iGaming content producer Spearhead Studios latest release is a fun-packed, highly volatile slot based on Mexico’s beloved celebration of life and death. Players get to experience the unique atmosphere of the Day of the Dead traditional holiday.

On the colourful backdrop of Mexico’s renowned holiday, players venture into a world of magic festivities and special symbols that hold the power to release fantastic wins. Three expanded Book of Muertitos reels can generate a combined scatter win multiplier of 27x, and mammoth 27,000x wins on any single free spins panel. The 5×3, 10-payline slot adds an epic twist to the classic “Book” series, packing it into an immersive experience with an exceptional soundtrack and graphics.

Kevin Corti, Game Development Director at Spearhead Studios, comments: “It’s a mechanic we’ve used before to great success, but we wanted to pair it up with a new theme targeted at the Spanish and Central/South American slot-playing audiences. Not only is the free spins feature incredibly exciting, but the game looks and sounds amazing.”

The growing 35+ games portfolio of Spearhead Studios is a testament to their mission of Building Local Games for Local Markets. The game creators leverage their industry insights and a variety of distribution channels to bring to 100+ operators top-quality, localised iGaming content certified across Europe and Latin America.

Global sports betting and gaming entertainment group, Entain, has announced a partnership with children’s charity, Chance for Childhood. 

The award-winning global charity works to support children suffering from homelessness, disabilities, and other issues.

Launching the partnership will be a new pilot initiative called Change the first 1,000 Days, supporting 600 out of school street children in the Ghanaian capital Accra. 

The project, which will be supported by the Entain Foundation, aims to ensure the children get access to good early childhood education, and will involve ten government kindergarten schools in poor areas of the city. 

Special needs teaching capacity will be increased across the kindergartens, by increasing the teaching capacity available to children with special needs, and employing learning assistants to support the development of children. 

Jette Nygaard-Andersen, CEO of Entain, said: “The Entain Foundation was set up to enable our business to contribute back to society and support communities around the globe. We are proud to be able to support the invaluable work of Chance for Childhood, to make a transformational positive impact on such vulnerable children.”

Anna-mai Andrews, Co-CEO Chance for Childhood, added: “Chance for Childhood are absolutely delighted to join forces with The Entain Foundation and all their incredible team to support this critical work to transform the first 1,000 days of children living in the world’s most unsafe, violent and challenging environments.”

In addition to the Change the First 1,000 Days pilot, Entain says it will also be supporting a range of other Chance for Childhood initiatives. 

AYO.NEWS says:

With the COVID-19 pandemic still dominating the mainstream news cycles, it’s easy to forget that there’s still a whole world of other issues out there – issues that the pandemic has further exacerbated. So, it’s fantastic to see Entain helping Chance for Childhood make a positive difference at the most critical point in these childrens’ lives. 

Staying with Entain, last week the group announced it was making a £100K donation to help the COVID-19 relief effort in India. 

Isle of Man-based gaming software provider, Microgaming, has signed an exclusive distribution agreement with US-based online casino developer Gold Coin Studios. 

Gold Coin Studios games including Arthur’s Gold™, Aquatic Treasures™, Animals of Africa™, and Bushi Sushi™ are offered on Microgaming’s platform, and under the new agreement, the US developer has launched Silver Seas™, with Treasure Tracks™ expected to go live in July. 

John Duffy, CEO at Gold Coin Studios, commented: “All of us here at Gold Coin Studios are thrilled to work with Microgaming and have had a brilliant experience so far. Our extensive land-based gaming experience has given us a great base to work from and we can’t wait for you to see what we’ve got coming up!”  

Andrew Booth, Director of Games at Microgaming, added: “Gold Coin Studios have already given us some great games over the past year since they joined Microgaming. I’m looking forward to seeing them continue to cement their place in our roster of exclusive studios.” 

Staying with Microgaming, earlier this month, the company marked twenty years of being based on the Isle of Man by supporting 20 local charities.

Casino games and software supplier Red Tiger has launched in Pennsylvania, through a partnership with BetMGM Casino and Borgata Casino. 

