Jul 16 2008
Flash Casinos are not used properly
Flash casinos are a great addition to an online casino network but some people have a misunderstanding of the actual purpose they serve. Yes it is true they are designed so that there is no need to download anything to your computer. Where the misunderstanding comes in is when people see the slogan “instant play” or “no downloading necessary, be playing in minutes”. Flash games certainly live up to those claims but what isn’t said is that the overall time involved for the process of downloading the casino and then registering for an account (which is something you would have to complete whether playing at the flash version or the download version) is not very much different.
Further is that once the download version has finished loading onto your computer it is much faster than the flash games, especially when changing from one game to another. The download version switches instantly where as the whole process of leaving the flash game and returning to the menu and then waiting for it to load, just seems to take so much more time that it almost becomes frustrating because you were told this was an instant play casino so you expect everything to happen right now and that simply isn’t how the flash games work.
Then in many cases such as the flash casinos powered by Microgaming, the leader in the online gambling industry, the menu is several pages and it usually takes at least two clicks to find the game you’re wanting to play next so you must wait for each page to load same as you would for any page on the internet only the flash games must have a lot involved because their load time is considerably longer than the time it takes for most web pages to load.
So what good are flash casinos if they are not faster and offer only about half the games as do the download versions? The answer to that is exactly why flash casinos have found a place for themselves nearly ten years beyond the first arrival of most online casinos, which is that they are convenient for those who want to gamble but are away from their home PC. That is entirely the reason flash casinos still exist today, aside from the few who may still need the room on their PC but that must be a minority by now considering that I can easily fit three or four online casinos on this writer’s PC and still have room for Front Page editor version 2003 which takes up over four hundred megabytes and compare that to a RealtimeGaming powered casino which takes up seventy-two megabytes.
Lack of room on a PC shouldn’t be a concern in this day and age but being able to gamble when away from home is a nice convenience that continues to be used by many online gamblers who enjoy playing while sitting at the office or while out on the road. Before getting married and settling down I use to enjoy the convenience of being able to log in from a girlfriend’s house or apartment and we’d kill some time taking turns playing the slots or video poker games. That is the proper use of a flash casino in current times.