Got Any Game Ideas?

There’s a new video on our Web site and YouTube with folks giving their ideas for what would make a good lottery game. We’re always interested in your perspective on that matter to see how your ideas mesh with the games we already have on sale or those we have on the way.

The folks in the video have some really insightful, relevant ideas. We may just have to use some of those!

The lottery develops game ideas from a variety of sources. Some we come up with on our own based upon the things in our everyday lives. Other ideas come from the companies with which we do business  -- some of them have licensed popular themes, such as television shows, movies and their popular stars. Other game ideas are suggested by Iowans. Every few years, we hold a “Design A Game” contest that lottery players can enter to win cash prizes. Iowans have come up with some really strong-selling games through the years.

Alice Hayes with her
$12,000-winning ticket
in 2006.

One of the best stories from our contests is that of a Webster City woman who won the top prize of $3,000 in our 2005 design-a-game contest with her idea for a scratch game called “Dream’n of Dollars.” Alice Hayes’ design was chosen as tops by the judges from amongst more than 1,900 entries in our contest. But the good news for Alice didn’t end there!

When our Dream’n of Dollars game went on sale in February 2006, Alice bought some tickets in it. She was perfectly within her rights to do so – although she designed the artwork for the tickets, she had nothing to do with the lottery’s development of the prize structure in the game and had no control over the prizes offered in it. One of the tickets Alice purchased ended up winning the game’s top prize of $12,000! Check out part of the coverage of her good luck here! I guess some people just can’t help it – they have the golden touch!   

We’ll hold more design-a-game contests in the years to come, so be sure to be on the look-out for them. Your game idea could come out on top!

Comments

[Mary Neubauer]

Hi, Gene. You’ve raised a great issue, and it’s one that we’ll be covering soon here in our blog. I believe you were referring in your question to the new Midwest Millions game, and in fact, the overall odds listed for that game are correct. Overall odds of about 1 in 3 do not mean that if you buy three tickets in a game, one of them will automatically be a winner. It means that if you bought all of the tickets in the game, about 1 in 3 would be a winner, but the winners are randomly distributed throughout the packs of tickets in the game. We have a video on our Web site that addresses your question and you can link to it here: http://www.ialottery.com/VideosAndMore/Videos/Video_Player.asp. We’ll also address this issue in an upcoming blog post. Mary N.

[gene shott]

i am just wanted to tell you that i think it is a disgace that you have to lie about the winning odds on your new game $10.00 iowa millions game more than 1 in 3 is a winner i bought six and on the last ticket i won ten dollars and thats what i paid for it so thats not a winner what a scam i'm considering a lawsuit i just think it is real scam one in three is a winner right