Месяц: Февраль 2014

A few years ago, I wrote a column about a story I read in “The Economist” magazine. It described a study done testing the impact of near misses on a slot machine on the human brain.
What the researchers found out was that near misses generated almost an identical reaction in the brain as an actual win. So, if bar-bar-plum (a loser) can make the player feel almost as good as bar-bar-bar (a winner), all the manufacturers have to do is figure out how to make near misses show up a lot and players will feel like they are winning almost all the time.
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Fortunately, the regulations and the technology do not make this much of a challenge. Slot machines can legally be programmed to generate a disproportionate number of near misses relative to what might be considered random. So, while they might throw in some fruit salad once in a while as an ugly loser, most of your losses will appear to be “oh so close” to winners.
Now, a new study was released this week that says the bells and whistles used on slot machines make the player feel like he is winning even when he isn’t. The days of coins dropping out of the slot are virtually gone, so the casinos added sound effects to the machine.
When you used to hit a cherry, got two coins back and heard klink-klink, this was simply not the same as hearing 20 or 100 coins going klink-klink-klink. But, in the digital age, no one says the sound effect has to mimic the actual win. So, the casinos can have a simple 2-coin win sound a lot like a 10-coin win.
To prove the theory, the researchers had slot players play with sound and without sound. Those with sound had a stronger impression that they were winning, even when they weren’t.
While this latter concept can be used for video poker, it holds a little less water because in most varieties of vp there is no such thing as winning but really losing.
While many hands in video poker result in a push – which may feel like winning because your original wager is returned (i.e. Jacks or Better), there is generally no hand that returns only a portion of your original wager. With the new generation of slot machines it is not uncommon to wager dozens of coins.
Frequently, a win will result in getting only a fraction of your wager back. Did you really win? If you wager 20 coins and get back 5, is this a win or a loss? Admittedly, I am the first to argue that once you wager the money it is lost and any money you get back is a victory.
This seems much more applicable to table games where you play 30 to 40 hands/hour rather than a slot or video poker machine where you can play hundreds of hands per hour; and repeatedly wagering 20 and returning 5 can quickly wipe out your bankroll.
So, what is a player to do when faced with all of this psychological warfare used by the casinos? Ironically, you have to use your own type of science against them. The science of math. Yes, with the exception of some varieties of video poker, the math says in the long run you will lose.
I’ve written many times that you need to look at casino games as a form of entertainment. The question is, do you want your night of entertainment to cost $20-$40 or to cost $100-$200? I’m guessing you’ll get a lot more value for your money if you spend less money.
Most of the games in the casino are built to allow the player to win about a third of the time over a 3-hour session. This assumes you learn to play each game correctly and try to pick the right games/paytables to play.
While I strongly advocate for playing video poker, if you wind up playing a Jacks or Better that pays 6-5 (Full House/Flush), you’ll be playing a game that has a payback below 96% and your chances of winning will decrease considerably. In similar fashion, playing a full-pay game has limited value if you don’t learn the right strategy.
Casinos rely on these two factors for games like video poker. Slots have no strategy and inherently have lower paybacks, so they need to come up with ways to essentially fool the player into thinking he is doing better than he actually is.
Video poker doesn’t need to create artificial near misses. A deck of cards and a dealt hand do an amazing job of creating these in a natural random fashion.
To combat the near misses and the bells and whistles of the casino requires doing a little bit of homework to learn which games to play and to learn the right strategy for those games.
It requires some discipline to stick to those strategies and to seek out the right games. Math can be your rock to the casino’s “psychological warfare” scissors.

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The downgrade of IGT came on the heels of a report from Mississippi where casino customers were singing the praises of the company’s progressive machine, “Wheel of Fortune.”
Earlier this month, an Alabama man won the $1.5 million jackpot on the penny “Wheel of Fortune” progressive jackpot at Hard Rock Casino in Biloxi.
Four days earlier, according to a story in the Biloxi Sun Herald by Mary Perez, an Indiana woman won the ninth-biggest jackpot ever hit in the state when she won $8.3 million playing a 25-cent statewide progressive “Wheel of Fortune” machine at Fitz Casino in Tunica.
The writer noted Mississippi comes in as IGT’s third most winning state, after Nevada and New Jersey, with 403 jackpots totaling $513 million in winnings.

