Patent ID: 7862427

Claim:
A gaming machine for receiving a wager on a game chance, the gaming machine comprising: a master gaming controller designed or configured a) to control the game of chance played on the gaming machine wherein an outcome for each game of chance is, respectively, an award of a wide area progressive jackpot among a plurality of wide area progressive jackpots accessed by said gaming machine, said wide area progressive jackpot a maximum award for the game of chance, and wherein a portion of each wager made on the gaming machine is contributed to the respective wide area progressive jackpot, b) to switch between a first game of chance including the respective outcome of an award of a first wide area progressive jackpot and a second game of chance including the respective outcome of an award of a second wide area progressive jackpot different from said first wide area progressive jackpot wherein the first game of chance and the second game of chance are each a type of the game of chance controlled by the master gaming controller, c) to terminate after a switch from the first game of chance to the second game of chance, a first communication session with a first remote gaming device that polls the gaming machine for contributions to the first wide area progressive jackpot and to establish a second communication session with a second remote gaming device that polls the gaming machine for contributions to the second wide area progressive jackpot, d) to maintain state information including credit information in a non-volatile memory such that after a power failure that gaming machine is restorable to a state prior to the power failure; a first display coupled to the master gaming controller for displaying an outcome to the game of chance; an input mechanism for inputting one or more of cash, indicia of credit or combinations thereof for the wager; an output mechanism for outputting one of more of cash, indicia of credit or combinations thereof wherein the one of cash, indicia of credit or combinations thereof is output under control of the master gaming controller; a network interface coupled to the master gaming controller for sending a message over a network regarding the portion of each wager contributed to each respective wide area progressive jackpot and a cabinet enclosing the master gaming controller, a portion of the input mechanism and a portion of the output mechanism wherein the first display, the input mechanism, the output mechanism and the network interface are coupled to the cabinet.