Roulette 101
Roulette has been in practically every game that has an in-game casino, but this is one of the few times that it has been released as a standalone game. As a casino game, it doesn’t have the tactical edge like poker, or the flashing lights of a slot machine. But there is an air of sophistication to what is a game of chance. But does it have enough weight to warrant a release all on its own in the form of Hot Stakes Casino – American Roulette? You probably already know the answer.
For those of you unaware as to what roulette is, let me enlighten you. (For everyone else I apologise but how else do I pad out an 800+ review of a roulette game?) A spinning circle is divided up into 38 separate compartments, numbered one to 36, along with a zero and double zero. Players place bets as to which numbered compartment the ball will land in. Bets can be placed as to whether it is red or black, odd or even, and just about every other possibility you can imagine. The ball is then spun around the edge of the bowl until it slows and lands in one of the compartments, with those betting correctly winning.
Is it really just roulette?
Hot Stakes Casino – American Roulette sounds like it may be a new entry in to the Hot Stakes Casino franchise, but from what I can tell this is the first one. Maybe others will follow, but I am already having a hard time understanding this one. And in a game so desperate for content, why limit yourself to just one format of the game, American style. That is, the one with two green zeroes on the spinner. Which, for some reason, the ball seems to be magnified to? Seriously, they appear far too often than they should.
To add a bit of personality, you can choose from four playable characters: Mr. X (no, not the one from Resident Evil 2), Kimberly, Bruce and Ms. Money. Each character also has a unique ability, from being able to change to a different number of the same colour, or to move up or down a single digit from the one that it has stopped on.
Well, that is half true anyways. The abilities don’t work exactly like that, but are only applicable to whenever you launch a minigame. Each time you start a game, your character is given three uses of their special power. You’ll know when you start using it because their portrait starts flickering uncontrollably in the top right corner and should definitely come with an epilepsy warning. That is when their special power kicks in.
Take the special powers with a handful of salt
Take Mr. X – still not the one from Resident Evil 2 – and his special power. He has the ability to move the number up or down by three. So, if you were to land on a 14 and trigger his special power, the numbers that would appear in the minigame would be 8, 11, 14, 17, 20, 23 and so on.
However, most of these minigames are left to chance too. Ofttimes you are just stopping a cursor and it holding at a random point, so it doesn’t really feel like they give you much of an advantage.
And you’ll need all the help you can get to unlock, wait for it, character art for these characters you were introduced to two minutes ago! Yay!
Each character has ten pictures to unlock, and they are related to the amount of money you earn. Not cumulatively though; at least, I don’t think. There doesn’t appear to be any indication as to how much money you need to earn for each picture, which would be useful. Instead, it would appear that you need to earn the amount of money in one sitting, so to speak. For Mr. X for example – no still not that one – he appears to be the easiest in terms of unlocking pictures, at around $10K for each one. However, if you were to lose all money before unlocking all the pictures, you need to start another go from the beginning. If picture five requires you to earn $50K, but in the last session you only managed $45K, starting again still requires you to get up to that $50K amount in a new game.
In that sense it feels a bit like a roguelike, but that would be giving Hot Stakes Casino – American Roulette way too much credit.
The elegance of roulette takes a nosedive
As far as I can tell as well, these pieces of artwork don’t look like AI, but like the rest of the game, they leave a lot to be desired. They’re just not very good. Poor Mr. X – nope – has several photos of him looking dapper and training hard at the gym, but there is also one in there in which he looks like he’s eaten the Christmas selection boxes of every child in the neighbourhood. But, maybe you can view these sequentially and put your own plot to them; anything to make this more interesting.
The rest of the game doesn’t look too good either, particularly when the ball is ‘spinning’. Or rather, the board underneath the ball is spinning whilst it just juts about for a couple of seconds. It doesn’t even start at the edge before dropping in. There are also handles on the vertical bar in the middle of the roulette spinner, these don’t even turn around at all when the spinner is in motion. It is really bad when there is so little in this game and yet it appears like half a job has been done.
A Poorly Designed Gamble
But, at least it works, and that’s the only positive it really deserves. A game with such little substance and still manages to feel poorly designed is quite a feat, but for all the wrong reasons. Hot Stakes Casino – American Roulette does absolutely nothing that other roulette games in bigger titles already do. The only additions are the minigames, that are very luck-based, and the character artwork, that just aren’t very good.
I always try and think of someone I would recommend a game I review to, but I am at a loss for this one. Not even the gambler who is trying to avoid going to the casino. If anything, this is that bad, that it will get him there even quicker.
Important Links
This New Roulette Game Lets You CHEAT! Hot Stakes Casino – American Roulette is OUT NOW – https://www.thexboxhub.com/this-new-roulette-game-lets-you-cheat-hot-stakes-casino-american-roulette-is-out-now/
Buy from the Xbox Store – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/hot-stakes-casino-american-roulette/9nsk0j6mrmbk
