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Gaming & iGaming trends for 2021
Gaming and iGaming industries exploded in 2020 as the pandemic has only reinforced the new edge entertainment trend. In times of massive uncertainty, the world turned to simulate reality games as a new way to connect and unwind.
According to Statista, today there are already more than 2.7 billion video gamers worldwide. The entire video gaming market is expected to be worth over $200 bln by 2023. As to iGaming, around 1.6 billion people gamble throughout the year, while the global online gambling market is anticipated to be valued at more than $92.9 bln by 2023.
Here we’re going to explore the impact of the pandemic in these domains, uncover new trends within the booming industries and learn what to expect for 2021.
Changes in the industries in the COVID times
Lloyd Richman, CEO of iBet Digital, thinks that since COVID-19 first hit, a lot of sportsbook bettors, who used to bet on a daily basis, started to look out for new things to bet on. “For sure, they were very unhappy, because almost all sports competitions had stopped at that moment. And this is why virtual sports have uplifted, as well as eSports”.
Lloyd briefly explained the difference between virtual sports and eSports.
“Virtual sports are predetermined or pre-recorded games architected by computer software. It’s very much a virtual video, that’s played out and then people can bet on that in real-time. Whereas in eSports people are competing against each other playing the likes of Counter-Strike or FIFA whether they’re playing individually or as teams. It’s streamed in real-time and viewers are able to bet on it the same way they do with sports.”
Will Mercer, venture director at Zag, a founder and CEO of Umaya Village, pointed out his favourite stats about eSports: “The entire of tennis as a sport can only support 300 full-time professional players, whereas League of Legends, which is just one of the many eSports, can support a thousand.”
At the end of 2020 Esports entertainment group acquired Lucky Dino for $30 mln, an online casino operator with its own proprietary casino platform. “You’ll probably see a lot more eSports levelling up with Sportsbook in 2021 because there’s a lot of money in that business”, says Lloyd Richman.
Poker also saw huge growth, in spite of the fact that just a few years ago, it was considered as a dying out product. Today poker products started to boom again across the whole industry. “People had time to kill while being stuck at home, sleeping patterns were changed and they were able to invest into things like 6-hours tournaments as opposed to quick Sit & Go games”, says Richman.
But all of this might change very quickly. “When poker was huge five years ago, eSports wasn’t really around. But today we’re seeing that virtual games are getting pushed a lot more. The same appeals to live casinos that boomed in the last few years. But all of it probably will go back into decline again, because the real sports are back”, noticed Lloyd.
From a technological perspective, there are several trends just coupling all together in an interesting way.
There’s a tremendous growth of the social media component in gaming. It became really important both in games and in-gaming infrastructure like Discord. “Gaming acts as the niche to hanging out and talking in comfort with your own communities and friends”, adds Vlad Beck, founder of Black Snow Games & co-founder of Sigma Software Group.
At the same time streaming has shown enormous growth compared to pre-pandemic. Twitch jumped from 9 billion hours watched in 2019 all the way to 17 billion in 2020. This is also accompanied by 5G getting up and running.
Casino in GTA V and the future of in-game experience
GTA V has sold over 110 million copies, making it one of the best-selling video games of all time, generating over $6 bln worth of revenue. In 2019 Rockstar released its Diamond Casino & Resort update, which lets players use real money to play its games. The casino’s chips can be purchased with in-game currency at a $1 to 1 chip ratio.
Richman believes that the full-time merging between online computer games and online casinos is happening right now. “It’s been happening, but very slowly. Rockstar released their Casino update six years after they released the original game.”
“In that week after they released the casino update, it was the most anticipated downloadable content (DLC) ever across PlayStation. They had more players playing GTA than they had in the previous six years”, emphasised Lloyd.
The audience wants to come on and play slots, walk up to blackjack people and watch virtual sports on horse racing. Rockstar merged into the casino and into gambling via creating slot games on an RPG computer game level. This is the accelerated change in gaming, and in the next 10-15 years merges like this are going to happen on a regular basis.
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casino games
Booming Games marks two years in South Africa, targets top supplier spot
Booming Games says it is marking two years in South Africa and is setting a target to be “recognised as the market’s leading games provider in the next 1-2 years,” according to a company statement dated 14 July 2026.
