The online casino industry has always wanted online gambling to be considered as a form on online entertainment. Just as computer companies offer multiplayer games for the internet, the casino firms hopes that the public would view them as yet another computer company offering similar services. Time went by, and a new British regulation might finally bring the entertainment industry and the online gambling community together - only in a very different way. A new regulation, the latest in a series of gambling regulation issued in the United Kingdom, might change the way we look at online gaming in general.
Under the new regulations, computer games such as World of Warcraft would be considered as online gambling. The game, by the well-respected Blizzard Company, is a multiplayer computer game that allows players to play in a virtual world. Players are able to create their own virtual selfs and go about a journey with different missions and a dynamic plot. Many see World of Warcraft as the future of computer gaming. However, according to the new regulation - the game is a gambling game just like poker is. If you find this to be weird, then you are not alone. Apparently, because computer companies charge fees from players in return for new missions, levels and options in the virtual world - the games could be considered as a form of gambling.
The definition of a gambling game includes a fee that is paid for playing, just like poker has an ante and a multiplayer game has a license fee. A gambling game also has prizes - just like online casino games feature jackpots, and internet computer games hand out virtual prizes (like extra levels etc.) that can be exchange for money. Computer firms will have to license their online activity over at the same authority that would regulate the online casino world, and that is surely something odd.
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