editor, Author at LearnPlayWin

Latest Tech Advancements in Online Casinos and Sportsbooks

August 27, 2021 By editor

The best online sportsbooks are also equipped with state-of-the-art online casinos whose impressive and immersive graphics get more robust with each passing year. The technology used to fire these engines and provide a virtual world for those who enjoy slots or table games is ever-improving. Therefore, we thought it would be interesting to shed some light on exactly what’s transpiring in this booming industry and the technological advances that keep its customers coming back for more.

In addition to the stunning graphics used in the online casinos, we should also be cognizant of the best sports betting app being offered at the best online sportsbook. This stunning mobile platform allows its customers to make wagers on the go and provide a bevy of betting options from sides to totals to the latest futures and prop bets. It’s all here in the palm of your hand, making wagering seamless with an easy-to-navigate dashboard. But let’s talk about the technological leaps and innovations currently being made to make the customer’s experience even more compelling.

Virtual Reality

We know VR from video games but it is being used in the online casino business as well. It transports the users to a new environment and the greater this virtual reality, the more immersive the experience for the user. The two industries have much in common from a technological aspect and strides in one area often complement the other.

Many of the newer, more innovative virtual reality casino playgrounds require a headset to complete the experience but those who prefer mobility over environment can choose that as well. It is all here because of the bustling industry that makes online casino gambling and sports wagering so exciting.

One company, in particular, XR Casino, recently announced a ground-breaking cross-technology, multiplayer, blockchain technology-based online gambling platform for Extended Reality (XR) technologies such as Augmented Reality (AR), Mixed Reality (MR), and Virtual Reality (VR).

The big news is that players on different devices will be able to play XR casino games like blackjack, roulette, and slots with each other. The launch is expected in August of 2021 and XR Casino CEO, Dan Martinez, released the following statement:

“XR technologies are changing the way we interact with each other and eliminating the need for expensive equipment. Tech giants such as Apple, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft have invested heavily into AR, VR, and MR to speed up mass adoption through both hardware and software solutions. XR Casino has first mover’s advantage in providing XR SaaS solutions to online, traditional casinos and sports betting companies. Our solutions create value for the gambling industry and offer competitive differentiation to attract new Generation X, Y, and Z players worldwide.”

Blockchain Technology

If there is one industry that has embraced cryptocurrency, it is online gambling. Blockchain technology is the science that has allowed the digital currency boom of Bitcoin, et al. And the online sportsbooks and casinos are nearly universal in allowing their customers to fund their accounts and make regular deposits using crypto.

Blockchain technology is the reason why deposits and payouts can be so readily facilitated while giving the user anonymity never before seen with credit cards and bank wires. It also safeguards the user’s personal information which has become increasingly critical in this new age of shared personal data.

Esports

Video gaming, online casino, and sports betting have started to cross paths. Similar technology is used to power both and many of the best online sportsbooks are offering betting propositions on esports tournaments. This new trend grew exponentially during the global pandemic when traditional sports were shut down and bettors had very few alternatives. As they say, necessity is the mother of invention and now esports tournaments like League of Legends, Fortnite, DOTA 2, and many others can all be wagered on at most of the premier online books.

Esports Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: EBET), a leading global provider of innovative esports wagering products and technology, has recently submitted a provisional patent application for a technique that leverages artificial intelligence to build odds models for use in a betting algorithm for esports tournaments and different stages within the tournament.

Bart Barden, COO, Esports Technologies, said, “I’m extremely proud of our quant and modeling team, which continues to develop potential industry-leading data solutions. Harnessing cutting-edge modeling and artificial intelligence to create the technology for this planned next-generation wagering tool demonstrates our commitment to innovation and our focus on the needs of esports enthusiasts and bettors everywhere. We continue to advance and innovate the esports wagering experience for customers.”

Essentially, this technology will make adjustments as the tournament is in progress, allowing bettors to wager on teams throughout a tournament and during the games. Betting on which team will finish in the top three or outside the top five, or on which round the team will advance to, are examples of bets that might be placed with this new technology.

A Brief History Of Gambling

August 6, 2021 By editor

Introduction

People have gambled for as long as civilization has existed. It’s a relatively safe way to get your heart pounding by introducing a small amount of risk into your life, with the possibility of winning something for your trouble, of course.

