The world of free casino stuff for slot playing is a strange world indeed. It is all based on points, and some slot clubs make it very hard to figure it all out. However, in general, you play “X” amount of money in the machine and you get “Y” points. If you play $100 through a machine, you might get five points.
1 - Get a Top Welcome Bonus
One of the advantages of signing up to an online casino is the often great welcome bonus you can get for making a first deposit. Most good casinos will offer 100% back - sometimes 200% - of what you deposit, up to hundreds of dollars. But it's not just the dollar amount you need to look at - it's also how easy that bonus is to trigger. If you have to play through a ridiculous amount of games in order to unlock that bonus, maybe it's not so good after all.
Confused? Check out our bonus guide and find out more.
2 - Great Security and Software
The best on-line casinos will have state-of-the-art graphics and software for seamless gambling play. If you're a roulette player you want virtual wheels that spin with ease and quick resolution of the bets. Blackjack players want slick shuffling and dealing of the cards.
And both sets of players want top, independently-audited software so that you can trust the games' Random Number Generators. The best casinos will have these in place. (If in doubt, look for the eCOGRA logos or similar on the site's homepage).
Security doesn't stop at RNGs, though. If you're playing for real-money, you want to know that your personal details are safe. That's why great casinos online will have the latest 128-bit SSL security in place - similar to leading credit card companies - to ensure players' money and vitals are totally secure. We've put together this handy guide to online casino security if you'd like to learn more.
3 - A Wide Range of Deposit Options
Take a look at a casino's list of banking methods. What do they accept? A bank debit card alone? Maybe a couple of major credit cards too? Perhaps they accept half a dozen e-wallets? Good online casinos should be able to process a wide range of deposit methods - and if they don't, steer clear.
Check out our in-depth guide to deposit options for more information.
4 - The Fastest Cashouts Online
So, you've found a casino that accepts a third-party processor payment, and lets you deposit via check or credit card in minutes. But how good are they at giving YOU your winnings? The top casino sites should be able to process a range of withdrawals in a couple of days, if not minutes. And if you're left waiting weeks, there's something wrong. Feel free to contact the site before signing up, or read what other players have said about them in reviews or gambling forums.
5 - Look For Plenty Of Game Variety
One advantage casinos online over their land-based cousins is the range of games they can offer. If a brick 'n' mortar casino has space for 50 slots, an online one will have room for 75, 100, 150 slots - and they can offer more progressive jackpots too due to the volume of players online.
The same goes for table games like blackjack and roulette. With no 'floor space' to take up, Internet casinos are free to offer dozens of games - and at a wider range of stakes too. You might be able to play roulette at 25c or blackjack at a dollar. But big online casinos will cater for ALL wallets. They will offer plenty of micro-stakes games for the casual player plus big stakes for the proper whales.
Before you sign up at a casino site, browse their site and find out exactly what games are on offer, for what stakes, and what variety there are. If there doesn't seem to be enough to keep you happy, look elsewhere.
6 - Great Customer Support
If you are having problems getting started, making a deposit, or getting hold of your winnings, speaking to customer support is your first port of call. And with online casinos being faceless beasts (although often very friendly faceless beasts) you need to be sure that you can speak to someone human who cares about your problems. Top casinos will boast 24/7 customer support so you can have your problem dealt with wherever you live, and offer email support, phone support, or instant chat if you want to talk online with an operator.
7 - The Best Download and No Download Options
Downloading a casino client to your desktop PC or laptop is often the easiest - and most secure - way to enjoy real-money games. But what if you are on the move a lot or you want to play on a Mac? Perhaps that great online casino doesn't seem so great if it won't work on your machine.
That's why the best sites will have both download AND no-download options. No download clients are great for playing on non-PC machines, on your mobile or smartphone, or on public machines, and work via a web browser for swift instant-play. The graphics, games and gameplay may suffer somewhat, but the best casinos make sure there's as little difference in the two versions as possible.
Online Casino How It Works Can U Figure Outside
8 - Reliability and Trust
Finally, tying up the security issues is reliability and trust. Is the casino regulated and licensed by a legit commission with a history of licensing leading casinos? Has the casino won awards for its software and service? These are things you need to investigate if you want to be sure about making a deposit with them.
