Q&A Ask Me Anything about Slots (AMA) 2020 with Trancemonkey

@trancemonkey

got a question I don’t think has been asked before over the 2 threads but just wondering if you’d know.

when a game comes to the end of its life and a company decides to pull it off the sites. Can they just do this anytime or do they have to wait until it’s at its RTP %?

I know these game have billions and billions of spins so after so long it’s gonna be close it it’s RTP anyway. So it might only be 1/2% but could still be a lot of money.
 
@trancemonkey

got a question I don’t think has been asked before over the 2 threads but just wondering if you’d know.

when a game comes to the end of its life and a company decides to pull it off the sites. Can they just do this anytime or do they have to wait until it’s at its RTP %?

I know these game have billions and billions of spins so after so long it’s gonna be close it it’s RTP anyway. So it might only be 1/2% but could still be a lot of money.

Games can be pulled at any time for any number of reasons... and no they don't have to wait.

Most games actually get close to the RTP reasonably quickly (the more volatile, the longer it takes)... but its only "billions" of games to get to the exact RTP to however many decimal places are stated.

Within a million games, the RTP will be very very close normally.

Within 100k games, still probably within a few percent either way. And popular games may do that many spins in a few days...
 
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You mean nothing even remotely like the promotion CM had a few years back, when a casino took a player to Malta and showed him their entire office?

Or nothing like where a staff of cm have seen pretty much every live casino studio in the industry?

Yeah it's bloody hidden.

Yes, but during lunchtime on the visit the guy did run, screaming hysterically "THEY'RE NOT RRANDOM, THEY'RE NOT RANDOM!!" and jumped into Ta'Xbiex marina and had to be rescued and later sectioned.
 
Yes, but during lunchtime on the visit the guy did run, screaming hysterically "THEY'RE NOT RRANDOM, THEY'RE NOT RANDOM!!" and jumped into Ta'Xbiex marina and had to be rescued and later sectioned.
so, a normal day then :D
 
Do you think some developers are pushing the casinos to choose the lower RTP version to get more profit depending on the deals they have?

I am growing more and more suspicious of Red Tiger lately that alot of sites now have them on a lower setting, even the likes of Pokerstars which are suprising..
Personally the whole industry is in need and struggling...

The RTP, the dodgy practices and the less and less reps we have here...

speaking from a U.K. point of view... yes things had to change as it was crazy Wild West nonsense, has it gone too far....
Hell yes...

It won’t end well, it’ll be the decent player whom loses out due to promotion and corporate greed...

But that’s the way of the world I guess...

no wonder I’m no longer looking for a match or even interested in a deposit with my takeaway and beer.... shame, utter shame
 
Yes, but during lunchtime on the visit the guy did run, screaming hysterically "THEY'RE NOT RRANDOM, THEY'RE NOT RANDOM!!" and jumped into Ta'Xbiex marina and had to be rescued and later sectioned.
Sloppy sloppy... They should have used the industry mandatory tazers, not let him run a couple hundred meters...
 
This probably varies by provider/casino, but do online slots play by the rules when it comes to progressive jackpots in terms of transferring the built-up funds to other games when games are retired? Or when someone hits a big jackpot but was playing with a max cashout, say a NDB?

I know in Vegas it's a regulatory requirement to move the progressive funds to another machine upon removing one since it was built up with player funds in the first place.
 
This probably varies by provider/casino, but do online slots play by the rules when it comes to progressive jackpots in terms of transferring the built-up funds to other games when games are retired? Or when someone hits a big jackpot but was playing with a max cashout, say a NDB?

I know in Vegas it's a regulatory requirement to move the progressive funds to another machine upon removing one since it was built up with player funds in the first place.

Pretty much the same here in Canada I thought I read it somewhere at least that the jackpot has to be paid first before the machine is taken out, I really doubt they do that here or at my local casino even if it is law.
 
This probably varies by provider/casino, but do online slots play by the rules when it comes to progressive jackpots in terms of transferring the built-up funds to other games when games are retired? Or when someone hits a big jackpot but was playing with a max cashout, say a NDB?

I know in Vegas it's a regulatory requirement to move the progressive funds to another machine upon removing one since it was built up with player funds in the first place.

