legal ?

In the current issue of "Men's Health" it was mentioned that digital slots have made it easy to program in "near misses". For example every fifth spin on a slot two 7's may show up on the play line or on a video poker machine three aces may be programmed to appear every 10/15 hands.

Although these "near misses" do not mean a big win is coming , the human brain is programmed to believe " near misses" indicate you are making progress.

I thought progamming of gaming chips with this kind of "near miss" technology was against the laws of the Nevada Gaming Commission ?

So they say- but who really knows if they are telling the truth?

Most everyone knows it is not the case. WOF spin, for instance, about a third of the time you will land on the slice next to the 1000, which happens to be the lowest pay on the wheel, 25 I think.

When you talk about the Wheel of Fortune bonus wheel, yes, that wheel is weighted, and yes, the slices next to the 1,000 coin slice have a lot more weight on the wheel than the 1,000 coin slice. As such, you get a lot of "near misses" with the big prize wedge. Even though the wheel has every appearance of being fair (evenly spaced slices), there is no regulation that requires the slices to have an equal likelyhood of being hit. (Video roulette wheels, on the other hand, DO have that requirement.)

As far as near-miss technology on slots go, it was outlawed, to a point. Old Universal brand slot machines has programming that would first (fairly) determine if the outcome was a win or a loss, but then occasionally if it was a loss that would have displayed, "blank - blank - single bar" or something boring like that, it could instead display "7 - 7 - blank." The outcome was the same -- the player got paid zero, but it made it seem more like they "almost" won.

The short version of the story is that IGT complained, and the gaming folks agreed with IGT and said, "that's not right -- you can't have an alternate set of results that display on a losing spin to make it seem like they were closer to the jackpot than the actual spin should have displayed."

Enter the Telnaes patent. IGT bought the rights to this patent and then went on to create machines that would also generate near misses, but legally. On a traditional reel slot (and the concept can carry over to video slots, too), there is the physical reel with 22 stops, and a virtual reel with any number of stops -- 64, 128, or whatever. Using the idea in that patent, IGT added a ton of virtual stops on the blank spaces directly above or below the jackpot symbol on the physical reel. As such, you would "almost" hit the jackpot (or "7") symbol many more times than you would actually hit it. Since the outcome of the virtual reel to physical reel translation wasn't being manipulated after the result was determined (like it was with the old Universal slots), it wasn't against the law. The end result is "legal" near-misses.

More reading:
http://robison.casinocitytimes.com/article/ask-the-slot-expert-slot-machine-payline-398

http://casinogambling.about.com/cs/slots/a/slotreel_2.htm

The outcome of a slot (including WOF) is pre-determined as soon as we hit the button, no?

Call it a near miss or whatever, it is pre-determined. When the wheel slows close to the 1000 then hits the 25 on either side...it is pre-determined, right?

I'm too lazy to read the articles LOL, and I will stand corrected if wrong.

Thanks.

For the most part, yes, but not completely. When you start a game of WOF, it is determined at that instant if the "Spin" symbol is going to appear on the third reel. It's possible, however, that the outcome of the bonus wheel spin isn't determined until you press the "spin" button, though. I don't know if anyone (other than IGT's programmers) knows that for sure.

Also, in bonus rounds where you have to pick, the outcome isn't always pre-determined. I have seen a PAR sheet for the original WMS "Jackpot Party" bonus -- the values in the presents on the screen are shuffled and hidden, and then the player picks until he/she hits a party pooper. The total bonus value isn't figured out until the player has made their picks and then hits a pooper.

knagl,

That was a very interesting explanation you posted, thanks a lot.

Personally, I would not be offended if the casinos were permitted to pre-program loads of near-misses, slots to me are designed to cause the player to overexpect winnings. So I love the Telnaes patent.

Imagine a $1, one coin video slot machine. The slot is called "Coin Flip". If the screen shows heads, the player wins $90. If the machine shows tails, the player loses her dollar.

They then install a chip that randomly generates numbers between 1 and 100. If the 100 comes up, that means heads, the $90 pay line is triggered, and the player is paid $90. If 1-99 comes up, that means tails, and the player loses her dollar.

As I understand it, that machine and its 90% payback would be incredibly dull, incredibly misleading, and legal. And I'd have no problem with it.

It might be a gray area about calling it "coin flip" since people could reasonably have the expectation that it's 50/50 venture, not a 90/10 venture. Maybe, maybe not. I imagine that the major game makers would come up with a different name for it... like......

the IGT game, "Hundred or Nothing"!



It's a 1-coin, $1 game. Get three red 7's, win $100. Anything else, lose your dollar.



Obviously, the 7's do not have an equal chance of landing on the payline as frequently as the blanks, or the game would give away the house.


Here's a video of the game in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nKGAqCFC3M

Incredibly dull is right, but the math behind it is the same as any other slot.

This may be totally off the mark here but here goes. I apologize in advance if this is pretty stupid.

The RNG determines the outcome of the reel spins. On a bonus game round (let's not talk about WOF this time, lets talk about pick a choice of bottles or monsters or strippers for a prize behind it by touching the screen), isn't the end result including the bonus and what is behind what you picked already determined by the RNG at the start of the spin even before the bonus is played?

So I am thinking it does not matter which bottle you pick as it was predetermined already by the RNG at the start of the spin, am I wrong?

I think this way since the payback percentage is already in the chip and the payback percentage has to include the bonus rounds for the payback percentage to work out in the long run.

Be nice please, I admit my ignorance.

Thanks.

Vantzy

No problem vantzy, legitimate question.

No, in this case the outcome is NOT predetermined. To use an example you have a choice of 10 packages to unwrap in the bonus section. 7 of the boxes have various multipliers or bonus amounts and 3 are duds. Player picks until he hits a dud. The RNG will assign the values to the various packages but not the overall outcome. For example it does not predetermine the player will get say 1200 bonus points regardless of packages picked.