Online Bingo Games
People all over the world love to play bingo, but it’s not always convenient to take the time to drive to the bingo hall, get set up and spend hours in play at a time. Online bingo allows you to get all of the excitement with a wider variety of games than you’d typically find in land-based games.
On top of that, you have several options for game fees and promotions that give you more value as well. Besides bingo, it’s also worth checking out the latest online video slots at various casinos. We want to provide you with an introduction to playing bingo on the Internet so that you can decide for yourself if it’s for you. New online bingo players receive a bonus on their first deposit or can claim a No Deposit Bonus just by signing up.
Different types of Bingo
Let’s start by looking at the types of bingo that you can play on the Internet. People from the United States are probably used to bingo games played on a grid of five rows with five letters. This is called 75-ball bingo, and it’s one of the most popular games on the Internet. Something the Internet allows for this type of game is a broader range of patterns, so you aren’t stuck with the usual, annoying, same old thing.
The games also go faster because it’s easier to play multiple cards since they’re displayed in a more organized way on your screen without you having to shuffle a bunch of cards. Players from the United Kingdom are probably more familiar with Housie bingo that uses three rows of nine columns with five numbers shown in each row. This is called 90-ball bingo, and it’s all about trying to line up numbers across the rows horizontally. It’s a faster-paced game than 75-ball bingo, and it’s the game that most US players tend to convert to when they see how much action there is.
However, players from the UK who prefer a slower, more relaxing game often find themselves defecting to the US 90-ball games instead. Other types of online bingo can give you some different experiences. For example, with 80-ball bingo, you’ll have an experience that’s a lot like the gameplay of 75-ball bingo with a twist.
There are five rows with 16 numbers each, and they’re broken up according to four colours that help to determine how you win. Players who want to enjoy Speed Bingo can play the 30-ball games as well, and this game is always played with a “full house” pattern. You get nine randomly-chosen numbers on your card out of 30, and you win when all nine of them have been called. This is a very, very fast-paced game that’s perfect for mobile players who want some quick action.
More stakes to choose from
Besides having a wider variety of games to choose from, bingo players on the Internet also have more stakes to choose from. You’ll have a hard time finding live bingo rooms that offer cards for less than £/€/$5 or £/€/$10 in many areas, but you can play for as low as £/€/$0.05 per game when you play online.
This gives you more action for less money since it’s easier to play multiple cards on the Internet. Tons of free games are also available where you can win real money prizes without having to risk anything with an entry fee. On top of that, you’ll get rewarded for your deposits with bonuses and other promotions.
When you deposit with an online bingo bonus, you’ll get extra money added to your account that you can use to get shots at winning big prizes in your games. Overall, it’s a much better value with a wider variety of stakes, promotions and games when you play bingo online.
Live bingo
One of the complaints that people have with moving from land-based bingo games to online bingo games is that the experience isn’t quite the same. The playing of the actual game isn’t the entire sum of the experience for these players, and they miss out on the interactions with the caller and the interactions they get from meeting and talking with other people.
Sites have been trying to come up with ways to take this into account, and live webcam bingo games are one way that many have gone about it. The basic idea behind these games is that your caller is more than just a number on a screen. Instead, you’ve got your cards in front of you on your desktop or mobile device, and the caller is shown via live video feeds.
This high-definition audio and video put you in the middle of a familiar atmosphere with the sounds and excitement that you get from playing in a brick-and-mortar bingo establishment. What’s more, is that you get the convenience of not having to drive to an actual bingo hall to get in on the action. It’s the best of both worlds when it comes to playing this game.
The Social Factor
The social factor is something that people miss out on when they try online versions of these games, and there are ways that the sites have tried to circumvent these problems as well. The most common social interaction that you’ll get when playing online bingo is a chatbox area.
This chat is moderated by exceptional people who keep it clean and prevent spam. You’ll usually find that each room on a bingo site has its separated chat area, and this allows certain groups of people to play together over and over again. Many sites offer concepts that should be familiar to people who are on social networking sites.
The basic idea is that you can add friends to a friends list, see if they are online, offline or in a game, and even follow their games and cheer them on in some cases. This brings together all of the factors of the social interactions that people love in these games, and that makes it easy to connect with friends from across the world who love the same bingo games as you
Technology and connection speeds
You might be wondering if you need a super-fast computer to pull this off. The fact of the matter is that today’s level of technology makes it easy to get even dated computers online with live webcam bingo games, and that creates a situation where it’s more accessible than ever before.
You can even play these live bingo games on your smartphone, tablet or other mobile devices so that you can take them with you anywhere you go as long as you have a connection. We recommend that you stay near a Wifi connection if you’re playing via mobile since the high-definition video feeds will probably eat up your mobile data plan otherwise.
The critical thing about live webcam bingo games is that they bring together several of the factors that people miss from a land-based experience without the disadvantages and extra costs of having actually to get ready and go to a bingo hall. With a wider variety of games and stakes to choose from, the online option makes more sense.
Bingo in the Past
Several games in different parts of the world go by the name of bingo, but the history of bingo is mainly similar for most of them. The general idea is that bingo, as we know it today, is based mostly on the old lotteries from centuries ago.
These weren’t necessarily lotteries like we think of them today with scratch card tickets and massive progressive jackpots. Instead, they were based on playing a single lottery card. While these games seem to have a common ancestor, the specifics of how they came to be are a little different. We’re going to take a look at the history of bingo for the two most popular styles of the game: 90-ball and 75-ball.
History of 90-Ball Bingo
A significant Italian lottery known as Lo Giuoco del Lotto d’Italia started way back in 1530. It came after the unification of Italy from the different states that were around at the time, and it was designed to bring the country together as a whole and to generate revenues for the state.
The same lottery is played now, and it contributes to the upper eight figures each year to the Italian government. The way the game is played will sound familiar to those who know how to play 90-ball bingo.
The card is played with three rows and nine columns for a 3×9 grid. Each column can contain numbers from 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, …, 81-90, respectively, but only five numbers are shown at random on each row. The key to winning the game is having all five numbers called in a single horizontal row.
In the Italian lottery version of this game, numbers would be called after they were randomly pulled from a bag of small, wooden circles, and players would cover the numbers on their card as they were called. It’s easy to see that this is virtually the same game as 90-ball bingo that’s played today.
History of 75-Ball Bingo
The owner of a failing toy company, Edwin Lowe, came upon a carnival game late at night in 1929. The game being played was called “Beano,” and the man running the booth had based the game on a lottery game he’d learned while working with a carnival in Germany. He brought the game to the United States and put a few tweaks on it.
He called the name “Beano” because he’d offer small beans for people to use to cover their numbers on their card. The cards were five squares by five squares, and people could win by getting five in a row in any direction: horizontally, vertically or diagonally. Lowe decided to bring this game back to his home state of New York, and he recreated it himself with some supplies he’d bought.
During the first games, he tried with his friends, one woman with a stuttering problem and other speech issues won and cried, “Bingo!” instead of “Beano.” And this was the birth of the game of 75-ball bingo in the United States.
Other bingo games
Other games like 30-ball bingo (speed bingo) and 80-ball bingo have largely been made popular to provide variety on the Internet. While they may have played previously, they are mostly just variations on the 75-ball and 90-ball versions of the game. Overall, the history of these games seem to go back to the old lotteries, and that explains why so many people love them.
