New law could bring esports to Vegas casinos

Slot machines are boring.

This isn’t just my empty wallet talking, it’s the fact that young people don’t want to spend their time on boring and unwinnable games when they have an entire world of video games at their fingertips.

New Nevada legislation aims to fix this problem by allowing skills-based games in Las Vegas casinos, Ars Technica reports, potentially opening up to the booming world of competitive video games that’s taken hold around the world.

“There is no other destination in the world that can rival the experience millions of visitors travel to Nevada for annually,” Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval said in a statement. “In order for our state to sustain its edge in an increasingly competitive gaming industry, we must continue to expand, evolve, and embrace the potentials found in the 21st century.”

The legislation, passed earlier this month, may yield fruit in the form of partnerships between video game studios and casinos. And if Governor Sandoval wants to stay atop the “increasingly competitive gaming industry” and capture a “new generation” of gamers, esports are an obvious future option.

It’s clear that the first beneficiaries of the legislation will be the Association of Gaming Equipment Manufacturers who currently make many games in the city. That group calls the law “a new era of gaming entertainment.”

There’s justifiable skepticism about the idea that Las Vegas would ever put out a game that would allow it to be a loser to a skilled player. Whatever games do appear, they may follow the model of poker, which puts skilled players against one another with the house taking a generous cut of the action.