Microgaming Casinos

Most online casino players don’t really know a lot about the companies that are behind the games they enjoy playing so much – it’s the online casinos that are getting all the publicity, regardless of whether it’s good or bad. However, one could easily argue that the games providers are actually the most important part of the entire chain – after all, players are spending much more time enjoying the different games than they are browsing the casino websites.

Official site : Microgaming

Microgaming, who are at the very front of the online gaming industry at the moment, are one of those providers that you’ve probably already had a chance to meet thanks to online slots like Mega Moolah or Battlestar Galactica. So what’s the story behind them and how good these guys are? This article should give you answers to nearly all the questions you might have.

About Microgaming

Microgaming claim that they have been around since 1994, which is when they’ve allegedly created the world’s first real online casino, although the truth is that their meteoric rise came only with the true advent of all the big online casinos. That said, their early experiences have helped them to establish themselves as one of the very top software providers out there and they can easily claim to be the very best as well.

Nowadays, the company is based on the Isle of Man and provides a massive amount of different services that online casinos can take advantage of, including casino games, sportsbook facilities, bingo games, and live dealers. This means that it’s quite likely that you’ve already enjoyed at least some of their products at one point or another – and, given Microgaming’s high standards, it’s safe to assume that you’ve had a good time with them.

Microgaming have also been active in defining the standards and regulations for the entire online gaming industry. In fact, they’re one of the founding members of both the e-Commerce Online Gaming Regulation and Assurance (eCOGRA) and the Interactive Gaming Council (IGC). This little detail virtually guarantees that you’re always going to get a fair service when it comes to all of their products – although this naturally doesn’t automatically guarantee that all online casinos that offer Microgaming products are completely safe to play at.

Interestingly, Microgaming also have a nice little history in providing pretty much the biggest jackpots that have ever been paid out in online gaming. Just to give you an idea – one lucky bingo player received £5.88 million thanks to Microgaming, while another lucky guy won €6.37 million thanks to one of Microgaming’s popular online slots.

Finally, we feel obliged to mention that Microgaming are also currently running a corporate responsibility programme called PlayItForward, which supports a number of universities, charities, and community initiatives.

Microgaming’s Products

Since Microgaming are one of the few software providers that offer the full package of services to online casinos and sportsbooks, there really is a lot to talk about when it comes to their products.

Microgaming have made their living off online casino products and those are still their main focus these days by the looks of things. The fact that they currently have the largest portfolio of games in the industry is then a testament of both their history and quality. Although the online slots – which they produce on a regular basis – remain to be their flagship, Microgaming have all the traditional card and table games in their portfolio as well.

What’s more, Microgaming are also setting the tone for live casino products, as they’ve practically revolutionized the live gaming experience by going for HD video streaming, multi-language support, and multi-window games that allow players to enjoy more than just a single table at the same time. They’ve also introduced themed studios into their arsenal as their unique selling point and many fans of live casino games have indeed already developed a preference for the Playboy live casino studio.

Microgaming have also developed a number of bingo games that tie-in with their casino games thanks to their innovative interface, which means that players can enjoy both at the same time while also using the chat function to stay in touch with fellow bingo enthusiasts. And we simply can’t forget about Microgaming’s poker network, which was a big hit during the golden days of online poker.

Finally, Microgaming do provide numerous business solutions to land-based casinos, so chances are that you’re going to get a strangely familiar experience during your next visit to a real casino in the gaming department. We can only hope that it won’t ever come to the point at which we’re just going to sit at computers with live casino streams at our favourite brick-and-mortar places.

Apart from all that, Microgaming are also becoming increasingly active in the sports betting department, but it nonetheless still remains one of their weaker points and their product currently isn’t in use at any of the truly high-profile online bookmakers. That might well change going forward, but we do feel that there isn’t much to see here right now and that it’s actually quite understandable.

Since 2004, Microgaming have also started to make their products compatible with the various mobile platforms, both natively and through HTML5, which is widely seen as the number one alternative to the increasingly obsolete Flash. Nowadays, virtually every single product they put out is available on both desktop and mobile devices at the time of launch.

Special Features

Microgaming are covering all the bases with the plethora of features their games tend to include, so expect to find the typical fare of free spins, re-spins, and win multipliers in pretty much every single online slot game that Microgaming have produced. Thankfully, it certainly doesn’t stop there, since these guys have also introduced some fresh ideas over the years – and many of them are still relevant nowadays.

First of all, we would like to mention that some of Microgaming’s online slots include different modes of play that dynamically switch from one to another and which give a new impetus to the entire experience by introducing slightly different rule sets from time to time. It’s always a breath of fresh air whenever that pops up – and we’re sure that it will make your stay at games like Battlestar Galactica incredibly enjoyable.

Another interesting feature that has pretty much been introduced by Microgaming is the 243 Ways-to-Win feature that’s become a bit of a trend in recent years. Put simply, Microgaming have decided to put the typical bet lines aside for quite a few of their games and instead go with a system that brings wins on a more regular basis and that basically gives players something new and unique to play with. Many other developers have already copied this system in one way or another, but Microgaming do have the most games on offer in this department and some of them certainly stand out even in the incredibly large pool of games that we can choose from nowadays. Immortal Romance and Thunderstruck II seem to be the crowd favourites, but you can choose from many others, including Battlestar Galactica, Alaskan Fishing, and The Finer Reels of Life.

Many of Microgaming’s online slots also award interesting bonuses that accumulate as you play – and the good news is that your progress is stored, so you don’t have to spend long hours playing the same game in order to reach them. One excellent example of this specialty can be found in the very popular Thunderstruck II online slot in the form of the so-called Great Hall of Spins that improves the bonus feature depending on how many times you’ve already activated it.

