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Introduction.
First I would like to state that in regards to 1990s Williams slot machines, no one seems to be archiving any informationon these (Williams is not doing this for example). Hence this web page. Even though most pinball people hate Williams slotmachines (because pinball financed slot machine development during the early 1990s,and Wms gaming eventually overtook and closed the pinball division in 1999),I find the Wms spinning reel dotmation slot machines to be the best of this era.(Note WMS Gaming became a publically traded company in 1998.)These are all pre-TITO machines (TITO is 'ticket in, ticket out'). Meaning they take quarters and paper money, and have a hopper to payout quarters. Most new slotsafter 2001 are TITO and don't handle money, only tickets. To me a TITO machinesis not a slot machine, it's a money sucking credit cardish eating device, and is nothing I would want in my home gameroom.

Brief History.
In early 1995 Williams introduced their first spinning reel slot machine of the 1990swith 'Reel Em In' (aka Fishtales slot). This was a very successful game,using great sound and programming to cast (re-spin) the reels with fishingreel sounds for bonus effects. (If a lure symbol lands on the pay line,the reel studders and 'casts' the lure out, hitting the water with soundeffects. Then the reel spins backwards slowly like someone is reeling the lure back.Usually a 'fish' grabs the lure, and the reel shakes and spins like theplayer has caught a big fighting fish).Reel Em In was extremely successful for a first effort, and was well receivedat trade shows and casinos.This was followed up by some other great spinning reel slots like High Speed (themedafter the Williams pinball game, complete with the reels re-spinning like tires burning rubber,and cop chasing sirens), and Top Cat, amoung others.

Towards the end of 1995, Al Thomas of Williams came up with the idea ofadding a 192x64 dot matrix displayto their spinning reel slot machines. These Wms model 40x slot machinesare known as 'dotmation' slots because of the dot matrix display.Though I'm not exactly sure which was the first dotmation slot by Williams,it was probably X-factor or Piggy Banking.Note model 400 and model 401 and model 405 or 40s are Williams reel slots with or without Dotmation, model 250 are Williams sit-down reel slots, model 550are their video slot machines, model 360 are slant top sit-down video slot machinesversion of the 550, and Williams Bluebird is their newest Linix based video slot machine.

If you have a Williams slot machine (dotmation, reel only, or video slot) for sale pleaselet me know. Broken or working is fine (I can fix them). Please email me [email protected]

ROMs Needed.
Also if you have any ROMs or ROM files for the following Wms Dotmation games,I would really appreciate hearing from you: Batter Up dotmation,Monopoly Advance to Boardwalk dotmation, and Monopoly Roll and Win dotmation.

What's the 'Best' Game?
I get asked a lot, 'I want a Williams slot machine, but which is the best onefor my home?' That's a hard question to answer, as it's like asking, 'which flavorof ice cream do you like the best?' But I will say this, I like the slots that havesome sort of interactive bonus round. All the Williams slot machines have bonusor dotmation animations that make them much nicer than a 'standard' spinning reel slot.(In my opinion, all other spinning reel slots like IGT are awful in comparison to Wms.) Justsome models get the player involved more than others.

For example, all these games have some sort ofplayer interactive bonus round: Jackpot Party (including Beach and Country), Perfect Match(very similar bonus round to JP Party), Stroke of Luck, Money to Burn, Jackpot Limbo,Mermaid's Gold, and Mermaids Treasure. I would consider all these games to be amoung 'the best'of the dotmation games as the bonus games are interactive (involving player sections and choices).

