Kotaku – This can only be a bad thing. Virgin Gaming is a service that essentially allows users to sign up and place real world bets on online games. Seems like a complete recipe for disaster to me, but hey, I’m not judging. It’s an automatic service that does all the heavy lifting for you and automatically deposits the cash in the right player’s account.
It’s probably worth noting that gambling in video games is a bit of an odd issue. Dan Golding looked into this subject fairly extensively last year and found that it was relatively easy for underage gamers to access Virgin Gaming’s gambling mode from within FIFA 13, and South Australia’s Gambling Starts With Gaming campaign focused almost exclusively on the links between gambling and video games.
That campaign was eventually changed, with a tagline of ‘Gambling Is No Game’, but I can’t help but wonder if these services will raise the ire of a certain group of people. If it’s relatively easy for kids to access it, then maybe the service deserves the negative attention.
Regardless, if you are a responsible adult and you totally want to wager on a Super Street Fighter IV match, go crazy. Knock yourself out. Or don’t because then you’ll lose your money!
