It’s a very different proposition for the two modes of transport; ferries generally carry passengers on faster, shorter journeys in a smaller craft with less requirement for sleeping accommodation, particularly on cross-Channel trips. Cruises are by their nature more laid-back, easygoing, and luxurious. And these differences have an impact on the choice of amusements that the ships’ operators offer.

Life on the ocean wave is potentially a lucrative market for amusements at the moment. Both the cruise and ferry industries seem to be thriving, with one surprisingly strong sector among cruises standing out.

Luxury cruises have experienced staggering growth considering the financial climate of the last couple of years, with 2009’s bookings in the UK market up 51 percent on 2008. Ferry figures are climbing less dramatically, but up to October 2010 they show a one percent increase on the same ten-month period in 2009 in passenger numbers, with 31.1m people travelling by ferry (and taking 7.1m cars with them).

Penny Guy, spokesperson for the Passenger Shipping Association trade body, explains the increase in its figures: “The latest ferry data demonstrates a renewed interest in ferry travel and includes the dramatic contribution made by ferries during the ash cloud crisis. In the past few months we have seen Stena Line commit to service improvements with the launch of their two new ships worth £375m, and in 2011 we will see P&O Ferries also introduce two new vessels on the Dover-Calais route, representing an investment of £300m. These service initiatives, along with others from many ferry companies, illustrate the strong commitment to ferry travel.”

An amazing 1.64m British passengers – getting on for three percent of the population – took cruises in 2010, but the estimate for 2011 according to the Passenger Shipping Association is eight percent higher at 1.77m. In 2009, the latest year for which figures are fully available, the association states that the luxury cruise market has bucked economic trends by opting for value-for-money pricing structures. The ultra-luxury brands, which had introduced new ships for the first time in several years, included more in the price: flights, drinks, excursions, and so on. With aggressive pricing and added value, the average cruise price fell by nearly six percent to £1330 – but as the average cruise duration was longer than in 2008 (up to 11 nights) the effective price cut, in terms of pounds per night, was closer to 11 percent.

The growth in cruises shows no sign of abating, either, and trends in the industry suggest that it has become an established vacation option. Sixty percent of passengers take more than one cruise a year, with four percent cruising more than six times a year. One in every ten package holidays booked is now a cruise, and northern Europe has overtaken the Caribbean as the most popular cruise destination for British tourists.

As the Passenger Shipping Association’s Guy puts it: “The continued rise in the number of cruises taken by British passengers reflects strong performances from the major UK cruise lines coupled with additional capacity that has come on-stream this year. The luxury cruise sector is also expected to continue to thrive, with new ships now in service and signs that strong growth will be maintained. The all-inclusive nature of a cruise holiday, which can be purchased in sterling and which offers exceptional standards of quality, innovation, choice and customer service, continues to make it a compelling and mainstream holiday choice.”

That’s the theory. But how, in practice, can amusements contribute to passengers’ enjoyment – and operators’ bottom lines – on such a range of ships and trips, from brief excursions over the Channel to long and leisurely cruises?

Something for everyone

On ferries, operators can safely assume that they have to cover all age groups and all types of consumer, so they tend to keep things simple. Brian Rees, head of PR for P&O Ferries, explains: “If you take our volume of passengers, say 7m on the Dover-Calais route per year, pick a demographic group and we’ve got it. So we have to appeal right across the market. The gaming opportunity is largely, for us, keeping the youngsters happy – happy kids equals happy adults, generally. Partly it’s about occupying time for people and partly it’s a commercial opportunity for us as well.”

This is not, operationally, as problematic as one might think. For example, although currency-handling devices generally only support single currencies, and gaming and vending equipment on P&O ferry lines is therefore limited to sterling, the company says that 85 percent of customers on that main Dover-Calais route are British, and the majority have changed their currency before getting on the boat going in either direction.

Amusements offered by P&O include AWPs and traditional arcade games. Again, keeping it simple is the key. The firm’s main business is ferrying people from one place to another; occupying them during that is a secondary revenue stream, and passengers’ time is limited with P&O’s busiest route being only a 90-minute journey.

Rees elaborates: “Our main source of revenue is the ticket price, followed by onboard spend on food and beverage. There are other opportunities such as foreign exchange, and gaming is another. To a limited extent we do some gaming on those ferries but it’s not a huge amount on a 90-minute crossing. You get the family on board, get settled and there’s not actually that much time left after that. A cruise liner at sea for weeks at a time will have an arcade in it that wouldn’t be out of place in Las Vegas – but there’s really no place for that on a 90-minute crossing.”

Knowing their customers

And there lies the difference – for cruise operators, the demographic is much easier to pinpoint, as a cruise is usually aimed at a specific group; just look at the success of the Saga cruises in recent years, aimed at retirement-age passengers. The Passenger Shipping Association trade body’s figures show that the average age over the last decade has been between 53 and 56 years old.

