New Cabinet Installs for Casinos in Mexico
Author:
Scott Lawson
A new arrangement between Zitro and several Mexico casinos will see new games available in Mexico through two new video slot cabinets, Allure and Illusion. Since the beginning of this month, these new cabinets have been made available in Red Casino, Caliente Casino, and the 7 Mexico casinos owned by Winland Group.
The casino landscape in Mexico continues to be promising for new business ventures, despite the President’s opposition to new casino licensing under his administration. ©N3otr3x/Pixabay
Illusion and Allure: An Overview
The new video slots cabinets provided by Zitro are called Illusion and Allure, and are appealing in no small part for their convenient size: taking up minimal casino floor space and allowing players greater legroom.
With the Allure cabinet, players can access the games “88 Link Lucky Charms” and “88 Link Wild Duels,” which can be played across the cabinet’s 3 screens. These screens are fully HD and come equipped with a “Syncroscreen,” a multimedia high-tech system paired with a “SmartDeck” touchpad.
The Illusion cabinet will offer its newest game, “Bashiba Link.”This game also comes with a 43-inch, curved HD monitor and the SmartDeck digital keypad. “Bashiba Link”, a game inspired by Chinese design, uses the Link King, run on a math model that offers gamers 243 ways to play. The Link King also can be played to lead to a Link Bonus.
Zitro and BRYKE, Born in Brazil
Zitro was founded by Johnny Ortiz, inspired by the prohibition of bingo in Brazil in 1994. That same year, Ortiz and his father hosted their first Bingo. The massive success of Ortiz’s new bingo games, paired with his innovative new twists on the game like “Bingdatas,” made the game a smashing success, and their business continued to grow.
As Brazil’s government continued to make regulations prohibiting types of gambling, Ortiz and his father continued to develop creative innovations around the law, including video bingo machines — what Ortiz has described as the first of its kind in the world.
Beginning in 1996, Ortiz and his father began leasing video bingo machines — much like Ortiz’s first business, begun at just 18 years old in the early 1980s with his friends, where they would rent out popular video games like those created by Atari to enthusiastic gamers. In time, Ortiz and his father had put their bingo machines in bingo halls across Brazil — up to 1,000 bingo halls nationwide.
All of this changed in 2004, when Brazil’s government banned gaming in the country, leaving 300,000 of the nation’s workers unemployed. On this, Ortiz has said, “I went to bed as a businessman and woke up as a delinquent.”
Still, Ortiz is not bitter. He speculates that, without Brazil’s strict prohibition of gaming, his company Zitro, founded in 2007, may not even exist today. Now, Zitro employs 300 people at its Ideas Factory in Barcelona, Spain.
In 2016, Zitro created BRYKE, an individual Bingo Hall system. This signified a shift towards the online market for the Barcelona-based company.
Throughout Zitro’s existence, the company has been interested in transnational expansion and innovation, with a particular fondness towards Mexico. Johnny Ortiz has talked extensively about the possibility of market growth in Mexico, which he sees as being ripe for development for the gaming industry.
The casino industry in Mexico offers a combination of traditional table games and innovative new machines, now including Zitro’s latest cabinets.©ToNic-Pics/Pixabay
Despite President Obrador’s Hostility Toward Gaming, Development in Mexico
Last month, Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (or AMLO, as he’s sometimes called) made a statement that he would not be allowing any new casino licenses under his administration.
This statement offers a tough stance to many companies which have, like Zitro, expressed the great possibility held in the Mexico market. Among these companies is Codere, which had a rumored deal in the works with Hard Rock Café to open a new guitar-shaped hotel-casino in Mexico City.
Still, despite President Obrador’s hardline stance against new casinos, this hasn’t stopped international game developers like Zitro from investing in Mexico’s market. Even with the existing casinos, Mexico has a lucrative and promising casino market: gaming giant Codere owns 95 casinos across the country.
Who Are Zitro’s Latest Mexico Stockists?
In the last month, Zitro has made arrangements with Red Casino, Caliente Casino, and the Winland Group casinos to make their Illusion and Allure cabinets available.
The Winland Group has 7 casinos in Mexico: Winland Monterrey, Winland Elite CDMX, Winland Cuernavaca, Winland Chihuahua, Fortune La Paz, Fortune Hermosillo, and Capital Premium La Paz. Of these casinos, Fortune La Paz receives the largest visitorship, clocking in at over 410 million guests annually.
Caliente Casino, which went public with its Zitro collaboration just a day before Red Casino announced its partnership, is located in Tijuana, Mexico. In addition to its casino, Caliente Casino hosts a number of popular events, including Miss Simpatía, a beauty pageant, and various sports watching events. All of the events hosted at Caliente Casino have betting options, and the casino also hosts sports betting and horse race betting.
In addition to now offering these cabinets from Zitro, Caliente Casino has games available from such game designers as IGT, Bally, AGS, Aristocrat, and FBM.
Red Casino was the most recent to partner with Zitro, announcing their collaboration November 15. Red Casino is located at the Oasis Cancun, a popular destination spot for international tourists. Opened in April 2017, the Red Casino is a recent venture by the international travel company, which offers a fusion of travel and adult entertainment for travelers. Like Caliente Casino, Red Casino also offers live entertainment, like comedy shows and musical performances and live sporting events like those hosted in Las Vegas casinos.
Red Casino is open 24 hours a day, and offers visitors a mix of traditional table games (roulette, blackjack, poker) and slot machines, now including the new cabinets provided by Zitro.
At This Year’s G2E, Zitro’s New Cabinets Make A Splash
This is a good year for Zitro, which is continuing to solidify its presence on the international gaming scene. Zitro premiered the Illusion and Allure cabinets at this year’s G2E in Las Vegas to enthusiastic feedback.
During last week’s G2E, Zitro announced that they had confirmed more the sale of the sale of more than 2,000 Illusion and Allure cabinets for gaming providers. This feedback can only bode well for the Mexico casinos, who see themselves as some of the frontrunners of featuring Zitro’s latest innovations.
Like Johnny Ortiz, Zitro founder and CEO, described of his experience growing a gaming industry in Brazil around the increasing regulations of a gaming-resistant government, it seems the gaming industry in Mexico is creating similarly inventive workarounds to an unfriendly government, and this latest partnership is further proof.