Gonzo’s Quest™ Megaways™, Cash Volt and Wings of Ra are among the popular titles being rolled out from the supplier’s portfolio, with more Red Tiger content set to go live with BetMGM and Borgata over the coming weeks.

Jeff Millar, Commercial Director North America at Evolution, said: “We’re excited to see Red Tiger go live with BetMGM and look forward to extending our partnership with them. The studio is producing very successful games and I’m sure they will be well-received by players.”

Matthew Sunderland, Vice President of Gaming, BetMGM, added: “Red Tiger delivers top-quality games to licensed markets around the world. BetMGM is delighted to add their popular titles to our world-class games portfolio.”

Red Tiger’s Pennsylvania launch follows the successful platform integration of Evolution Group’s Evolution-powered live casino games and NetEnt slots through its states of operation in the United States. 

NetEnt acquired Red Tiger in September 2019, in an all-cash deal with an initial value of over $240M USD. NetEnt itself was then acquired by Evolution in summer 2020 in a deal worth over $2B USD.

Asia’s largest online poker room, Natural8, is fundraising to support COVID-19 relief efforts in India. 

The operator says it will be matching every donation dollar for dollar until 29 May, with every one donating $1 USD or above also receiving tickets to a flipout. Prizes for the flipout will increase as more donations are collected, and will be announced soon.

All contributions will go to community run fund CryptoRelief, and will help provide medicine, oxygen, and other essential items needed to help India fight COVID-19. For full transparency all donations will be published on the Natural8 website. 

CryptoRelief fund has so far donated almost $1M towards providing #OxygenForEveryone during the current Indian crisis. 

Donations can be made in the following ways:

• Making a transfer (via the Natural8 app) to helpindia@natural8.com
• Contacting the Natural8 24/7 live support team
• Sending Natural8 an email at support@natural8.com

You can find out more about the initiative here. 

AYO.NEWS says:

Kudos to Natural8 and its players for helping India during this unprecedented crisis. Over the last few weeks, we’ve seen several gaming and tech companies step up to help, including British gambling giant Entain, which last week announced a £100K GBP donation, Swiss computer peripherals and software manufacturer Logitech, which donated $2M USD, and South Korean game developer and publisher, Krafton, which contributed over $200K USD. 

King of Cats is another world first from BTG, featuring the brand new Player Select™ Mechanic which went live last week at LeoVegas Group via Scientific Games’ OpenGaming, before going network wide on May 26th, with customers  on the OpenGaming eceosystem having exclusivity on the game until August 19th.

Player Select ™ allows players choice over two very different games. Players can dial in an entirely new game at the touch of the alt spin button. King of Cats takes players on a psychedelic world safari from the Savannah’s of Africa to the Jungles of darkest Peru; these cats are wilder and more ferociously volatile than any cats in any online slots before this release. It really is the King of Cats!

On top of the groundbreaking Player Select™ mechanic, King of Cats employs BTG’s acclaimed Megaways™ game engine, which gives players up to 117,649 ways to win on every spin.

Reviewers are going wild for King of Cats. CasinoGamesOnNet gave it a roaring 94 per cent. The Big Win Board called it “Superb” and gave it 9.2 out of 10, adding, “winning potential is huge, features are varied and frequent, plus you get two games in one; it’s all hard to fault, really.”

BTG CEO Nick Robinson said: “King of Cats is really about rip-roaring entertainment. At Big Time Gaming, we’re constantly looking at ways to ramp up player engagement and to reimagine what a slot can do and how we can take it somewhere completely new. With King of Cats, we think we nailed it. This game really is a win.”

Johan Ekberg, Group Casino Games Manager at LeoVegas Group said: “We love getting early access to Big Time Gaming’s new slots because our players love them and the Player Select ™ mechanic will undoubtedly bring a whole new level of action for players to enjoy.”

Dylan Slaney, SVP Gaming at Scientific Games Digital said: “King of Cats is yet another fantastic release from BTG that features cutting edge gameplay and new mechanics which are sure to be popular with players. We are delighted to have provided LeoVegas with the first opportunity to experience the excitement of this game before delivering another hit on the OpenGaming network that provides more immersive experiences for players worldwide.”