As long as I’ve been paying attention – and this goes back to the 1980s – slot players have been told that higher denomination slots pay back a higher percentage than lower denominations.
It’s not difficult to see patterns in wins and losses, and it’s all too easy to jump to conclusions based on small samples. Over the years I’ve fielded questions from readers who wondered if they should skip drawing to four-card straights because they missed several times in a row and from others who were convinced 20 was a losing hand in blackjack because they dealer drew a few 21s to beat them one night.
Among those who have been playing in casinos as long as I have, there’s a sizable number who miss being paid in coins clattering into the tray of slot machines. On a September day when I cashed out by printing a ticket, the machine’s speakers resounded with an imitation of that sound, and a neighboring player told me she missed the real thing.
The Internal Revenue Service has proposed changes to federal tax requirements on that could triple the amount of paperwork when we win big on slots, video poker and other electronic casino games. In one proposal, you’d still have to sign form W-2G on any jackpot of $1,200 or more, but also would require casinos to use their player tracking systems to trigger tax forms on cumulative winnings of $1,200 or more above losses in one day.
When you’re a smaller slot manufacturer trying to compete with the likes of IGT, Bally, WMS and Aristocrat, you need to be nimble, creative and innovative.
Multimedia Games has been all of that, and expects to keep bringing the innovation now that it has been acquired by Global Cash Access. The new company is in the process of rebranding, and will reveal a new name in late August.
Players usually don’t notice, or even have a chance to see, behind-the-scenes procedures that are important to the house.
Not long ago, I received a note via email from a craps player who was taken aback when a shooter rolled five sevens in a row. “It would seem to me there has to be a makeup time to get the odds to come out right,” he wrote. “What’s the hidden factor that balances those five 7s in a row?”
Casinos everywhere put their highest payback percentages on their highest-denomination slot machines. The Mississippi Gaming Commission report for October—the most recent available as I write this—showed that in northern Mississippi on non-progressive machines, payback percentages included 91.1 percent on penny slots, 93.3 percent on nickels, 93.4 percent on quarters and 94.5 percent on dollars.
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