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PARS – This is the paytable and real strips sheet, a crucial piece of information for slot machines. It spills the dirt on the likelihood of each winning combination occurring. Nobody but the casino has access to the PARS, obviously. A few years ago, casino gaming site The Wizard of Odds gained access to the PARS for an obsolete international version of IGT’s Red, White, and Blue slot game. What it taught us is that the odds of each payout occurring are not intuitive. It would, for example, make sense that the lower the payout, the higher the chance of it occurring. Not so!

In actuality, there is a mid-level payout that occurs with higher frequency than some with much lower payouts. The whole point is that the midlevel payout is one that is big enough to really get a player excited and motivate them to keep playing, without being significant enough for them to want to take their booty and run. Given the average amount of starting credits that a player bet on this machine, this midlevel payout occurred about once every other player. Another discovery gleaned from the machine was that, over an extended play period, a punter is likely to experience several medium-sized payouts and a few small ones but is unlikely to win a huge jackpot. The IGT slot game jackpot, for example, only paid out a jackpot every two hundred sixty-two thousand spins on average.

PATTERNS – It’s no myth that slot machines have patterns to their payoffs, although it sounds like one. Pokies operate on the basis of random statistical trends, so it is not impossible to pick out these trends and aggressively play the machine on the upswing of such a cycle to give a statistically significant increase to one’s chances of hitting a jackpot. But don’t grab your notebook and head to the casino just yet, tiger. Modern slot games may have patterns spanning days or even weeks, which means that capitalizing on their patterns is nowhere near as simple as back in the days of yore. Progressive slot games are hooked up to a common network that may encompass many terminals per casino, as well as numerous other games in casinos throughout the city, state, or region. It’s just not realistic. There is a pattern to online slot play as well, but those are impossible to discern.

PAY CYCLE – Superstitious punters hold sacred the belief that ever slot game is programmed on a “cycle.” Because the casino in question is legally obligated to meet its percentage payout, the powers that be “tell” the machine to award a jackpot after so many coins inserted or spins played. If you follow this line of thinking, one could conceivably become hip to the cyclical nature of the machine’s payouts and even time your play strategically to hit a jackpot. This is nonsense when it comes to the online slots, and is only marginally more realistic with land-based slots. In reality, such a “cycle” would last thousands of spins, making timing a jackpot nigh near impossible.

PAY FOR PLAY MACHINES – A play for play slot machine is another variety that rewards you for playing more coins. Play for play slots actually award you with better odds based on your wager. This is different from a multiplier slot, which offers a multiplied prize if you have bet the max coins for that particular title, but maintains the same odds no matter the scale of your gambling. It is also different from a buy-a-pay, which maintains a multi-tiered payoff system, with static odds. You are actually MORE LIKELY to win a pay for play game if you bet more. Pay for plays are illegal in several locations.

PAYLINE – The payline, which can be abbreviated to just “line,” is the plane across which the winning symbols line up. It’s an actual, invisible line across which you “read” your result to determine what, if anything, you won. A classic three-reel, single-payline slot will clearly show the middle horizontal line as the payline, but modern day pokies (and especially online slots) will have multiple paylines. This means that you can place wagers on multiple chances of winning on a single spin, with lines that run horizontally, diagonally, and in zigzag patterns! The most paylines we have seen in a slot machine is one hundred, courtesy of Microgaming’s online slot machine Cashapillar. Microgaming set another online fruity payline precedent in 2009, when it released Burning Love – a title with no paylines.

PAYOUT PERCENTAGE – Knowing the payout percentage for the slot game you are playing is crucial for savvy punters. Also known as the “payoff” percentage, this all-important figure represents the amount of every bet that is paid back to players in the form of winnings. Believe it or not, casinos actually make a very small margin off one-armed bandits, no matter how much cash that margin amounts to! It’s not uncommon for casino slots to pay out anywhere between eighty-five and ninety percent of what money they take in.

There are many regulations on minimum payoff percentages for gambling establishments, which mandate a minimum figure for the entire casino or slot parlor. Individual terminals within the casino may be set higher or lower, as long as all the odds average out at least to the minimum. Some casinos set higher payoff percentages to attract customers, while some are known to be stingy, and just maintain the bare legal minimum. 

If a slot machine has a generous payoff percentage, it is known as a loose, hot, sizzling, or liberal game. Those that guard their coins jealously are known as tight, cold, or conservative. The payout percentage is determined by multiplying the coin payout of a game by how many times a certain combination of symbols occurs in the RNG’s choosing. You then add up the payouts, and divide this number by the total number of possible symbols sets, or combinations. The arithmetic can be dizzying, but if you are playing in a certified casino, you can assume that a regulatory agency did the math for you and made sure that things are kosher. The money that is not paid out in winnings is kept by the casino as income, and is referred to as the “hold percentage.” Generally – but not exclusively - the difference between the payout percentage and one hundred percent is the hold percentage.

PAY TABLE – The pay table is that all-important area of the slot machine you are playing that tells you how many coins you can possibly win. Some slot games show the pay table as a plaque mounted physically on the terminal; modern video slots will show the pay table as a feature alongside the reels, somehow integrated into the digital display. This table will show the symbols for each winning combination, as well as how much you will win for scoring that combo. The amounts on the pay table are expressed as a multiple of coins – the jackpot symbol, for example, may show “x1,000” which means that you will win one thousand times your bet for that payline. The pay table should also outline any bonuses for you and tell you how you can obtain them and how much they are worth.