The Malta-based supplier entered the market in July 2024 and says it has since grown from a single partner relationship to working with “a host of tier one operators across Africa.” The company also claims its local team has doubled in size, with further hiring planned in the coming months, and noted shortlistings at the SiGMA Africa Awards and iGA Summit Awards earlier this year.
In South Africa, Booming Games said it has more than 145 titles “tested, approved and live” in Mpumalanga, Western Cape and Eastern Cape. The company also pointed to a partnership announced last month with World Sports Betting (WSB), under which a selection of its titles will be integrated into WSB’s platform.
Solomon Godwin, Head of Africa at Booming Games, said: “Close partnerships with operators is central to our ability to innovate and deliver at speed. These collaborations allow us to establish a comprehensive feedback loop that informs future games. Put simply, we listen to our punters through our partners.”
Looking ahead, Booming Games said it plans to expand into “every remaining province” and increase investment in local presence and operator partnerships, including targeting new aggregator platforms entering the market. The supplier also said it will expand its release pipeline with localised titles and is developing new games across crash and instant categories, alongside updates to existing games.
Max Niehusen, Founder of Booming Games, said: “South Africa already drives the largest proportion of our revenues in Africa, and as we celebrate two successful years here, we are well placed to build out our offering even further over the years ahead.”
The post Booming Games marks two years in South Africa, targets top supplier spot appeared first on EE Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
iGaming Marketing
Tonybet awards €7,000 silver prize in World Cup Card Collection campaign
Tonybet has awarded a €7,000 prize to a player in Kilcock, Ireland, after the customer found the campaign’s silver card in the operator’s World Cup Card Collection promotion. The update was announced Tuesday 14th July 2026.
The World Cup Card Collection includes 51 cards: 48 digital cards representing each participating World Cup nation, plus three unique cards—gold, silver and bronze—tied to prize payouts. Tonybet said the bronze card was available during the group stage and was previously found by a customer in Canada.
According to the operator, the silver card was available during the knockout rounds through the quarter-finals. The gold card is now in play for the semi-finals, third-place play-off and final.
Tonybet Head of Product Kiryl Liudvikevich said: “Our Tonybet World Cup Card Collection Bronze prize went during the group stage; now Silver has gone too!
“A massive congratulations to our lucky winner in Kilcock, County Kildare. Silver was always the knockout-round card, available once the World Cup reached the stage where a single result ends a team’s tournament. It has found its winner just as the field thins to the last handful of nations.
“Now we’re down to the final four, that’s where the competition really hots up, leaving just the golden card still hidden somewhere for our lucky winner to find. Best of luck to all of our players as this amazing World Cup reaches its conclusion this week.”
Tonybet said its World Cup Card Collection runs until 31 July. With the bronze and silver cards already claimed, the remaining campaign prize depends on when the gold card is found before the promotion ends.
The post Tonybet awards €7,000 silver prize in World Cup Card Collection campaign appeared first on EE Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
b2b partnerships
Tequity signs Koom Games to its RGS platform
Tequity has agreed a Remote Gaming Server (RGS) deal with slot studio Koom Games, with the partnership announced on 14 July 2026. Koom Games will use Tequity’s licensed modular RGS to develop and roll out new titles for distribution to operators worldwide.
Under the agreement, Koom Games will use Tequity’s infrastructure to handle game delivery while keeping control of its creative and development roadmap. The studio said its approach is to build content closer to mobile and social gaming than traditional casino titles.
Tequity said it currently supports 31 RGS clients and manages more than 130 integrations across regulated markets. The company positioned the Koom Games deal as part of a wider run of commercial agreements with providers and operators.
Tanja Bergman, VP of Partnerships at Tequity, said: “Koom Games is a studio that is looming to enter the global market by making a big splash. The team’s dedication to creating content that is genuinely fresh is highly impressive. We are thrilled to offer the stable, high-performance environment needed to transform this creative vision into a market-leading reality.”
Marko Zulj, CEO & co-founder at Koom Games, said: “Whenever operators and aggregators ask us what category our games fit into, we actually struggle to give a traditional answer. Instead, we tell them, ‘you’ll need to try them, because you haven’t played this before’.
“Our games come with completely new mechanics, fresh math, and features built for social engagement. To scale such a vision and remain agile, we needed more than a reliable RGS — we were looking for a robust iGaming platform that lets us confidently develop in any direction, and we found exactly that in Tequity.”
The post Tequity signs Koom Games to its RGS platform appeared first on EE Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
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