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Marketers: Reduce slot hold to attract more customers
Fri, Jul 31, 2009 (3 a.m.)
Slot allure: A video poker player is shown at Timbers Bar & Grill on Maryland Parkway.
Longtime gamblers have been saying it for months: If you want people to play in your casino during the recession, reduce the hold on your slot machines.
A panel of marketing experts validated that strategy at last week’s Casino Marketing Conference and Player Development Summit, sponsored by Raving Consulting Co. at Paris Las Vegas.
About 200 casino marketing executives, mostly from tribal casinos and commercial properties outside Nevada, attended the event. Organizers called it “the recession edition” of the annual show, and many of the panels and presentations dealt with how to draw crowds in tough economic times.
In a session on what a casino’s best players are saying and doing during the recession, panelists concurred that many of them are staying home. But panelists said one strategy to get people in the door is to drop their traditional hold percentages to keep gamblers playing.
“Casinos have become far more interested in getting the money as quickly as possible to satisfy Wall Street,” said panelist Michael Meczka, president of Los Angeles-based MM/R/C Inc., and a 30-year member of the American Marketing Association and the Marketing Research Association. “Casinos no longer care about providing a great time, every time.”
Paraphrasing a line from 1995 Martin Scorsese film “Casino,” Meczka said no matter how slowly a casino wins its money it still wins.
He said a slight difference in slot hold — moving it from 7 percent to 6 percent, for example — can make a perceptual difference to the player. Lowering the hold enables a player to get more money back for every dollar played.
“The reality is the customer doesn’t know the difference between 6 percent and 7 percent,” he said. “But the big difference is that gamblers will play longer, have a better time and be more likely to come back.”
Meczka lamented some of the other strategies game manufacturers have used to enable casinos to win money from bettors faster – replacing the pull handles on “one-armed bandits” with push buttons, forcing gamblers to play maximum coins to win the biggest jackpots and designing games that play 50 or 100 poker games at a time.
On the table-game side, he said casinos are speeding up games with automatic shuffling machines and that dealers have become less personable in order to play more hands per hour.
“I view those as short-sighted answers to a long-term problem,” Meczka said.
But he admitted making those changes is tough sell with casino bosses pressured to maximize profits at a time when companies are heavily burdened by debt loads. But during a recession, when every casino is clamoring for market share, is a good time to push for bold changes to attract customers, he said.
Panelist John Thomas, executive director of Clear Seas Research, which conducts the VegaSAT Index, an independent Las Vegas visitor satisfaction survey, concurred that hard economic times are the best times to try new things to attract customers. His most recent surveys indicate there are plenty of things Las Vegas visitors like – and a few things they’d like changed.
Clear Seas’ 10-minute visitor intercept surveys conducted in late 2008 and early 2009 said the atmosphere of a casino is what attracts most gamblers to where they play and where they stay drives their gambling habits.
Most U.S. visitors said they were “somewhat satisfied” with slot machines and table games in Las Vegas and contrary to previous studies, non-U.S. gamblers are spending less than their American counterparts in the casino.
And what would those surveyed want to make Las Vegas a more desirable place to visit?
Respondents wanted restrictions on escort-service pamphlet distributors, improvements on mass transportation on the Strip, more family-oriented attractions, improved customer service, a theme park and a major-league sports team, Thomas said. They also wanted more information to be available on nongaming attractions and tours of local points of interest.
One of the highlights of the Casino Marketing Conference is Raving Consulting President Dennis Conrad’s presentation on the best and worst casino promotions of the previous year.
Conrad applauded Station Casinos for Texas Station’s job fair in collaboration with LasVegasJobs.com. He also gave a nod of approval to O’Shea’s squeamish “Freak Show” entertainment as a curious attention-grabber.
But Conrad saved his best material for ripping casinos for the worst promotions of the year.
As in years past, Conrad – who won’t name names when listing the worst marketing ploys – attacked properties with promotions that could be construed as geared toward children. He criticized “Three-Ring Circus,” “Kat in the Hat” and “Funhouse” with messages seemingly directed at children.
He also ripped promotions with religious connections, such as “Merry Giftmas,” “O Cashmas Tree” and “Stocking Stuffer” as well as IGT’s roundly criticized Noah’s Ark-themed slot machine.
Conrad also was critical of the tackiness of a Canadian casino that offered the giveaway of 22 Mercedes Benz B200 cars so close to the struggling Detroit auto industry and the O’Aces Bar and Grill in Las Vegas for giving away a free handgun for players who hit two royal flushes within 30 days.
Discussion: 62 comments so far…
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To move toward a change in business model is more than than most of these morons could handle. It would require flexibility.
