Washington State Approves Fishbowl Frenzy As Amusement Game

OLYMPIA, WA -- The Washington State Gambling Commission has approved Fishbowl Frenzy as a genuine amusement machine, according to Team Play Inc., the game's manufacturer.

The commission examines all types of games to determine whether they satisfy the state's statutory requirements. Amusement games, in particular, must not have any "auto-percentaging" programming, which would give operators control over the gameplay outcome. According to the approval notice, Fishbowl Frenzy meets Washington's definition of an amusement game because it involves hand-eye coordination.

"At first, the Washington examiners rejected the game, because it was not immediately apparent to them that Fishbowl Frenzy is strictly skill-based," said Team Play chief operating officer Ken Fedesna. "But we were able to demonstrate that its gameplay is driven exclusively by the player's skill."

To prove the game's skill requirements, Team Play made a video that showed its lead programmer playing it. In the video, Brian Smolik points to the virtual bowl that he will drop a ball into -- and does so, repeatedly. "It's pretty hard to dispute that Fishbowl Frenzy is a skill game when Brian can drop that ball anywhere he wants, all day long," Fedesna said. "The rest of us can't do that!"

Fishbowl Frenzy, without any software modification, is now shipping to Washington state operators. The operator's manual, tech support information and pricing ratio can be downloaded at teamplayinc.com.