NextGen (short for Next Generation) Gaming are an Australian-based company who describe themselves as “the world’s leading independent supplier of innovative games to the gambling industry” – and who are we to argue? They’ve been in business since 1999, and indeed have supplied over 600 online casino titles to the online gaming marking. Some popular NextGen Gaming titles include Foxin’ Wins (and its sequel Foxin’ Wins Again), Irish Eyes and Merlin’s Millions.
In 2011 the Swedish software company NYX Interactive bought NextGen Gaming for an undisclosed sum. The NextGen Gaming brand survived the transistion, and now is a subsidiary of NYX.
Despite being created as a company in 1999, NextGen Gaming did not really manage to attain much of a positive reputation for themselves before their 2011 buy-out by NYX. They began life in Sydney in New South Wales, and seemed content to maintain a subtle and understated presence, concentrating on slot development, gaming innovation and the development of end-to-end gaming platforms.
The first step to NextGen Gaming making a bit more noise in the industry came about upon that NYX purchase. NYX were up-and-comers in the competitive Swedish gaming market (they had NetEnt to contend with for one) and were probably seeking a quick solution to the limited number of games they’d produced. By snapping up NextGen Gaming they successfully expanded their gaming portfolio to over three hundred.
Over the years NextGen Gaming has won many awards. In 2013 they were voted ‘RNG casino supplier of the year’ at the 2013 eGaming Review B2B awards ceremony.
NextGen Gaming is famous for its slots more than anything else. The company has made many dozens of online slots over the years, but only a few have genuinely managed to capture the imagination of the gambling public. This is something of a shame, as when NextGen Gaming really tries it quite often succeeds. It just seems to tread water with its releases at times, but every now and again comes along a title that’s an absolutely joy to play.
Case in point: Foxin’ Wins and the equally-enchanting Foxin’ Wins Again. In these colourful slots, your chances of winning a prize payout are controlled by a rather dapper-looking fox who’s obviously worth a bob or two. However, the real stars are his three cute cubs, who are given free reign to cause mayhem and mischief. They will generally muck about with the gameplay – sometimes to your advantage, and sometimes not!
Another NextGen Gaming favourite is Merlin’s Millions. The Merlin in question is the famous wizard from King Arthur’s Court, depicted here in flowing green robes and with a magnificent pointy beard. His magical slot is somewhat unique in that it has four rows as opposed to the usual three, and you can decide upon the ‘superbet’ option which ups your stake in return for more chances of winning and larger payouts.
Some other NextGen Gaming slots that you might like to try include Amazon Wild, Irish Eyes, Ramesses Riches, Mad Mad Monkey, Doctor Love and 300 Shields.
The vast majority of titles produced by NextGen Gaming are online slots. In fact you’d be very hard-pressed to find an online casino that carries a game by NextGen Gaming that isn’t a slot.
NextGen Gaming’s titles are carried by many dozens of online casinos. You’ll find NextGen Gaming’s titles at a huge number of online casinos, including InterCasino, Casino Luck, Gala Casino, Casino Room and Betsson.
Nearly every online casino you come to will offer you some kind of bonus as a welcome promotion. These include matched deposit bonuses, and free spins bonuses. NextGen Gaming’s titles are generally not included in ‘special deals’ (unlike NetEnt’s), but at many online casinos you’ll be able to use your free spins and/or bonus money to play NextGen Gaming’s games. All NextGen’s slots can also be played for play money.
Although online live casinos are enjoying something of a current boom in popularity, NextGen Gaming has not ventured into this particular sector as yet.
Togther with the NYX Gaming Group, NextGen Gaming is licensed by the UK Gambling Commission, and the Gibraltar Gaming Commission.
NextGen Gaming sort of missed the boat when it came to the rise in popularity in mobile channels, but there are more than making up for it now. Originally NextGen Gaming developed their games in Flash, which meant that such games were not easily portable to smart phone and tablets. Happily, they have now seen the error of their ways and have instead begun to develop using HTML5 instead, which means porting to mobile devices is a much easier process.
Here are some of the major developers of software for online casinos:
