Technology, especially the one that helps take things from brick-and-mortar places to the online world, has influenced and changed many industries, and casinos are no exception.
From the first casino that ever opened in the 17th century to today’s online gambling heavens, almost every stage of development in the casino industry was somehow influenced by the new technological achievement. Let’s take a look at the crucial ones.
The first influence of technology
Gambling existed long before the gambling houses, a.k.a. casinos. Think about human nature and love for the excitement of winning big wagers and the ease of earning money while playing a game. We could speculate some form of gambling has existed for centuries, maybe even since mankind itself exists.
What we do know is that the dice were one of the first instruments used for some form of gamble. They can be traced as far as 6000 B.C. There is also the beloved game with cards – Blackjack, originally known as 21. This is a very old game too and it has been played for centuries. And there is, of course, Keno, a form of Bingo that originated in China. The legend says it helped collect enough money to build the Great Wall.
We could say that all of the games above required some form of technology to be created and developed, but the game that is characterized by this more than any other before is probably Roulette. Its existence would not be possible without the invention of the Gambling wheel in 1720, and some historians believe Roulette was actually introduced by the famous scientist Blaise Pascal.
Late 19th-century technology will make the development of one more gambling machine possible. In 1891 a New York-based company produced the first slot machines. As for their more modern form, the first video slots saw the light of the day in 1976.
All of these games will eventually find their place in the casinos. And now we cannot imagine all those famous and grandiose Las Vegas places without their Roulettes and Blackjacks, not to mention the slots.
The switch to the online world
The constant technology development brought us the Internet in the 1960s and this will eventually cause many services and products to move into the so-called online world. As for the casinos, the first online form was opened in 1994, thanks to the previously developed software.
The first online players could enjoy Blackjack, Craps, Roulette, and Video Poker, and then a couple of years later Slots as well. The beginning of the new century will bring the development of live dealer casinos; hence the world was introduced to the first cross-breed of traditional and online gaming.
But the Internet did not change just where and how we can gamble. It also made more knowledge about it available to us. Now, anyone can search the Internet to find out about the rules of Poker, or discover tricks to winning on slot machines for example. In the past, one would have to find a person to pass the knowledge and hope to be lucky enough for that person to know what they are talking about.
On the same note, games of chance are very often about math and psychology. Thanks to the information available to us on the World Wide Web, anyone can research how these sciences can help us win. In the past, if you wanted to do such a thing, you would have to find a well-equipped library.
Online but also mobile
A few decades ago many could claim that mobile phones are the future of communication, but not many realized what a big part of our lives they will become. We all have these smartphone devices and, while we obviously use them to communicate in many different ways, they are also used for so much more.
A smartphone is now a newspaper, it is a book, it is a phone book, it is a source of information, it is a camera and a device to play videos on. So, of course, it also found its way to becoming a gaming device and a portable casino.
Similar to the move online before them, the mobile devices brought a new audience to casinos that like to place their bets on the go and have immediate and almost constant access to different types of casino games.
Other than even higher quality and quantity, online mobile casinos have also brought a bigger number of payment options to their patrons and improved safety in comparison to brick-and-mortar ones. The gamblers that access online casinos through their mobiles are also more certain in fair gameplay, thanks to security software.
The future is now: AR and VR, blockchain, crypto, and more
Online casinos with all their benefits became especially popular at the onset of 2020. The lockdowns caused the pressure to improve the quality of the online gambling experience since brick-and-mortar casinos were not available during this period. This also gave the necessary push to some still developing technologies to improve.
Augmented reality and virtual reality are among these technologies. They are the solutions for those who love the old-school way of gambling in actual casinos, but cannot get there for various reasons.
Blockchain technology has also been relatively recently developed and its influence on the casino industry is massive. This is the technology that allows casinos to use cryptocurrencies as the main or additional payment method. Thanks to it, the cost of the transactions is lower whereas it has transparency. It also means that the gamblers can play anonymously.
To conclude
The world of casinos follows closely every development of technology and finds a way to implement it. It will be very exciting to see what the future will bring and how it will make the gambling experience even more convenient.
