Patent ID: 8070609

Claim:
A gaming machine adapted for accepting a wager, playing a game based on the wager and granting a payout based on the result of the game, comprising: an exterior housing arranged to contain a plurality of internal gaming machine components therein; a master gaming controller in communication with at least one of said plurality of internal gaming machine components and adapted to execute or control one or more aspects of said wager based game; and a flexibly configurable button panel in direct or indirect communication with said master gaming controller and adapted to provide a plurality of input buttons that can be arranged into multiple distinct button panel configurations, said flexibly configurable button panel including: a flexible cable having a plurality of separate printed circuit lines running therethrough, a plurality of cable connectors spaced along and coupled to said flexible cable, wherein each of said plurality of cable connectors comprises a unique address along said flexible cable, and wherein each of said plurality of cable connectors is adapted to provide electrical access to at least a portion of said plurality of separate printed circuit lines, and a plurality of button assemblies coupled to said flexible cable via at least a portion of said plurality of cable connectors such that each of said plurality of button assemblies is provided electrical access to at least a portion of said plurality of separate printed circuit lines, wherein the relative physical locations of said plurality of button assemblies with respect to each other are substantially reconfigurable to form different button panel configurations while said plurality of button assemblies remain coupled to said flexible cable via said respective portion of cable connectors.