Why?

Well as it happens, Riga is fast becoming the epicenter of the online gambling industry’s push to bring live dealer games to European players.

Evolution who?

This all started a couple of years ago, when a then unknown niche casino platform developer named Evolution Gaming built a dealer studio there, with a view to streaming games with European dealers to the online gambling world. Until then, video streamed casino games were largely confined to Asian based dealer studios served to Asian players – and there the format continues to enjoy considerable and growing market support.

Owing largely to the quality of their platform, Evolution managed to sign up a couple of big name operators back in 2008. Not wanting to miss out on having the slickest new product on the market, other operators were keen to jump on board also, and soon the trickle of licensee sign-ups turned into a torrent.  A who’s who of the online online gambling world now serves Evolution’s games to their respective customers. Blue Square, William Hill, Ladbrokes, Unibet, 888.com, Bwin, GalaCoral, Paddy Power, PartyGaming, Victor Chandler. These are all companies that count their registered player bases in the millions.

It was no surprise to anyone watching these developments, when Evolution announced in early 2009 that they had to double the floor space in their Riga dealer studio to cope with demand for their live games.

Playtech joins the party

Watching all this with interest was online casino software power house Playtech.  They had been already operating a successful Asian based dealer studio streaming blackjack, roulette, baccarat and sicbo to their licensee casinos.  Not wanting to miss out on the European party they decided to launch a new dealer studio with European dealers, and their location choice…Riga, Latvia.

So now, in terms of access to a registered player base, you have arguably the 2 most significant online live dealer studios in the world both located in the picture post card city of Riga.

About Riga

First a quick geography lesson…Riga sits on a Baltic Sea bay on the East coast of Latvia (green).  It’s Latvia’s capital and  from all reports and pics, a very beautiful city whose center has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site.  About 700,000 Latvians call Riga home.   And least 200 of those 700,000 deal blackjack, roulette and baccarat in front of web cameras that are streamed to players around the world 24/7.  And if those 200 are at all representative of the rest of the population, I (young red-blooded male) am moving to Riga in the not too distant future.

A typical Riga dealer from a game recorded at Unibet…

To be fair, some of these ‘smaller, rag tag’ casinos aren’t that small.  Some are among the industry’s pioneers, operating without incident since the late 1990′s (eg English Harbour).  But the fact remains, when it comes to choosing an online casino, US players face a far more limited selection as regards both quantity and quality than players from most of the rest of the world.

And while choice is limited where online casinos generally are concerned, turning to live dealer casinos, that choice narrows to practically non-existent.

An unfortunate reality for US players is that most casinos that live dealer games happen to be amongst the larger, European licensed brands that withdrew from the US market back in 2006.  Both Microgaming and Playtech, the industry’s 2 largest software developers who are leading the charge into live dealer platform development do not allow their licensee casinos to accept US players.  And the likes of William Hill, Ladbrokes, Bwin, bet365, Unibet, PartyGaming, Expekt, 888.com, Blue Square…etc etc – the biggest online gambling names, who have all added live dealers to their product offering in the last couple of years, all do not accept US players.

The live casino landscape is a very baron one indeed if you live in the United States.  And this will probably remain the case until such time as (if at all) UIGEA is repealed and replaced with a regulatory regime that allows the likes of Harrahs et al to go online.

It’s baron but its not totally bare.

One casino that has live dealers and will accept US players is Betphoenix.  They offer blackjack, baccarat and roulette and accept UseMyWallet (one of the few virtual wallet services available to US players).  And the games are very playable.  Of course the downside is, they are licensed and based in Costa Rica.  Which isn’t to say they are unscrupulous (the word in the forums is they’re trustworthy operators), but it is to say that if they were you would have little recourse if you had some issue with them.

Live Blackjack at Betphoenix…

Live roulette at Betphoenix…

It’s played online.  But this is where its similarity to traditional online roulette games whose outcomes are determined by random number generators and presented by computer graphic simulations ends.  In live roulette the game you are playing is conducted by an actual croupier using a real roulette wheel and ball.  A real-time video feed of the game is fed to your computer so that you can see the the ball drop, spin and outcome, as if you were sitting at the table.

Of course a you are also able to place real money bets on the game you are watching over the live video.  The image at right is a typical example if the way the live games are presented by various casinos.  A video feed is inserted in the bet screen providing a continual view of the game itself.  The rest of the bet screen contains various information on the game (history of outcomes, table limits, access to help/rules pages etc) as well as a virtual table allowing for placement of your bets.

Of course different casinos/software developers have slightly different functionality and look and feel to their roulette games and also offer different roulette variations (French, European, American etc), but broadly speaking the way the game is delivered is the same.

We have set out more details of various live roulette options available at our live roulette.  The variations currently available in live format are also examined at out live European roulette, live French roulette, live American roulette and live Asian roulette pages respectively (also accessible from top menu).

Live roulette at William Hill