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A tale of two gambling countries: Why Canada is the real gambler’s paradise
It’s pretty amazing how the 49th parallel separating Canada from the US is more than a symbolic border. When it comes to online gambling, it separates one school of thought from another.
The school of thought we like? The Canadian online gambling one. As a country, we tend to embrace online gambling. While the US has gone after offshore gambling sites and attempted to shut them down, Canada has learned to live with them. Instead of the mob mentality embraced by the US of eliminating the competition, Canada subscribes to the old “if you can’t beat them, join them” proverb.
Case in point? British Columbia, Manitoba, and Quebec. In an effort to capitalize on the popularity of online gambling like Internet poker and casino sites, the provinces decided to create their own Internet gambling portals where residents of the province can play on a provincially regulated site.
Ontario, too, is trying to get in the game. The country’s biggest province by population is working on establishing an online presence. It will be run by the OLG, which doesn’t exactly have a stellar history of making players happy (what with their lottery ticket scandals and slot machine payout errors), but at least Canadians have options.
Gambling in Canada is a big bet
So how did we get here? How did we get to the provinces deciding that online gambling is a good thing while so many states to the south of us are totally against it?
Well, it has a lot to do with the gambling market in Canada. It’s big. Actually, big is an understatement. Massive is more appropriate. We’re talking $16 billion big. That’s billion with a B. And that’s not a typo.
While the United States sees gambling as a dirty little secret and, in some states, a horrible sin, Canada sees it as an economic stimulator. In fact, in Canada, gambling is part of the hospitality industry. And with $16 billion in revenue per year, it sits right behind the limited-service restaurant and full-service restaurant industries as a top Canadian revenue generator. Gambling, for the record, is ahead of the hotel and transportation industries.
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Before you decide you want to be a part of this industry, let’s be clear. It’s illegal to operate an online gambling site in Canada. Technically, only the provinces can do so. That’s why so many gambling providers are based offshore.
But here’s the thing. Many servers for online poker sites and casinos are actually based within Canada’s borders. They’re technically on a Native reserve, but they are in Canada. If you’ve ever searched for an online poker site or casino to play it, you might have noticed the Kahnawake logo plastered at the bottom. That means that many sites are licensed by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission. And many sites have their gaming servers based on Native land. Because the federal government doesn’t really want to get in a fight with First Nations, the Canadian government has pretty much respected their sovereignty.
But this is actually bigger than just the government being complacent. Gambling sites have had a pretty big presence in sports and entertainment. Just look at NHL games, which for the longest time featured poker site advertisements along the boards. And you can’t watch a current CFL game without seeing an on-field advertisement for a betting site.
Gambling advertising. In sports arenas. In 2013. In Canada. Contrast that with the US where everyone pulled out of gambling advertising after the fall of the big three online poker sites.
Fewer restrictions, more choice
Canada’s lax stance on online gambling means that Canadians have way more choice for places to gamble than our neighbours to the south. That doesn’t just apply to the online gambling world. Even live casino popularity is growing in record numbers.
The government of Ontario is currently undergoing a modernization program that includes building several new land-based casinos throughout the province. The province already has a number of resort casinos in Niagara and Windsor, plus Native casinos like the big one in Orillia. And they’ve got tons of slots and racetrack sites. But their goal is to satisfy Canadians’ appetites for gaming by building several new casinos.
Sounds great, right? More gambling for Canadians who love to gamble? Let’s be honest, though. They have a hidden agenda. Gambling generates tons of revenue for the province of Ontario, and they use that money to build things like hospitals and do other things to help communities across the province.
Hidden agenda or not, if you ask us, that’s the ultimate win-win situation. We should all be thankful we live in a country that celebrates responsible gambling and believes in gambling freedom. The US should take a look at Canada to discover what liberty really feels like.

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Owners of a $125 million horse racetrack and video slot racino near Youngstown are scaling back the number of gambling machines that will go into the facility.
Penn National Gaming said this past week that it will open with 1,000 video slots instead of 1,500 as planned.
The Vindicator in Youngstown reports that Penn National’s president says they’ll allow demand to determine if any machines should be added later.
Groundbreaking for the racino took place in May.
Penn National also operates casinos in Columbus and Toledo.

