*Veterans Only* The Difference Between Gambling In 2013 VS 1997

[X-Raided]

Based on the fact that I just recently started playing online only about a few
years ago, I'm really intrigued to learn what the major differences were about
playing online from 1997 and how the industry has changed in 2013.

Obviously, I know the differences in the graphics, but what I want to know is
how the online casino perks were versus how it is now. What was the first online
casino that some of you guys started playing at? Mine was Rushmore and from there
I went to Go Casino and Vegas Online. Was using dial-up a bitch? How did withdraws work?
I'm under the impression that maybe PayPal was used heavily?

What do you think the future holds for online gambling?

Can't wait to hear some of your stories!

P.S. Even if your started a little after the 2000's I still would love to read about it.

 

[anniemac]

The major difference between then and now is that US players could play any and all casino platforms.

MG casinos were my favorites. Fortune Lounge, Riverbelle were some of the first ones I played at. Don't think I ever played RTG casinos until after UIGEA came into effect.

There were lots of web wallets to use - Neteller, EcoCard, Payspark, Moneybookers.

Free chips were plentiful and playthrus were low on deposit bonuses.

Oh, the good old days.

 

[KasinoKing]

I started in January 2001.
Back then was before I started recording my online play in detail - but I think my first online casino was William Hills.
For sure I was using them for online sports betting, so that's why I suspect it was my first casino too.

I remember with their early version of the CryptoLogic software you could "walk" around a virtual casino floor and just click on the table you wanted to play. I don't mean the second version where you are looking down on the whole floor, with the first it was like you were really down there among the tables.

Some of the other casinos I tried in my first 6 months were Intercasino, Alps Casino, Roman Casino, Slotland, Windows & Cleopatra's casinos (RTG).

I've heard stories that BEFORE I started, bonus wagering was VERY low, but for me the lowest I can remember was about bonus only x15 (pretty sure this was applied at Will Hills & Intercasino). And the great thing back then was that many Table games were included in the WR at 100% - even Blackjack at Will Hills if I remember correctly.
At many others, including Intercasino & Windows for sure, PaiGow was allowed at 100%, and I soon learned this was a great way to play through bonuses with minimal risk!

Those WERE the days my friend - I was not a ruthless "advantage player", just a bonus hunter who did pretty well in my first 10 years playing online (especially at the aforementioned Will Hills & InterCasino).
I have a month-by-month log of my profits & losses while playing bonuses since May 2001 on my website Old / Expired Link if anyone is interested. I think it's a very interesting trip-back-in-time read - but I would, wouldn't I cos played it and I wrote it!

And yes, you could use PayPal at most places up until about 2006 I think (?). These days it can still be used for some UK casinos which are also linked to SportsBooks, but I haven' used it myself for gambling since I got a Neteller account.

I'm looking forward to hearing other players stories too!

KK

 

[lotusch]

For what it is worth,I only started to play online a couple of years ago on a serious basis.
Before that I was living in The Netherlands,my home country,and lets say in the period of 1997-2000 there wasn't much of a choice for online gambling in The Netherlands.
There was a few outfits but most of them were rogue as hell and payouts were to cry for.
So I was mostly playing in local landbased casino's but also there alot has changed.

In the early days we had like slots that would have a 200 points Jackpot which equals €40.00.
However those machines were well able to pay multiple good wins and you could cashout like €150.00-€200.00 with lets say €25.00 invested in that machine.
My alltime favourite was a machine called Lotus (Now all know where my nick comes from).
Dutch people will defo know this machine.



I made serious money out of this machine and would drive through the country to look for those and play them.

But now years down the line they have modified these machines,they are still available but very scarce and if you would find them they are the modified ones built in a casino cabinet and programmed way different,no fun to play anymore.

Also the games have changed from fun to play,low risk machines to monsters which offer huge Jackpots but can cost you dearly as they are multi high variant.

So in that perspective I think gambling in the 1990's was more fun and less stressfull in my opinion.

