Roulette Chat

What it is

Roulette Chat is a free video chat community where random people from around the world connect for group and private webcam chat. It is a roulette-style site rather than a cam site: there are no performers selling shows, and the site states there is no paid service at all. Its twist on random chat is a spin wheel that shows thumbnails of other users before a visitor connects. It describes itself as a free video social network, its FAQ says what visitors do in a private chat is up to them as long as they break no laws, and it requires visitors to be at least 18. No registration is needed to enter.

What you get and how the money works

The mechanic is a wheel. After logging in, a visitor clicks the Spin button, and the wheel shows thumbnails of random users in whichever room the visitor is in. The site says the wheel displays up to 5 random users at a time with thumbnail snapshots. A black thumbnail means that user's webcam is disabled. When the wheel stops on a thumbnail, the visitor can click Chat to connect to that person or click Spin to try for someone else, and a Disconnect button ends a live chat. The home page also says a visitor can see the partner's broadcasting before talking, and see the gender of the partner before the chat starts, so there is no need to ask for age, sex and location.

That preview is the site's main selling point: a visitor sees who is on the other end, and what gender they picked, before choosing to talk. The home page also lists HD quality in video cams as an advantage of the service, which is the site's own claim.

Gender is chosen before joining. The home page says users must pick a gender and that the choices are girls, guys, couples, ts and groups, so a visitor meets one of those types. It adds that there is a good and friendly LGBT chat community in the service, which a visitor can join, talk to randomly, and browse the broadcasts of. The site's own wording is that it allows a free video chat with girls, guys or couples instantly. The nav bar also carries a Girls link.

There are two chat formats. The original random chat is private video chat between strangers, and visitors can also invite anyone they know for a private video chat directly by email. The group version allows live video chat with up to four people at the same time, using text and audio chat as well. A connected visitor can receive unlimited invites from other users while chatting, shown as a pop-up under the video screen. The features list also includes enlarging the partner's video screen and taking snapshots.

Rooms organize the wheel. A visitor chooses a room from the Rooms menu and clicks Go, or types any room name to create and enter it. The site advertises unlimited chatrooms that can be created and entered instantly. The catch, in its words, is that other people have to type the same room name for the visitors to see each other on the wheel. So rooms are shared names rather than a directory of populated channels, and a visitor who creates a new room has to tell others its name.

The social layer is small. A visitor who sees someone they like can press Kiss to give that person 2 points, or Praise to give 1 point if they impress in some way. The site says a user with a lot of points is worth chatting with, and that for now points give bragging rights, with rewards planned for the near future. A visitor can add someone to a Friends list with the Friend button, which sends an invitation to accept or decline, and can look a user up by user name with the Search button if the wheel loses them. Block adds someone to a block list. A Hide My Location checkbox removes the visitor from the map where partners' locations are shown, and a Do Not Disturb checkbox hides the visitor from the wheel while they chat.

Guests and registered users differ in what is kept. A guest's user name becomes available again at logout, and the friends list, points, block list and preferences are lost. Registered users keep their user names, friends, points and settings permanently, and registration is free. The home page says some features need registration.

The pages cover embedding too: Roulette Chat can be embedded into any website for free with a custom embed code, with no hardware, software or programming skills.

The figures from the pages

• Price: the FAQ says Roulette Chat is 100% free to use or embed into a website. The home page says there is not any paid service on Roulette Chat, and that registration is free.
• Wheel: up to 5 random users at a time, with thumbnail snapshots.
• Group chat: up to 4 people at the same time.
• Points: Kiss gives 2 points and Praise gives 1 point. The FAQ says points are bragging rights for now.
• Age: at least 18 to enter and use the site.
• Technology: the About page says it works with any Flash enabled web browser without downloading or installing software.
• Rules on the home page: no recorded videos from a webcam while broadcasting, nothing obscene, rude or illegal, no giving out or asking for personal info or spam, and no logging in as a female or a couple if the user is male.

On adult content the FAQ says Roulette Chat is a private video chat network, so what a visitor does is up to them as long as they are not violating any laws. Abuse is reported with the Abuse button from inside the chat, and the About page repeats that route.

Who it suits and who it does not

Roulette Chat suits an adult who wants a free random video chat with no payment screen and no account, and who likes to see a thumbnail and a gender label before committing to a chat. The group video option, the invite-by-email private chat and the shared-name rooms make it more flexible than a bare one-button roulette, and the points and friends list give regulars a reason to register. Webcam-less visitors can use it too, since the FAQ says a webcam is not required and others will see a black thumbnail.

It has plain limits. The site says it runs on Flash enabled browsers, which is a technical dependency a visitor should check before relying on it. The rule against male users logging in as female or couple tells a visitor the labels are self-declared. The pages describe no verification, so the gender shown on the wheel is only what the user chose. Rooms only work if others type the same name, so a new room can stay empty. Finally, since the site is free and has no paid tier, there is no premium route to private shows, performers or recorded content.