SERVER-BASED GAMING CLOUDS ON
THE HORIZON? Cloud computing is a hot trend in mainstream IT and it could be an industry- changing development if applied to server- based gaming.
Put simply, it means that heavy-duty IT
technology – in the case of server-based gaming, the servers that run the games and the disks that store customer data and transaction records – are no longer operated by the business itself (in this case the casino) but by outside suppliers, generically referred to as “the cloud”. The business just buys computing power and disk space as and when it’s required, taking the “thin client” principle that we examine in our main feature to the next step.
The benefits are simpler management –
fixing technical problems becomes someone else’s headache – and potentially substantial
cost savings, as the IT horsepower being paid for is always exactly the amount that’s required: there’s no wastage.
Many of us already do a bit of cloud computing without realising it. If you’ve used Windows Live Hotmail or Google Docs, for example, you’ve been in the cloud, getting all the benefits of email and office software without it running on your own PC.
And undoubtedly casino operators will
follow the lead of big firms in many other fields by taking the cloud approach to some of their non-gaming IT – to manage payroll and human-resources systems, or hotel bookings, for example.
The rise of server-based gaming, however,
makes it technically possible for the cloud principle to be applied to gaming systems too. It would permit innovations like the “pay for play” relationship between game suppliers and casinos that some have predicted: the casino only pays for the game when it’s actually played by a customer, rewarding good developers and
encouraging weaker ones to improve their product.
But the big question mark is, of course, the
regulators. The cloud computing provider would have to be as thoroughly approved as both the casino and all its technology suppliers are today; there would be fears over the vulnerability of the gaming systems and of customer sensitive data, not only on the cloud provider’s servers but in transit between them and the casino.
The cloud philosophy so strongly resembles the server-based gaming approach that it’s certain the growing interest in the cloud will have some impact on server-based gaming’s future. Perhaps we’ll see a very tightly- controlled form of the cloud emerge specifically for the gaming industry. But don’t count on being able to clear out the server room just yet.
For a complimentary guide to the basics of cloud computing, please email
casinointernational@barnabypage.com.
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