Throughout the past few decades, casino based console games have jostled for shelf space with platformers, shoot-em ups, puzzle games and all the rest in the gaming stores of the western world, but since the meteoric rise to popularity of casino gaming apps and websites like coral casino, casino gaming on traditional consoles has suffered a steady and seemingly inexorable decline.
The way things were
Since the 1980s a broad array of casino titles have been available across a range of major consoles. 1989’s Casino Kid for the NES saw the titular Kid playing his way through a series of casino games in order to raise enough money to defeat the evil Casino King. Later titles such as 1992 NES offering Caesars Palace and the 2005 Nintendo DS game Golden Nugget allowed gamers to play a range of casino game, without any added narrative distractions to speak of, typifying the genre.
What was the problem?
The general consensus amongst most game critics is that the casino gaming genre has never really worked out on consoles. Console based casino titles have undoubtedly offered a great many gamers an insight into the rules and culture of casino gaming, but the crucial elements of in-play sociability and the option to bet and win money are missing. Online casino games meanwhile, offer sociability through in-built chat functions and vitally, there’s money up for grabs for winning players. It’s a serious mismatch, which has seen console based casino gaming’s stock slide whilst online casino gaming has enjoyed a meteoric rise. It’s quite simple: casino gaming devotees generally desire the experience of playing alongside real people, with real cash at stake.
Whilst the future looks decidedly dubious for hardcore casino gaming on traditional consoles, a number of games still incorporate aspects of casino gaming and betting – thematically at least – in a highly successful manner. Strategy titles such as Casino Tycoon (2001, PC) demonstrate the suitability of a casino theme for games of this type; if one of the great minds behind a strategy classic like Command and Conquer: Red Alert or Theme Hospital could put their weight behind a casino game, the results could be remarkably entertaining.
If that’s not sufficiently outside of the box for your taste, check out this gem of a game from Japan, which is apparently the subject of a large amount of illegal betting in the country: