BetConstruct, the award-winning developer and provider of online and land-based betting and gaming solutions and services, has announced today the launch of a new ground-breaking service called Game Store.

Game Store allows game developers the opportunity to turn their creativity and technical expertise into hard cash and earn royalties from any and all of their games that get deployed on the BetConstruct platform.

BetConstruct has established a transparent process and concise API to make it simple for third parties to integrate casino and skill games into their platform.

Vahe Baloulian, BetConstruct’s CEO said “This type of opportunity offers the potential for any independent developer or game expert to have unfettered access to a revenue stream that has, until now, been mostly beyond their reach. It is part of the innovative Spring Platform, which we launched at the ICE 2015. There are so many incredible developers who don’t have the opportunity to complete “the last mile” – i.e. to get their games in front of the real money gambling public. Game Store changes everything in this regard. It is a win-win situation for all as BetConstruct gets to offer their partners totally new and unique games.”

Now that we’ve gotten a chance to take a few breaths and settle down from the whirlwind coverage of the Floyd Mayweather Jr. – Manny Pacquiao fight, it’s time go finally go back to what we do best: taking a look at the betting market surrounding the fight.

It’s already been established that Mayweather is the favorite leading up to the fight, even though the action so far has been heavy on the Filipino southpaw. The one-sided bets favoring Pacquiao have even forced some sportsbooks to drop his odds and raise Mayweather’s own odds. This time, though, we’re going to dive into the first round – no pun intended – of prop bets that have been released.

Usually, the more kooky prop bets are released closer to the fight, but for now, round betting and fight outcome are what’s already being offered.

The first prop is a pretty straight-forward, asking the question on whether the fight will go the distance or not. A bet on the fight going all 12 rounds is the favorite at 1/3 odds while a bet on a stoppage is a short underdog at 23/10. There’s not a lot of surprise here because most pundits believe that the fight will go to decision, hence the heavy favorite odds on that happening.

The Sun City Group, the largest junket operator in Macau, has plans to invest in a hotel and casino project in Phu Quoc, an island in the southwest portion the Kien Giang in Vietnam.

According to Vietnamnet, the  company CEO Alvin Chau Cheok Wa said, during a meeting with local authorities, that Sun City was willing to put up a resort and casino in Rach Tram hamlet in Bai Thom or Bai Truong in Duong To commune, should current investors who have dibs on the area decide to withdraw their projects.

Kien Giang province Vice Chair Nguyen Thanh Nghi, who recommended that the company submit official documents for the government to consider, welcomed Sun City in Vietnam. Nghi pointed out that any proposal submitted to the government should come with a full understanding of certain provisions on foreign investment laid out by the state, particularly those targeting Vietnam’s gaming and casino industries.

The announcement is a positive shot in the arm for Vietnamese officials who welcome foreign gaming and casino operators, who are beginning to see Vietnam as an attractive tourist destination in Southeast Asia.

Casino operator Sands China has unveiled its new movie-style TV spot starring retired footballer and former England captain David Beckham under the marketing campaign “Never Settle.”

Remember when Sands China scrubbed the debut of a marketing push it had created starring Beckham last month? Turns out, the casino operator merely shelved it temporarily, delaying the launch for one month for reasons that are still unclear.

Beckham is at the heart of the ad, walking around Marina Bay Sands in Singapore, dressed up all suave-looking and inviting everyone to enjoy all the spoils the integrated resort and casino have to offer.

The Anthony Mandler-directed TV spot is just one aspect of the “Never Settle” campaign, which will also consist of newspaper and magazine ads, as well as billboards spread all over Asia, particularly in Singapore, Indonesia, China and Malaysia.

My Poker Pal are putting the ‘banter’ into poker, quite literally, after announcing plans to host Strip Poker, Crazy Shots, and Masked Events at their inaugural Grand Party Festival in Montenegro.

At the tail end of January I sat down with My Poker Pal founder Paul Rimmer to talk about his dreams.

It was a simple.

He wanted to put the banter back into poker.

The sports world has been embroiled in one episode of outright lunacy after another in recent weeks. From Russell Westbrook morphing into the Highlander to the ongoing mess that is NFL free agency, there’s so much going on in the world of sports that keeping up has become a workout in it of itself. I haven’t even made a peep about the excitement surrounding the Mayweather-Pacquiao mega fight, the circus of nuttiness that is the Champions League, and the ongoing Cricket World Cup (shout out to the fellas over there in Oz!). You could say that my sports calendar looks like a grocery list by now, and yet, I know that I still need to keep enough space for the biggest sports spectacle of the month.

March freakin’ Madness.

See, there’s a reason why March is dominated by college basketball and it boils down to two things: rooting interest and gambling. I didn’t go to any of the schools that are likely going to the tournament so that first part is of little interest to me. The second part, though, is where I’ll be taking a lot of action, boss.

Gambling is such in an ingrained part of March Madness that a lot of people from all walks of life gamble on the tournament without even knowing that they’re doing it. Yes, those office pools and bracket wagers generally involve monetary transactions, making them a form of gambling. But that’s beside the point. What’s important is that March Madness is arguably the most important sporting event for any sports book in a calendar year…and that includes the Super Bowl.

Lee Davy pores through the weekly news stories including Mukul Pahuja and Mike Sexton stirring up a little C&C, and the Godfather of Poker having surgery to remove a melanoma and then back to the tables within a week.

Sometimes writing this column is like eating soup with chopsticks, but this week I got a big spoon.

We start with the reigning World Poker Tour (WPT) Player of the Year, Mukul Pahuja. Talk about a man on a tear. The Florida native had made the trek to Maryland to play in the state’s first World Series of Poker Circuit (WSOPC), when he took to twitter to share a four page iPhone notes account of all the things pissing him off.

It seems the spark that ignited the Pahuja petrol bomb came from the organizers of the WSOPC Baltimore Main Event. They took the rather crass approach of advertising a $1m guarantee, after the prize pool had topped $960,000.

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has proposed using unclaimed casino winnings to help cover the costs of medical examinations of rape victims.

On Thursday, Jindal revealed that he is working with state Rep. Helena Moreno to end the practice of charging sexual assault victims for the cost of their post-attack medical exams. The Times-Picayne recently reported that rape victims can expect to pay up to $4,200 to cover the costs of these exams, creating a further deterrent to victims coming forward to report their attacks.

Jindal’s office claims the state’s casinos keep around $2.3m per year from unclaimed winning horseracing tickets and expired slot machine tickets. Jindal and Moreno want to divert those funds to the Crime Victims Reparations Fund. The plan would enable the state to receive an additional $1.2m in federal money for the Fund.

Moreno says she expects “there will be some opposition” from the casinos, who have been booking the unclaimed funds as earnings, “but I couldn’t think of a better cause.” Jindal’s assistant chief of staff Stafford Palmieri said the governor had “reached out to the gaming community and they agree this is a good cause.” Palmieri said the state would reimburse casino operators for any taxes they might owe on the unclaimed winnings.