Even as IPL franchise owners continue to face the heat from income tax authorities amid allegations of financial irregularities, netizens are making quick bucks after buying their favourite teams in the virtual world.
Online T20 games launched by prominent gaming portals like zapak.com, indiagames.com and dream11.com, have become popular this season with cricket fever on a high fuelled by the ongoing IPL and the upcoming T20 World Cup.
Bidding farewell to popular online games such as ‘Mafia Wars’ and ‘Farmville’, cyber addicts are now enjoying the thrill of owning a cricket team, choosing their preferred players and even making some quick bucks with their team’s win.
Fantasy cricket gaming portal Dream11.com, which has over 4.5 lakh registered users, has seen a considerable jump in web traffic even days before the IPL extravaganza began.
“Cricket lovers are making one team every second on an average on our website. Even before the IPL began, we had around 9 million page views a month,” Harsh Jain, CMD, Dream11 Gaming Pvt Ltd told PTI.
Dream11.com offers cricket lovers an opportunity to create their own dream 11 team from over 180 Indian and international cricketers and win a total of Rs 5 lakh in cash and that too without investing any money.
The gamers have been allocated virtual money worth Rs 100 crore to choose their dream team. Interestingly, the results of the real-time matches played in the IPL are used to decide the points earned by the gamers.
“So if a gamer has bet on a player, who performed well in this IPL matches, he will earn more points and will be among the contender to win Rs 10,000 worth daily cash prizes,” says Jain adding that it took them nearly ten months to develop the game.
The Reliance ADAG group owned gaming portal, Zapak has launched zapakcricket.com with over 30 games themed on cricket, including fantasy ones.
“On an average, the portal sees 15-20 million page views a month. During the last season of IPL, Zapak recorded 40 million page views, which is expected to grow by at least 25 per cent this time,” says Arun Mehra, COO of Zapak Digital Entertainment.
They have also launched a multi-player cricket tournament called ‘Cadbury 5 Star Howzat Cricket League’, which is purely an online tournament wherein prizes worth Rs 10 lakh are up for grabs.