Finally, Microgaming are also naturally offering a number of games with progressive jackpots that can turn your life upside down with a bit of luck. Naturally, most of them can be found in the online slots department, but you can also try your luck elsewhere, for example in the excellent Caribbean Draw Poker game.

Top Online Slot Games

With all the aforementioned information in mind, you might have already realized that Microgaming are responsible for quite a few of the very best online slot games out there at the moment. To be honest, that’s not incredibly surprising considering that these guys have already produced more than 800 games, but the sheer quality of them is something that you simply need to experience on your own – we can only give you a few directions to the very best online slots.

When it comes to traditional online slot games, there’s a plethora of interesting offers to found in Microgaming’s repertoire. It is truly impossible to pick just one of them and say that it’s the best of the bunch, but we can definitely recommend Immortal Romance, Thunderstruck II, and Avalon II, which are the games on which Microgaming have been able to build in recent times. You could perhaps call them the current backbone of Microgaming’s online slot games, so they will undoubtedly give you a good idea regarding what these guys are able to put out there.

If branded games are what you enjoy the most, then you will be in for a real treat with The Dark Knight Rises online slot game, which includes many of the aforementioned innovative features. If fantasy worlds are more your cup of tea, you should definitely give the Game of Throne online slot a go in order to meet your favourite heroes once again. Some developers rush their efforts just to get a branded game out there in no time, but, thankfully, Microgaming prefer quality over speed and that’s why none of their branded slots look bad or even average – all of them are top-notch and many of them remain on our “best of” lists well beyond their release dates.

Those of you who are looking for big progressive jackpots that could allow you to turn your smallish stake into a real fortune simply have to know that Microgaming run an extensive network of progressive jackpots that are scattered around their online slot games – one of their bigger progressive jackpot sis even found in their Batman-themed game! There’s also the Major Millions progressive jackpot to dream about, but the biggest and most interesting one can be found in the Mega Moolah games, including Mega Moolah Isis and Mega Moolah Summertime. That’s where millions can be won – and if that doesn’t get you going, we don’t know what would.

Supported Platforms

Since Microgaming have always been one of the biggest innovators in the field, it is hardly surprising to see them offering products on a very large variety of platforms nowadays. To be fair, it’s pretty easy to make cross-platform products and services nowadays, but it’s nonetheless pretty impressive to see Microgaming’s achievements on this particular front, especially if you also consider that these guys have usually been among the very first to make an appearance whenever a new platform popped up.

Although the focus has recently shifted from regular computers to mobile devices and tablets, the majority of online gaming is still done on desktops and that’s why these guys are still offering an excellent download package of the Microgaming experience. The stand-alone download is also typically seamlessly integrated into the entire online casino that you’re playing at, which means that you can usually also easily do all the banking operations from it.

Alternatively, Microgaming also offer a Flash interface if you want to enjoy your gaming from a web browser. This interface is virtually the same as the stand-alone download in terms of functionality and it might also be easier and more convenient to use for some.

If mobile gaming is what you’re looking for, you’ll be glad to hear that Microgaming are also offering pretty much the same deal for the most popular mobile platforms. The web-based interface they offer is compatible with pretty much every single mobile device out there, but you’ll be much better off by downloading the stand-alone apps, which are already covering the vast majority of the market, as native downloadable apps are available for iOS, Android and Windows devices.

Microgaming are also actively developing their very own Quickfire platform that aims to provide a seamless gaming experience suitable for nearly all operators out there. Since this is something that’s running in the background, we’re only mentioning it for you to know how professional Microgaming are and how they aren’t willing to compromise or take any chances – the backbone of all the operations is what they’re actively caring about as well.

Notably, Microgaming are also active when it comes to multi-player options and their multi-player products are accessible across all three platforms (download, Flash, Quickfire). It seems to us that this option is still fairly underutilized, with the various live casinos being its main application, but the possibilities are nearly limitless and we’re already looking forward to what Microgaming will be able to do with it in the future.

Of course, not all online casinos offer all of Microgaming’s products and support all of the aforementioned platforms.

Known Problems/Issues

Since Microgaming have been around for a really long time, it’s not surprising that they’ve had their own share of smaller problems and issues over all those years. Thankfully, most players have stayed unaffected by those things and it’s safe to say that Microgaming are almost flawless in the software and security department.

One thing that needs to be mentioned is that Flash is considered to be an outdated platform by many and that many software developers are currently abandoning it in favour of newer ones, so chances are that Microgaming will also have to make the jump at some point in the near future. We’ll see how that goes and if it brings any issues or problems – right now, however, everything seems to be fine from our point of view.

It should also be noted that Microgaming have already been – rather unfairly – blamed for a number of issues and problems that originated at the online casino or the online sportsbook to which Microgaming have only provided their products and services. Liquidity issues are nearly never the issue of software providers, but Microgaming seem to be going the extra mile nowadays and are only rarely working with online casinos that are seen as slightly suspicious in the wider community – and we can only applaud them for this decision.

Summing Up

As we’ve already mentioned, it’s very likely that you’ve already enjoyed at least a couple of Microgaming’s products – and chances are that some of them now even firmly belong to your favourites. We could talk a lot about the various online slots and other casino games they’ve produced, but the bottom line is that they all have excellent production values and that the company is as professional as it could possibly be in virtually every single department. It’s only unfortunate that these guys will never have the same publicity as the online casinos they supply with a constant stream of excellent products.

All in all, Microgaming are currently the top of the crop when it comes to online casino software providers and, considering what we’re seeing from them nowadays, it seems to us that things are indeed going to stay that way in the near future. There are some worthy contenders out there trying to reach the place where Microgaming are at right now, but it will take some time or a major screw-up from Microgaming for them to really have a shot at the throne. There’s just no going around it – as far as we are concerned, Microgaming are the current number one on the online casino gaming front.

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