Patent ID: 6910962

Claim:
An electronic game device for a player comprising: a) a display; b) a game processor and a data structure storing data representing a plurality of game symbols and data representing a predetermined award schedule for winning outcome sets; c) a wager input apparatus for the player to input a wager on at least one symbol type to play the game and prompt play, the processor configured to, in response to prompting of play, (i) select, assign and control the display to display a selected game symbol into each coordinate of a game matrix having columns C and rows R, where C and R are at least 3, (ii) compare the symbols of the coordinates to determine whether a predetermined number of like symbols are disposed in at least one of a plurality of predetermined winning patterns defining a winning outcome set, (iii) define the winning patterns to include at least three of the wagered upon symbol type arranged in an adjacent relationship in a column, row or L-shaped pattern (iii) assign an award to each winning outcome set based upon at least one of the criteria of (a) amount wagered and (b) number of symbols in the winning outcome set, (iv) remove the symbols of each winning outcome set from the display,(v) to select, assign and display symbols to replace the removed symbols to reconstitute the game matrix and (vi) repeat steps (i) through (v) until there are no winning outcome sets.