While Bingo was sweeping across Europe in popularity –another game of a similar ilk was also taking shape – Loteria. Like Bingo, Loteria can also trace its roots to Italy around the time of the 15th century. Loteria is a game that involves art and passion – being famous for its iconic and beautiful art imagery that are created and used for its cards. The use of iconic and now famous imagery really creates an easy to identify game that has grown in popularity ever since. In Mexico – Loteria has become commonly known as Mexican Bingo.
Loteria, Mexico’s most popular family game is played throughout Mexico. A bingo style game, the images on the cards used today can be traced to the late 1800’s, and have become established icons within the culture, attaining folk lore status. The game of Loteria uses images on a card instead of numbers as used in Bingo. There are 54 images on a card. Some of the most famous images being El gallo (The Rooster),El diablito (The Little Devil),La dama (The Lady),El paraguas (The Umbrella), La sandía (The Watermelon),El alacrán (The Scorpion) and La palma (The Palm).The images have become so famous in Mexico, that they have been used as imagery on products from tablecloths to sneakers.
The most famous Loteria cards were created in Mexico by Pasatiempos Gallo, S.A. de C.V operating as Don Clemente in the US market. It is widely described as Mexican Bingo and is known as a game of chance through the use of images.
Loteria’s real rise to prominence occurred when it made the leap across the pond from Europe to Mexico. Like Bingo, Loteria was played with many people and naturally appealed to the community based culture of Mexico.
Bingo rose in popularity across Europe at an increasingly rapid rate. 90 ball Bingo is now one of the most played games in the UK and Germany. When a Bingo game is being played – players need to either cover the whole card, the T bar, a horizontal, vertical or diagonal line. Similarly to win in Loteria, players need to cover 4 pictures in a vertical, horizontal or diagonal row.
It is impossible when discussing Loteria to not highlight the cultural symbolism that the cards have.
In Mexico, for example the imagery on the cards are inspired by some of the most important icons in Mexican history for example Guadalupe. Kids grow up playing Loteria from an early age while learning through the beautiful imagery and artwork the stories of Mexico and its origins.
In the modern era – Bingo has made the leap to Internet Bingo, where people can play multi player online bingo with their friends. They can play for both free or cash bingo rewards. The rise of online Bingo has been both rapid and startling. Unlike online bingo, Loteria has not made the same leap yet.
There have been many debates back and forth, if Loteria can make the leap to the internet. One major factor helping bingo make the transition online so easily is that unlike Loteria the online bingo industry has been able to create a Random Number Generator, which is essentially a program that is able to generate a sequence of random numbers. It would be interesting to see if the Loteria industry can make a similar leap. As a start, the Mexican internet community would be waiting with open arms.