Hopefully the casinos will adopt the wise strategy of reducing their "hold" percentage on slot machines. I have been to Las Vegas 80 times since 1975 and over the years, especially in recent years, have definitely noticed that the slots have become much tighter. This certainly takes most of the fun out of gambling. Losing slowly is still fun. Losing quickly is not. The occasional winning session is a real high, but I haven't had that feeling for a long time. The bean-counters have ruined Las Vegas for slot players.
I can remember back 27 years ago when times were real bad and Vegas was like a ghost town. I walked into the Aladdin in the middle of the day and there was only 1 crap table open and it was only about 12 full. The competition for business was fierce! The marquee's in front of all the casinos were all saying 98% payback! IT WORKED!! People slowly started getting wind of it from there friends telling of how they had a blast in Vegas over the weekend winning jackpot after jackpot! This was the beginning of getting the boom started in Las Vegas that lasted for about 15 years. Then along came all these corporate morons that know nothing about running a casino and fulfilling the customers desires! Conclusion is, as you can see is a total disaster! WAKE UP!! Loosen up those machine to the MAX and hold on to your hat! Vegas will boom once again!
OOPS! It was half full, not 12 full.
The problem is they have killed the goose that laid the golden egg.
The corporate geniuses have over developed and over borrowed to the point that they can't stand to win slowly because it won't generate the immediate cash they need to pay their bills.
So they increase the hold percentage on slots, change the payoffs on BJ, reduce service etc. etc. etc. in an effort to generate cashflow.
Sure the economy has a lot to do with it but the fact is, it probably has had less to do with it then the greedy decisions that were made by the corporate strip managers.
Only in America can a Casino end up the biggest loser in a gambling venture.
Actually, I heard on TV from a girl who parents ran a casino that, "Play was just for suckers," and they did not want her playing at all.
So that years ago and today, "Play is just for suckers," and a sense of fairness means little.
But, years ago Royal Flushes were common in many casinos and the game was assumed to be "Random draw." Today, the lawyers and judges of Nevada have gotten past that hurdle and made sure that Royal Flushes are mostly extinct.
The "sharp pencil" people have done everything possible to increase the hold. It is one thing to bar skilled players or get rid of such machines, but it is another to rid the place of "lucky players," by cooking the electronics. I think they have done that.
Then when it used to be "cash back," it became "play back," and finally they decided to turn the whole matter over to drawings when you play rather than just winning when you play.
I would never recommend anybody come here to play.
hey,
here's a crazy thought...
grow a brain and stop throwing your money away trying to win money at the slot machines.
don't worry, as long as nascar is in business, there will plenty of idiots to play slots.
Free wi-fi, looser slots, cheaper meals that will bring them back. That was what built Vegas. Pencil pushers and other so-called "experts" have made it unfun and unaffordable to come more than once ever year or two. We normally come 2 to 3 times a year but we are down to once ever year and a half. We set our limit to $2000 per year to loose gambling and $5000 for vacations but because we loose the gambling budget so quickly, Vegas doesn't get the mutiple rooms, meals and other money we normally spend that isn't in the "gambling budget". We use it other vacation places without the "one arm bandits".
Vegas has out priced theirselves. As George Maloof would say "Let'em play." Loosen the "one arm bandits"!
it took a conference for these yo-yo's to realize this. alot of good comments here in posts, then again we have stevem.
Criticizing gamblers and NASCAR fans in one comment is a two for one steve. The only place you would be happy is a planet occupied by clones. But then you would look around and see all the a--holes.
Where's the gaming law that requires machine holds to be revealed to the player/consumer?
#1 Take Care of Your Customers
#2 Make Your Customer Feel Like They Are Valued
#3 You can cut a guys hair many times, but scalp him onetime
Overtime, the house will ALWAYS win, treat the customer well -
It's crazy - I am a local, I buy in for 1G at a $10 craps game at one of the Big Strip casinos. floor is NOT busy, yet I am treated like a flea. I toke about $50/hr. and if I win I Tip 10% on the way out...yet I get treated like a piece of crap...
These casinos need to wake up and realize who is keeping the lights on - the customer
thank you for proving my point.
i love how people complain "oh, i didn't win at the casino".
idiots.
stevem , You don't have a point. In reality you are not successful at anything and hate just about everything in life. Not that I care for the sport of NASCAR but the village idiot knows the fans of this sport are numerous,educated and spend large amounts of money in communities that sponsor these events. NASCAR is a bigger draw than most profesional sports now. Of course you would not know you are to busy hating life. Whether you realize it or not gaming is the reason you don't pay a state income tax as well as other tax breaks Nevadans enjoy. What a nit wit. If you don't like an news article or the posters then move on and shut up. idiot.
Word of mouth is the ultimate advertisement. The two monopolies have destroyed the strip. People talk about 6:5 payouts on blackjack and tight slots. It never used to feel like they wanted to take your money as fast as they could. It does now. Maybe it's a poor analogy but it would be like spending $100 to bowl (pick your hobby) all weekend in a tournament versus spending $100 to bowl a single game. One might be fun. The other, not so much. So, while the casino exec's make fortunes making one poor decision after another it will be the Nevada tax payer who ultimately ends up paying for what is going on with this failed business model.
