Online roulette offers a number of different types of bets so that both conservative and aggressive players can enjoy the game. The common online roulette variants are American, European and French. In the newer releases software providers have included some advanced features. We list below Australian online casinos that offer the best roulette games.
The European Roulette wheel has 37 slots. These are for the numbers 1 to 36 and 0. You place your bets and then the wheel is spun. If the number of the slot in which the ball falls is covered by your bet then you receive the corresponding payout. The bets are placed on the roulette layout displayed on the screen. Some of the bets are placed outside the main numbers layout and are referred to as Outside Bets. The most popular of these is betting on red or black. Some of the other Outside Bets are even numbers and odd numbers and the first, second and third columns. The bets that cover 18 numbers pay even money and a considered the most conservative bets.
The Inside Bets are placed within the main layout and cover six numbers, four numbers, three numbers, two numbers and one number. The payouts for each of the European Roulette bets are available from within the game. The single number bets have the highest payout of 35 to 1. All bets, except the single number bet on 0, lose when 0 is called. This gives the house edge of about 2.7% to the online casino on all bets.
American Roulette originated in American land casinos. It is different from European Roulette in that the wheel has 38 slots. These are the numbers from 1 to 36 and 0 and 00. The game play, bets and payouts are the same as in European Roulette.
All bets that do not specifically cover 0 lose when 0 is called. Similarly all bets that do not specifically cover 00 lose when 00 is called. Because these bets lose on two numbers in American Roulette as compared to one number in European Roulette, the house edge for American Roulette is a double at 5.3%. This means that the Australian online casino player will realize an average return of 94.6% on American Roulette as compared to an average return of 97.3% on European Roulette.
All the Australian online casinos recommended by us offer both European Roulette and American Roulette. However we recommend that you should avoid wagering on American Roulette. There is one unique bet offered in American Roulette that deserves mention because it appears to be interesting. It is called top line and covers 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3. It pays out at 6 to 1 but has a house edge of 7.9%.
French Roulette originated in the land casinos in France and follows the European Roulette wheel. In French Roulette layout the numbers appear on the background of the same colour. Therefore the player cannot immediately distinguish between the red and black numbers. The biggest advantage of French Roulette is the La Partage rule. When 0 is called half of all the even money bets are returned to the players. This reduces the house edge for these bets to 1.35%. Conservative Australian players who want to wager only on even money bets should go for French Roulette.
In online roulette players like to create their own patterns from the standard bets offered based on their lucky numbers. In order to eliminate the cumbersome process of placing chips on this pattern before every spin Microgaming has created a feature that allows you to save the betting patterns you want. This is available in the Expert Mode in the Gold Series roulette games. Whenever you want to wager on a saved pattern you can click on it and at once the chips are placed on the layout.
One of the latest Microgaming online roulette variants is Premier Roulette, which incorporates some advanced features. You can customize the colours of the wheel and the felt. The roulette wheel appears in 3D format and a zoom view is provided to show on which number the ball has come to rest. The Win Details feature shows the details of all bets that have won. The History section displays the last nine numbers called. The Cover % displays the percentage of numbers covered by the wagers placed. The Expert mode allows Auto Play based on edited bet layouts. Microgaming Multi Wheel Roulette allows you to bet on eight wheels simultaneously with the same betting pattern.
The software provider Playtech also offers some online roulette variants with advanced features. One of these is 3D Roulette. It offers a 3D view to make the playing environment more realistic to start with. The roulette wheel can be customized in a number of ways. The Breakdown feature displays the break-up of the amount won. This is useful for new players who place multiple bets. The Repeat button allows you to repeat the same wager.
Video Roulette has even more advanced features. Realism is enhanced through video displays of the croupier spinning the wheel. The French Roulette bets can be conveniently placed through a drop down box. The payouts for all the bets are displayed in a separate payout table. Playtech Video Roulette has introduced a new feature called the Heat Map. Mathematically, the past history is irrelevant in roulette, but yet players use it to predict future outcomes. The Heat Map displays the most likely numbers and also the least likely numbers and also assigns probabilities to the numbers being called.
Online roulette fans should check out Playtech Marvel Roulette. It offers a progressive jackpot that is linked to the Marvel Mystery jackpot of the Playtech online slots. This jackpot is also triggered randomly and ensures that you will win one of the four jackpot levels offered.