Also the conversion from our national currency,the Dutch guilder (FL) to the Euro (€) back in the days destroyed gambling a bit as 1 credit became 2.2x as expensive as it used to be.

Mark.

 

[The Viking]

I started in 2005, i cant remember my first casino but i do remember my first withdrawals, first one was a $1200 from Roxy palace on my first deposit, got paid very quick i remember without any docs, also had a withdrawal from Chrystal palace yep thats right the rogue one this was before i started checking out forums, all you looked for was casino in on search machines i actually got paid there on firs withdrawal think it was $300, so deposit again, i won about $4000 playing Honey to the bee, but now the prob started, they wanted more and more docs, more delays etc etc, in the end i played it back and never looked in there again beside the biggest diffrent (beside graphics) at least for me is the betting pattern, i used to bet $3, $4 even $5 at spin now i hardly ever go past $2

 

[MisterBJ]

I started in the 1997/1998 while in College. I was taking up computer programming and while in class. We would use the internet for research. A gambling ad popped up and I clicked on it. The casino was called Caribbean Gold Casino. I used my visa debit card and made a deposit right there in the computer lab. I think I won like $150. They had to mail me a pin # in order to withdrawal. While I was waiting for the pin. I went to Circuit City and bought a $1600 Compaq computer. I went home and stayed in the house for about 2 weeks. Signing up to various casinos, I had lost touch of reality, abandoning family and friends.

Paypal was the method for depositing and withdrawing. It was sweet back then. I remember when Neteller was just a baby with hardly any members. Paypal was the KING... There was this rogue casino called Casino Bar at the time. It had rigged games, I remember playing BJ and could never seem to get a winning streak. After about $1000 in deposit. I discovered from reading the forums they were crooks. At that time I didnt know about chargebacks, but I was able to get intouch with their payment processor. He agreed to refund my deposits back. He accidently coded it wrong. So instead of having $1000 back in my bank account. I had $10,000 lol. Like a good boy, I took $4000 went to Mardi Gras and won $5000 extra will down there. Finally my bank called and said I needed to return the money as it was in error. I returned it and continued on my internet gambling.

Casino On Net, Intercasino, Sunny Group, Casino Action, etc. They were good solid places back then. I remember my first Poker site was Poker.com and then Delta poker. Paradise Poker came along and stole the show. I was one of the 1st 25 people to have an account at party poker. They were good and honest people. I like them because I could deposit with Firepay and cashout to Neteller. And then use my Neteller card to withdrawal at ATM.

As Kasino King stated bonuses was great then. I remember them being 10X the wager and all games counted. The early part of the 2000's I stayed away from MG BJ as I believed it to be streaky unfair. I found that RTG (Bodog - and a few others whom names i forget) was the fairest. Also this casino that had spanish 21 that went under after USA closed, they were great. When Playtech came out and had BJ Switch, Playtech became my favorite software. BET365 was awesome as they would process your cashout by just calling them up. I hate they didnt give out much bonuses...

TODAY SUCKS!!!! PLAIN AND SIMPLE!!! I FEEL SORRY FOR THOSE WHO MISSED THE GOLDEN AGE

 

[weesie]

My first time was in 1999.

I was playing at pogo.com, a game website for free games of fun with a very miniscule chance of winning real money.

An ad was on my page for a free $20 at a place called "English Harbour" It was microgaming at the time.

I was in the process of getting ready for work and had time to kill so I thought what the hell, I'll give it a go.

Within 20 minutes I had $300.00 in my account! (Loved, loved, loved that Cash Splash Slot!) I thought this can't be for real! I logged out of the casino, walked around the house in awe, thinking is this for real?

I logged back into the casino, thinking it would be gone, but, it was still there!

I played all weekend and cashed out $925.00 on their $20!!, doubting very seriously I would ever see the funds.

I mean, I had never seen anything like this! Is it for real?

It took about 2 weeks, but the check did come, with no problems was deposited into my bank account.

It was amazing and I was hooked!

Like everyone else, I really miss the good old days!