Throughout this short history of gambling, you’ll see how the practice has developed from ancient China and Mesopotamia to the modern-day, where the latest blockchain technology is being combined with the industry. Online gambling is also mentioned here. You can see online gambling at work at https://www.stardustcasino.com and similar gambling sites.

Ancient Gambling

We don’t know when gambling as a practice started in human history. Like with so many historical practices, nobody thought to write the first occurrence of gambling down, they were preoccupied with other things.

That said, the oldest examples we have come from ancient China and Iran. Gambling has been identified in every Chinese dynasty, starting in the Xia Dynasty some 4,000 years ago. That’s the oldest known instance of gambling though there are probably older practices that we don’t know yet and may never know.

Modern gambling practices like lotteries, mahjong, and pai gow have origins in China. The first playing cards are thought to have come from 9^th Century China, too. Even back then, provincial governors would take a cut of profits of the games they’d allow to be played in their realm.

As for Egypt, that’s where we have found the oldest dice. They were found at Shahr-i Sokhta, or The Burnt City, a Bronze Age site in modern-day Iran. Dice were thought to be a trinket used by fortune-tellers and others who claimed magical ability but gradually became a gambling object. Dice were ubiquitous, having been excavated in ancient Scotland, the Indus Valley Civilization, Greece, Rome, and Japan, all independently of one another.

Speaking of Greece and Rome, pottery from those civilizations seems to indicate that gambling was available for animal fights and chariot races. Around 600 BC, the first Roman circuses took place where bets were encouraged and craps were played with old Roman dice.

Gambling In The Renaissance

Gambling continued throughout human history but the next historical landmark occurred during the Renaissance period. This is where certain European societies had to decide to allow or forbid gambling and decide how regulated the games ought to be.

The first regulated casino was Il Ridotto in Venice, Italy. It was made in 1638 to create a stable gambling environment since the carnivals at Venice allowed such games, which were illegal to play at other times and other places in the city. After a century of operation and paying heavy taxes, the Ridotto was closed after stricter gambling laws in the 1700s.

During that timeframe, the first French casinos were established in Paris and organized gambling spread through continental Europe. The roulette wheel was established there and other games, like vingt-et-un, have their origins in Spain and France. The taxation gains were made clear for local governments, paving the way for acceptance despite the Church’s disapproval at the time.

Gambling In The United States

As the New World took form, lotteries were used to fund the original 13 Colonies that would become the United States of America. Jamestown seems to have conducted lotteries the most out. Horse race betting also took place in Virginia and was used as a meeting place for the social elite, where formal codes and shared values were established. In 1769, restrictions on gambling were added to the list of grievances toward the British Crown.

French settlers brought roulette and vingt-et-un to the US early into its lifespan and Mississippi steamboats became popular gambling venues. As industrialization took hold of the USA in the 20^th Century, gambling machines were invented in New York and San Francisco.

As the Internet developed, the logical next step was to take the gambling online. Relaxing legislation was instrumental to many of these organizations and, in response, the USA and many other countries scrambled to introduce protective legislation against fraudsters.

Blockchain Gambling

With the rise of cryptocurrencies and the tech used to facilitate them, the blockchain is being studied for gambling applications. The future of gambling is likely to take place on the blockchain, where cryptocurrencies can replace chips and all transactions are transparent, anonymous, instantaneous, and cost everybody less.

Blockchain projects that use metaverses and other VR worlds allow for the possibility of digital casinos in the future too, staffed by real people but conducted anonymously and safely via cryptocurrency.

Learn How to Play and Win at Video Slots

July 12, 2021 By editor

Of all the many kind of online games that you can play for money, video slots are surely the simplest to understand and the most fun to play. There are no complex rules to understand. This is simple, fast and thrilling play on fixed odds games. Unlike table games like Blackjack, Baccarat or Poker, you do not need to study strategy guides and charts to enjoy playing slots. However, by understanding some key points about how these products are put together, you can ensure more enjoyment and more chances of winning cash when you spin those reels.

Here are some of the most pertinent features to look out for.

Return to Player (RTP)

The first thing you’ll need to check out is a game’s Return to Player (RTP) which refers to how much money it will pay out as a percentage of all the money wagered on it. The average RTP of a slot is 96%, though in some cases it may be as low as 88% or as high as 99%. A 96% RTP means that for every £100 wagered on the slot, £99 will be paid out in wins. So, always look for slot games with a higher RTP. A good example is Mega Joker by NetEnt (99% RTP).

