Featured Articles Archive - Page 486

Is jackpot size your criterion for choosing a video poker machine?

Make believe you're at a casino and notice something strange. Five double joker video poker machines in a row. They all look essentially alike but have different jackpots for natural royals. You figure they're progressive games, where payoffs rise as action proceeds and nobody hits the biggie...read more

Aria casino gets license approval

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- There was never any doubt Thursday whether Nevada gaming regulators would approve a casino license for the centerpiece resort inside the $8.5 billion CityCenter development. However, all five members of the Nevada Gaming Commission said they had reviewed a 10-inch thick notebook of background information prepared by state gaming agents, as well as the transcript from last week's Gaming Control Board hearing into CityCenter...read more

Slot machines center of attention at G2E

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- Slot machine manufacturers didn't hold back at the Global Gaming Expo. Games with high-definition animated characters and 3-D graphics, touch-screen technology and Xbox-type or similar video game features were on display in the booths of the major slot machine makers. Slot machines built around familiar themes and popular culture took up a large chunk of G2E's 258,000 square feet of exhibit space inside the Las Vegas Convention Center. International Game Technology highlighted a slot machine based on the television series "Sex and the City" while WMS Industries displayed a game based on the movie trilogy, "Lord of the Rings." Bally Technologies focused on its games with new cabinet designs, liquid-crystal-display screen displays and games with new bonus-round features to enhance a player's interest. Companies even trotted out slot-machine chairs with movie-theater-quality audio systems built into the seat backs that played sounds incorporated into the games. Equipment manufacturers were more positive about the 2009 G2E than they've been about recent shows. "There is that sense of energy and anticipation this year," International Game Technology Chief Executive Officer Patti Hart said before the opening of G2E...read more

Pinnacle seeks to hire CEO in 90 days

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- Las Vegas-based Pinnacle Entertainment hopes to have a new chief executive officer in place "within the next 90 days" company officials said this week. Interim CEO John Giovenco, a member of the casino operator's board of directors and the former president of Hilton Gaming Corp., told Morgan Joseph gaming analyst Justin Sebastiano that his roll was "very temporary." Sebastiano met with Pinnacle management this week at the Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas. Pinnacle is looking for a new CEO after , who stepped down after a public incident at a St...read more

Deal Me In: Those thinking machines have still not arrived

Dear Mark: If a machine has just paid out a jackpot, would you recommend moving to another machine being that the machine now has to recoup its losses? Dale M. Far too many players erroneously believe that any machine that has just hit a jackpot won't hit another anytime soon because the machine has to re-prime the pump and win back the money it just forked out...read more

'American Casino Guide' super value; 'Beating the Odds' revealing

The American Casino Guide (2010 edition), written and edited by Steve Bourie, could be the biggest bargain of the year in regards to a book that's guaranteed to pay for itself immediately. The 496-page tome (paperbound, $18.95), which is really three books in one, does a remarkable job of explaining positive strategies for playing casino games, telling you where casinos are state by state and how to contact them and offering more than $1,000 in discount coupons for food, lodging, car rentals and for use in match play situations.Bourie's book is a new arrival as is Brandon Lang's biography (co-authored by Stanley Cohen), titled Beating the Odds: The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of a Sports Handicapper(hardbound, 249 pages, $24.95).The American Casino Guide's arrival is perfect, in time for a holiday gift item, for occasional or first-time Las Vegas visitors or for use by anyone who loves a bargain (show tickets, extra slot play, two-for-one buffet, free drinks and of course, the match play coupons)...read more

Catching up with Joe Cada

One year ago this week, Joe Cada celebrated his 21st birthday. He went out to a local bar in his hometown of Shelby Township, Mich. to savor his first legal cocktail with a group of friends and it was a satisfying feeling for Cada, but not for the reasons you may think. "I was excited to be 21, but not because I could go to a bar," Cada told Casino City...read more

Gaming insiders not betting on end of recession

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- America's casino industry is showing slight signs of a recovery from the economic firestorm of the past 18 months, but gaming insiders believe it will be three to four years before business returns to levels seen before 2008. During his annual Global Gaming Expo state of the gaming industry media briefing Tuesday, American Gaming Association President Frank Fahrenkopf Jr...read more

Penn seeks approval to buy Fontainebleau

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- Penn National Gaming asked the federal bankruptcy court in Miami on Tuesday to approve the company as the stalking horse bidder for the shuttered Fontainebleau project, setting a starting price of $50 million for the Strip development that had a construction budget of almost $3 billion. In an interview Tuesday, executives for the Wyomissing, Pa.-based casino operator said the Fontainebleau's value has fallen significantly since construction was halted on the 3,889-room project...read more

PartyGaming executive sees future in online betting

LAS VEGAS, Nevada -- Internet gaming companies could become the next wave of casino industry equipment manufacturers if the U.S. government legalizes online wagering. Jim Ryan, chief executive officer of Gibraltar-based PartyGaming, told a private meeting of institutional gaming industry investors Monday night that Internet gaming companies can provide casinos with better player data and customer tracking technology than they now use. "It's far deeper than that," Ryan said...read more