But if that’s the average age, why do the two largest liners in the world – Royal Caribbean International’s Allure of the Seas and Oasis of the Seas – offer climbing walls, zip wires and basketball courts? Because multi-generation cruises are a growing market, too. Grandparents can travel with children and grandchildren, and on the Allure of the Seas everyone has something to do. The Allure’s casino has a surprising 400-plus slot machines inside, much larger than the average cruise ship casino. There’s also the Kids Arcade on board, the name of which betrays its focus on the younger passenger rather than a broader demographic.

The amusement content on a cruise ship is not dependent on the length of the trip, which is always multi-day and sometimes multi-week; there’s plenty of time in passengers’ daily schedules to engage with more complex entertainment than they can on a ferry. It’s the passenger demographic, which cruise companies can target so cleanly, that is key – and the growing multi-generational cruise sector is the area that will see growth for gaming-related companies looking to the future.

No icebergs in sight

Taking a cruise was often considered the preserve of the upper classes, but over the last 30 years it has become much more accessible to the man in the street; the all-inclusive nature of the vacation brings with it good value and variety for holidaymakers. But there are still liners which ooze real opulence, as the recently-launched Allure of the Seas demonstrate.

The Oasis-class cruise ship Allure, alongside its sister ship Oasis of the Seas, is the world’s largest, with room for 5400 guests when its 2700 staterooms are fully occupied. Allure spans 16 decks and has a gross tonnage of 225,282. (By comparison, the largest-ever supertanker was only about 20 percent bigger with a gross tonnage of around 275,000.)

And to entertain its sea-confined guests, Royal Caribbean International offers a phenomenal range of activities. Perhaps the most noteworthy is Central Park, a tropical oasis in the centre of the ship which is open to the sky. Complete with flower gardens, canopy trees and paths, the space offers retail (including the first Romero Britto gallery at sea), six restaurants and bars, and entertainment (including concerts, street performances and strolling musicians in the park’s central piazza).

The Boardwalk is a hybrid of traditional English piers and the boardwalks of American legend, such as Coney Island’s. It features a spectacular custom-built carousel, and is also the home to the AquaTheater – pool by day, 735-capacity ocean-front theatre by night.

Sports facilities for guests include surfing, zip lining, water polo, rock climbing, table tennis, a running track, scuba diving, kick boxing, ice skating, cycling classes, and miniature golf. For more sedate passengers, the Rising Tide Bar moves between deck five and deck eight; 32 patrons can enjoy the ride while having a cocktail. The journey takes a quarter of an hour.

For gaming, the Allure is exceptionally well kitted-out, with its Casino Royale venue hosting 460 slot machines – many times the amount allowed in a UK casino – 27 table games (blackjack, roulette, craps, Caribbean stud poker, and electronic poker tables) and 104 penny games, over an area of some 21,336 square feet.

Allure cost around £1bn to build and its makers say if it were standing upright, bow-to-stern, it would be twice the height of the famous Gherkin building in London.

Bowling on board

Not all amusements on cruise ships involve gaming. Bowling supplier Brunswick has installations on a number of notable cruise ships (as pictured), including three operated by Norwegian

Cruise Lines, which offers passengers Brunswick lanes on its Pearl and Gem vessels and on its newer luxury liner, the Norwegian Epic.

The Epic feature six lanes of bowling, said to be the most on any ship at sea, with all the features one would expect to see when bowling on land – synthetic lanes, pinsetters, scoring systems.

Three of the Epic’s lanes are in the ship’s sports bar, with three more in the Family Fun area.

A bowling installation on a ship has some special requirements not encountered by its land-based counterparts, says Brunswick’s Filip Pawelka: “The lanes on a ship need to meet two sets of requirements: fire prevention, and sound emission. Our lanes already meet strict fire regulations, but for a cruise ship installation they were even more stringent, requiring a non-flammable subfoundation under the lanes, along with sound isolation materials between the open spaces of the subfoundation.” The basic construction, however, is similar and employs the same materials that would be used on land.

Ship staff are trained to maintain the lanes and cope with day-to-day care, but, Pawelka explains, “as the industry leader and a company with worldwide representation Brunswick can offer all kinds of services in harbours over the world. As these ships sail out of Florida, Norwegian Cruise Lines was made aware that we have a service person in the region that could be available to make a service call if needed while a ship is in port.”

Other bowling suppliers have also taken an interest in the cruise market, including QubicaAMF, which has installed its Highway 66 – a scaled-down version of ten-pin bowling – on MSC Cruises’ Splendida. As on the Epic, these lanes are part of the sports bar; the Highway 66 product is designed to be configurable to different spaces.

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