Variance

Alongside RTP, variance is the most important aspect of a slot game that will affect your experience. Variance refers to how far from the advertised RTP a game will drift during your session. A low variance game will not normally vary much from the RTP, giving a fairly even distribution of wins with regular, small payouts. In contrast, a high variance game will vary dramatically from the advertised RTP, with long spells where the Return drop drastically, before short sharp spells of much higher value payouts. This uneven distribution of wins makes for a risky gambling experience with long odds of wins, but the potential to hit much higher payouts than those in low variance games.

Whether you enjoy high or low variance games will depend on your attitude to risk and your budget. If you are risk averse then we recommend playing low variance games. If you love risk then high variance slots will be more up your street.

Payout Potential

Alongside variance and RTP, you should always look at the payout potential of a video slot before you play it. This will be published on the information screen accessible from within the game and shows you what the maximum amount you can win on one single spin is. For non-progressive jackpot games the top prize will be expressed as a multiple of your stake, and can be anywhere from 500x right up to 150,000x on some recent games. Keep in mind that the odds of hitting a jackpot payout on a slot with a 150,000x top payout are much longer than those of hitting a jackpot on a game with a 500x top payout.

Theme and Game Features

Risk, win potential and odds are aspect of a slot game related to your winning experience. But finding a game you like isn’t just about these factors. You should also check out slots with different themes and a variety of features.

The theme of a game refers to the story behind it which dictates the graphics and soundtrack you will experience when you load it up. Typical themes are Ancient Egypt, Sports, Music, Sci Fi and Steam Punk. But in truth, anything can provide the backdrop to a slot game and browsing a long list of titles is worth it to one that captures your eye. Slot developers spend a lot of money on the graphics and animation of their games and the best have stunning and compelling artwork to improve your enjoyment of the product.

Finally, we recommend that you learn a bit more about game features which are also built to enhance the thrill of spinning the reels. Features are additional gameplay events that can lead to more wins and alternative narratives in a slot. For example, free spins are a regular feature of the best video slot. They are usually triggered by landing 3 or more special icons on the reels simultaneously. When your free spins play out no money is deducted from your balance and you can watch your wins stack up ‘hands free’!

Other cool features that regularly appear in online slots are Wild symbols that substitute for all others to create winning lines, Stacked Symbols, which are icons that always land in vertical stacks to increase your odds of completing paylines, and Mystery Symbols which are special ‘?’ icons that land in groups on the reels before all simultaneously changing into one identical icon from the paytable, in doing so improving the chances of scoring wins.

These are all generic features used by all game developers. There are also some trademarked features that you will find exclusively on games by particular developers. For example, Australia’s Big Time Gaming have created a Megaways™ engine in which each reel randomly re-configures to a different height on each spin to create more paylines, and Sweden’s No Limit City have created games with an awesome xNudge feature in which stacks of symbols auto-nudge into position to fill an entire visible reel when they land. With each nudge, a win multiplier to be applied to any wins from that spin increases by 1x. This seriously enhances your chances of scoring bigger payouts at that point in the game.

So there you have it – these are just some of the important aspects of video slots that you must look out for if you want to get the most from these exciting online games. Good luck, have fun, and if you do play, always gamble responsibly!

Beginner’s Guide to Baccarat

July 8, 2021 By editor

Baccarat is a traditional casino game, one of the oldest card games in the world, and the game of choice for players in European and Asian casinos. The game rewards ambitious bets and, due to its simple rules and lower house advantage, is currently one of the most popular at online casinos. The game has many variations, but the most played versions are punto banco (the variant we’ll cover in this article), chemin de fer, and baccarat banque.

Baccarat gained mainstream attention thanks to the world’s most famous secret agent, as it has been depicted in many James Bond movies, like For Your Eyes Only, starring Roger Moore as the man with a license to kill. The game originated in Italy, as one of the many ancient Italian card games, with its first accounts dating back to the 1400s, and then was introduced in France at the end of the 15th century, by soldiers returning home from the Franco-Italian War. By the end of the 19th century, baccarat had become a popular pastime among French nobility.

