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Gaming Guru
What's Up with All These Penny Machines?25 April 2005
Dear Dave, There are no dumb questions here. Dumb answers, yes, but no dumb questions. (Okay, I paraphrased that bit from a Car Talk commercial.) If you want to find the higher paybacks, head off the strip and go to the casinos that the locals frequent. The locals scene is dominated by Station Casinos and Coast Casinos. Best of luck in and out of the casinos,
Dear Joe, Probably not. The jackpot combination was the result only at the split second that game began on the one-dollar bet. If the max-coin bet began the game at the exact same split second, then the jackpot would also have hit. Chances are, though, that the max-coin bet would have taken more or less time to place than the one-coin bet, so the game would have begun at a different instance and therefore would have a different result. Best of luck in and out of the casinos,
Dear Paul, There are many ways to populate the virtual reels in a slot, but there's only one way populate a deck of 52 cards. Unlike slots, video poker machines with the same paytables have the same long-term paybacks, Best of luck in and out of the casinos,
I don't know of any way to download the game and I don't think it's on any CD of slot games. If anyone knows of a home version of this game, please let me know and I'll print your response in a future column. Best of luck in and out of the casinos,
Five years ago, if I told people that nickel and penny slots would be the fastest-growing segment of the slot floor, they would have thought that I was crazy. But then video slots and ticket systems really took off and low-denomination machines are taking over more and more of the slot floor. Players like penny machines for many reasons. Players have a lot of betting flexibility in the number of lines and number of coins per line they can bet. A penny machine is also almost guaranteed to be a ticket machine. And a penny machine can be played by players with all sizes of bankroll. Video slots are big money makers for casinos. First, they tend to get a lot of play because many people enjoy playing them. Second, they also tend to have relatively low paybacks. Because players can bet just a few cents per spin, I think most casinos order about the same payback percentage for all of their low-denomination machines, regardless of whether they're reel-spinning or video. After all, the max bet on a reel spinner is usually 3 to 5 coins, and players could bet that many coins on a spin on a video slot. But most players play at least one coin per line and many bet the max. What a great situation for the casinos! The average bet on these machines has skyrocketed, but the payback is still the same. And players can't get enough of the games. Best of luck in and out of the casinos, Send your slot and video poker questions to John Robison, Slot Expert, at slotexpert@comcast.net. Because of the volume of mail I receive, I regret that I can't send a reply to every question. Also be advised that it may take several months for your question to appear in my column. This article is provided by the Frank Scoblete Network. Melissa A. Kaplan is the network's managing editor. If you would like to use this article on your website, please contact Casino City Press, the exclusive web syndication outlet for the Frank Scoblete Network. To contact Frank, please e-mail him at fscobe@optonline.net. Recent Articles
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