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Siberian Storm is one of the most popular IGT slots to feature in the casino halls of Las Vegas. We take a closer look at the evolution of the game, its theme and game mechanism, to see if we can unlock its secrets.
Siberian Storm was first unveiled to Las Vegas gaming audiences in 2010. After a year where it wowed millions of avid slots fans, IGT – the development house behind the game – revealed it was their most successful game in 2010, beating its other hugely popular titles, such as Sex and the City, Cleopatra and the Megabucks machines.
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This slot machine uses an intriguing system of reels, set out in a roughly hexagonal arrangement. It offers players an unbelievable 720 different ways to win, paying out for any combination of consecutive adjacent symbols reading from left to right, and from right to left.
What’s more, it also uses a special winning system known as Multi-Way Xtra, which pays you a multiplier on any specific combination’s prize equal to the number of permutations of the said combination on the reels. This sounds a lot more complex than it actually is – after all, the Las Vegas slots audience wouldn’t have warmed to Siberian Storm in such a big way if there was even the merest hint of inaccessibility in its base-game.
The Multi-Way Xtra system featured on Siberian Storm was first featured on another popular IGT game, Treasures of Troy. This machine is themed around Homer’s epic Iliad, and comes complete with a free spin round that’s activated by hitting Trojan Horse scatters. However, the reel arrangement in this game, which uses a conventional five grid with an equal number of stop spaces on each one, didn’t ­really seem to lend itself to the Multi-Way Xtra system.
In our opinion, the spin cost was disproportionally high when compared to the amount of winnings you could take from the machine. We believe this was a big factor that IGT considered when creating the innovative hexagonal reel arrangement that’s part of the Siberian Storm signature look.
One of the questions we’re often asked about Siberian Storm is whether or not the Multi-Way Xtra system is as truly innovative as IGT claims. The short answer to this is, when compared to many other slot machines that offer what’s known in the trade as ways to win systems, it’s not really that different, as these tend to pay out multiple prizes for each instance of a combination that appears on the reels.
Where Siberian Storm does stand out, however, is in the fact players can win on the reels for combinations reading in both directions, which is quite a rare mechanic on any slot machine.
We believe one of the big reasons for the success of Siberian Storm is the use of white and Bengal tigers as some of the main symbols on the reels, forming the central point of this game’s theme.
These large cats will always be associated with a unique magic act in Las Vegas – the famous Siegfried and Roy. Gamblers in Las Vegas have come to associate these magnificent animals with the high art of stage-show magic. Players who are looking to conjure some wins off the reels of the many slots in Vegas are always going to choose a theme with which they feel an affinity. They are also well known for liking games suggestive of fate and fortune, which are ideas that go hand-in-hand with magic.
It’s our opinion that IGT has cleverly chosen this theme to hit these notes with the gambling public. Siberian Storm is one of the most successful slots of the last few years to feature in the IGT catalogue. While their new standard reel games like Kitty Glitter and Cats attracted quite a large interest in Las Vegas on their release, they failed to really offer players a new and exciting twist on the slot concept. Instead, they relied on free spin and wild mechanics, which are commonplace within the industry.
But Siberian Storm has been so well received over the past few years that IGT remade it a number of times.
The first re-skinning is known as Fire Opals. This gem-inspired game also gives you more free spins in the bonus round, although in order to accommodate this we believe the mathematical model behind the reels must have been trimmed to offer less cash in the base-game.
Star Trek: Against All Odds uses IGT’s tie-in license with the latest generation of J.J. Abrams-directed films to bend this formula around the USS Enterprise and her well-known crew.
Finally, the most recent slot to be based on Siberian Storm is the Mexican-themed machine, Day of the Dead. This has received a very good reception in Las Vegas, mainly due to the extremely colorful and distinct graphics and animations, which feature dancing skeletons blended with a fiesta feeling.
The final part of the Siberian Storm picture is the free spin round bonus. Players need to hit at least one scatter on every reel to access this feature, receiving eight free spins for every permutation of this combination they hit on the reels.
This means players can hit a maximum of 96 free spins in the initial reel blast with a chance to add even more with re-triggers during the feature.
When you put together all the component parts of this fantastic slot machine, it’s not hard to see how it became such an overnight Las Vegas gaming sensation.

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When you spend a lot of time in casinos gambling, you often see new things, and are occasionally reminded of what to avoid.
That happened to me recently when I walked into a casino and chased a keno jackpot that was just a few dollars from hitting. I didn’t get the jackpot and was reminded not to chase bets.
Chasing can happen anywhere from the sports book to the machines to tables. Chasing rarely wins and is rarely fun. I try to be smart when gambling, while always wanting to have fun.
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Siberian Storm one of the most popular slots in Vegas
I was introduced to chasing when first playing poker. In poker, chasing happens when you lose a tough game. Human nature tells a player to immediately avenge their loss and go right for a win on the next hand. Risk, odds and probability for the win be damned. We must win at all cost.
Human nature isn’t always right and if the statistics aren’t on your side when you go for revenge, you will most likely lose. I learned not to chase in poker after too many losses because of blind rage.
Chasing followed me to the sports book. Nobody ever wants to end their football weekend with a loss so it’s easy to bet the Sunday or Monday night games to exact revenge on that late Sunday loss. No bueno.
Pro sports bettors will always tell you chasing losses in football is among the worst plays you can make at the sports book. Most football bets I make are based on studying data, watching games and checking the psychology of a team. It takes more than a few minutes to pick a team.
Now, instead of trying to exact immediate revenge I’ll just wait for a game I like next week. Last week when I chased that video keno jackpot it reminded me: a) I don’t like keno of any kind and b) I shouldn’t be chasing.
Returns on video keno are as bad as penny slots. I play penny slots because I like the bright lights and loud noises. They entertain me.
I was walking through a casino and saw an empty bank of 10 keno machines with a progressive jackpot that pays out by $100. The progressive was up to $93 and change so I figured I’d drop a few bucks in and see if I could get that jackpot
Two hours later and bored out of my mind a little old lady sits down. Three hands later she snaked the jackpot from me.
I was out of coffee, cranky from losing the jackpot and down money. After a few minutes of internal complaining I walked away with a lesson learned – don’t chase jackpots. It was a lesson that cost me as much as a trip to a psychiatrist so we’ll call it even.
Gambling is almost as psychological as it is statistical. When you’re able to master both you’ve probably reached the pinnacle for a gambler. I don’t think I’ll ever reach the point where I master both sides of gambling but it sure is fun trying to get there.

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