Do ya think any of these idiots will listen to what the researches and players already knew? Nah, they would have to be able to read to learn from it.
Excellent point 'Lightfoot'.
A slot machine's hold percentage only becomes normal over millions of games. A player that's here for the weekend can't percieve the house's hold percentage and their individual experiences will vary greatly. Lowering the hold on all games isn't going to change that.
In the old days ago, with the older pull handle machines there were always one cherry and two cherry small payouts, things like that. You may not have won big but at least you had the sense of having a good time and could last a little while to enhance the entertainment value with the possibility of hitting a jackpot.
My experience in the modern day is you get to the machine, put your twenties in, press buttons until it's gone and that's it.
Sure you may get a little win once in a while, but, in my opinion, the fun has been mostly been removed from play.
My experience may not even be true percentage wise, but it's the public perception that counts, as to whether people play or not.
After reading these comments, I have figured it out!!! Stevem is a complete idiot...lol...but I pretty much think just about everyone else figured that out too..lol...
be nice to stevem,it's not his fault his mom drop him on his head when he was a baby
Wow, SteveM, what is your problem? You are either very ignorant or have some underlying issues with "Nascar types" and whatever connotations you believe them to carry.
I am not a fan of Nascar, but any fool that reads/watches the news knows that these folks are a tourist town's dream: they have disposable income (some of them travel in very expensive luxury RVs), they are educated (certainly more than you, obviously!), and they actually tip, instead of going on gun-toting crime sprees when they come to town. (I think we can all remember the NBA debacle or whatever it was a few years ago-complete opposite of the tourist you want and no one benefitted from it,)
Anyway, you clearly have some issues. I am personally grateful for these "Nascar types" because they are part of the reason I don't have to pay state income tax. If you ever emerge from your zone of bitterness and manage to get a job, you might understand what the rest of us are talking about!
I always planned to lose the money I brought to Las Vegas. I budgeted it as entertainment. What I did want to get was some play/excitement for my money. It's not true players don't notice when the hold goes up. I'm a long time VP player and I can say for sure holds have increased/paytables have changed for the worse over the past few years. Consequently, Las Vegas isn't as much fun anymore and I spend less time and money gambling.
Junk: "A slot machine's hold percentage only becomes normal over millions of games. A player that's here for the weekend can't percieve the house's hold percentage and their individual experiences will vary greatly. Lowering the hold on all games isn't going to change that."
Not real helpful, like nothing matters at all to the player/sucker. THIS IS FALSE. Roughly a royal flush in an "honest game" should come up about(depends on game & play) once every 60,000 draws--a figure way below the millions and millions of confusing plays that you talk about. Some people can achieve those 60,000 plays in a month or two and might win 8 or so times a year. That's a lot different from never winning. People do know the difference.
For example it is relatively easy to play 5 draws a minute, or 300/hr. Now, many players may play triple games of the quarter varity, so that's 900/hr, and in 8 hours 7200. So for a pro looking for a win, he could play 60,000 hands in about 8 days.
From the point of view of looking at the future of a business, I found the comments on the Sun and the RJ, posted following stories about Station Casinos' bankruptcies to be remarkably consistent, but much tougher on the casinos than the opinions expressed in the story above.
The Casinos' ex customers were wishing the company a speedy death, through the bankruptcy, based on a view that the payout on all games, but slots in particular, had fallen to a ridiculously low level in order to pay the interest on the Wall Street buy out of the chain.
I suppose the customers of the Harrah's chain are thinking and saying the same thing.
So did my brother in law, who is a devoted slot player at Casino Niagara. He was in Las Vegas for a week, visited a number of Station Casinos, the Hard Rock and the Mandalay Bay. He said he'd never bother to come back to Las Vegas. I suspect his opinion is not unique among gamblers.
It seems like no one in the LVCVA or Gaming Control Board realized how badly the "corporate securitization" of Las Vegas' casinos would affect the monthly income of the entire tourist industry.
It's tough to figure out what the Las Vegas and Nevada state economies can do to reverse reverse the continuous decline in gaming revenue, short of hoping all of the banks foreclose on all of the casinos, and hoping that after months and months of losing money operating the casinos that the banks realize that the customers, both local and tourist, again expect a very high pay-back for their gaming dollars which are no longer "extra discretionary spending" in this tough economy.
We used to come to Las Vegas about 6 times per year and enjoyed the play on machines; then, a few years ago, something noticeably changed and we almost never got good hits or payouts from the machines in the casino where we regularly played. It didn't happen just once but on many consecutive trips. Our friends noticed the same thing. Now we come about once a year and play less. Seems short sighted on the part of the casino exec's to think that players wouldn't figure out things had changed. Give me a good time and a chance to win occasionally, even if I know in the long run I have to lose, and I'll keep coming back. Make it a bad deal and I'll look for other places to spend my entertainment money.
