Merkur Casinos – Pros and Cons
When compared to other online game providers, Merkur Interactive Services and Merkur Gaming are both considered small companies. This is due to the fact that they have a limited selection of games to offer. Currently, not all of their online casinos offer live table games. The company has built its reputation and has focused its business strategy on land-based casinos.
Not one to shy away from a challenge, they have leveraged the popularity of their top pokies to create their first online games. This has provided an opportunity for loyal game enthusiasts to play their favourite games from the comfort of their own homes or while they are out and about. As time goes on, they are developing a faithful following of punters.
Merkur Interactive Services has developed partnerships with iSoftBet and Blueprint Gaming, introducing Merkur online games to a much larger market. These partnerships have also increased the quantity and selection of machines that they have access to for the Merkur brand online casino sites.
It is easy to identify a Merkur Gaming casino site, as they all have ‘Merkur’ in the name and their familiar smiling sun logo.
Pros
- Integrates with online casino platforms to accept all of the popular, international deposit and withdrawal methods.
- Licensed with the UK Gambling Commission
- No software download is needed
- Straightforward pay lines
- Offer Free Play or No Money Wagered without a deposit
- Include Risk Cards and Risk Ladder Gamble Features
- Merkur Interactive Services offers its players additional gambling features on many of its pokies. Risk Cards offer the punter a chance to increase their win by 50% or 100%, by fluttering it on a 50/50 card picking game or by playing the more entertaining ladder-climbing game, Risk Ladder.
Cons
- Limited (but growing) selection of online games
- Only found on a small selection of platforms
- Does not offer Live Games on all sites
- Does not offer mobile play opportunity for most of their games
The Australian Government has taken a firm stand with regards to off-shore gambling sites and in recent years, has revisited this topic. On 13 September 2017 the Interactive Gambling Amendment Bill 2016 came into effect. This has severely restricted the access to off-shore casino sites in Australia without the use of a VPN.
Merkur Gaming – Pokies
Most of the Merkur Gaming games are designed around their most popular land-based machines. They offer users the opportunity to play a variation of or an exact replica of their favourite physical machines:
- Queen’s Citadel
- Eye of Horus
- 221B Baker Street
- Arabic Desert Adventures
- Age of Machines
In an effort to create an all-round electronic brand, they have also created the more popular table games of: Roulette, Roulette HD, Bahama Roulette, Scratch Cards and the progressive jackpot game, Jackpot Rain. Jackpot Rain is only available on Merkur Gaming online gaming sites.
Merkur Gaming sites are one of the more generous when it comes to offering Free Spins, Bonus Rounds and Bonus Cashback offers. They also offer No Deposit Bonus or Play for Fun opportunities that reset with every logon. Even with this, they have a lucrative Sign-up Bonus.
Merkur Gaming – Live Casino
Despite the small selection of live table games, they do offer the more popular games of:
- Blackjack
- European Roulette
- Casino Hold’em
- Deutsches Roulette
- Baccarat
- Deal or No Deal
- Football Studio
Play for Fun or Free Play is not available on their Live Table Games. Not all live games are offered on all Merkur Gaming sites.
Merkur Gaming – Mobile
Merkur Gaming is making great strides in getting their games created for mobile friendly platforms. They are aware of the market trends and have placed this at the forefront of their game design process.
Merkur Casinos in Australia – Licences and Certificates
All games created using Merkur Gaming software are subject to ongoing fair gaming approval from Global Laboratories International (GLI). An independent compliance company that not only inspects and certifies the software prior to it being implemented on their sites. They also do onsite inspections to protect the players and operators from any malicious tampering.
Global Laboratories International continues to hold an ISO 9001 certification on their software, ensuring that they continue to provide products and services that meet customer and regulatory requirements. In other words…they are doing everything possible to make sure their games are fair and safe to play.
The live European Roulette tables have an RTP (return to player) of 97.3%. In an effort to ensure their players can enjoy their games to the max, they also include tips on learning the best strategies for playing the live European Roulette table to the player’s greatest advantage.
The RTP for some of Merkur Gaming more popular titles rank as some of the highest in the industry:
- 77777 - 96.76%
- 221B Baker Street - 96.00%
- Eye of Horus - 96.31%
- Double Triple Chance - 95.65%
- Hocus Pocus Deluxe - 97.47%
- Ghost Slider - 95.91%
- Magic Mirror - 95.94%
- Dragons Treasure II - 96.00%
Conclusion
Merkur Casino and Merkur Integrated Services pokies are considered ‘too old school’ for some of today’s more sophisticated punters; while being just what the doctor ordered by others.
The vintage look and feel stems from the fact that the bulk of their machines are generally programmed with three to five reels and have a lower than expected number of pay lines when compared to many newly created games. That being said. They do have games that with more complexity, more symbols, and higher quality, detailed animated graphics.
Merkur Casinos offer a welcome change to the current trend of complex games that are being developed for today’s market.