Pragmatic Play Unveils New Arcade Games Category with Plinko+

The debut of Plinko+ was announced in late July, marking the beginning of Pragmatic Play’s new game vertical with arcades. The first title is the simple Plinko, which is inspired by the popular TV game format where a ball bounces through a pyramid of pegs, landing in one of several multiplier pockets at the bottom.

In Plinko+, players can set the pyramid size (between 8 and 16 rows) and adjust their risk level before dropping the ball. The higher the risk setting, the bigger the potential rewards, with multipliers reaching up to 1,000x. It’s a simple idea, designed to offer light, fast gameplay with quick results.

Irina Cornides, Pragmatic Play’s Chief Operating Officer, said the new title signals a broader focus for the company.

“Plinko+ is the first in Pragmatic Play’s arcade portfolio, combining simple, low-volatility gaming with a fun theme, vibrant visuals, and multipliers up to 1,000x,” she said. “More arcade games are set to follow, with Spire+ and Mines+ next in line.”

According to the company, the goal of this new game type is to bring more casual and interactive games to players who enjoy quick outcomes without the complexity of modern pokies.

Pragmatic Play is already a recognised name among Australian operators and players. Their games appear frequently in Australian casinos, with titles such as Sweet Bonanza, Big Bass Bonanza, Sugar Rush, Gates of Olympus, The Dog House, and similar regularly topping the charts for local players.

The studio has used this opportunity to scale vertically and add arcade-style games to its portfolio in an attempt to reach a broader audience, including mobile players and those who are not keen on pokies.

Arcade content has been gaining traction globally over the past year, with many studios looking to bridge the gap between casual mobile gaming and casino games. These games often use simple mechanics and are based on popular TV shows or logic puzzle games like Minesweeper, but they have been redesigned to fit the casino-gaming style.

For casino operators, this could be a smart opportunity, and it fits into the international trend where gambling and video game mechanics are merging. Pragmatic Play’s new direction shows that the studio has been adapting to the market moves and broadening its content portfolio beyond the traditional categories.

For quite some time now, Pragmatic Play has been ‘refurbishing’ its successful pokie titles with variations like “Super Scatter,” “1000,” and dice versions. These adaptations are popular among players, but they don’t bring innovation to the table. The introduction of arcade-style games means that the studio is finally ready to bring something completely new to its fans.

Following Plinko+, it has been confirmed that Pragmatic Play is working on two more arcade titles: Spire+ and Mines+. Spire+ will see players climbing a nine-step tower, choosing from five difficulty levels, with multipliers increasing at each step. Mines+ is very similar to the standard Minesweeper game, where players reveal safe tiles and the goal is to avoid hidden mines, with each safe tile increasing the payout.

All of these games have already been “casinofied”, meaning that their concepts aren’t entirely new, just adapted by Pragmatic Play with their own way of implementing multipliers, risk settings, and bonus mechanics.

Still, this move marks a step in the right direction for Pragmatic Play. Instead of simply remixing existing pokies, the studio is finally branching into a new category, offering different types of games for its players and expanding its portfolio beyond pokies and live casino content.