Good question - i admit i'm not familiar with the rules for online where this is concerned, but as jackpots (big ones at least) are paid for by the developer and not the casino, i'm not sure where the money would go (if anywhere) if a casino pulled a game. My guess is that it goes nowhere....but if i get chance, i'll read the regs and see if i can tell what the UKGC has to say about it, if anything
 
Hi! Yesterday, I found a
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with instruction how to play slots like pro. I would be interested in your opinion.

Thanks!
There's no such thing as a professional slot player. And Step 10 tells you all you need to know, don't listen to those guys. Next they'll tell you how to constantly beat roulette with martingale :D
 
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Hi! Yesterday, I found a
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with instruction how to play slots like pro. I would be interested in your opinion.

Thanks!

That document is ok in places, laughably bad in others and actively dangerous in parts...
Let's go through one by one...

1. Explore the history of slots
Interesting maybe, but is it a step to make you a "better player" - no

2. Learn how to understand the slot controls
Well, yeah - if you're going to bet, you should probably understand what you're doing. So nothing too wrong here - however, the double or nothing round it describes (with a hi-lo card choice) is certainly not the only one that exists, and most use the red / black gamble. But, at least it's not bare-faced lying here unlike...

3. Choose slots like a pro
Every single word of this is a lie, and a dangerous one at that. A random game has no knowledge of previous play, and therefore the current state of the game (i.e whether you think it's hot or cold or neutral) has zero impact on whether the next spin could be a 1000x win. So the method, and reasons, they moronically posit here are not a "really neat conclusion". I mean, who in their right mind thinks that running the slot in demo until it "goes hot" and then "switch to real play" is honestly a real way to gain an advantage?!

4. Understand volatility
This part is actually useful - you SHOULD understand volatility. And probably avoid too many high ones...

5. Understand RTP
Another good part

6. Familiarize yourself with multiple developers
Why not - the more choice you have, the better right?

7. Master the basics of slot features
Master? Anyway, an informative section covering multiple different wild functionalities...

8. Use the bonus advantage
Actually, i would encourage most people who ever want to have any hope of withdrawing money to not take a bonus. But if you CAN use them to your advantage, why not!

9. Decide which casino to play
Derr.. well, yeah. But to be fair, they posit only using licenced casinos, so this is good... however then they say:

10. Apply a simply double up betting system
No, no, no... don't do this. This is NOT a sure fire way to win. This is NOT roulette - and casinos have bet size limits for this exact reason (as doubling up on Roulette endlessly would, in theory, work..

However, it doesn't on slots - because on Roulette you know exactly how much you will win if your number comes in - you have no idea how much a bonus will pay you.. could be anywhere from nothing to 1000x or more. Doubling up on slots is just a very very quick way to lose a LOT of money.

Don't do this - this is dangerous and stupid.

TM
 
I don't really come on here much but have been playing online slots for about 5 years. I thought I'd better check on here to see what's been happening, because I've noticed that, since lockdown in particular, the games have been playing worse than I've ever seen them.

Now I can see why and I feel really cheated by the casinos, and I have to say by the UKGC as well if this has been instigated by them. It's bad enough losing the quickspin, but discovering that casinos can lower the stated RTP is simply disgusting. As far as I'm concerned this is fraud, pure and simple.

I have a question about the effects of an RTP reduction of 1 or 2 percent on the games, because there's been a marked difference between how they play now to how they used to play. I thought I'd seen the very worst these games can throw at you over the years, but last night I was playing Shogun of Time in the Glossy Bingo Slot Sprint and I've never seen a game play so appallingly badly (although in the last few months it has been deteriorating rapidly). More than ten games in a row playing at nearly 100% dead spins, no free spin rounds and no respin wins. Very few winning spins and nearly all very low, the rest losing or stake back wins. The last game I played I got 33 dead spins in a row from the beginning (my record is 39 from the start and 60 during a game, both on Netent games unsurprisingly), but those 10 games must be up there in the top 1% or so of the worst games I've ever played.

Could a 1 or 2% reduction really make that much of a difference, because I've noticed multiple games across multiple casinos playing so incredibly badly (these are games I play an awful lot and know what to expect), it's like being slowly tortured without quickspin.

