The online casino industry, much like almost all other technology industries, must continue to evolve and develop to stay ahead and bring customers the latest and greatest offering. Luckily for online gaming fans, competition is fierce, which has led to many innovations in recent times as each company battles to surpass the others.
Since the 2010s rolled around, the online casino scene has changed a great deal, with a move to a smaller screen, the new real-casino experience, and the introduction of the latest technological craze. So, let’s explore the technology powering these latest online casino innovations, and see how they’ve changed the industry for years to come.
Play in real-time with optical character recognition
Online casinos were faced with a problem not too long ago: players noted the distinction between land-based and online casinos as being that playing at a website fails to deliver the real-feel experience of going to a casino hall. So, online casinos went live.
Through the use of live streaming cameras, a game control unit for encoding the broadcast, a monitor, a physical game table, and a human dealer, online casino companies can deliver a live-streamed casino game. To enable to players online to play along in real-time, optical character recognition technology has been adopted.
Optical Character Recognition is programmed to pick up on certain figures or symbols, such as those on a playing card, and then it converts the information for use digitally. This allows for the game program to reward those who have won in the game automatically.
Time to go mobile
If there’s one technological advancement that has taken over the lives of almost everyone, it’s that of mobile devices. Mobile phones and tablets have enabled us to access the internet and do almost everything that we do online while on the go.
It didn’t take the online casino industry to note that they could give access to a huge audience if they began building games suited for mobile devices, so that’s what they did. In 2011, Net Entertainment announced the launch of NetEnt Touch, on which the world-renowned game developers would create games especially adapted for mobile play.
With the technology being used to make casino games usable on mobile devices, mobile casinos began to open and offer much of their regular online offering through a condensed mobile website or mobile app. Nowadays, the top mobile casinos boast just as many games as their desktop counterparts, while being more convenient to play.
Virtual reality is coming
If there’s one piece of tech that everyone anticipates as being the next big thing, it’s virtual reality gaming. In the world of video games, the PlayStation’s virtual reality headset has sold very well, and Sony have a long line of games scheduled to be released in the VR format. As for online casinos, major VR casino titles are in development.
Online casino virtual reality games will enter the player into a simulation of a 3D environment in which players can interact with the contents of the environment, which includes playing online casino games. Through the use of a VR headset, players look through two autofocus lenses and onto the screen behind them, immersing themselves in the world. With the use of motion-sensor gloves and headphones, the player is embedded in the simulated world.
It’s quite amazing to see how the online casino industry has leapt at the opportunities to create new ways to play as technology has evolved. Mobile gaming and live casino games are already wildly popular, and we expect virtual reality casino games to be a huge hit upon release as well.
Photograph by FirmBee