Ice Fishing history: from a London trade show to three continents

Ice Fishing began as a stand on a trade show floor. Evolution first showed the wheel at the ICE trade show in London in early 2025, and the game reached players with a launch release dated August 2025. By November 2026 the studio was reporting more than 26 million players and over 469 million fish caught. Since then it has picked up local versions in Brazil, Italy and the United States, which is why it turns up in so many lobbies and so many short videos.

When did Ice Fishing come out

The first public sighting was ICE in London in early 2025, an event where Evolution shows new tables and game shows to operators rather than to players. The playable release followed in August 2025. That gap is normal: in general, a live game has to be tested and certified, loaded into casino lobbies and given studio hours before anyone can place a bet on it.

What arrived was described by the studio as a speed game show, a faster format than the big wheel titles its live line-up was already known for. The build reflects that. A virtual 53-segment money wheel fills the screen, the host sits in a small framed box in the corner, and a round is over quickly enough that you can watch several while deciding whether to bet at all.

If the format is new to you, what the show is is the shortest way in, then come back for the rest of the story.

From the trade show to three continents

1. Early 2025, London. The wheel is shown at the ICE trade show, in front of operators rather than players.
2. August 2025, launch. The release goes out and the game starts appearing in casino lobbies that carry the studio’s live games.
3. June 2026, Brazil. Ice Fishing Brasil opens from a Sao Paulo studio with Portuguese-speaking hosts.
4. Ice Fishing Italia. A localised version for the Italian market, with the same gameplay as the original.
5. 2 November 2026, the USA. The American debut lands in New Jersey, Michigan and Delaware, broadcast from a studio in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Read down that list and the pattern is clear. Nothing in it changes the game. Each step adds a studio, a language and a set of licensed markets, while the wheel, the six bet spots and the three bonus games stay as they were at launch. That is how a live game show scales: the format travels, the presenters are hired locally, and the regulator in each new market decides when it can go live.

It also explains the speed of the rollout. A studio does not need to design a new product for Brazil or Italy. It needs a room, a crew and an approval.

Ice Fishing Brasil and Ice Fishing Italia

A localised version is mostly a studio decision rather than a game design decision. The hosts speak the local language and the table is offered through operators licensed in that market. Everything a player interacts with stays familiar: Leaf 1 and Leaf 2 pay instantly, Lil’ Blues, Big Oranges and Huge Reds send you into their bonus game, All Bonuses covers every bonus segment, and the ceiling remains up to 5,000x the stake.

One thing is not fixed across all of this, and it is easy to assume otherwise. Casinos can run different versions of the same Evolution game, so the payout table and the return figure that apply to you are the ones in the game’s own help panel at your casino. Open the i or Help button and look at the Rules and Payouts tabs before you bet, whichever language the host is speaking in.

The USA launch across three states

The American debut came on 2 November 2026 in New Jersey, Michigan and Delaware, hosted from the Grand Rapids studio in Michigan, with more states expected as approvals follow. So Ice Fishing in the USA is a state-by-state question rather than a national one. Evolution’s North American chief executive described the game as fast, fun and unlike anything else in the company’s live portfolio, and called it a viral hit, which is roughly what the rollout schedule suggests too.

For readers outside those states, the practical answer is unchanged. Availability depends on the operator you hold an account with and on the law where you live. A supplier being licensed in Malta or the UK says nothing about whether a particular casino may legally take your money, so check your own country’s rules first.

Rounds run through the day in the lobbies that carry the show, and a logged-in player can watch one without staking anything.

Why it spread so fast

Four things did most of the work. Rounds are short, so a session is a stream of outcomes rather than a slow build. The top end is loud: Huge Reds alone runs from 10x to 500x, and a wheel boost on top of it pushes towards that 5,000x ceiling. The bonus round is a piece of television that everyone at the table sees, whether they backed it or not. And all of that fits inside a clip of thirty seconds, which is exactly the length social media rewards.

The first bonus round I saw was one I had no stake in. The picture cut from the wheel to the lake, fish drifted past under the ice with their multiplier tags showing, and one came up through the hole with its number flashing. Free to watch, easy to film, and completely detached from whether anyone won anything.

That visibility had a cost. The same footage became raw material for a wave of fake apps, cloned lobbies and paid social adverts, including the fake ads that followed using a well-known businessman’s face without his consent. The game’s popularity is real. Most of what has been built around its name is not.