Why The Emoji Planet Slot From NetEnt Will Suck

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Emojis. Love them, hate them, poop head them into every conversation, they are here to stay.

They help convey emotions during textual conversations, allowing subtly sarcastic comments to be wonderfully misunderstood by absolutely everyone.

But did you know that the Emojis we know and love are created by a company called “Global Merchandising Services & The emoji Company”?

No? Neither did we.

So imagine our surprise when NetEnt Game Studios announced that they will be creating an official Emoji Planet video slot based on those smiley, confused faces.

Yeap, pretty much our faces too when we heard the news.

Believe it or not, it’s based on the Emoji… Movie?

Insert sleepy face emoji… right about here.

It says a lot of our life that the first we’d heard of an emoji movie was the fact that NetEnt was creating an Emoji online slot.

If you are really interested; here’s the film trailer. We had nothing better to do for a minute and a half, but feel free to skip it and move to the more interesting part of this post.

Or don’t. You know. Meh.

That’s right folks. Even the creators of this film couldn’t bring any enthusiasm to their trailer.

What on earth could this film, and mobile slot, be about?

That’s exactly what we thought when we first heard about the Emoji slot machine.

Other than put different emoticons on the reels, could there really be any real theme to this mobile slot game?

Apparently; yes: “Gene, an emoji born with multiple expressions, teams up with his handy best friend Hi-5 and the notorious codebreaker Jailbreak on an epic adventure through the apps on a teenager’s phone. Starring T.J. Miller, Ilana Glazer, Steven Wright, and James Corden.”

So there you have it folks. All those times you told your teenager to get off their phones, and you’ll be throwing yourself right in the mist of it. Yay? [insert eye roll emoticon here]

The Emoji slot will be out August 2017, same time as the movie

Because what’s the point in releasing a slot based on a movie, if you can’t tag-team the marketing?

Jens Drinkwater, Licensing Manager at Global Merchandising Services Ltd said: “We are tremendously excited to bring the colorful and exciting world from the emoji company to the gaming community. We are sure that the Emojiplanet® game will be a fantastic success for players of all ages.”

So the whole thing is still a long way away, meaning we know very little about the Android and iPhone / iPad slot in question; ie. what features will show up, how many reels, the bonus games etc…

Really, there’s only one question in everyone’s mind:

So why create an Emoticon slot game to begin with?

Simon Hammon, Chief Product Officer of NetEnt, comments:

“As a leader in both mobile online gaming and innovation, Emojis is a perfect fit with NetEnt. Every day, millions – if not billions – of people around the world enjoy using Emojis. They have become a language in their own right; it is hard to think of a more collectively familiar and loved brand to partner up with.”

In short: we all use them. We all know them. And we will all play with the familiar.

There’s worse reasons in the world to create a mobile slot machine.

After all, if Leander Games can get away with creating a Taxi phone slot, based on a TV series 30 years too late, NetEnt can certainly try and cash in on an up and coming movie.

Why we’re not convinced this NetEnt slot will work

We showed you the advert for the movie. What we didn’t show you is that NetEnt also created their own strange and weird advert promoting the upcoming EmojiPlanet mobile slot.

So wait… this isn’t based on the movie, instead it’s based on… a guy having a really bad nightmare when he overuses Emojis to such an extent that his whole world is overtaken by the emoticons?

Sounds… great?

It might all be a strange nightmare after all

You may not have gotten the subtle hints, but this slot machine seems to be all over the place.

The best we can hope for is that they will just use the emojis as symbols, and move away from the movie.

Why? Because no video game movie has ever been any good. Ever.

The best of their kind are the slots that go straight to the original source; ie. the Hitman slot, or the Tomb Raider game, both using original graphics rather than a movie theme.

And it’s not like emoticons even had that big a history. They are simply emotions on a page. So the theme is pretty shallow anyway, without adding a movie that will be forgotten the moment it’s released.

Don’t believe us? Who amongst you watch (or enjoyed) the Angry Birds movie? Case in point.

There is a glimmer of hope…

That hope, of course, is called NetEntertainment studios.

Even their mediocre slots tends to be a a cut above the rest. And whilst we know nothing about the features, NetEnt have given us a small light at the end of this emoticon tunnel.

“As NetEnt’s latest branded game, Emojis will bring a new and unique social gaming experience to the online casino world.”

A unique social gaming experience

What does this mean? Will it be a little bit like the BRAG Yggdrasil slot feature, where you can brag about your wins to other players playing the same game at the same time?

Or does it simply mean you’ll unlock achievements and bonus features?

Neither we hope, as these are not unique. It might just be a tiny glimmer of hope, but for that alone, we look forward to seeing what NetEnt do with this EmojiPlanet online slot.

Till then, we’ll be playing the simple, yet fun, Wild Wild West slot over at Casumo Casino, where they give you up to £€1,200 in welcome bonuses.