Points, Bounceback, Mail Offers and Good Machines
by Frank Scoblete
The savvy slot player knows that there is more to playing slots than just putting in your coins or paper and watching the reels spin while hoping and praying that a win is in the next decision. There are three elements to successful slots play. These are:
1. Always play the machines with the best returns.
2. Always use your player’s card when you play.
3. Always take advantage of as many of the casino’s comps as you can.
The fact is that there are good slot players and there are bad slot players, just as there are good and bad doctors, dentists, dancers and detectives. Some slot players just walk into the casino, plop themselves down on a chair and start playing this, that, or the other machine, never knowing if the machine is any good in its payback return. They don’t use a player’s club card either, so all their play is hit or miss. They get no extras from the casino marketers.
The Ploppies, as I have dubbed the outrageously poor casino players that litter the gambling landscape, don’t know what they are missing—and they don’t care. They are like drivers heading 100 miles per hour into a solid brick wall. They figure luck will decide their fate. I’d bet the brick wall wins every time.
Before we get into the nitty-gritty of all the casino perks offered slot players, let’s first outline what machines you should play in order to get these perks with the least cost to yourself. The casinos want you to play, play and play some more in order for the house edge to grind away at your bankroll. We want to play, yes, but we want to select machines that give us the least house edge to go up against.
The machines with the highest house edges are the progressive machines that offer million –dollar prizes. These progressives are usually holding about 15 percent of all the money played in them. That means for every $100 you wager, your average loss will be $15. It’s hard to come away a winner facing such edges—they are the brick walls of slot play.
Now if you take a careful look at the Strictly Slots payback percentages on the machines in this issue, you will see a curious thing. The 25-cent and dollar machines are returning a lot more than 85 percent of the money played in them. Why is this? Because there are machines out there that are giving good returns in all denominations. These good machines are in all casinos. These machines are not, I repeat, are not those progressives with million-dollar jackpots. They are stand-alone machines with fixed pay schedules. So just by playing the non-progressives, you have given yourself a much better chance to win today or tonight.
The Player’s Card
The casinos all want to give you “free” treats, known as comps, based on your play. Actually, the “free” treats they want to give you are based on your theoretical loss at the type of machine that you are playing. Some casinos actually have a different formula for different machines—which means they give you more “free” stuff because you lost more on the progressives. They give you less free stuff because you are playing high return video poker machines.
My advice—even if your casino does this comping formula machine-by-machine—don’t play the progressives. The value of the comps they are giving you will not make up the difference between your losses at the progressives and your losses on stand-alone machines. You are almost always better off playing stand-alones. (There are rare cases where some progressives get to a point where they are good bets—but as a rule of thumb, they aren’t, so pass them by.)
While different casinos might call this theoretical loss something else (like total wager, player expectation and we gotcha!), the effects are the same. The casino will give you back a percentage of your theoretical loss in the form of comps. But you get nothing if you don’t use your player’s card.
Free Stuff
The world of free casino stuff for slot playing is a strange world indeed. It is all based on points, and some slot clubs make it very hard to figure it all out. However, in general, you play “X” amount of money in the machine and you get “Y” points. If you play $100 through a machine, you might get five points. Each five points is worth one dollar. If the machine is calculated as holding a five percent edge over you, then you lose a theoretical five dollars but you got one dollar back.
All casinos have their own methods for determining points, so my example is just one of hundreds of possible ways the casino figures out what you are worth to them. That’s fine. Our job as players is to determine how valuable the casino is for us. Casinos shouldn’t be the only ones in the judging business.
If the casino merely gave you a dollar credit on the machine every time you put through a hundred dollars, figuring out comps would be an easy thing to do. But that is not what the casino does. There are a whole host of comps the casino gives slot players based on the theoretical loss.
Let us say that you put through $10,000 in a machine. You won some spins, lost more spins, but after all was said and done, you played that $10,000. The casino gives you back 500 points, which is $100. (If the machine is holding five percent of all money played, your theoretical loss is $500.)
Now, the casino has to decide how to give you back your $100. Rarely does the casino slot executive walk up to you and hand you the $100. (“Here you go, Sally, thanks for playing.”) The casino brain trust wants to give you your comps in a way that makes you want to come back to the casino again. Here are the most common ways the casino gives you back your comps based on your theoretical loss. (I’ll use $100 as the amount they are returning to you.)
Same-Day Cash-Back: The casino might give you a percentage of your comps as same-day cash-back. That is almost the same as the casino slot executive walking up to you and handing you some money. However, you have to go over to the slot player’s club desk to get the cash-back or put your card into one of the automatic kiosks that can print you up the necessary cash-back coupon. The casino might give you $20 for your same-day cash-back in our example.