 

[X-Raided]

Oh wow! Very interesting reads! I would love to also hear from Casinomeister himself too.

 

[silcnlayc]

It was 1996

It was 1996 the day I found real money slot casinos. I was bored with going to the track and decided to see what was online. 5 Roses casino was my first I believe and my favorite casino back then. I played and won many times without a hitch. Slots were definitely a lot looser back then IMO. I played at many casinos after that, that would not have met the critiera at CM and never had an issue or ever was denied a withdrawal.

My favorites were"

5 Roses Casino
Intercasino
All MG casinos
Old RTG casinos
English Harbour (#1 spot)

Truly was good times then when one had many choices to play at unlike now, I feel like a hostage to those few US facing casinos.

.

 

[mathsboy1975]

I started in January 2001.
Back then was before I started recording my online play in detail - but I think my first online casino was William Hills.
For sure I was using them for online sports betting, so that's why I suspect it was my first casino too.

That is about the time that I started playing online and William Hill was my first casino too and I remember that original cryptologic casino software that you describe. I never played slots though until many many years later and tended to stick to the casino poker variants. It was actually around that time that the explosion of poker took place here in the UK and that the major online bookmakers started offering Poker rooms online.

The poker rooms used to be a bit of a nightmare in the early days with other players losing connections on dial up modems and stuff and you having to sit there until the 30 second reconnect timer elapsed to give a player chance to reconnect before he / she had their cards forcibly folded.

I never used paypal at all for depositing at the casinos/bookies back then. But then it was simpler as only the big name bookies had an internet presence (Ladbrokes, Hills, Coral) and at the time they were seen as "trusted" in terms of web security due to having a large high street presence in the UK. Nowadays the internet seems flooded with a bewildering array of casinos/bookies some of which have complicated associations which can negate sign up bonuses (like signing up with a sister casino but not realising it then wondering why you dont get a bonus...).

To be honest back in those days the only slots experience I would get would be in the pub using the mechanical reel type slot machines. Here in the UK at least there was a point in time (cannot recall exactly) when gambling seemed to lose its label as a "seedy" activity - bookies no longer blacked out their windows, you could start buying refreshments in the shop and bookmakers seemed to be acting more as sponsors for professional sportsmen and teams. Bookmaker advertising on TV became more commonplace at that point too. It really was a different world before that.

One thing I really remember well in the early days of the online bookie explosion was that when in-running betting first came into being there were a lot of advantages that could be exploited by the bookies appearing to be understaffed. Many times I made a good profit by the odds compiler setting incorrect odds on a live market - so incorrect that you could actually get a worthwhile arb on the market. You even had time to get multiple bets on before they rectified the mistake. And in those days the bookies even honoured the bets - no such chance these days although you rarely see that kind of error too.

I even remember getting a bet on at sportingodds many many years ago on Tim Henman to beat some other tennis player in a minor tournament. He was a set up in the game but the bookies had not spotted that the match had started and so I was able to get the pre-start price of 5/6 even though he was a set up in a best of 3 set match. Never get things like that anymore, but that is probably as much to do with the fact that there is far more TV coverage of sport now than there was then.

Oh they were the days.....

 

[cpdnd31]

I played in the 90's and I so miss those days. I was able to use a checking acct and it was safe. American express card , visa any way I wanted to deposit and there were no fees. I loved the fact when I won money was in ewallet within 30 min usally and back into bank anywhere from an hour to a day. It was so nice. I played mostly at party poker and party casino, English Harbor and Rushmore. There was also a micro gaming one I can remember. But honestly it was fun to play relaxing and never had to worry if you would get your money. Now it is to stressful and you try to hit over 300 just to withdraw.

Oh have the times changed!!!!

 

[Przecinek]

I started in January 2001.


I've heard stories that BEFORE I started, bonus wagering was VERY low, but for me the lowest I can remember was about bonus only x15 (pretty sure this was applied at Will Hills & Intercasino). And the great thing back then was that many Table games were included in the WR at 100% - even Blackjack at Will Hills if I remember correctly.
At many others, including Intercasino & Windows for sure, PaiGow was allowed at 100%, and I soon learned this was a great way to play through bonuses with minimal risk!