Next are the spinning reel slots that have non-interactive bonus rounds, hence 'sit and watch' entertainment (these too are incredibly popular and fun). This includesReel Em In, High Speed, Top Cat, Jackpot Stampede (those four are non-dotmation), Winning Streak, Piggy Bankin, Big Bang Piggy Bankin, Mega Multiplier, Palace of Riches, Riverbelle 21, Jackpot Stampede Deluxe, Safe Cracker, and Shopping Spree. And last there are those that don't have a bonus round, but just have lots (often hundreds) of cute dotmation animations that play between spins: Magic Lamp, Pharaoh's Fortune and X-Factor.Note *none* of these Williams spinning reel slots are 'bad'; they are all good. It's just what you like. And again *any* Williams dotmation is better than any IGT model from the 1990s.

Cabinet Styles.
The 400/401/405 upright models came in three cabinet formats: 9' top glass, 16' top glass, and 'round top'(just like IGT). All models were available with or without card-reader strips belowthe top glass (casinos use these to track players). The round top cabinets are considered the fanciest, but personallyI like the 16' square tops the best from a cosmetic point of view. Williams made thedotmation slot machines as late as 2001. (Late models were mostly made forthe Canadian market, as the Canadians put in big ordersfor Dotmation slots around 1999.) Williams also made sit-down versions called the 550 series.These are big things, and generally just too big for the home arcade. (But interestingly the Monopoly series only came in 550 sit-down format.)

Bonus Rounds.
On the dotmation slot machines, if the patron is a 'winner', most games go to a bonus mode whichplays on the dot matrix display (DMD). This was the first useof a bonus game in slot machines with a DMD, and its development is largely due to Williams' involvement in pinball. The creative talent of the pinball programmersand designers really shows through on these dotmation slot machines.Unlike 'regular' slot machines that just have three spinning reels, the bonus games provide a chance to increase the payout, and made the games more interactive and fun. In addition to giving players the chance to win more, these games are more engaging than traditional slot machines, incorporating funny audio and video features on the dot matrix display.

Games that don't have a bonus round instead have random award multiplier (2x to 15x), againincorporated through the DMD. Lots of great animations on the display keeps theplayers more engaged and dropping more quarters to see, 'what it will do next.'The earlier dotmation games generally don't have bonus games. The first dotmations, based on the Williams-assigned game number, are Piggy Bankin, X-Factor, Magic Lamp, Phoroahs Fortune, and have limited bonus features. Later gameslike Winning Streak, Big Bang Piggy Bankin, Jackpot Party, Jackpot Stampede Dlx, Jackpot Limbo, Mermaid's Gold, Shopping Spree, Perfect Match, Money to Burn, Stroke of Luck,Monopoly, etc, have some sort of interesting bonus game.

Locking wilds slot machine. To lock the new wilds automatically as they appear, check the corresponding box on the gaming interface. You can select and deselect wilds as you wish, making the game interactive and player-based. Another bonus feature in Wild Gambler.

Even many of the non-dotmation mechanical reels have bonus rounds. For example Jackpot Stampede,High Speed and Short Circuit do 're-spins' when the bonus round is hit. These are incorporatedinto the game's theme very well. Like on High Speed the reels do a 'burn out' like cartires when the bonus round is started, and continues as the cop chases the getaway car. This is all done very well with great sound and speech, and is much more exciting thanany IGT S+ or Bally slot of the same era.

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Sound.
The Williams slot machines also have much better sound than their IGT counterparts, withgood music and even speech. The sound is miles ahead of other slot machines ofthe 1990s (most other slots have monotone synth sounds, which is pretty lame compared to Williams slot machines). The familiar Williams pinball 'bong'is used as a Dotmation slot machine is turned on. The sound is so good on Williamsslot machines that it rivals the sound on games made 10+ years later. Even IGT's S2000series and Bally 6000 series can't compete with 1990s Wms slots regarding sound and speech (well unlessyou pay extra and have an additional sound board and software installed,and even then it's debatable if they are better).

