10 YEARS OF TECHNOLOGY ADVANCEMENT
Te most successful virtuals are built for betting first and the industry has made huge strides in technology and playability over the past decade. Initially based on hand drawn 3D animations, now some of the biggest movie studios use high-tech motion capture technology to create the ultimate sports betting product.
Audiences also want more out of their betting experience. Cutting-edge innovation has helped bring fans closer to the action, with more options available to heighten entertainment and engagement levels. As such, additional elements that appeal to customers, including statistics, live content and, more recently, in-play within virtuals, help bookmakers to differentiate their offerings. Personalisation is also a key factor, enabling fans to choose what they want to bet on, when and how.
Virtual sports contain all these betting features. Our virtuals solutions, for example, are based on real sporting events and can be played out live across multiple channels, including mobile and online, providing the same engagement factor as live streaming. Te same betting markets and statistics utilised in real sports are presented, giving users access to just as much information and entertainment.
While the look and feel, betting options and ability to play 24/7 provide the gamification and personalisation that, again, will continue to be a key aspect of a stand-out offering. Te underlying factor of all of this is realism.
Realism is crucial with audiences expecting the same quality from virtual sports betting solutions as they do from live action sport. Using the world’s best motion capture studios with real-life professional athletes, enables us to create virtual sports that look and feel just like the real thing.
Tis technology enables virtual sports suppliers to capture huge volumes of footage and transfer it instantly to simulate the real-time movement of 3D characters. Many people compare this to playing a video game but there is no comparison. Whereas you can visibly see the movement when a football player alters direction in a video game, the transition between a player’s motion is seamless within the leading virtual products. Sooner or later you won’t notice whether a product is real or virtual, with natural movement perfectly replicated.
Te other key to ensuring the most realistic virtual sports experience is by using the same data, markets and odds as real sports. Our virtual products are all based on our comprehensive sports and betting data that we have accumulated and analysed for more than 20 years, enabling us to power these products with real-life team and player statistics. Tis has, and will continue to, boost our portfolio
with in-play betting solutions to appeal to customers who bet on form and momentum and is crucial to helping us maintain the unpredictability and excitement of real sports. We also offer the same betting markets in our virtual solutions as we do in real sports, seamlessly merging the betting experience so that this is also the same as placing a bet before or during a live game.
Te other significant advance has been the introduction of in-play and modelling them in the same way as a real-life match. We changed the game significantly with our tennis product, for example. Tennis is a ball-by-ball betting product, therefore we introduced two to three hour matches complete with all the in-play options of a person-to-person game. Two years ago, it was all about pre-match betting, today the importance of live betting and who will win the next point has grown significantly.
Virtuals has often been a supplement to sportsbook, but during these turbulent times, and even when sport resumes, we should not underestimate its appeal both as a standalone product and as part of a wider sports offering. Tanks to the advances in technology and gaming, it has an even greater ability today to extend user sessions and increase site visits.
Equally, with comprehensive data, in-play betting and the latest technology adding to its near real-life visuals, plus its flexibility, ease of integration and 24/7, ‘always on’ nature, virtual sports can both enhance and complement the entertainment and engagement factor of a sportsbook. Its potential to add value has never been questioned, but it is being realised now more than ever.
NEWSWIRE / INTERACTIVE / MARKET DATA P71
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