild Adventure is actually two games in one. Wild Adventure places a heavy emphasis on finding wild symbols, which is where its name comes from.
Slingo might not have had the same impact on the world as Nokia, whose 3310 model of phone is still famed today for its durability, but it can still serve as a lesson in how to keep a product fresh for a new group of customers.
