Online Play and South Beach Casino

In Manitoba, gaming is regulated by the Liquor, Gaming and Cannabis Authority, or LGCA. Provincial gaming is conducted and managed by Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries. At a First Nations casino, that corporation is responsible for conducting and managing the games inside premises belonging to a licensed gaming operator.

The province also runs its own site for online play. Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries operates PlayNow.com, which Manitoba's regulator describes as the sole gambling site holding a Manitoba licence. In Manitoba, a person under 18 counts as a minor and cannot take part in gaming. Anyone who looks underage has to show ID to prove their age.

The regulator's caution to Manitobans is plain: most gambling sites shown to them in advertising sit outside Manitoba regulation. It also says it has no way to make such a site follow Manitoba law. Seeing an advertisement does not make a gambling site legal. The same caution covers the Ad links on the home page of this guide, set out below.

For a site licensed in Manitoba, the regulator's answer is PlayNow.com.

This guide carries paid links only on its home page. Each of the three is marked Ad. A button sits in the header, and two blocks appear, one just after the first screen and one close to the bottom of the page. Every one of them points to the same private online casino partner, which pays the guide a commission. That partner may change over time.

That partner holds no Manitoba licence, and it is not PlayNow.com. Nor is it connected to South Beach Casino & Resort or to the resort's Ocean Club.