What's Not to Like?
Reform? Why do we need health-care reform? Everything is just fine the way it is.
Oh really? this article at Newsweek "Nails IT"
http://www.newsweek.com/id/209817
Could one of you conservatives opposing health care reform could issue a logical response to this article above, I would like to hear your response. Really!
In my mind there's no question the casinos have tightened down.
It makes sense they need more profit to repay their debt service.
The places that will do well in the future are the one's that realize this and offer players a "good gamble" like Benny Binion used to say.
Who would ever have thought that any public opinion would turn against Las Vegas casinos?
What I am interested to know is do you think the general public is really aware of these issues, like a lot of people beyond those that might be likely to post here?
denro
What I am interested to know is do you think the general public is really aware of these issues, like a lot of people beyond those that might be likely to post here?
Do you think Las Vegas revenue would continue falling if they weren't? On some level they must get it because they aren't visiting?
I wonder if other gaming towns are having the same level of loss?
If you have one customer who drops ten thousand, and ten who drop a thousand, and a hundred who drop a hundred, which is the more profitable customer? Your overhead for the one is pretty much the same as for the one in a hundred, and more profitable than the one in ten.
That is where the casino bosses headed, fully realizing that there were a lot more hundred dollar players than ten thousand dollar players. And when times get tighter, who is more likely to keep coming back?
Honestly, do you think they got where they are because they are stupid?
Everyone knows I'm not a big fan of the empty suits, but that is because they have no heart, not because they have no brain. Sorry if this is anti-populist, but it's a reality check.
Crazy how things have changed in this town. Larry Volk was murdered over similar allegations. This would not have flown back in the day before corporations took over the town. No way the locals would have allowed the casinos to get away with this.
Last night, I was in Redrock and had to kill some time for a movie, so I put $40 into a video poker machine. Gone in less than 5 minutes. Won two hands, pushed about three, and that was it. I walked away feeling like I needed a shower, they might as well have mugged me in the parking lot and stole my money. 15-yrs ago, I could throw in $20 and play for 30-mins or sometimes longer. Not anymore.
That won't be happening again for a long time. The casinos made their beds by ripping off their customers, now they have to lie in it.
WOW It took years, now if ONLY the casino control board could see that the system of gaming versus gambling has brought Nevada to it's knees. Bring back gambling, take your "did you have fun" gaming and give it back to Harvard. One other question, if gaming systems replaced gambling how come this combined mutual quietly decided choice not considered consumer fraud and thievery? Wall Street stealing money through rigged systems sound familiar?
SBob2U - I'm not calling players suckers, but pointing out that most visitors to the strip don't play nearly enough to get a normal result. In your example, it's assumed that once every 60,000 hands, a royal flush will be hit. That's the "normal" result. But the results are randomly distributed. Three royal flushes can come up consectutively. When that happens, 180,000 consectutive hands have to go by without another royal for the machine to achieve the "normal" frequency of royal flushes and that's unlikely to happen too. It will take millions of hands for it to normalize.
cnev, I hear you.
Of course revenue has been falling also because of job losses, real estate equity gone, retirement accounts decimated, etc.
I just have not heard any buzz among the general population about video or slot payouts, or changes in blackjack payouts, for example.
I have always felt the Indian casinos were tight and no fun, and therefore I had no interest in playing with them, and now I pretty much feel the same way about Las Vegas.
I'm glad I was able to experience the glamour and style of Las Vegas in the fifties.
I'm surprised no one has mentioned the RNG chip...
"Modern slot machines and video poker machines operate using a random number to generate their results. This random number generator (RNG) is a computer chip that is constantly generating a series of random numbers, even when the machine is not being played. When a player makes a wager, the player receives whatever number the machine is cycling on at that minute. In some ways, the random number generator is like a constantly spinning wheel of fortune which stops instantly when a player makes a wager.
Differences Between Video Poker and SlotsThe main difference between video poker and slots lies within the random number generator. On a slot machine, the random number generator is programmed to pay out a percentage of the money that's run through it at a given percentage, usually anywhere from 83% to 97% over time. That amount is called the payback percentage, and it's completely determined by the settings on the RNG. There is no way to determine what a slot machine's payout percentage is just by looking at it, and to determine it by the machines payouts would require 100's of 1000's of trials.
On a video poker machine though, the random number generator duplicates a deck of 52 (or in some games 53) playing cards. The odds of getting any card is the same as it would be if someone were dealing from an actual deck. Since the payouts are determined by what hands a player receives, and since someone can mathematically determine the odds of getting each hand, a person can relatively easily calculate the payback percentage of a video poker machine."
It is sad to think that it would take a conference to tell casino execs that customers would return to Las Vegas if they decreased their slot hold.
