How to Beat Video Gambling Machines

Casinos started out with cards and dice games being the big lure for the player, and now slot machines have become more popular. They are flashy, loud and a lot of fun when they are paying out. There is no sure-fire way to beat a slot machine; the odds are generally against the player. The machines are designed to take more money than they give and to make a profit for the casino. To turn the odds in your favor, however, you can educate yourself on the payout percentages of each machine, and to use strategies that will help you win a jackpot.

Difficulty: Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Slot machine
• Money
• Players Club card

1. 
    
   Gambling machines come in all sizes, wth different pay-outs.

   Visit a legal casino. There are many in Las Vegas, Nevada, where it is legal to gamble. You can also find them owned by Native American tribes, located on their property. For a vacation, find a casino that is attached to a hotel, which sometimes offer casino packages with vouchers that work like money, and you will not have to drive home after a long night of gambling.

2. 
    
   Players Club Cards

   Find the customer service desk and ask to fill out a Player's Club Card. Slide the card in the special reader slot in the machine. Use the card in every slot machine you play. It will gather points that you can use for free hotel rooms, meals, shopping and even give you money back.

3. Find the highest payout machines. Casinos will put machines that payout a lot in easy to see places, where you enter or stand in line for dinner, near cashiers' cages, check in, at the beginning of a row of machines. They will not be next to the lines or any place a customer is forced to be idle. They put machines in these areas to occupy you while you wait, and they rarely pay out. Ask an employee working at the casino where the machines are with the highest payouts. They are required by law to help you with this. You can also look for signs that show a high percentage of payouts. Gambling machines are set at different percentages, the average is 95 percent, which means that over a period of time the house machine will pay out 95 percent of a dollar and the casino will get 5 percent. This sounds like you should never lose more than 5 percent of your money, not true. Casinos would be out of business if they paid that out every time. It is a percentage that is gathered over a period of thousands of game sessions. If the sign says "up to" a certain percentage, then the casino legally only has to set a few machines at that percentage, so the trick is finding them.

4. Always play the max bet available to get the highest jackpot possible. Machines that are played at a higher denomination, like a dollar or five-dollar machine will generally have higher payouts than a penny or nickel machine. Progressive machines have large jackpots, but do not pay out very often. Three-reel machines that line up on one line have a record of higher payouts.

5. Every slot machine operates with a Random Number Generator (R.N.G) that is constantly generating different number combination's even when not played. The trick is pushing the play button at the exact moment the jackpot numbers are being generated, which is completely left to luck. There is no such thing as "a machine that is due to hit," a machine can go for days without hitting and then in 1 day hit twice. The average three-reel machine has a 1 in 27,000 chance of hitting big.

6. 
    
   Big jackpot win

   Any jackpot over $1,200 has to be reported to the IRS, so keep track of all the money amounts you lose when you gamble. You can use them to offset any winnings when reporting and filing your taxes.

Tips & Warnings

• Make a decision on the amount you are going to spend before you enter, and stick with it. Decide how many rolls you will sit through before it hits, if eight or ten go by and no hit, move to another machine. Ask the pit boss at a casino if you have earned any comps. They can give you vouchers for free dinners or tickets to a show, and can even give you free rooms.
• Gambling is supposed to be fun. If it is making you miserable and you're running out of money, find another hobby that does not have the potential to destroy your life and leave you broke.

References

• Learning Slot Strategies
• Slot Payout Percentages
• Las Vegas Slot Machine

Resources

• Las Vegas Specials