If these games are truly random, how can the RNG churn out nearly 100% zeroes over a long run of separate games, because this month in particular over 90% of the games I've played have just been dead spin fests. They're also playing in almost exactly the same way nearly every time and there are clearly patterns of play because I see it every time I play certain games, to the point it's getting easy to predict when a run of really bad games is starting up. I carried on playing last night out of morbid curiosity, just to see how bad it could get, and boy, was it bad!

If this is what we can expect from now on then forget it, I'm not going to waste hour after hour sitting watching the games cheating me with a bunch of dead spin fests. As far as I'm concerned they all deserve to go out of business and we should just stop playing them until they give us a fair chance of winning sometimes. What's happening now is just criminal.
 
A 1 or 2% drop will likely not be that noticable on most games. Of course it depends where they take the RTP from when doing the maths, but you would only likely notice it over a long time if you were a regular player.

And the reason games can give lots of dead spins is exactly because they ARE random... I used to made compensated games for the UK, and the good thing about compensating games is that for the most part you can avoid giving people really long, shit runs. You would never program a game to play that badly if you COULD control it.

On a slightly different note, I've played Spartcus Megaways at 40p and lost over £200 in it. Biggest base game win was less than 10x and I had three features which paid 3x, 12x and 15x. What an absolutely atrocioua game that is...
 
FYI: Bloatgoat's recent "It's a fucking scam" derail has been moved here Bloatgoat vs slots.
 
A 1 or 2% drop will likely not be that noticable on most games. Of course it depends where they take the RTP from when doing the maths, but you would only likely notice it over a long time if you were a regular player.

Have you noticed any difference or changed your play? I stay away from lower so cant comment.

I wonder if anybody who has not changed their gameplay/slot choice noticed anything?

Bit of a loose question as we all seek excuses for losses and it would be easy to blame.

I have a friend who plays nearly nothing but Gemix at Videoslots on min stakes (the kind of player who deposits £20 and withdraws £30) and he says the games not the same. I also heard a whisper that Gonzos Quest Megaways reduction is taken from the base game, which i found to be fairly brutal anyway.
 
Hello! Will you be ready to answer if the slots are rigged? Haha just joking. Thank you for this. I wanted to ask you if there are regulations when it comes to autoplay?
 
Hello! Will you be ready to answer if the slots are rigged? Haha just joking. Thank you for this. I wanted to ask you if there are regulations when it comes to autoplay?

Yes, in some jurisdictions, there are regulations about autoplay.
 
I kinda understand the Idea. That's just unfair gameplay, anyway thanks man.

Most jurisdictions just either limit max autoplay amount, or as per the UK, they request you to add some loss limits with the autoplay.
 
Have you noticed any difference or changed your play? I stay away from lower so cant comment.

I wonder if anybody who has not changed their gameplay/slot choice noticed anything?

Bit of a loose question as we all seek excuses for losses and it would be easy to blame.

I have a friend who plays nearly nothing but Gemix at Videoslots on min stakes (the kind of player who deposits £20 and withdraws £30) and he says the games not the same. I also heard a whisper that Gonzos Quest Megaways reduction is taken from the base game, which i found to be fairly brutal anyway.

Yes, without a doubt some games have completely changed how they play.

I'm a bit like your friend, play the same set of games at lowest stakes, some of which I must have played thousands of times across multiple casinos so you get to know how they play and what to expect as a general rule.

They go through patches, especially Netent games that seem to change literally overnight. Some come back but others don't, and of those some change so much they're almost unrecognisable from how they played for years. For example, Magic of Sahara used to be a fair game, some decent FS rounds, some decent winning spins, but overnight it changed and is now basically a dead spin fest. Rubbish FS, hardly any multiple full reel wilds, barely any decent winning spins, and nearly every game almost exactly the same. I don't really play it anymore unless it's a bonus or qualifying game because it's simply not the same game. It's only really noticeable if you play it nearly every day and have done since it came out, which I did.

You can still win on it, but the percentage of good games to bad ones has plummeted. That's just one example of a number of games that have done the same thing.