I am Asian, and come from a culture that loves to gamble. From the 1970's, we used to go to Las Vegas and Reno at least nine to fourteen times per year to play, and I brought an average of $2,500 to gamble with per trip.
In those days, large jackpots were common, food was inexpensive and good, and the comps flowed freely. Casinos then knew how to treat their players and we all felt valued. I won money so often that people joked that gambling was my part-time job, and I couldn't wait for my next trip to a casino.
Now, those same casinos deny comps, food is expensive, and since 2000, the slots have tightened progressively as casinos grew fat with greed. I know that IGT has supplied tighter eproms regularly since 2000 to casinos for their slots.
The fun is gone, and most importantly, the hope of winning in Las Vegas. I am in the Optimist Club, and in a large Asian fishing club, and all of us once went to Vegas many times per year. That is over as all of us realized that there was no hope of winning any longer. Most, like me, have given up and only go once every year, or year and a half. In my circle of friends and family, that means nearly 240 fewer repeat visitors and customers for Las Vegas' casinos, restaurants, shops, gas stations, service industries and attractions.
Gamblers are not fools, and we know a bad deal when we see one. I DID NOT go to Las Vegas to lose, as the "Price of admission for entertainment" as some gaming execs called it. Who are they kidding? Gamblers play to win, and when they can't, they quit.
I now travel with my discretionary spending instead of gaming. Thank you Las Vegas, for letting me visit Italy, Switzerland, Germany, France, Japan, New York, Florida, Hawaii and Ireland, instead of losing on your tight slots the past few years. That travel money was once spent in your town.
The corporate pencil pushing accountants have ruined Las Vegas and gaming, and I hope they either fix it or go bankrupt, like they deserve. We are not all player/suckers and it is time you figured that out. Bring back the 98% payback slots, easy comps, and I will return.
Casino owners need to think about the people they want to fill their new casino buildings with, instead of their next projects or bottom lines. Since 2000, a lot of players have been alienated, and it won't be easy to lure them back. Casino owners and accountants should listen to the comments at family gatherings and club meetings about their casinos and feel the deep anger and resentment felt by former players. Anger, betrayal, feeling cheated and ignored are the common themes.
We can't talk to casino owners and accountants, so we have all voted with our feet, and walked away.
Tell it like it is, Tentimer.
I hope the owners and penny counters read your comment, but mostly act on it.
I've read a lot about the RNG chip and yes they have changed the VP payout percentages. As well as making the listed paytables less lucrative. Yes, players know this has been done. Just look at the banks of empty machines.
A good fast player should hit a 4 of a kind about every 45 min of play. That just doesn't happen anymore. Ever. $200 per day used to be enough money to play .25 VP all day long. I know because I did it for years. Now that same money MIGHT get you 3 or 4 hours of play.
There's also a lot of value in having your casino full of people gambling and having a good time. The atmosphere makes people want to stay there and put some money down. Somewhere along the road the casino owners have lost sight of the reasons people want to come to Las Vegas.
yellowsnow,
You may have read a lot but you have understood very little. Read what I just posted, and I'll repeat it...
"On a video poker machine though, the random number generator duplicates a deck of 52 (or in some games 53) playing cards. The odds of getting any card is the same as it would be if someone were dealing from an actual deck. Since the payouts are determined by what hands a player receives, and since someone can mathematically determine the odds of getting each hand, a person can relatively easily calculate the payback percentage of a video poker machine."
...so your post is just flat out wrong! They can NOT change the VP payout percentages, as you falsely allege. They can indeed change the payout paytables, but those are listed on the machine and if you play after they change them to lower payouts, then that is your fault.
I will see your anecdotal results and raise you with mine from just yesterday...I was playing a $1 VP machine and the lady next to me got 6 four-of-a-kinds in less than an hour before I even got one. The point is the RNG chip makes all the results...wait for it...RANDOM!!!!!!
it is not a true random number generator. it is a psuedo random number generator. a book excerpt i recently read, says that the cards in a standard deck are "listed" to 26-squared. your math will tell you that's a HUGE number. when someone puts money in a video poker machine, the prng picks a place in this liste of millions and millions. thereafter, the cards that come on the deal/draw are those that are consecutive in the list from where the first card was dealt. if you are interested in the article, please email me.
iwonder,
Please define pseudo RNG and true RNG and explain the difference.
Here's what I googled...
"True" random numbers vs. pseudorandom numbers
Main article: Pseudorandom number generator
There are two principal methods used to generate random numbers. One measures some physical phenomenon that is expected to be random and then compensates for possible biases in the measurement process. The other uses computational algorithms that produce long sequences of apparently random results, which are in fact completely determined by a shorter initial value, known as a seed or key. The latter type are often called pseudorandom number generators.
