Methods and systems for consolidating game meters of N gaming machines

1. A method of multi-player regulated gaming on a network of gaming machines, the method comprising the steps of:

enabling game play of a same game at each of a selected first to N th gaming machine in the network, the first to N th gaming machine forming a virtual combined gaming machine;

maintaining game performance meters at each of the selected first to N th gaming machines of the virtual combined gaming machine;

consolidating the game performance meters by adding together the maintained game performance meters from the first to Nth gaming machines;

dividing the consolidated game performance meters by N to generate respective regulatory meters for each of the first to Nth gaming machines and reporting the N regulatory meters to a central system coupled to the network;

removing a gaming machine from the virtual combined gamine machine whenever the game performance meters of the gaming machine reaches zero;

carrying out one of:

causing a player of the removed gaming machine to forfeit his or her regulatory meters in remaining ones of the first to N th gaming machines of the virtual combined gaming machine, and

awarding the player of the removed gaming machine his or her share of the regulatory meters;

continuing game play and returning to the removing step until only a single one of the first to N th gaming machines remains, and

awarding any remaining regulatory meters to a player of the single remaining gaming machine.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the regulatory meters in each gaming machine provide metering for one player, one game and one gaming machine.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising a step of synchronizing graphic elements of the game played on the selected first to N th gaming machines.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the game performance meter of each player is displayed on the video display of each of the selected first to N th gaming machines.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the enabling step is carried out with the selected first to N th gaming machines being all of the gaming machines on the network.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the enabling step is carried out with the selected first to N th gaming machines being fewer than all of the gaming machines on the network.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the maintaining step is carried out with at least one of the selected first to N th gaming machines being a two-player gaming machine that is configured to maintain first game performance meters for a first player and to maintain second game performance meters for a second player and wherein the game performance meters for the two-player gaming machine is a sum of the first and second game performance meters.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the enabling step, the maintaining step, the consolidating step and the dividing step is carried out with the selected first to N th gaming machines communicating directly with each other over the network without a server.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the game play enabling step is carried out with each of the first to N th gaming machines including a selector to enable the game to be played in single-player mode or in multiplayer-player mode.

10. A multi-player regulated gaming system, comprising:

a remote management system coupled to a network;

selected first to N th gaming machines coupled to the network, each of the selected first to N th gaming machines being configured to enable multi-player game play of a same game across the selected first to N th gaming machines and to maintain respective first to N th game performance meters, and

a computer, the computer being coupled to the network and configured to consolidate the maintained first to N th game performance meters by adding the first to Nth game performance meters together and by dividing the consolidated meters by N to generate respective regulatory meters for each of the selected first to N th gaming machines from the consolidated first to N th game performance meters, each of the selected first to N th gaming machines being further configured to separately report its respective regulatory meters to the remote management system, the computer further being configured to cause any one of the first to N th gaming machines whose performance meters has decreased to zero to be removed from the multi-player regulated gaming system and a to cause a player thereof to forfeit his or her share of regulatory meters in favor of remaining ones of the first to N th gaming machines.

11. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein the regulatory meters in each gaming machine provide metering for one player, one game and one gaming machine.

12. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein the selected first to N th gaming machines are further configured to synchronize graphic elements of the game across the selected first to N th gaming machines.

13. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein the selected first to N th gaming machines are all of the gaming machines on the network.

14. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein the first to N th selected gaming machines are fewer than all of the gaming machines on the network.

15. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein at least one of the selected first to N th gaming machines is a two-player gaming machine that is configured to maintain first game performance meters for a first player and to maintain second game performance meters for a second player and wherein the game performance meters for the two-player gaming machine is a sum of the first and second game performance meters.

16. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein multi-player game play is carried out with the selected first to N th gaming machines directly communicating with each other over the network without a server.

17. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein each of the first to N th selected gaming machines are configured to maintain the game performance meters by directly communicating with each other over the network without a server and without communicating with the computer.

18. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein the computer is configured to consolidate the maintained first to N th game performance meters by communicating directly with the selected first to N th gaming machines without a server.

19. The multi-player regulated gaming system of claim 10 , wherein each of the selected first to N th gaming machines includes a selector to enable the game to be played in single-player mode or in multi-player mode.