Robots have already begun working as casino bartenders, and are now dealing cards
Land-based casinos might be looking at the next revolution in the business that consists of bringing human-like robots to work on casino floors. The product is presented by the gaming technology developer LT Game, a subsidiary of Paradise Entertainment Limited. Paradise has long been engaged in providing management services to casinos, as well as the sale of electronic gaming systems, mainly to a casino located in Macau, the Casino Kam Pek Paradise. These robots powered by artificial intelligence (AI) will be working as casino dealers, and the company confirmed that it is ready to deploy the product in the casino.
Under Macau’s law, only residents of the island can be employed as casino dealers, which has translated to a lack of manpower to take over those functions. Therefore, this product can be tested in ideal circumstances, especially because there are no expectations of the situation to change for casino dealers anytime soon. The robot was first presented at the opening day of the 2019 MGS Entertainment Show at The Venetian, and LT Game QA engineer, Ross Zhang said, “Local casinos lack manpower so we invented this machine in which we keep the fun of the game while avoiding the lack of manpower with this robot.”
These dealers can operate table games, stand or sit behind a casino table and dispense the appropriate number of cards or blocks to players, and even operate other gaming equipment like chips. The design of this AI-robot has been going on for years, and the first prototype was presented at the 2015 Macau Gaming Show. Since then, the company has been working on getting government licensing and going through a required testing period. Perhaps now, this product comes to address a need in one gambling location; nevertheless, a successful launch means that other casinos might consider replacing human dealers with robots to lower costs and avoid human error, among providing many other benefits.