A "random number generator" based solely on deterministic computation cannot be regarded as a "true" random number generator, since its output is inherently predictable. How to distinguish a "true" random number from the output of a pseudo-random number generator is a very difficult problem. However, carefully chosen pseudo-random number generators can be used instead of true random numbers in many applications. Rigorous statistical analysis of the output is often needed to have confidence in the algorithm.
...I have a headache....yikes!!!!!
Tentimer's words are right on and the money guys would be wise to listen to and act upon them.
What you are seeing is not just a Las Vegas problem. It is just another example of the rich getting richer. The executives are squeezing every dime out of your pocket to enhance their wages and bonuses. Look at how many management bozos have run their companies into the ground while enhancing their paychecks, and when the fat lady sings these guys get a huge severence package for a job terribly done. The customers and the employees get left holding the bag.
I have seen countless interviews of rich people who claim they have more money than they could ever spend, yet they want more. It's a way of keeping score. As long as the rigged paydays and bonuses continue to flow, don't expect sanity to raise it's ugly head in the corporate suites of Las Vegas or the USA.
What Las Vegas and the casino industry need is a good old fashion trust busting. Break the MGM?Mirage & Harrahs to a bunch of smaller companies to spur ideas & increase growth.
Tentimer hit the nail right on the head.
Very well done, Sir.
Tentimer said exactly what I tried to say, described my experience and what my behavior has been (as I write this I am in Italy). I know playing slots over a long period of time is a losing proposition (but payouts, cheap great food and comps made up for a lot when I compared the cost of Las Vegas trips to others like scuba diving, fly fishing and European travel) but when I might as well just throw my money down a rat hole, I'm not playing. It's a beautiful day here in the Abruzzo.
I know so many former Las Vegas visitors who have stopped comming to gamble in the past 3,4,5 years. Their main reason: they can't win anything anymore and it's no fun just getting hosed all the time.
Now that the ecconomy is bad and they have less discretionary income, they simply aren't comming and aren't planning on comming ever again.
Talking about numbers gives me a headache too.
Here's how I would describe the difference between a random number generator, and a pseudo random number generator.
In a true random number generator, the outcomes are nearly infinite. Compare that to the grains of sand on a beach.
In a pseudo random number generator, the outcomes are logarythms chosen to reach a predetermined outcome, say a 94% payout on a slot. It would be like a bucket of sand, instead of the whole beach.
A casino can order a slot machine to have a specific payout for the casino over the slot machines' lifetime on the casino floor, an average of five to ten years. That means that over it's lifetime, and perhaps millions of spins, it will deliver that chosen percentage of payback to the casino, guaranteeing the win they requested from the manufacturer.
Should a casino determine that it isn't making enough money on a machine for the space it is taking up, they can easily reregister the machine with the NGC Board and install a new Eprom Random Number Generator chip in five minutes with the hold they want. That is what has been going on the past nine or ten years, and that is why it is so hard to win now.
The payouts also seem to have been changed so that players get more time on the machine, receiving smaller payouts like cherries and mixed bars, but the number of big jackpots that they used to cash in and take home, have been drastically reduced in the "bucket" of available sand. Time on a machine has been given to the players instead of jackpots they used to take home.
That is a short-term and short-sighted gain for the casinos, but a bad return in the long run, if players wise up to their game and stop coming. You can't make money on an empty seat in front of a slot machine, no matter what the payout and hold is.
I also hate the multi-line, multi-game, video electronic slots that eat $20 bills like haystacks. Where are the old 2 and 3 coin, three reeler slots I love? The new machines usually stand alone and empty, while players wait to play the remaining so-called "classic" three reelers. Is that progress or more misguided greed in action?
Thanks for listening to my rants.
Hey, Resort execs are you reading these comments?
It looks like good ideas could come from the intelligence generated on this board.
Once word gets out that a place has reverted to the old way, they would flock right on in.
Old school, that's the way to go.
YES! Make Las Vegas slots fun again. I've visited Las Vegas (from Northern California) six times in the past two years. I just spent five nights (Bellagio and Wynn) and decided that the gambling scene is just not worth it anymore. While I don't expect to win, I do expect to have some fun playing slots. It was my experience that the machines are set way too tight. We have 3 native american casinos within an hours drive from home and they will be getting my gambling budget from now on. Vegas is good for Cirque shows and music, and sunshine around the pool. Forget about playing slots....
You casino executives should form an advisory board made up of taxi drivers. I know mine had to listen to me vent about vegas on the way to the airport. I'm sure they hear what your tourists are thinking and whether they will be returning anytime soon....
I have been thinking about why the fun is gone from Las Vegas and the Indian casinos too. Not only are the slots set too tight now, but a lot of other things are missing that added to the excitement.
Many of the missing elements were pioneered by the Indian casinos and the big casinos followed suit. Playing slots became automated.
