Even if the machines pay out 89% of the time, the house still wins. Quite a bit. On every $1, it keeps 11 cents. So, let’s do the math: if you play a $1 machine for an hour, or approximately 800 spins, you’ll have spent $800. The fact that casinos refuse to provide the chances of winning on each slot machine (despite the fact that the government does not force them to) should serve as a caution. McDonald’s is obligated by law to declare the odds of winning each reward when it holds a contest. The same may be said for Powerball and the state lottery. Casinos, on the other hand, consider the odds as a well guarded trade secret.
Three rotating reels are typical of an สล็อต pg machine. There are roughly 20 symbols on each reel — a cherry, a lemon, a blank, and so on. Since 20 × 20 x 20 equals 8,000, it’s logical to estimate that a person’s odds of winning the jackpot are one in 8,000. Reasonable, but incorrect. In reality, today’s electronic slot machines have even worse odds.
Because a slot machine is set for much more stops than the 20 symbols seen on the reel, each reel may hold up to 256 symbols. Even though the device is not around, every video slot incorporates a small device microchip that produces random data on a regular basis. The computer pauses on three numbers, one for each reel, when the button or lever is pressed or pulled, and those random numbers (after the internal computer does some computations) correlate to the symbols on the reel and indicate where each reel will stop.
The digits one through 66, for example, may represent a blank between the symbols, whereas 67 through 77 could represent a lemon or a bar, and so on. Obviously, lower-paying symbols correlate to more numbers than higher-paying symbols.
The jackpot symbol is only one or two numbers, 255 and 256. Because the losing blank lines above and below the jackpot picture correlate to more random numbers than other images, the blank stops exactly close to the winning symbol are the most likely to be struck. This gives the false sense that they “barely missed” the prize, encouraging them to continue playing. Of course, the proximity of the actual stations has little bearing in actuality.
And the reels are weighted: the jackpot symbol is considerably more likely to appear on the first and second reels than on the third, deceiving you into thinking you were near to winning and keeping you playing. So the odds are 256 × 256 x 256, or around 1 in 17 million, or roughly double your chances of becoming president. And the odds are significantly better for some machines.
While the casino business doesn’t expect most people to grasp all of this, you’d think our lawmakers, who decide whether or not we have slot machines in Maine, would.
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