Last month, Henry McLean, our Co-Founder and Commercial & Marketing Director, sat down with Emma Sjökvist from CasinoGuide.se to answer a few questions all about 4ThePlayer – our mission, games, and past collaboration with Yggdrasil in 4 Fantastic Vikings Go Fishing. 

He also gave a little teaser for a new collaboration that will come out very soon with Yggdrasil, so it’s definitely worth a read! All we can say about it for now is that it is going to be very cool 😁🥶

You can read the full interview, in Swedish, here👇

https://www.casinoguide.se/nyheter/exklusiv-intervju-med-4theplayer 

Or, if you want to read the interview in English, keep reading!

CasinoGuide: For Swedish readers who aren’t familiar with you yet, how would you introduce 4ThePlayer?

Henry: We’re a boutique slot studio that puts the player at the heart of everything we do. We don’t mass-produce, we craft. Every game gets the full weight of the team behind it, from the maths to the artwork to the tiny details players might not even notice at first. Our founders and management team are all slot players too, so we genuinely “get it”. We see the same highs, frustrations, and magic moments that players do, and we build our games to maximise the entertainment.

CasinoGuide: Which title best represents the 4ThePlayer DNA, and why?

Henry: 4 Fantastic Fish is a great example. We took a genre players already loved, fishing, and asked ourselves: “How can this be better? What do players find frustrating?” That’s where Money Ways™ came from. Instead of seeing cash on the reels that you couldn’t win in the base game or only being able to collect it if you triggered a special feature or landed a specific symbol, we made it instantly winnable as part of a ways win, with no collect symbol needed. It might sound obvious, but this small player-centric tweak makes all the difference – removing the frustrating tease and adding excitement and anticipation. I think this is one of the reasons the series has grown the way it has. So part of our DNA is the player – it’s in our name and part of everything we do.

Another key part of our DNA that’s in every title is fun: fun for us when creating it, because we really love what we do, but more importantly, fun for the player when playing them.

CasinoGuide: Is there a game you think is an especially good fit for Swedish players? Which one, and why?

Henry: 4 Fantastic Vikings Go Fishing. It combines our Fantastic Fish mechanics with Yggdrasil’s legendary Vikings Go Berzerk characters – two worlds Swedish players already know and love. Since its launch nearly a year ago, it’s consistently been in the top three games across the entire Yggdrasil network of more than 400 titles – something we’re very proud of.

What’s interesting is that while some markets lean towards classic retro-style slots, Swedish players tend to appreciate high-quality graphics and rich, captivating worlds. On top of that, the game has just the right mix of volatility and big win potential, which keeps every session exciting.

That’s what makes Vikings Go Fishing such a strong fit for Swedish players – and the data shows it. And we’re really excited for Swedish players to try the sequel coming this November – 4 Fantastic Vikings Go Ice Fishing – which takes the adventure into icy new waters with fresh features and even a new character!

This interview is starting to sound very fishy, haha, so another game to mention is 10,000 X Gold. Looking at the data, it’s also a player favourite in Sweden. It takes the glitz and excitement of a TV gameshow and packs it into a slot, driven by super-solid maths to power the experience, while throwing in massive multipliers and Boosting Fortune™ prizes along the way. I think this game resonates so well in Sweden as it’s such a polished production, combined with the volatile big win spikes in the maths, that I know Swedish players really seek that out.

CasinoGuide: What’s an underrated 4ThePlayer feature more people should notice?

Henry: Definitely Big Reel Portrait Mode™. We designed it so the reels fill the whole mobile portrait screen rather than asking players to tilt their phone sideways or showing tiny letterbox reels. Everything feels immersive and alive! We want players to enjoy our games, having the same experience, wherever they want to play. It is a lot of work as we need to redesign most symbols, animations and create an entirely new layout, but that extra immersion the player gets from it makes the experience more entertaining, which is exactly what we’re always aiming for.

CasinoGuide: How do you balance fresh mechanics with elements players already love?

Henry: It’s like a new season of your favourite TV show. You still want the same cast and core storyline you enjoyed before, but you also expect new plot twists to keep you engaged. We treat sequels the same way – the heart stays familiar, while new features and ideas keep it exciting. The point is to make sure players can enjoy it, whether it’s their first game with us or their tenth.

CasinoGuide: You’ve released several “numbered” titles (e.g., 9k Yeti, 6 Wild Sharks). What do the numbers actually signify?

Henry: Partly they reflect the max win potential, or sometimes a key feature in the game, but they’ve also become our calling card. When we launched 9k Yeti back in 2019, we were the first to use numbers like this. At the time, it felt fresh and different and really stood out, helping people see our games and spot our latest creation. Now you see numbers everywhere! We take that as a compliment, we set a trend!

We’re also doing something new with a few of our upcoming releases, you might have noticed it in our last game. It’s a new way for us to evolve how we name games while still keeping them instantly recognisable as 4ThePlayer titles.

CasinoGuide: What do collaborations with other providers mean for 4ThePlayer as a company (e.g., strategy, culture, distribution/reach)?

Henry: We build our games from our own ideas, but we collaborate when we see something genuinely exciting or new that we can bring to players. A great example is our work with Yggdrasil – we really wanted to take their iconic Vikings somewhere new, and that’s how 4 Fantastic Vikings Go Fishing was born. Their Vikings are some of the most recognisable characters in slots, and combining them with our mechanics and style created something fresh that players instantly connected with.

As players ourselves, we all have our favourites, so who knows – there might be more of those special collaborations in the future, but only if it makes sense.

CasinoGuide: How do the collaborations work in practice? How involved is the partner in concept, math, art/audio, engineering, and marketing?

Henry: With 4 Fantastic Vikings Go Fishing, Yggdrasil brought their iconic Viking universe and their famous Vikings: Gunnar, Yngvar, Knut and Sigrid – along with the mechanics for what they do. We then came up with ideas and built the maths as well as the overall design and gameplay around that. Taking what players loved from 4 Fantastic Fish and carefully crafting it together to make something magical and not a Frankenstein. It’s a bit like cooking, one of us brings the spices, the other the main ingredients and the rest of the recipe, and together you end up with a dish neither could have made alone. The result is more engaging, more entertaining – and ultimately, more fun for the player.

CasinoGuide: If you could co-create a slot with any other studio, who’s your dream collaborator and what would you build together?

Henry: It’s a tough one because there are so many studios we admire. The ideal partner is one that shares our passion for players and entertainment. I would love to build something around an iconic player-favourite character or a standout feature, then reimagine it with our mechanics.

The best collaborations work because each side brings their strengths: we bring the maths, design and production craft; they bring a world or character players already know and love.

If it excites us as players, we know we’re on the right track. And we’re always playing slots and thinking, so who knows – there might be more in the future.

CasinoGuide: Any teasers you can share about what’s coming in the next 3 to 6 months?

A: We have lots of exciting games coming over the next few months – the one I am most excited about has to be 4 Fantastic Vikings Go Ice Fishing, as it’s such a fun game and the first one is such a player favourite!

I am also excited for 9k Yeti Gold Dream Drop – as I have a special place in my heart for our Yeti, as the original 9k Yeti was our first ever game we made, so great to see him coming back again in another new game.