The variant we know today, which is the most common version at American land-based and online casinos, punto banco was created in Havana in the 1940s. When the first Las Vegas casinos were built in the 1950s, baccarat was already one of the games available then.

The game’s popularity in the United States has been increasing in the past few decades, and today most online casinos offer baccarat and its many variations, including live baccarat, which is managed and operated by professional croupiers, and streamed to players all around the globe.

In this article, we present the basic rules of the game, and some useful tips that can help players improve winnings. However, since baccarat is strictly a game of chance, there isn’t a single strategy that guarantees wins, so it’s important to gamble responsibly.

The basics

The rules of baccarat are very simple and straightforward, and a bit similar to blackjack. Two hands are dealt every round: the player hand and the banker hand. The goal is to make hands that add up to nine or as close as possible, and just like blackjack, the player and the banker can opt to draw another card or stand, but it depends on the value of the initial hand. Each card represents the same value as its face number, whereas 10, J, Q, and K represent a zero, and aces account for one.

Bettors can wager on the player hand to win, on the banker to win, or on a tie, which pays out more than the other choices, but present worse odds as well. Some casinos also offer the pair bet, which pays out if the banker or the player comes up with a pair of cards of the same rank.

Drawing rules

If neither the player nor the banker is dealt a total of 8 or 9 in the first two cards, which is known as a natural, both hands must draw another card, starting with the player’s hand. If the player has an initial total of 0-5, a third card is dealt. But if the initial total equals 6 or 7, the player stands.

If the player stands, the banker acts according to the same rule, drawing another card for totals below 5, and standing with 6 or 7. However, if the player draws a third card, the banker act as it follows:

If the banker total is 2 or less, then the banker draws a third card, regardless of the player’s third card
If the banker total is 3, then the banker draws a third card unless the player’s third card is an 8
If the banker total is 4, then the banker draws a third card in case the player’s third card is 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, or 7
If the banker total is 5, then the banker draws a third card if the player’s third card is 4, 5, 6, or 8
If the banker total is 6, then the banker draws a third card in case the player’s third card is a 6 or a 7
Finally, if the banker total is 7, the banker stands

Useful tips

Just like other casino games, game selection is an important factor, as it can improve winnings, or at least increase bettor’s odds. At land-based casinos, players can find baccarat tables using eight decks of cards, six decks, or one deck. The house edge, which is the amount punters lose on average over time, is different for each one of these setups, and single-deck games have the lowest house edge, usually 1.0117 percent, so it’s preferable to play these tables. Since most online casinos today feature single-deck games, this shouldn’t be an issue when playing online baccarat.

According to statistics, the banker hand tends to win 50.68 percent of the time, so when handling standard wagers and trying to improve winnings, it’s better to play the banker bet. It’s also important to notice that, even though they might seem attractive bets due to their higher payouts, the pair and the tie bets are bad choices, since the chances of winning are thinner, and the house edge on these bets is too high.

How to Enjoy Online Casino Bonuses

July 8, 2021 By editor

business shadow people and a giant hand holding euros

Online casino games have become popular around the world and the bonuses they offer. Many free bonuses are being introduced to the different online casinos for players to see the meaning of their hard-earned real money.

The only place you can see the real reason to play online casinos is to play at online casino sites and win big. Many online casinos have managed to attract more players. However, in this article, we are going to give you amazing reasons why you should enjoy online casino bonuses.

Redeem Your Loyalty Points

Being a regular player at online craps games is something that casinos do not like sometimes. If you happen to participate in a variety of casino games, you can have the chance to earn more points. Moreover, this also shows how the casino heavily values its clients.

Free Games can be Accessed

Moreover, players can be offerd free games as well despite the bonuses. The free games help players to have full knowledge on how to play other casino games before they bet any money. Therefore, this is one of the amazing advantages it has on online casino players. These free games also enable players to win real money as well.

Different Payment Methods

In addition, online casino gamblers can pay to have the chance of winning bonuses using any payment method at https://www.acepokies.com/online-casino/ . Unlike land-based casinos, online casinos have managed to make sure that all the players that visit the casino will not be inconvenienced. At some casinos, you can use payment methods that are transparent and convenient.

In conclusion, these are some of the reasons on how you can enjoy online casino bonuses. These bonuses will help you to have the chance of winning big. Therefore, make sure you play online casino games to be provided bonuses.