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More Slot Myths Explained – And Debunked! (3 of 3)

#3 – It’s a Hot One, Baby!

Have you ever grown irrationally excited while playing a slot machine, because you were absolutely CONVINCED that it was about to “heat up” and start spilling coins into your lap? Don’t worry – we have too, actually. That doesn’t make this “gut feeling” any more correct or logical. There really is no such thing as a slot game becoming “due.” Whether you believe us or not (and we know that this particular superstition is a hard nut to crack), a slot device has no real “memory” of the spins that have preceded the one you are about to activate, and exercises no actual judgment of when it’s “time” for one lucky player to hit a jackpot.

The “intelligence” of a slot machine is its RNG, or random number generator. This microprocessor is located deep in the bowels of your favorite slot game, and is a tiny little chip that spends all its time generating – you guessed it! – random numbers. All these numbers correspond to one of three distinct outcomes… lose, win, or jackpot, in descending order of likelihood. Like flipping a coin, every spin of the slot machine’s reels carries no more likelihood of winning than the one before it.

What about payout percentages, you ask? It is true that every slot machine carries a set percentage of its proceeds that it will pay out to players. Good luck timing that win, however! Both land-based and online slot machines generally have “patterns” of payouts that last over several hundred thousand spins, and can take days or weeks to complete. Are you really going to sit on that machine and wait for your lucky break? We don’t think so!

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