Betting companies, like so many other industries these days, have taken to the Internet to offer their services, given that the vast majority of the population is now online.
The online betting market is one of the fastest growing out of all the digital industries, and this has opened it up to a lot of variety and innovation in the game and events you can try.
What makes online casino games unique?
Whether it’s card games or table games, you can find every variant available that you would in a physical casino plus many more unique ones. To take a common example, if you were to try online casino betting at Paddy Power, you’d be getting dozens of versions of virtual blackjack or poker, each with unique rules behind them.
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This isn’t even mentioning the live table game versions that feature a live host in a studio acting as a dealer. These games usually feature chat options as well as unique bonus features, and some are more elaborate live games such as giant wheel games with a range of extra modes that can be triggered.
The basics of online slot games
The first time you go onto an online casino, the odds are that the first thing you’ll see is the virtual slot games. These make up the core of most betting sites, and you’ll often see them used in promotions as they are typically the most colourful and eye-catching games available. They work in the same way as any physical slot machine for the most part, and fundamentally you are aiming to connect lines or groups of symbols, with rarer symbols worth more when they’re matched.
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The advantage of virtual slots is that they can be much more flexible in design and gameplay, with features and animations not possible with traditional machines. The other key difference is in convenience; with Statista claiming 71% of Americans own a smartphone as of 2021, developers have made sure that almost every title is mobile-friendly.
How jackpot games work
On the face of it, jackpot games resemble slot games on the front end, however, they work a little differently in the back end. They most closely match Wikipedia’s definition of the most common jackpot, a type known as a progressive jackpot where any non-winning spins add to the jackpot pool. A similar system has been used in traditional casinos for decades now.
In the case of online casinos, it works out that every single person playing on a single jackpot slot title, no matter where they are or what site they use, are all feeding into the jackpot, and the top prizes can go up into the millions regularly. When a jackpot is won, the whole thing resets and starts over; the odds of winning are naturally lower than normal slots, but the potential payout is many times bigger.
Summing up
These are the core kinds of games you’ll find in an online casino. Of course, other titles don’t fit perfectly into any of these categories, but these are enough to get you started with online betting.
