After several weeks of testing, the French national lottery (La Française des Jeux) has launched live cash Internet gaming for residents of France and its overseas territories.
The initial rollout of games, developed by Access Gaming Systems of Australia, features three instant lottery games: "Abracadabra," a richly animated game with a "magic" touch; "XIII" ("Thirteen"), a multi-stage game based on a popular French comic strip; and "C'est tout Foot," an animated penalty shoot-out game.
The software used for the animated games mimics real-world instant lottery tickets.
"The games are instant lottery games, specific to the Internet and use a database of pre-generated results, as opposed to a random number generator," explained Access Vice President of Sales and Marketing Paul Barnes.
Customers buy the games online and play over the Internet in real time with instant results, a much different system from that of Loto-Quebec's Tresors de la Tour, a competing multimedia interactive lottery game that requires customers to buy tickets from a retail outlet and then play the PC-based games via CD_ROM using an "access code" displayed on the ticket.
The French lottery (LFDJ) has also opted for a specific payment method--a debit card system provided by Credit Mutuel and implemented by Access.
The instant lottery games run on Access Gaming System's platform, but the games are actually co-developed by three groups: Next Generation Gaming (an Access games development partner), Naji (an Access games development subsidiary) and a current unnamed Access customer. LFDJ was able to incorporate games from such divergent sources under the Access Open Content Strategy, which permits the company's customers to obtain games content from various sources using the Access Games Development Kit (GDK).
Access, which also works with WestLotto in Germany as well as the Austrian Lotto, has partnered with a number of companies to develop games using the GDK, including Spike Networks, Maverick Gaming, Oberthur, SpinCycle and others.
The three new games are just the first wave of online products the lottery plans to introduce this year.