Here are a couple of longtime “tips” best filed in the Old Wives’ Tale department. The first is that you should only play slot machines on Friday and Saturday nights. The theory goes that the machines have already earned their quota for the week by the weekend, so they’re less stingy at that time. It’s true that there are more winners on the weekend than there are on weekdays wins the Jackpot, but that’s because there are more players on the weekend. I also believe that casinos would like to have winners screaming with joy more frequently per machine when the place is crowded—because the winning feeling then takes over the very souls of that many more prospective slots players—but there is no truth to the rumor that machines know what day it is, or that they make all the money they can during the week so they can dump it into the pockets of weekend-only players. While it’s absolutely true that there are tight machines and loose machines, they don’t switch back and forth. The rate of return is preset in the machine at the time of its manufacture, according to the specifications of the purchaser, but it cannot be adjusted to fluctuate depending on the day of the week or the time of day.
Here’s another one you might hear. It goes like this: The trick to finding a loose slot machine slots tournaments is to take its temperature. The warm ones are the loose ones. Again, this is a rule that might work in dating but not in casinos. People who believe this go around placing the palms of their hands like religious healers on the slot machines to find the warm ones.
To be continued…
