The timeless game of roulette has gone online and changed the way we play while opening up new business opportunities at the same time. How has this online casino sector embraced different kinds of technology to make this happen?
A Growing Variety of Ways to Play
To start our look at online roulette, we need to see how the game began and has since diversified. Roulette was arguably first played in France in the 18th century and quickly became one of the favorite gambling games across Europe before moving further afield. One of the notable aspects of roulette is how it stayed recognizably the same game all that time.
The simple gameplay is part of the reason that roulette has been a popular casino game all over the planet for a long time. By letting us bet which number the ball lands on in a spinning wheel, it provides gameplay that anyone can understand but that is impossible to predict. Players have long tried to work out when the wheel with stop but there’s simply no way of knowing.
Yet, when we go online and look in the lobby of a roulette casino, we can see that there are now many different ways of playing. European and Roulette are still the two main variants, with the extra zero pocket on the American wheel the main difference between them. French Roulette adds some extra rules while Double Dragon Roulette offers the chance to win with multipliers.
Players in the past might have only known about the basic version of roulette most commonly played in their region. Now, they can play in many different ways with the convenience of online play from a laptop or mobile device. This variety is possible because game developers and casinos have spotted the opportunity to diversify and attract different audiences.
A random number generator is used for each version to always give an unpredictable result. This removes any of the possible problems of physical wheels in the play, where some form of unintentional bias could have affected the outcome. From that basic starting point, developers can add extra details to vary the gameplay with additional rules of features that they feel will appeal to more players.
Live Dealers on the Screen
The introduction of live dealer roulette games has been one of the biggest changes in the online casino world. By setting up a selection of special cameras around the wheel, the leading developers can provide a new type of presentation where the action takes place live in a themed studio with the players betting on their screens while watching the action taking place in the real world.
It works by using special software that’s known as Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology. This software recognizes the cards dealt in blackjack or poker and the numbers on the wheel in roulette. In this way, when the wheel is spun, the winning number is automatically recognized, and the winning bets can be paid out right away rather than the dealer having to check every bet manually.
This type of presentation has led to new themes being used. The studio can be decorated to match a certain theme, and the presenters get dressed up in outfits that match it. Some games even have multiple presenters or more than one wheel on the stage at the same time.
It also opened up the potential for immersive technology like virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) to be used. We can already see AR in some card games, with the physical cards transformed into digital versions when the dealer puts them in a special slot on the screen. This technology could be used on the roulette wheel, blending realities to produce a fresh way of playing.
What Can Other Industries Learn from This?
The changes we’ve looked at have allowed online casino operators to look at this timeless game and consider new ways of playing that take advantage of the latest technology. This has led to multiple variants and other bonuses being added, giving an extra degree of randomness to the game and making it more enjoyable to play.
The evolution of online roulette throws us some interesting instances of new technology being used to good effect. Perhaps the key lesson for other industries is that the basic game has remained as appealing as ever, with the added extras giving it a new dimension and adding to the marketing plan without taking away any of the original game’s excitement.
Sometimes, it’s possible to add emerging technology in creative ways that might not seem immediately obvious. The casino industry has revealed some fascinating ways of doing this and it seems certain that these won’t be the last changes to roulette that we see.
