Where to find new slot games
Slots. They’re the most popular games in the casino and probably the most fun to play. Certainly modern slot games can draw you in with bonus games, fantastic graphics and themes designed around the latest movies. But how do you go about finding these fantastic slot games and more importantly, finding them somewhere where you can play them.
The first thing most of us do these days when looking for information on the internet is to try a search engine such as Google. These have become the modern method of finding anything. Science has shown that our brains have even stopped trying to remember information if it knows we can find it on Google. (It’s true. Google it.)
Now search engines are a great way of finding information, but there is one little catch – you have to have some idea of what you’re searching for. In fact, to get the best results, you have to be fairly specific about what you’re looking for. If you want the Lord of the Rings slot and search for Lord of the Rings Slot, you’ll do fine. But try searching on “Fantasy Slot Games” and you won’t get Lord of the Rings slots back as an answer. Try it. Then try searching on Fantasy books. Guess what, Tolkien and his books are right there at the top. Search engines just don’t always think the way we do.
That’s why I try to bookmark a few sites and blogs out there that I know will cover slot games. Sites like http://playslotgames.ws/ and a few other favorites. Then when I’m looking for new slot games, I can drop in and read what they’ve been up to lately. Sometimes they help me find games that I would never have thought to search for. Of course, if I know the slot game I’m looking for, well, Google can be your best friend.
Where to play free slots
Where do you go to play free slot games? The answer isn’t Las Vegas. The casinos there might spot you for a free buffet, but not free time on the slot machines. Those machines bring in serious money and you aren’t going to get to take up space playing for free. Which is a shame because when I play a slot game for free I find I actually pay more attention to the game itself rather than my ups and downs in the money. Which is why I love playing some of the fancier 3D slot games as a free option instead of a real money option. When I play for free I can explore all the subtlety that the developers put into the game.
But where do you go to play free slot games? Well, most online casino will let you sign up for a free play account and they don’t ask for much more than an email address before you’re in and playing. You may want to set aside a free hotmail or other email account for the casinos so that the offers for bonus money are filtered out of your regular account. But don’t lie about the email. I’ve had more than one casino give me a few dollars to play on with no deposit needed.
And these days some casino information sites are offering slot games in a free demo play mode so that newcomers can experience the fun of slots and see how much the games have advanced over the years. The new 3D slots aren’t your grandmother’s slot games. They’ve moved beyond the simple spinning reels to include arcade style bonus games and even fully plotted story lines. Give them a try. I bet you can’t resist spending a little time playing when you don’t have to spend any money playing.
Are slots a form of meditation
Excuse me for a moment while I go all funky and New Age on you, but the news in intriguing. We’ve all heard for years that mediation is good for you. Well, if you haven’t heard, you’re hearing it now. Meditation can help calm you down, lower your blood pressure and potentially lead to spiritual enlightenment. That last part may depend on how you meditate. Anyone up for an experiment?
See, a clinical professor of psychiatry has done a study that shows playing slot machines is a form of meditation. Or at least that players enter into a meditative state when playing the games. Yes, there’s science behind this. It seems that when we play slots, our brain releases dopamine and natural drug that creates that meditative sense of oneness with everything. Or at least oneness with the slot machines.
This, the psychiatrist says, explains why people enjoying playing slot games even when they lose. The very act of playing makes us feel good. Oh, winning will make us feel even better, but even when we lose; we’re actually getting a good body response just by watching the reels spin. This also goes a long way toward explaining why we like loose slots — those games that don’t pay out big but feed us enough money to keep playing. Those slot games help us extend that great feeling we get from playing.
So, all this has me wondering if it’s possible to obtain spiritual enlightenment by playing slot games. I could start my own religion, or at least a cult. I could build a casino and install a bunch of slot machines and declare it to be a church. And playing slots a form of prayer. Oh, sure, you think I’m being silly, but I bet I’d see you in “church” every Sunday if I really did that.
Tight or loose slot games
As a slots player, you’ll often hear people refer to a slot game as being either tight or loose. You may wonder what those terms mean and more importantly, how do the change how you play the slot machine. Because not all slot machine games are created equal. So, let’s discuss tight and loose slots, who they appeal to, and how to play them.
A tight slot machine is one that holds on to its nickels, figuratively speaking. What this means is that tight machines don’t pay out very often but when they do, it’s more likely to be a sizable sum. This type of slot machine appeals to those who are playing with the thought of winning a fortune. An easy example of a tight slot machine would be a progressive slot machine. Just think about it for a moment. You play a progressive slot because you want that big slot jackpot. And to win that jackpot, you have to be willing to bet the maximum number of coins to qualify. So, sit down at a dollar progressive machine in a big casino, and you can expect to drop $5 or so on each spin. Which tells you what you really need to know about playing the tight slot machine — you’re going to need a decent size bankroll. These machines won’t let you get away with small bets and winning just enough money to keep playing. They require an investment.
