In the first episode of SlotBeats’ Beyond the Reels in 2022, we take a look at Evoplay‘s flagship game of 2021 in Star Guardians.
Joining CasinoBeats’ senior reporter, James Ross, to delve deeper into the game was Vladimir Malakchi, chief commercial officer at Evoplay, who explained the title’s third-person shooter and the reason for including a manual mode within the slot.
Talking about what players can expect within Star Guardians, Malakchi noted: “The game includes a manual mode where players can control everything themselves and enjoy the entertainment, alongside the usual mode of traditional spins but from behind [the character] point of view.
“We have included a special mechanic, nothing too special though if we’re speaking about mechanics and mathematics. This was part of the challenge where we wanted to keep the game very simple yet from another point of view, very interesting and interactive so we decided to use the same popular mechanics which are making money for people.”
Touching on the manual mode and Malakchi highlighted that the whole process was about enhancing the player’s involvement within the game, pinpointing to the company’s own data which revealed that the average session length within Star Guardians was “highly different: from its other titles.
He continued: “If you’re playing traditional slots, you just click and play and gain wins or losses so you’re just waiting to see if you get a big win.
“Playing Star Guardians, you’re not just involved in outer play, you need to see how many, and what monsters, need killing. Will I receive special prizes from the chests or not and, in some cases, we’re seeing players prefer manual mode just to kill monsters and up their skills.”
A spiritual successor from Evoplay’s Dungeons: Immortal Evil title, released in 2020, Malakchi stated that Dungeons was a “foundation” for making Star Guardians and to learn from the experience and mistakes made.
Providing an example on enhancements from Dungeons, Evoplay’s CCO pinpointed its bonus round: “In Dungeons it was an interesting concept but we understand people want to control more elements. Everybody was saying, that’s so cool but we get to kill dragons but we want to kill it.
“With the manual mode within Star Guardians where the player can fully control what is going on… you can shoot rockets and you can shoot usual refills so there is a feeling inside it.”
Malakchi also goes on to explain the inspirations behind the character reactions and what each offers the player, certain audiences that Star Guardians targets and gives a quite impressive yogurt analogy on how innovation can progress the slot sector.