To be honest I'd be more surprised if developers didn't mess around with the games so they're more casino friendly sometimes, we're dealing with human beings and money after all, and the UKGC seem to have taken their eye off the ball as far as actual fair gameplay is concerned, being more interested in self-exclusion and quick spin fiddling from where I'm sitting.
 
Hi trance, admire your dedication to these threads.
I think they really need a FAQ as the OP though.

I'd like to ask what the shoddiest coding (slot or site) you've seen is.
 
I'm always curious how the slot providers make money, I'm not talking about the contractors/third parties who sell assets or front end games to the slot provider, I'm more interested in the slot providers who deliver the entire front end/back end packages.

Say, I have developed a slot game with brilliant maths, how would I go on to sell the slot? do you need to get the license to begin with? if so, apart from paying the license fee, getting you game code reviewed and regulated is there anything else you need to go through? After obtaining the license, does this mean you can legally sell your slots to the casinos within the jurisdiction?

Assuming all above is correct, so now you have become a license holder of the certain jurisdictions, do you just peddle around with your games to the online casinos? if you are lucky enough that they find your games interesting, do you then just plug your games in their platform and take commissions (based on the revenue of the game), so the game would be basically running in remote control mode (hence Remote gaming service?) which is still hosted on your server not the casino? do you need to take care of the money side or it's handled by the casino? Lets say, if there's a big payout, you don't pay anything but the casinos? if the game makes money, you take in commission at the end of the period, but if it loses money over time, it doesn't affect your end other than the commissions?

I know its probably a big topic, I'm just being curious, if you would shed some light with us.
 
Say, I have developed a slot game with brilliant maths, how would I go on to sell the slot? do you need to get the license to begin with? if so, apart from paying the license fee, getting you game code reviewed and regulated is there anything else you need to go through? After obtaining the license, does this mean you can legally sell your slots to the casinos within the jurisdiction?

Assuming all above is correct, so now you have become a license holder of the certain jurisdictions, do you just peddle around with your games to the online casinos? if you are lucky enough that they find your games interesting, do you then just plug your games in their platform and take commissions (based on the revenue of the game), so the game would be basically running in remote control mode (hence Remote gaming service?) which is still hosted on your server not the casino? do you need to take care of the money side or it's handled by the casino? Lets say, if there's a big payout, you don't pay anything but the casinos? if the game makes money, you take in commission at the end of the period, but if it loses money over time, it doesn't affect your end other than the commissions?

Assuming you want to target the regulated market then from my understanding the process would go something like the following
  • Run a billion round tests on your game and get all important numbers so you know it works as you expect
  • Find a company that audits software. Send them all your code for your slot machine including the test program so they can verify that all works correct. They will also want to check your client side to verify that you dont cheat with showing wrong symbols, balances are clear, help text show the information required, history of previous rounds can be seen and match outcomes. The cost of this and the amount of work varies per market you are going into.
  • Get a suppliers licences for the market you are after. This will take a lot of time and can involve a massive due diligence of all key personnel and owners of you and your company. This includes police records checks, financial backgrounds checks, "good character" confirmations and so forth.
  • Start to talk to operators or get connected to a hub supplier. If you go after the operators directly and make a deal with them you now need to integrate with them or them with you. So you can send bets and wins between your systems. This is specific to each operator.
    Also the operator would never pick you up for one slot. You need to have a lot and be able to produce at regular intervals with a expected quality. You should also be unique in some way. See megaways, daily jackpots and other such features. Otherwise they would much rather just use the big suppliers they already have that gives them 1-3 game per week with a stable/known quality and performance.
  • Deals are from what I gather based on a % of the GGR (Bets - wins) so if your slot had 1000 in bets and 950 in wins you and the operator shares the 50. They handle the money and the marketing to a large part so expect that % to be very low.
    You shouldn't need to care about money except if your slot is buggy. Then you can expect the operator to come after you for the damage caused. For example in the Razor shark thread someone won 85000x the bet while stated max is 50000x. I would expect the operator to go after the supplier in this case since the risk for the operator was higher than they expected. One such issue can kill your company.
If you are in a unregulated market you can skip a lot of the steps above and also why its so dangerous to go to such sites as a player.
 

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