Evolution has launched a new live roulette table called Disco Roulette. Normally, a new Evolution release immediately gets our attention. This time, the name alone was enough to make us curious.
Disco Roulette? Coming from the company behind Funky Time and the recently released Disco Balls? Surely Evolution was about to bring Mr Funky to the roulette table.
Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth.
I played Disco Roulette and discovered that it is basically a normal live European roulette game in a disco-themed studio. There are no special multipliers, no bonus game, and, most disappointingly, no Mr Funky dancing across the floor collecting multipliers.
For a company as creative as Evolution, this feels like an enormous missed opportunity.
What I Expected From Disco Roulette
The name creates expectations for a reason.
Evolution introduced Funky Time in 2023 and built an entire 1970s disco world around the game. Two of its most recognisable bonus games, Disco and VIP Disco, take players onto a dance floor with Mr Funky. He moves across the floor collecting multipliers until the bonus comes to an end.
It is one of the most original bonus concepts Evolution has created.
More recently, Evolution expanded this disco theme with Disco Balls. The new live game show combines ball draws with evolving multipliers and bonus games, while Mr Funky once again returns to the dance floor.
Evolution itself describes Disco Balls as being inspired by the atmosphere of Funky Time. The connection between Disco, Mr Funky, the dance floor and multipliers is therefore already well established.
So imagine what could have been done with Disco Roulette.
After the roulette ball lands, selected numbers could have opened a Disco Bonus. Mr Funky could have entered the dance floor and collected multipliers for the winning number. Evolution could even have adapted the Disco or VIP Disco mechanic from Funky Time and Disco Balls to roulette.
It seemed like an obvious opportunity to combine two successful Evolution concepts.
But Evolution didn’t do any of that.
So What Is Disco Roulette?
It is roulette, regular live roulette.
The studio has a disco theme, and there is a dance floor, but that theme doesn’t appear to change the actual gameplay. There is no special Disco bet, no multiplier feature, and no bonus round. Even more strangely, there is a flatscreen in the studio promoting Disco Balls.
So you are sitting in a disco-themed roulette studio, looking at advertising for a game featuring exactly the type of disco features you might reasonably have expected Disco Roulette itself to contain.
I genuinely don’t understand this decision!
I Expect More From Evolution
My disappointment is probably greater precisely because this is Evolution. This is the company that created Lightning Roulette, which completely changed what players could expect from an online roulette variant.
Evolution later created XXXtreme Lightning Roulette and took the multiplier concept even further.
Then there was Red Door Roulette, where Evolution did exactly what we would have loved to see with Disco Roulette: it combined roulette with an existing Evolution game-show concept. Red Door Roulette brings elements of Lightning Roulette together with the Crazy Time Bonus game.
Whether you love every one of these games or not, there is an idea behind them. Evolution has repeatedly shown that it can take a classic casino game and add something genuinely new without making it unrecognisable.
That is why Disco Roulette feels so poor by comparison.
The Timing Makes It Even Stranger
Evolution has only just started promoting Disco Balls. The company describes Disco Balls as a new live game show inspired by Funky Time, combining ball-drawing gameplay with evolving multipliers and bonus games.
In other words, Evolution is currently reminding everybody that Disco means Funky Time, multipliers, bonus games, and entertainment. And alongside it, we suddenly get Disco Roulette, where Disco apparently means… a dance floor.
That’s it.
Even adding a simple Mr Funky multiplier feature would have immediately given the game an identity of its own. Imagine five random roulette numbers being selected after betting closes. If one wins, Mr Funky enters the dance floor and starts collecting a multiplier. It doesn’t need to be another Crazy Time-sized production. One well-designed feature could have turned Disco Roulette into something we genuinely wanted to play.
Instead, the most interesting disco feature in the studio appears to be the advertisement for another Evolution game.
Conclusion
Disco Roulette isn’t a bad game, but it is a huge missed opportunity. Evolution has already connected the disco theme with Mr Funky, multipliers, and exciting bonus games, yet none of that appears here.
For any other provider, this might be acceptable. From Evolution, I simply expected much more.
