Are Online Casinos Too Open To New Technologies & Variants?

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Back in the late 1990s when the iGaming industry first began to transform into a viable online industry, everyone had high hopes of online casinos ruling the web. Of course, even those with the highest of expectations back then couldn’t have imagined just how successful the iGaming industry would become. Now, just twenty years later, iGaming is a multi-billion-dollar sector that is on par with video games, console games and even mobile games.

This is due to a number of factors, from accessibility to clever marketing, but the best quality that the iGaming industry has always had in spades is adaptability. At the turn of the millennia, when other land-based industries were doubling-down on their aversion to the web or were simply not putting enough stock in what the internet could one day become, iGaming was embracing the new technology completely.

Before long, casino fans didn’t even have to consider driving to their nearest brick-and-mortar casino or even leaving the house as everything they wanted could be found with just a few clicks of their mouse. Then, as technology evolved, the quality and quantity of games also improved. Soon the days of pixelated, 2D, sickly-green poker games and repetitive fruit machine slots were in the past, and the era of top-notch graphics had arrived.

As if that wasn’t impressive enough, it wasn’t long before live casino games were introduced and players at home could experience a true casino vibe with live trained croupiers and fellow players all streamed through webcams. Plus, that’s just one of the many new technological advancements and game variants that online casinos have adopted. Massive online casino platforms tend to have plenty of different types of games and tech players can use. For example, while it is also available on web browsers, Redbet online poker can be downloaded onto players’ devices much like a video or PC game, with unlockable achievements, customisation, tournaments and everything.

It’s clear that online casino brands are open to trying new things and will often achieve success after embracing emerging tech, but this isn’t always the case. A great example of this exists in the niche market of online cryptocurrency casinos, iGaming platforms that work with internet-centric money such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and Ripple. While some of these casinos have received some positive responses and attract a bit of traffic, it’s unlikely that they will be able to match the bigger brands. This isn’t because the owners haven’t tried or the platforms aren’t impressive, but because they embraced an emerging tech trend that may never pay off.

Fortunately, most of the big-name brands haven’t started accepting Bitcoin and we highly doubt that platforms like Redbet will remove all traditional currencies in favour of cryptocurrencies (though Redbet would be a great alternative name for that business endeavour). However, there are plenty of other upcoming technologies that big brands are more likely to embrace such as augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR). Now, while that may seem like a good idea, neither of these technologies is really at the point where the mass market is ready to have them appear in their everyday lives.

We just hope that the iGaming industry doesn’t continue an admittedly successful method of adopting new technologies to keenly. Back in the early 2000s and even up until recently most tech has been beneficial and even necessary, but in the modern world where all this extra stuff is being created, maybe iGaming should take a back seat and wait to see what happens.