Ticket in, ticket out slots took away the friendly coin changing personel who gave you a smile, wished you good luck, and sometimes a tip on what slot was paying. Didn't matter if the tip was wrong. The noise of coins falling into the trays was exciting and encouraging. The simulated phony noises machines now play don't do it.
You felt proud carrying a bucket of coins to the change booth, like a hunting trophy. People would ask you how you won it. I even liked the black fingers at the end of a long playing session. Using coins also slowed down the losing process, and the rattle of coins told you if others were winning. The sound of hundreds of dollar tokens falling was a crowd magnet. The casinos are too quiet now.
Hitting a big jackpot let you talk to casino personnel, but with no big jackpots anymore that is gone. I see fewer hand paid jackpots in five days in Vegas than I saw in five hours there before.
No coin people, fewer cocktail waitresses, fewer floor personnel, no coin noise, simulated sounds. You play alone with no personal contact with casino staff to talk to. The humanity of gambling has been removed and it has become man vs machine in an unequal battle.
The gambling experience was much more than cheap food, comped rooms and big wins, it was the casino people you talked to and related with that added to the experience. The floor personel often saw your play and gave you comps to the buffet, but that is gone. Now you stick your card in, and hope you lose enough to get a free breakfast out of it. A bored slot host checks the computer when you ask, and says "Sorry, you didn't play long enough" even if you lost $1,000 dollars in a couple of hours. They used to just comp you if you were a regular, before you even played that day, and you felt like a VIP. Now you are judged first, by a computer and made to feel like a beggar. Benny Binion and Sam Boyd would roll over in their graves if they saw what was going on now. Wynn, Addison and the other big shots have taken the heart and soul from Vegas. You give them money, and they give you nothing.
No more humanity, no more fun, no more winning, no more visits by me.
http://www.ethicalhacker.net/content/vie...
this link is to the book exerpt i mentioned in an early post on rng's versus psuedo-rng's
Tentimer, I very much agree with you. Vegas used to be so much fun. I saved and saved to come to Vegas and didn't regret it. Even when I lost I had a great time. Bring back the best of the old Las Vegas.
The RNG/PRNG/EPROM mystery is hard to understand for almost everyone. Promise, the casinos are manipulating payouts. It's just not necessary. The odds were in their favor playing it straight and the machines were full. Now they have jacked up the odds in their favor and the machines are empty. How is this making money?
We used to travel from St. Louis to gamble in vegas 3 times a year. That ended when the casino's on the strip changed their slot machines and tightened them up..The fun & expectation of a fair chance to win is gone! Tentimer's comments were exactly what we (& all our friends) have been saying. Spend your money elsewhere. We have not been back in a couple years and don't plan on it. The casinos around St. Louis give you much better entertainment for the money. I believe this is happening all over the country. Casinos are popping up everywhere that give a fair payout and this is going to continue to be a thorn in the side of Vegas casinos. We love Las Vegas & would come back if the strip casinos change their ways.
yellowsnow:
your observation is astute. many, many machines are empty. i wonder what the correlation is between the number of currently empty machines and the current total number of machines versus, say, 10 years ago when there were far fewer machines and casinos. do you think some of the emptiness reflects over-saturation?
yellowsnow and iwonder,
I think that banks of slots are empty for many reasons. First, casinos are springing up all over the country, so Vegas has lost it's uniqueness. We can play slots almost anywhere when the urge hits. In California, there is a casino within an hour's drive of most cities. We don't need to drive all the way to Reno, Vegas or Lake Tahoe anymore. Casinos are sprouting up all over the world, so the Whales don't need Vegas anymore either.
Slots have become much too complicated as well. Some of the new slots practically need an owner's manual to understand how to play them. Does anybody like those multi-line monsters with all those crooked, bent paylines? I never know how I won and never understand why I lost on them. It is frustrating and no fun.
I also avoid all those stupid machines with the bonus rounds. You can't win unless you make it to the bonus round, and then when you do, you often win nothing or far less coins than you risked to get there. What's the point of that? I feel jerked around and manipulated, and most of all, made a fool of. With the old three reelers, you either won or lost. You didn't have to sit there while the machine spun and played on by itself while you watched.
Worst of all, casinos consider those bonus rounds "entertainment" and also "down time" where they don't make money, so those bonus slots are set much tighter than regular slots. A lose lose situation for the player.
Lastly, in their desire to wring every dollar out of the players as fast as possible, they created machines that take hundreds of coins at the same time, and force you to play max coin if you want a shot at their impossible to hit bonus jackpot.
How many people play those so-called penny machines, betting 360 pennies at once? That's more than a three coin dollar machine. I just think players finally wised up to Vegas and stopped going. As a friend of mine said, "I can lose at a local casino, why should I drive to the middle of the desert and spend three days to do the same? Vegas casinos are fancier and prettier, but I don't want to help pay their light bills!"