Which brings us to loose slot machines. These are the slot games for the casual player. The person who wants to spend some quality time playing slots but is more interested in the fun of the game than the big jackpot. Not that anything is wrong with winning a jackpot, but the loose slot machine player is the player who wants to sit down at a nickel machine with $10 in their hands and play all night. Casinos have done studies on these players and realized that they’re perfectly happy if they walk out at the end of the night without that $10 as long as they got to play slots for a long time. So loose slot machines are designed to dribble back winnings to these players to keep them playing longer. These will be smaller winnings, but they keep the player at the slot game longer.
Now, neither of these methods is better than the other. Yes, the tight slots player can argue that they’re more likely to win big. But they’re also more likely to lose big. The loose slot player will win more often, but at the end of the night, all they’ll have to show for it is the enjoyment of the game. Which isn’t a bad thing.
Slot tournaments gaining popularity
If you play slots, either online or at a land based casino, you may have run across some slot tournaments and wondered what these are all about. Slot tournaments are gaining in popularity. In fact, The Meadows Racetrack and Casino in Pennsylvania will be holding its first slot tournaments this December, which provides an excellent chance to compare online slot tournaments with a land based casino tournament.
Now a slot tournament is essentially a race to accumulate as many points as possible during the period of time that the tournament runs. So, you sign up for a slot tournament and generally pay an entry fee. For that fee, you get a specific number of credits and a place at the slot game. Then you spin as fast and furiously as possible to gain as many credits as you can. Now in a tournament, you won’t win the money amount that shows on your machine. Instead you’re competing for prize amounts set by the casino. These can be very large when a casino wants to offer a big tournament. Online casinos often hold frequent tournaments with smaller prizes and low entry fees.
Now the Pennsylvania casino seems to be learning a lesson from online slot games because their slot tournament is a free entry tournament. In the past, I’ve check out Las Vegas casinos and found that they can charge entry fees over $100 for a slot tournament. The average online tournament will probably run you about $5 for entry.
Now, there is a trick I use when assessing a slot tournament. First – if it’s free, enter it. After all, you can’t actually lose money playing for free. (Don’t rebuy chips. That’s how the casino makes money.) If it has an entry fee, look at the prize levels available and how many prizes are being awarded. An online casino may award 500 levels of prizes with hundreds of players potentially winning back their entry fee plus a little bonus cash. So, even if I don’t get the grand prize, I’ll have the fun of playing plus a little extra money.
Check out the slot tournaments at your favorite casino. They can be a fun, fast and furious way to win!
Determining your slots bankroll
I read lots of articles on gambling and how to determine your bankroll for various games. Okay, I probably read too many articles on it. Some of the methods make me feel like I’m back in my college Calculus class. Unfortunately gambling returns can’t be demonstrated by a line infinitely approaching zero. That’s about all I really remember about calculus class. Lines approaching zero and never getting there. If you’ve ever gambled, you probably know that getting your bankroll to approach and achieve zero is a lot easier. So, that’s the principle I base my bankroll principles on – zero exists. Hey, it’s calculus so it has to be right.
So, here’s how you determine your slots bankroll. This is amount 1.
Contact your bank and ask how much money you have. This is amount 2.
Look at all your bills and determine how much money you need to pay them each month (or as they become due). This is amount 3.
Now, calculate how much you spend each week on food and clothing and other stuff you need. This is amount 4.
Don’t forget, you should probably be saving or investing each week. This is amount 5.
Now, we do something that may be familiar if you’ve ever filled out a tax form for the IRS. Add amounts 2, 3, 4 and 5. Subtract them from amount 1. The remain number, amount 6, is money you can spend on things like gambling. Since you probably want to do things other than gamble, your bankroll is LESS than amount 6. If amount 6 is zero or less than zero, you should skip gambling, since your bankroll is zero. If amount 5 is zero, you may also skip gambling and your bankroll is zero.
Now my method is firmly grounded in theory that you probably won’t actually win the money for that house payment every month on a slot game. And that players chasing the win usually find their money quickly achieves zero. So, don’t gamble what you can’t afford to win when play an online casino real money game.
What’s in a slot gaming platform
If you play slot games, you’ll soon notice that different casinos offer different slot games. The choice of game depends on the gaming platform that the casino uses. Now, the gaming platform does determine which casino games the casino offers overall, but the effect is most noticeable in slots. After all, slot games all have different looks, graphics and themes while blackjack is pretty much blackjack no matter where you go.
So, what’s up with all these different gaming platforms? Well, developing an online computer game that plays for real money is a complex process and if every casino developed their own, we’d have more variety, but we’d also be constantly struggling to make sure the games played fair. So online casinos determined years ago that the best thing to do was partner with a developer who had expertise in designing casino games. As the online casinos grew so did the reputation of the top develops such as Real Time Gaming, Microgaming, Playtech and Rival.
