State planning exhaustive tests of gaming machines’ accuracy

Tuesday, March 16, 1999 | 10:33 a.m.

A laboratory set up inside a government building near one of the three proposed casinos is testing slot machines and other gaming hardware.

"We get into every nook and cranny. There are 65 pages of tests," Patrick Leen, a supervisor for the Michigan Gaming Control Board, said from inside the lab where he and three other employees test the slots.

"We want to make sure that when you put in $1, you get a $1 credit," said Leen, whose duties include approving the machines. "When you win 100 credits, it's accurately reflected."

Slots generate up to 70 percent of a casino's revenues, and Leen said the state needs to protect its interests and those of gamblers by ensuring the machines work.

"If something went wrong in Michigan, we can't blame it on Nevada," Leen told The Detroit News in a report Tuesday.

Manufacturers bear the entire cost of the testing program, the newspaper said.

"It's important to manufacturers, casinos and, most important, the public that they're confident that the games do what they say they'll do. The lab is another layer of security," said Brian McKay, general counsel for International Game Technology.

"Labs are sometimes underfunded and understaffed, but there's no indication we'll run into any undue delays in Michigan."

Testing the machines involves a combination of computer science and electrical engineering. A few slots at a time are tested during a process that takes an average of two months or more.

"We want to make sure it doesn't fry the brain of a machine," Leen said of the electrical impulses beamed at each slot. "In the old days, it would trigger a jackpot."

They'll even see whether static electricity from humans creates havoc. "We don't want patrons to put a quarter in and get fried," Leen said. Machines also are doused with liquids to simulate angry losers.

The lab also tests a slot's computerized program to make sure it pays off as often as it's designed to do. Other checkups involve nothing more complex than slipping 10 coins into the slot to see what happens.