Backlit Reels.
Another great feature of Williams slot machines are back lit reels.If a winner is spun, the reels back light showing the winning symbolcombination. Even IGT didn't have this feature until 10 years lateron their S2000 series (and as an upgrade option, not as a stock item).On the Williams slot machines there are 6 lamps behind each reel strip, so even a 5-linegame can show winning combinations. Williams used a lamp matrix much liketheir pinball machines, for a total of 64 CPU controlled lamps (an 8x8 row/column matrix). This is done using TIP102 and TIP107 transistors on theSlot I/O board (same technology used on WPC pinball games).

Dollar Bill Protocol.
Another thing Wms did was to use the JCM dollar bill protocol. This is the methodwhere the dollar bill acceptor 'talks' to the slot machine. Dollar bill acceptorsbecause a big feature of 1990s slot machines, so this is an important item to have working on these 1990s and later slot machines. IGT used their own dollar bill acceptorprotocol, and frankly it stinks! That's why it's so hard to get the dollar billvalidator to work on an IGT S+ machine (I do more repairs related to dollar bill acceptorson IGT machines than any other problem). Compared this to Williams where there israrely a dollar bill validator issue, because Wms used JCM's (the dbv145 and dbv200bill validator manufacturer) protocol.

Reliability.
Every brand of slot machine has its Achillies Heal. For example, in the case of IGT,their dollar bill acceptor never seems to work consistently. And the array of bizzarenumeric error codes and weird procedures to fix them is frustrating. With Williams none of these things are issues (they use english commands on the frontLEDs to display problems), and the dollar bill protocol is far better. Overall IGTslots are not good for a 'home' user, as working on them requires experence and a good understanding of their weird error codes and procedures to fix them. Alsounique set and clear chips are often needed (which are not readily available).In this regard Williams slot machines are far easier to work on.

But Wms slot's can have power supply issues. On dotmation games there are two switching power supplies - one in the top box forthe DMD display, and a lower switcher for the rest of the game. These can both beproblematic. But they are also easily changed out to a single inexpensive ATX computerpower supply (for both upper and lower power), making Williams slot machines pretty bullet-proof.Once this is done, a Wms slot is less problematic than an IGT or Bally slot. And if apower supply problem does happen, 30 seconds later you're up and running with a newinexpensive power supply installed.

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Popularity.
Of the Williams dotmations slot machines, certain titles seem to have been made ingreater numbers. For example, Winning Streak, Piggy Bankin, Big Bang Piggy Bankin, and Magic Lampseem to be the easiest to find, and are very popular. Some are pretty rare like Mermaid's Treasure, Shopping Spree, Perfect Match, Palace of Riches, Money to Burn, Riverbelle21, and the two Monopoly games.Williams only had a 1 or 2 percent market share in the 1990s (compared to IGT who basically had 80+% of the slot machine market).So none of the Wms slot machine titles were made in great numbers.

Also some Williams slot machines were made as 'lease only'. This includes thetwo Monopoly dotmation slots. Because they were never sold to the casinos,when the games were 'finished' (when their profit per square foot no longermet casino expectations), the games were returned to Williams. At that pointWilliams would crush the games. Hence very few survived. Some titles were availableas both lease and sale (Jackpot Limbo for example), so they are also 'rare'.

Telneas Patent.
At the time (mid-1990s), Wms was being sued by IGT overpay table calculations (the Telneas patent). This really kept Wms from cranking out machines, as they were tied up in court. /carnival-slot-machine-game.html. The arguement was that a spinningreel could be divided into 72 virtual stops (instead of just 22 'real' stops), andodds were calculated on these 72 virtual stops.

The Telneas patent was originally developed by Telneas of Bally during the early 1980s.The patent was granted to Bally, but gaming commisions would not allow its usage.Because of this, the patent was sold to Universal in the late 1980s and then to IGT in the early 1990s.Somehow IGT was able to convince the Nevada gaming commision that the Telneas patent was Ok,and IGT cashed in on this. Other state gaming commisions followed after Nevada declaredTelneas as legal.