For online players, the software providers can offer a first check point to see if a casino is reputable. Since the software developers want to protect their reputation so they can sell their software to more casinos, they are often particular about who they do business with. So a good developer will only work with a good casino. Knowing who the top developers are can also help you find a new online casino that offers your favorite games or one that offers different games from those you usually play. When you look at a casino, if it rules RTG software, it will probably offer most or all of the same games as the other RTG casinos you have accounts with. But a casino that runs Playtech software will have different games.
If you’re going to be a knowledgeable player at online casinos, you’ll want to know who the top software developers are. If you play slots, you’ll find you soon figure out based on the games they offer.
Chasing the progressive jackpot
Walk into any casino and look at the slot floor and guess where you’ll see players heading – to the progressive slots. Now land based casinos often make a production of the progressives to draw even more attention to them than they do to the regular slot games. Whenever a casino makes a production of anything, you can figure it makes them money, but it’s hard to ignore these flashy groups of games with big bright jackpots advertised above them. Even though, well, we probably won’t win all that money, and I’ve discovered that the progressive games often have a worse payout rate than regular slots. So if I hit a regular slot game with $20 in my account, I may leave with $20 or even $50 if I’m lucky. I won’t win a million, but I can walk away with money in my pocket. If I hit a Progressive game, I usually walk away with nothing.
So, why do people play the progressive slot games? Because that jackpot can change your life rather than just give you some extra change. But if you like to play casino gambling online, there are ways to help catch that jackpot you’re chasing after.
Many online slot players stalk their fav casinos and watch the progressive games to see when they typically pay out. So, they’ll notice that when a certain jackpot gets close to $100,000 it pays up. Another might not pay out until $500,000 on average. Now these amounts aren’t guarantees, but what the savvy online player will do is wait until the games are close to their usual payout amount and then play that slot game. There are reports of folks winning hundreds of thousands in cash following this method. And still plenty of us leaving without that $50 in our pocket.
Extra Bonus Promo at Lucky Red Casino
I’m checking out Lucky Red Casino for their new bonus promotions and tomorrow begins the Extra Bonus Day promotion over at Lucky Red Casino. This is a great bonus offer for members of the casino. From Tuesday, October 25th through Thursday, October 27th, you just need to use the code EXTRA50 to get $50 added to your balance when you make a deposit of as little as $20. So, a little math – deposit $20 to your Lucky Red account and use the coupon code EXTRA50 for an additional $50 or a total of $70 in playing money.
Now, I always caution people to check out the terms and conditions before taking advantage of a bonus offer, but I know some people see that extra $50 flash in front of their eyes and don’t go any further. So here’s what you need to know. The extra $50 can only be used for slots, keno and scratch cards. There are other bonus offers for blackjack and video poker players, but they’ll want to skip this one. Also, both the deposit money and the extra $50 must be wagered $1250 before you can cash out. Which isn’t a bad play through rate compared to some out there. Also, you can only use the EXTRA50 coupon one time!
Of course in addition to checking out bonus terms, you’ll want to check out the casinos themselves. Now I can tell you that Lucky Red is a good casino because I’ve done my research, but if you’re thinking about a casino that isn’t on my list, be sure to make sure they’re properly licensed with a group like http://www.ciga.an/ or other reputable casino licensing authority.
Does how much you bet make a difference
One of the big questions people have about gambling is — does how much you wager on a game make a difference in the potential payout. Now, here’s where slot games can have a very different answer than other games. Let’s take blackjack as an example. Most of us are familiar with the rules of blackjack even if we don’t play the game. Since blackjack is played with decks of playing cards and those are a set quantity, there isn’t much a casino can do to change the overall odds on blackjack games other than setting different rules for variations of the games. But the simple answer for a blackjack player or a video poker player is that the odds are the same at the $5 table and the $50 table.
But what about slots? Ah, now we’ve discovered why casinos love slot games. Yes, it is possible for a casino – online or in Las Vegas – to set slot games based on the amount bet. So, at a land based casino, the penny slots and nickel slots usually do have worse overall payouts than the dollar and up slots. And yes, it is possible for this to vary with online slots. But these may be subtle differences.
Players are more likely to find a big and obvious payout difference when it comes to how much they bet on a game and that is the difference between the minimum bet and the maximum bet to qualify for bonuses and jackpots. Let’s take a simple three reel bonus game at a casino. Find one if you’ve never played one because they are fun but also because the principals are easy to understand when you break them down to one payline and three reels.
At a three reel slot game with a bonus option, you can bet from one to three coins. Look at the paytable. There’s a bonus option available but you won’t qualify for the bonus unless you bet three coins. This is the casino’s way to encourage you to play for the full bet, and they don’t hide it at all. Casinos know they make more money from you if they tell you how you might make more money from them. And that’s someone you don’t need the world wide web to discover.