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A new way to play blackjack by majority rule has launched with Playtech’s live dealer offering. In Majority Rules Speed Blackjack, players can all vote on how to play a hand, and the way that’s voted on the most is the way that the hand is played for everyone with a different option for forced strong strategies for tables with just a few players.
Majority Blackjack Comes to Playtech
One of the areas in which there has been a lot more competition in the past few years than ever before is that of the live dealer tables. We’ve seen companies like Playtech jump into this sector that was previously completely dominated by one company (Evolution Gaming).
They’ve been pushing the envelope with new ideas for classic games, and the latest is their Majority Rules Speed Blackjack title.
The way they’ve come up with something fresh and new over and over is really exciting, and if you’re the more casual type of player, which is the majority of people playing, then you’ll really enjoy what Playtech has brought to the tables this time, so to speak.
What’s New With This Title
There are two game modes with this new title, and the mode you get is based on how many players are active at the table. The main version is the Majority Rules version, and the key idea is that players will all vote on how to play the given hand instead of being dealt individual hands to play against.
In the live dealer version, they’d end up playing the same hands as each other anyway, and most of them would play it the same as each other in most cases. However, this forces the issue by causing the option that gets the majority of the votes to be used by everyone. This means that everyone wins, loses or ties at the same time.
Aside from that, if players are few at the table, it defaults to a Best Strategy mode that will automatically pick the best mathematical option available. This will literally play the game perfectly for the player, and the idea is to avoid a situation where a small few players could hijack the game by purposefully picking objectively bad options just to grief and bother legitimate players.
The Increased Social Factor
Because the players win together and lose together in the main version of this new variant, that means that they will be celebrating their wins together and lamenting their losses at the same time.
There is a precedent for this type of group play, and that’s in craps. It’s actually what made the game so popular for so long in land-based casinos.
In the example of craps, the vast majority of players play what’s known as the “pass line” wager, which means they are winning and losing at the same time as the person rolling the dice. The Majority Rules blackjack game creates a similar dynamic by putting players together with their wins and losses.
Playtech Moving Forward in the Industry
What we’ve seen with Playtech’s expansion into the live dealer arena is that they’re serious about taking on different sectors that they haven’t explored before. Many software companies will say this as some sort of lip service to their shareholders, but we don’t always see action on it.
With the various new titles they’ve came out with, and with the seriousness of the push they’ve even these new live dealer creations, there’s no doubt that Playtech is serious. What’s more is that they’re setting things up in a way that forces the issue on the social side of things as well, which is something that has been lacking overall in the online casino world for quite some time.
It’s possible that they learned from their work in the bingo and online poker markets that the social factor is pretty important for players, but no matter where it comes from, the fact of the matter is that what they are doing with their live dealer games signals a serious takeover of market share.