Gaming commisions try to protect the player. For example if a gaming devices usescards or dice, it must react and play like a deck of cards or dice. That is, odds are1 in 52 for any card, and 1 in 6 for any dice position. Slot machines were like thistoo prior to the Telneas patent. There were 11 symbols per reel, so the chances of hitting any symbol was 1 in 22. The Telneas patent made any symbol (or any blank area)have multiple position, which was not obvious to a player, increasing the odds to say 1 in 72 (or even higher). So seeing a 10,000 coin jackpot on a game with 11 symbols was in many respects very deceiving - instead of each reel having the obvious 1 in 22 odds, the odds were really much longer. Because of this the Telneas patent was illegal formany years. It is speculated that IGT bribed or paid-off the Neveda gaming commision to get theTelneas patent approved. This gave IGT the upper hand in slot machines in the 1990s,and this is why IGT had 80% of the slot machine market during this period.

Most games have 11 symbols on eachreel strip. This means there are 22 'stops' on each reel (11 symbols and 11 spacesbetween the symbols). So the chances of hitting any position are 1 in 22. What theTelneas Patent does is to 'divide the pie' into say 72 pieces instead of just 22(even though there are really only 22 visible 'stops' on a reel). This allows for'long odds', where the slot can payout much bigger jackpots. Yes the odds of hittingare reduced, but notice no one plays the lottery when it's at $1 million (but everyoneplays when it's at $50 million!) That's why IGT slots were so popular during the 1990s,since players had the possibility of hitting huge jackpots.

The idea of having many more reel stops than reel symbols was not missed by Williams either.When Wms starting making spinning reel slots in 1995, they also used the Telneas idea.IGT obviously didn't want Wms to enter the slot machine market, so they sued Wms overthe Telneas patent. Manufacturing of Williams games that used the Telneas virtualstop calculations were haulted, and Wms had to go to calculations based on 22 'real' stops.This makes paying out larger numbers of coins more difficult and less lucrative for thecasino, since the potential for big coin payouts is what attracts many slot players. Wms lostthe Telneas lawsuit, which forced them into the video slot machine market (where the Telneaspatent did not apply.) And the Wms spinning reel slot division now did all calculationsbased on 22 'real' stops.

What Williams did to work around the Telneas patent was to increase the number ofsymbols on a reel strip. Instead of 11 symbols, they went to 12 symbols (Jackpot Stampede),and then 18 symbols (Money to Burn, Jackpot Party). This gave Williams36 stops instead of 22 (without violating the Telneas patent), which allowed for longer odds and bigger payouts (though not as long oddsas 72 stops). The reel strips were more cramped, but this compromise helped keepWms in the game and popular amoung players. The Telneas patent also pushed Williams intovideo slots, where the Telneas patent did not apply. This inadvertently made Wms theleader in video slots, where they still are today. So though IGT won the battle of theTelneas patent, they really lost the war of slot machines (since video slots are far morepopular today at casinos than spinning reel slots). Little did IGT know that protectingtheir Telneas patent on spinning reel slots would be the equivalent of shooting themselvesin the foot in the long run.

TITO Video Slots.
Though all the rage at casinos, I personally hate 'ticket in, ticket out' video slots. They just seemso 'unreal' compared to a mechanical spinning reel slot. Casinos love them - less moving partsand less people needed to fill hoppers with coins.Also they can change a game quickly as all that needs to be done is to swap the softwarein the case of a video slot machine.The number of reels and the reel strips obviously change instantly with a software changeon a video slot. But for my basement, only spinning reel slots with hoppers will do.

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Williams Slot Machines and Kits for Sale.
Occassionally I have a Williams slot machine or two for sale or some game kits(a 'kit' is the top glass, belly glass, reel strips, and EPROM software so any model 40x canbe converted to another game). Please see thefor sale web pagefor more details.

Titles and Pictures of Williams Slot Machines.
Below is a list of all the Williams Dotmation model 400/401/405 reel slot machines by Williams,and some of the popular non-dotmation slot machines.

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