Gambling in casinos is a fad, and like all fads, once it is everywhere, the novelty wears off. People move on, especially if the fad is no fun anymore. If Vegas wants to recover, they will have to drop their arrogance and indifference to players, and especially their greed. They need to drop their failed business model and adapt, or die.
Just by reading the first paragraph shows how little the casinos here in vegas care? They never even showed up! If they would stop and listen to some of there guests,things might improve?LOST AND WASTED.
I have really enjoyed all of the great posts. My wife and I have been gambling for about 15 years and have found it to be a very enjoyable pastime. We have raised our kids and enjoy traveling. We normally have some gambling involved in our trips. Because of the environment in most of the casinos today I am not sure that we will be able to continue to do so. Like many people I will not bankrupt our family in order to continue what we have done in the past. We came to Vegas in March and I had lost 495.00 in four hours playing quarter machines. The next day we rented a car to see the sites which didn't make the casinos a dime. I realize that the odds are against us but all that I ask is that I get some enjoyment and fun out of the experience. I really hope they wake up or we will have to find a new hobby.
If I sounded a little bitter and angry in my posts, it is because I am. I mourn the loss of the old Las Vegas slot games and high payback percentages.
Since I started playing slots heavily in 1989 on my visits there (I formerly played only Blackjack poorly), I have kept accurate records of the cash I played and the cash I won on my trips.
I am still $63,680 ahead in winnings, but have not won a single large jackpot since 2006. The winnings have seesawed between $68,000 and $63,000 for the past few years. My last big wins were two $2,000 jackpots in 2006. Since then, it has been a slow decline, since I have basicly quit playing Vegas slots. A bad 2007 made me back off Vegas slots for good. I saw the handwriting on the wall and gave them up for the local Native American casinos instead. They aren't very good either, but we go for fun and play $100 - $200. I won $400 at a Native American casino last week, so that covers me for the year.
In the good old days, I won a Jeep Cherokee at the Luxor, after playing only $4.50 in quarters, and hit many $5,000 an $4,000 jackpots along the way, many on the very first spin. I invested the money I won and it put my son through college and furnished my house.
If I was to start playing now, I doubt if I would have ever come out ahead. The odds are stacked far too high against it happening now. I have quit Las Vegas and my slot hobby while I am ahead, and have only been willing to risk $100 - $200 per visit for the past two years instead of the old $2,500.
I save my money for vacation trips, new computers and gadgets, gifts for my family and for my garden. Money is too hard to earn, to throw it away on a bad bet. I thank Las Vegas for the great run of luck I had, but when they turned the tables on their players, I knew it was time to find a new pastime. I miss the excitement, lights and glitz, but I don't want to pay for it with losses. I enjoyed two weeks in Italy and France instead of Las Vegas gambling this year. Maybe I should thank Las Vegas for that too.
Steve Wynn said in his 60 Minutes interview that he knew of nobody who ever quit while they were ahead. Tell him about me. I used to love his casinos, until like a bad lover, they turned on me.
61 comments on this subject say's it all. Dear Las Vegas Sun editor LISTEN UP!! Please go to your printer and copy and paste all 61 comments down, then personally mail to each and every casino big wig these results and lets see how many have the brains to stop all this crap and turn it all around to the good old days! Then and only then, will I ever return to Vegas. It was my second home, but when they started robbing all of us hard core players, I quit coming!
I'm a successful business man and have been at my present location for over 25 years now, but my god I would love nothing better then the chance to sell my business, be hired by a casino that is in deep financial trouble and let me prove that I could save there business! I'm so sure that I could do it, I would even be willing to do it with no salary being paid to me unless I lived up to what I claim I could do!
Oh well, to bad my dream will never happen, but in the mean time Mr. Or Miss Editor don't think that even your job is all that secure, because just like I predicted to all my friends and customers about all the things that are going wrong with Vegas years ago is finally happening, I can also see things getting much worse in Vegas! Even to the point of the Las Vegas Sun going under right along with the entire city!
It's all so sad.
Sorry gang but, casino's just like any other buisness need to make a profit. The way they do that is by providing games that pay out less then they take in. They need to keep enough of the action to pay their staff, taxes and other costs. Now of course, fewer players or players just betting less means less action (coin in). The main reason buisness is down in Nevada is the recession and out-of-state competition. Getting market share by reducing percentage holds will not pay the bills, if Gross Gaming revenue declines.
Nevada can only thrive as a "Desination resort" area. That means
1. Entertainment (what about the old free lounge shows?)
2. bargain prices on food (no your not in the restaurant buisness) and
3. general resort facilities (charging tourists to use pool areas. You've go to be kidding)
4. Catering to everyone not just (Comps for) high-rollers (what ever happened to player development)
Vegas used to have a reputation as a glamorous, fun, and inexpensive place to visit. Anything, that can be done to bring back that attitude will help bring back more players and profits sooner.