From those heady days of Nintendo’s classic Super Mario Brother 3 through to the newest, most advanced video games, game manufacturers have for years turned to a surprising source to make their games play just that little bit better: the casino.
You would perhaps be excused for thinking that, unlike playing online games at Royal Vegas, an honest to goodness online casino where you can play for and with real money on online slots, poker or roulette, there wouldn’t me much appeal to playing these sorts of games without any hope for real monetary gains. And yet, for all the complex and richly immersive gameplay of serious video gaming, where the only reason for playing is for the love of the game, the apparently entirely separate world of gambling still has a habit of making its way into some seriously great video and computer games – often with astounding (but decidedly non-financial) rewards.
Casino-based subgames or side quests have shown up time and time again in video games throughout the years but to gain a true appreciation of just how successful this marriage between gambling and gaming could be, just take a look at two very different games that use faux-gambling in very different but equally great ways,
Super Mario Brothers 3
Nintendo’s third entry into their Mario Brothers franchise proper (or fourth if you include their Japanese alternative to Super Mario Brothers 2, later released in the US as the Lost Levels) relied heavily on power ups like invincibility stars, extra lives and the raccoon suit and, along with the usual ways of gaining these power ups during the regular levels themselves, you could also win them in side games that were scattered throughout the map.
These subgames were, in effect, games of chance that may have been colourful and kid-friendly but, aside for some of them including actual playing games, they were basically just re-configured roulette and slots games. These levels offered in-game rewards, rather than anything in the real world but the idea is basically the same: not only did Nintendo slyly include casino-like games in their biggest game but they were fun, snappy and didn’t feel at all incongruent with the rest of the game.
Fallout: New Vegas
This installment in the popular Fallout franchise couldn’t be more different to Super Mario Brothers 3. It features high-end 3D graphics, is aimed at a much older audience and offers a much more complex and lifelike (though not necessarily better) playing environment. It also took a rather different tack to how it approached gambling.
As its name suggests, Fallout: New Vegas is set in a futuristic Las Vegas and a large part of the game takes place within exactly what Vegas is best known for: a casino. Or, more specifically, a whole bunch of casinos. Not only do you get to play all sorts of proper casino-games like poker or blackjack, you would even get VIP treatment to go along with your virtual winnings. Not only are these ventures into many of New Vegas casinos intrinsic parts of the game’s story, they would also give you cash to spend in the game and would increase your all-important “luck” stat.
Conclusion
These are just two examples among increasing hundreds but, even as the virtual and real move closer and closer, so too do the worlds of video games and casino games. Whether that’s good or bad remains to be seen.
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