One of the most beloved pastimes in the world, gambling has also swept the internet, with the iGaming industry recording some of the greatest growth rates ever over the past two years.
More people turned to online gambling as a new form of online entertainment while we stayed indoors as a result of global events, and iGaming companies reported a rise in the number of new and returning customers.
In 2021, as the number of online casinos increased to an all-time high, the chance to play casino favorites like roulette, blackjack, poker, and even game shows drew online gamblers from all over the world, making online gambling one of the most significant online activities.
iGaming is today acknowledged as a crucial part of the internet entertainment industry, despite once being perceived as a shady industry.
It’s also obvious that one of the entertainment sectors that gained the most from recent technological improvements was the iGaming industry.
What began as straightforward games with crude graphics on MS-DOS has developed into intricate platforms with a wide range of gambling options and visuals that simulate a real casino.
The industry has undergone a dramatic transformation as a result of the rise of mobile gaming and the advent of technologies like live streaming and virtual reality.
Because innovators like Microgaming and operators like STS Bet pushed the edge to give us better gameplay and safer platforms, we can now play our favorite casino games and even enjoy real-time gaming through live streaming anytime we want.
In this piece, we’ll look at a brief history of casino gambling, from its earliest iterations on MS-DOS through the first online casinos and, ultimately, all the innovations the twenty-first century has to offer.
Early steps
The Microsoft Disk Operating System, or MS-DOS, was introduced about 40 years ago, although it may be difficult to grasp.
For youngsters born in the 1980s and 1990s, the mere mention of MS-DOS gaming could trigger a flood of nostalgia, especially for all the fantastic games we used to play.
Back then, MS-DOS games were the real deal, with games like Prince of Persia, Wolfenstein, and a host of others.
Herein lies the origin of the earliest casino video games. The only gaming possibilities were slots and a few card games, despite the fact that there were many choices, like Caesars Palace and Vegas Gambler. Additionally, the images and sound effects were still primitive.
With the launch of two MS-DOS games bearing the names of his hotel-casino in Atlantic City, even Donald Trump tried his luck at casino video games: Trump Castle: The Ultimate Casino Gambling Simulation and Trump Castle 2.
Although casino video games improved in visuals and playability with the advent of more powerful operating systems like Windows and Mac OS, there was still no money involved since, at the time, financial transactions through computers were not possible. Only with the development of the Internet would there be significant changes.
The Emergence of Online Gambling
Online casinos emerged during the early 1990s internet boom thanks to platforms created by two industry pioneers: the cutting-edge online gambling software from Microgaming and the infrastructure for online casino money transfers from CryptoLogic.
Together, these two companies created InterCasino, widely recognized as the first internet casino. Following that, a ton of new online casinos appeared, and by the end of 1996, there were around 15 gaming sites with a casino theme.
The game selection was still constrained at the time due to technology restrictions, with the majority of operators just providing slot games.
The development of new games, improved visuals, and improved gameplay became the emphasis of iGaming developers and operators as personal computers became more efficient machines and internet connections got faster.
Therefore, new casino games were quickly developed, including roulette and blackjack, and by 1997, there were more than 200 online casinos with a wide variety of games.
The new Millennium
Due to the advent of the HTML5 programming language in the late 2000s, which enabled programmers to design new codes that could be used on a number of platforms and devices, iGaming operators started offering these games on desktop and mobile devices.
Most online casinos today support mobile devices, and some even have applications for iOS and Android smartphones and tablets.
However, playing live games is currently one of the most alluring aspects of online casinos. Live dealer games, as opposed to standard online casino games, which merely rely on random number generators, are managed and run by trained dealers and streamed in real-time to players from physical casinos or upscale studios.
This trend was made possible by the rising use of streaming services and technology in the early 2010s since live dealer games fundamentally changed how we play classic casino games online.
Instead of only observing automatic action, we may now take part in live games like roulette, blackjack, or even game shows like Deal or No Deal and Mega Wheel and interact with the dealer and other players.
