A technology for realizing real-time frequency hopping in an environment
containing a plurality of masters. A game machine includes a plurality of
communication modules which carry out the frequency hopping, and a
control section which controls communication by the communication
modules. The control section controls the frequency hopping of at least
one communication module to prevent frequency channels used by the
plurality of communication modules from temporally overlapping. As a
method for achieving the control, for example, a frequency band may be
divided, and a divided frequency band may be assigned to each
communication module. Alternatively, each communication module may use
the same reference hopping pattern by shifting its phase, or may use the
reference hopping pattern by adding a predetermined offset.