A Gamer's Guide to Live Baccarat Variations: What Makes Each Version Unique

Of all the games available in the online casino world, one game often goes under the radar. Players in land-based casinos are familiar with classic table games such as roulette, blackjack and poker, while slots aisles snake their way across the gaming floor. Some of these games even feature in high profile movies. However, baccarat is one game that is also steeped in history and has also taken its rightful place in the online casino industry.

Like other casino classics, there are many variations of baccarat that each contain subtly unique elements of game play to appeal to the wide audience of baccarat enthusiasts. With the introduction of live casino onto online casino platforms worldwide, the gap between realism and reality is bridged with the employment of real person baccarat dealers to organise the game play. But in an infinite online space, which versions of live baccarat are standing out on online casino operators?

Punto Banco

Sometimes the classics are the best and Punto Banco is the most standard form of baccarat play worldwide. The traditional game play revolves around bets placed on the Player, Banker, or a Tie. The standardised rules make for straight forward game play with no further action required once bets are placed, much like in roulette. The uniqueness lies in the simplicity of the game. With only three bets to choose from, two if you eliminate the long shot of a tie occurring, there is little thinking involved in this game based on pure luck.

Speed Baccarat

Online casinos around the world and more specifically, the digital nature of them, give casino classics more variation with programming capabilities allowing game parameters to be changed and new innovative features to be introduced. In live dealer baccarat games, the involvement of a real person dealer who organises the play already adds a uniqueness to the game play. But in the world of live baccarat, new variations are available in quicker forms of the game. In the revved-up version of speed baccarat, innovative game mechanics are integrated to produce faster game play.

While a round of standard baccarat would usually last around 48 seconds, speed baccarat is played with rounds being turned within 30 seconds. The rapid turning of hands provides a unique approach to the game with much less time to make decisions and more hands in a shorter space of time.

Lightning Baccarat

Speed baccarat takes the game play up another notch. Lightning baccarat takes it to a new level with the introduction of multipliers. In this breakneck speed version of baccarat, five random numbers are assigned multipliers and if these cards appear in a winning hand, a bet is multiplied by the assigned value. The inclusion of multipliers is a prime example of a classic game meeting digital enhancement to provide a new dimension of game play.

Unique Mechanics

Furthermore, another feature that applies to all versions of live baccarat is the presence of a side bet. Side bets are not linked to the value of the hands, but the cards drawn. Bets can also be placed on a pair being revealed for the Player or Banker, or if King or Queens pairs are drawn, known as a royal match.

Along with the variations mentioned in this piece, online casinos house a huge range of baccarat games produced by reputable game developers such as Pragmatic Play and Evolution. Peek baccarat allows players to see cards during game play, Bac Bo uses dice instead of cards to determine hands, and Always 8 Baccarat gives the banker a head start by always drawing an 8 as their first card. The range of game mechanics at the disposal of game developers means the game play has the potential to continuously evolve and find new levels of uniqueness.