Bounce-back Cash: So you now go home and several days later you receive a coupon or check worth $60 for your next trip. (“Thanks for coming to our casino, Jim, and we want you to come back again soon, so here’s $60 for you that you can use on your next visit! Coupon expires by such and such a date.”) The thing is you have to go back to the casino to cash in the coupon or check you received in the mail. The casino wants you to “bounce back” to them. You can’t get the money if you don’t show your face on the property. The casino assumes, correctly, that most slot players who come back with their bounceback coupons or checks will play the machines.
Mail Offers: All mail offers are bounce-backs. Let’s see how these work. Okay, you’ve gotten $80 back in the form of same day cash-back and bounce-back coupon or check. Now you note that a mailer has been sent to you offering you discounted or free rooms, a super-dooper pooper-scooper for your doggie or a “never dies ever” flashlight for your car. These offers change on a monthly basis—sometimes on a weekly basis—and some slot players have gotten so much stuff from the casinos that they have to put it all in specially-built rooms in their homes! The mail offers usually reflect the level of play that you are at. With the remaining $20 in comps coming your way, you can estimate that the super-dooper pooper-scooper and the “never dies ever” flashlight will be valued at around $20.
Okay, the comping I have outlined all looks pretty easy up to this point. However, casino marketing executives must earn their salaries and their Rolls Royces and to do that, the saying around marketing enclaves is, “Hey, that’s too darn easy!” Marketing executives don’t want you to know exactly how they figure out the total comp package you can get for your play, so the example I gave above will not fit most casino slot clubs perfectly. It is, as we say in non-marketing circles, an easy norm to understand. But there is more added to the comp package and you can take advantage of these add-ons.
In slow months—and most casinos still have slow months all around this gambling land of ours—the comps will be greater because the casinos can’t make money if you aren’t in their pleasure palaces playing their machines. So instead of the normal $60 bounce-back mentioned above, you get a $100 bounce-back coupon in February and March. But come April, you suddenly get that $60 again. You get free rooms in February and March but you have to pay a small price the rest of the year. You get crystal glasses in those slow months, but ashtrays in May. Café in February; buffet in May.
In “locals” casinos in Vegas and other states, you will find that certain days of the week that used to be considered slow now offer double, triple or more points for your play. Many of these days aren’t that slow anymore. Rather than end these special “extra point days,” some casinos will subtract points if they ascertain that you only play on these “extra point days.” Yes, that is a little weird isn’t it; they give you points and subtract points at the same time?
Now there are some things you should keep in mind about points—they come and go. If you take your bounce-back coupon to the casino, cash it, and head out the door, it is quite possible, even likely, that the casino will judge that trip as a zero dollar one—and reduce your theoretical loss on your next mailings. You get no points for no play. In fact, you lose points. However, some casinos will give you extra points if you have a credit line. Casinos like credit players because that credit line is there to be played and gives the casino a good insight into what you are willing to lose. Credit players are cash in the casinos’ vaults.
Now, the best way to find out how the casino figures all this out is to call them. You can ask to speak with a slot host who should know the formula for the full range of comps. That doesn’t mean he’ll tell you all the ins and outs, but he’ll tell you enough ins and enough outs to give you a solid idea of whether this club is one you want to be in.
In some venues, such as Atlantic City, the formulas can be so arcane that even Einstein, the great thinker who said that God doesn’t play dice with the universe, wouldn’t be able to figure them out. So there is a good chance the Atlantic City casino slot host you call will not know exactly how everything works. But he should have some idea, however vague, of what kind of play will give you what kind of general comp.
Be warned about Atlantic City: Because the New Jersey legislature has passed some weird gambling laws, there are certain things the casino hosts can’t say—for example, anything that encourages people to gamble is verboten. Yes, that is strange. But Jersey is strange, so there is a nice fit.
Okay, let’s sum it all up: Play good machines, get a player’s card and get those comps and you will be one happy slot player.
Frank Scoblete is the #1 best-selling gaming author. He is executive director of the Golden Touch advantage-play seminars in craps and blackjack. If you are looking to get an edge using a controlled dice throw or to learn the revolutionary and easiest advantage-play method at blackjack, call 1-800-944-0406. Frank’s websites are www.goldentouchcraps.com, www.goldentouchblackjack.com and www.scoblete.com in association with CasinoCity.com. His newest book is The Golden Touch Dice Control Revolution! For more information or a free brochure, call 1-800-944-0406 or write to Frank Scoblete Enterprises, PO Box 446, Malverne, NY 11565.