Golden Fish

What is Golden Fish?

The New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) has recovered NZ$11.5 million (US$6.6 million) in an investigation into compliance across the pokies sector.

The regulator of gambling in New Zealand announced on Friday that the funds returned by operators will be directed towards community organisations.

Under Section 106 of New Zealand’s Gambling Act 2003, a class 4 licence holder, also known as a “corporate society” by the regulator, “must apply or distribute the net proceeds from class 4 gambling only to or for an authorised purpose specified in the corporate society’s licence”.

What is Golden Fish?

The submission form will close on 1 October, at which time nominations will be put to our esteemed panel of judges for final review.

More information on judges, submissions and deadlines can be found here. You can also access interviews with last year’s winners and the final list for 2025, as well as for every year prior.

We look forward to working with our judges, and once again shining a light on some of the gaming industry’s best talents!

How to play Golden Fish

The text also prohibits bets placed using credit cards, the use of predictive models to identify moments of greater vulnerability, and platform design mechanisms that hinder a conscious decision to stop betting, leave the service, or activate limits and blocks. Operators must maintain permanent alerts about compulsive gambling, indebtedness and asset loss, and adopt verifiable protocols for identifying risky behaviour.  

The proposal establishes criteria for classifying products according to their potential for harm. Among the characteristics considered are instantaneous or short-lived results, continuous repetition at short intervals, use of random mechanisms to determine the outcome, intermittent rewards, near-miss incentives, incentives to recover losses and features that make it difficult to stop betting or induce successive, impulsive, or increasingly valuable bets. 

Products offered to the public must undergo prior evaluation by a competent body of the Federal Executive Branch, to be defined in regulations. Products classified as high-risk will be subject to specific harm reduction measures. Products with excessive risk may not be offered. This category includes products with outcomes determined by random mechanisms, continuous cycles and variable rewards, such as roulette, slot machines, collision games and simulated virtual sports.