I started out in 2006 but I'm sure Ladbrokes offered bonuses with x4 or even x1 rollover. Their sign up bonus had x10 rollover at worst. If you started out in 2001 then you had to encounter bonuses with even better WR, definitely better than x15, maybe you just don't remember

I can recall back in 2006 32red offered bonuses with 25x wagering, so it wasn't really all that different from what they offer today. It's a bit strange that I can't recall how things look back in the days. But I agree, Cryptologic was a very popular software at that time. I too played Intercasino, William Hill, Littlewoods and Playboy Casino which at some point closed down A lot of casinos were running on another software platform called Chartwell. It was fun albeit quite slow. You can check what is left of this software at Doxx bet for example (Amazon Wild is a good slot IMO). Now in 2013 most casinos are a mix of different platforms, you can see same games almost everywhere.

My first casino ever: That would be Betfair Chartwell soft, game high-low, then Blackjack. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw BJ strategy offered in a help file. I thought to myself: what are these guys doing? Why are they helping me? After that came Gala Casino with their own prop software I believe, then Coral and then the rest. My first lesson learned was when I was using some progressive strategy in 2007 while playing in VC casino. I won't explain it fully, but you had a string of numbers like 1,1,2,3,5 etc and you had to bet the sum of the first number and last and then remove them if you won, or add lost sum as the last number. Upped my bets from 1 pound to 50 and blew 400 quid or so. Since then I know systems don't work

My first playtech had to be bet365 and Totesport shortly after. And so on and so forth. Fastforward in 2013 and I'm playing Jack&Jill atm. See you in 2024

 

[LaurieJim]

When I started out , I was watching TV and saw this ad about a pregnant woman who had this casinos name placed on her belly , I was shocked but it caught my interest so I went looking on the internet and low and behold there were a slew of them internet casinos.................Cha...Ching , done found myself a gold mine.

Well I was wrong , ended up playing for a couple of years at the Virtual group , lost a small fortune but did not know any better , they were so nice and sweet and hell they were my friends I then stumbled on to CM and voiced my thoughts about how great this group was and did I get the sense knocked back into me, Pina is the first person that comes to mind right now

Why had I not found this place in the beginning , it sure would have saved me a boat load of money , this I guess is why we try to steer newbies from those sites, cause we don't want them to make the same mistake, you pay it forward with sound advice.

I found so many wonderful casinos and I made money, CWG , Sands Of The Caribbean , InetBet, Wild Jack, Rushmore Group were some of the first that I made my money back on. It was later on that I found 3 Dice , JPC , Sloto and so many others .

Gaming life was good in the US and then one dreaded night it was pulled from us with the swift signing from one damned ink pen , The US goverment wanted to tell us what we could and could not do with our hard earned money, who were we hurting ?

Now for us old timers in the US we still have some casinos that give us the gaming entertainment we love and something beats nothing , right?
We have InetBet , CWG, JPC group , 3 Dice and several others.

It just is not the same but the fun is there, just limited.

I also miss the good days.........................Those were the days my friends

Laurie

 

[KasinoKing]

I started out in 2006 but I'm sure Ladbrokes offered bonuses with x4 or even x1 rollover. Their sign up bonus had x10 rollover at worst. If you started out in 2001 then you had to encounter bonuses with even better WR, definitely better than x15, maybe you just don't remember

Yes you are quite right - I did forget about Ladbrokes because I was concentrating on my early years online. Lads had monthly, weekly and even daily promotions for many years, as you say with WRs as low as x4 at the beginning, later increasing to x10 (and I made £1,000's off them ). That only stopped about 1-2 years ago, so I don't know how I forgot that!

KK

 

[albrco123]

I started around 2005 when MG were still in the US mostly Seven Sultans Casino if I recall, played a lot of Hitman & Video Poker, wish we could get MG back in the US, especially when we see all the great screenies on CM and I do miss Neteller!

Al