PLAYERS’ CLUB – The players’ club is a perk of patronizing a specific casino on a regular basis, whether land-based or your favorite online slots site on the World Wide Web. Casinos have loyalty programs, or players’ clubs. When you sign up – which is usually free – you are issued a card which is then inserted into the machines that you play, so that your wagers and time spent playing are logged. (When you play the online slots or other internet casino games, you have a name and password that is linked to your loyalty account.)

The players’ club gives you perks for playing, usually on the basis of how much time and/or money you spend. These can include casino freebies, cash back rebates, or points to use towards free play. Sometimes, all players’ club members will be entered in a raffle or giveaway, and some online casinos offer their loyalty program members free or discounted entry in tournaments. It’s a good idea to sign up for the players’ club at any and all casinos you frequent, even if you don’t foresee spending much time or money there. You never know what rewards you could rack up, just by doing what you were planning on doing anyway… playing the slots!

PENNY SLOT – A penny slot is any fruity that accepts pennies as a bet, although the maximum wagers of these games vary greatly. The fundamental definition for a penny slot is one that you can stick a penny in and play, even if you don’t win very much on such a low bet!

The national recession that shook the United States starting in 2008 triggered a countrywide resurgence in the popularity of penny slots. Casinos that had few or none of these terminals suddenly began trading in their nickel slots – formerly some of the most popular on the gaming floor – for the penny games that their customers were demanding. Economic factors led players to expect more “bang” for their proverbial buck, and the appeal of stretching a buck (one dollar) into one hundred spins was a very attractive concept.

PLOW – To “plow” has nothing to do with effective crop raising… unless you a trying to grow a cash crop! Once you have won a bit of money playing the slot games, you can “plow” your winnings – which is to say that you use those funds to feed the one-armed bandit before dipping into your bankroll. If you are conservative with your bets and utilize good money management, it can be possible to play solely off your winnings after an initial investment. Casino operators LOVE the fact that players tend to plow their winnings, so it should go without saying that you never want to blow your whole wad on frivolous gambling, if you win a jackpot. 

POKER MACHINE – This is what our Australian counterparts call a slot machine. The very first slot games were created at the end of the nineteenth century and featured playing card faces in five tumblers showing up in a quintet of “slots.” To get a prize playing these games, you would be lucky enough to draw a combination that was a winning poker hand. Down Under, punters still use the name that was originally given to these Victorian delights, even if not all their terminals still exclusively feature playing card images. Ozzies are apt to shorten this term into “pokey,” which is also spelled “pokie.” (Like Gumby’s friend, the red horse.)

PRIMARY JACKPOT – The primary jackpot for a given slot game is the largest prize that can be won, based on the pay table’s comprehensive list of combinations. Obviously, this only applies to “flat top” slots, not progressive games with an ever-changing jackpot.

PROBLEM GAMBLER – Those with an unhealthy attachment to the slots and other forms of gambling are not called “addicts” anymore; twenty-first century political correctness has re-branded these poor souls as “problem gamblers.” Twelve-step programs like Gamblers’ Anonymous have established all sorts of criteria for what constitutes someone with a gambling problem, but we think it’s one of those things that you know when you see it. Those punters that are liquidating their retirement plans and tapping into their children’s savings accounts to get more money for gambling and keep chasing the big win that they are sure is coming probably need held. Areas that legalize but regulate gambling usually set funds aside for preventing and dealing with the social issue of problem gambling.

PROGRESSIVE JACKPOT – A progressive jackpot is one that grows consistently with every bet that comes into it. Until recent years, all slot machine jackpots were fixed. No matter how much or how little money was in the hopper (virtual or otherwise) and how many players have given it a spin, the top prize for this kind of slot game is unchanging. On the other hand, a progressive fruity is exactly as the name suggests. It will grow progressively from a fixed starting point, and continue rising –minus any smaller prize payouts- until one very lucky winner cleans it out!

Progressive jackpots can range from those that that “grow” by just the bets on a single machine, or can encompass a large amount of terminals within a certain casino. Moreover, land-based progressive jackpot terminals can be linked within a whole city (as is the case in Las Vegas or Atlantic City), a whole state, or a whole region! In terms of online slots, players all over the world may be competing for the same progressive prize!

The upside of a progressive jackpot is the fact that these prizes get absolutely huge – the Mega Moolah online slot STARTS at one hundred thousand dollars, and is currently approaching six million dollars. The downside is that you are much less likely to land a big progressive jackpot than a fixed one. In order to program machines to create such big prizes, the odds of hitting a winning combination must necessarily be quite low.

PROGRESSIVE METER – Also called the progressive ticker, this screen gives you the most up-to-date reading on where the progressive jackpot of a slot game currently stands. Well… almost up-to-date. There have been reports of one progressive jackpot paying out twice within just a few minutes – a highly unusual circumstance – and the progressive meter not having the chance to update between hits, which caused a major problem in casino accounting!

PUB FRUITY – This term refers to a certain subset of British fruit machines, the likes of which are played in pubs (bars) and normally feature themes having to do with drinking and having a good time. These games will typically feature the cash ladders, nudges, and hold features that are seen in normal fruit machines.

PUBLISHED PAYOUT - The gaming board of a state publishes comprehensive collections of these annually, for every registered slot machine within state lines. These records are made public as a result of the state’s inspections to make sure that all slot game operators are in compliance with state law. It’s a good idea to study these lists religiously and determine what the best payouts for slot devices are in your area – the published payout list is a very valuable resource.

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