My online slots videos (plus UK AWPs)
- Thread starter ChopleyIOM
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One more reupload for the weekend.
A reasonably straightforward proposition for a video, but when doing the timecodes for this one I was struck by the fact it's quite a fun video. (If I do say so myself.) I seemed to be enjoying making it and that comes through I think. It helps that there are quite a few flyers to look at, as well as the fact I have looooads of memories of playing these for real, thanks to the cheap ass operators on the IOM. (I mention this in the video.)
The goal I set myself is to get the BIG FIFTY POUNDS out of High Spirits, which all of these Empires could do as a £10 jackpot that repeated four times.
Anyway, entirely up to you if you watch it or not of course, but it struck me as one of the more entertaining ones.
A reasonably straightforward proposition for a video, but when doing the timecodes for this one I was struck by the fact it's quite a fun video. (If I do say so myself.) I seemed to be enjoying making it and that comes through I think. It helps that there are quite a few flyers to look at, as well as the fact I have looooads of memories of playing these for real, thanks to the cheap ass operators on the IOM. (I mention this in the video.)
The goal I set myself is to get the BIG FIFTY POUNDS out of High Spirits, which all of these Empires could do as a £10 jackpot that repeated four times.
Anyway, entirely up to you if you watch it or not of course, but it struck me as one of the more entertaining ones.
On last orders think you could hold down which one u want when hitting start and it would give you it, not sure but think, lol.. If you held all 3 reels it would hold the number gamble reel too, .
Used to play the fiver version religiously. Went for Whiskey galore on it, though it could pay anything from 20p to 20 quid. Fiver version would only do 'hold 2nd reel' if had some value, same with siren cancel flash thing. Same with rolling onto stagger or let em spin above cherries. Or 3 trail holds on the number trail meant value (iirc, you were then also guaranteed to get a number on each reel the following next spin too).
fiver version gamble was so tight on the hi lo id exchange and go for the staggers for either a slammer and hit 4 - 4.80, would on the rare occasin do 5.00 too. But block at max 1.60 if shit. If deeper involved by time got the board, would be trying to hit the double yellows off stagger and hope to roll stagger again to get double yellows to reach to whiskey galore.
the fiver version we had in the arcade would repeat but rarely do 2 repeats. Amazing games.
Used to play the fiver version religiously. Went for Whiskey galore on it, though it could pay anything from 20p to 20 quid. Fiver version would only do 'hold 2nd reel' if had some value, same with siren cancel flash thing. Same with rolling onto stagger or let em spin above cherries. Or 3 trail holds on the number trail meant value (iirc, you were then also guaranteed to get a number on each reel the following next spin too).
fiver version gamble was so tight on the hi lo id exchange and go for the staggers for either a slammer and hit 4 - 4.80, would on the rare occasin do 5.00 too. But block at max 1.60 if shit. If deeper involved by time got the board, would be trying to hit the double yellows off stagger and hope to roll stagger again to get double yellows to reach to whiskey galore.
the fiver version we had in the arcade would repeat but rarely do 2 repeats. Amazing games.
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Never had any Empires on £5 over here, they invaded the pubs en masse on the £10 jackpot, I learned that all of them could do £10 plus four repeats for £50 cash, which wasn't to be sniffed at in 1996/1997!
High Spirits in particular there were quite a few of around.
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Latest reuploads.
The Labyrinth/Sphinx video is recognising the fantastic hi-tech AWPs that Electrocoin made for a short period of time but never really saw much success with, for reasons no one fully understands to this day.
The Doctor Who video covers the machine and also pays tribute to Pook, a long standing FME scene member who has produced some of the very finest layouts for the emulator.
The Indiana Jones video covers a brutal range of £70 jackpot machines made by a company called Red Gaming, which made no pretence of being anything other than fairly hardcore gambling devices.
The Labyrinth/Sphinx video is recognising the fantastic hi-tech AWPs that Electrocoin made for a short period of time but never really saw much success with, for reasons no one fully understands to this day.
The Doctor Who video covers the machine and also pays tribute to Pook, a long standing FME scene member who has produced some of the very finest layouts for the emulator.
The Indiana Jones video covers a brutal range of £70 jackpot machines made by a company called Red Gaming, which made no pretence of being anything other than fairly hardcore gambling devices.
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You roll the die mate, dice is a plural.
Yes but if you're playing Monopoly, for example, you would roll the dice. Or Risk, where the attacking force would roll three dice.
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Latest couple of reuploads, the Maygay video is recognising some of the absolute bangers they turned out during the £6 jackpot AWP era, and on a similar theme, the Indiana Jones video simply covers a single fruit machine of that name released by JPM in 1995.
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Latest two reuploads, both about the same machine, in Part 1 I didn't really get the method right (although I did demonstrate the reversing), for the second part I'd taken on a quite a bit of new information, including from CM's own @Jono777 - so it seemed worth making a follow-on video to demonstrate it being done correctly.
Another one of Barcrest's slip-ups.....
Another one of Barcrest's slip-ups.....
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Latest reuploads.
The Extremes & Globals video covers a whole family of machines by two different manufacturers that were a reasonably safe bet for £50 on the force. I used to like playing them when I was a bit drunk because they're nice and simple and you can't really fuck them up.
The BFMulator video covers a fruit machine emulator that was developed from 2003-2005, and for a period of time was the only way to play machines based on the Scorpion 1 and Scorpion 2 techs.
The John Francome video covers a really rare machine that hardly anyone knew had ever existed. It wasn't one I'd ever seen before, and I thought I'd seen them all! (I'd never heard of John Francome either, but apparently he's quite a nice chap.)
The Extremes & Globals video covers a whole family of machines by two different manufacturers that were a reasonably safe bet for £50 on the force. I used to like playing them when I was a bit drunk because they're nice and simple and you can't really fuck them up.
The BFMulator video covers a fruit machine emulator that was developed from 2003-2005, and for a period of time was the only way to play machines based on the Scorpion 1 and Scorpion 2 techs.
The John Francome video covers a really rare machine that hardly anyone knew had ever existed. It wasn't one I'd ever seen before, and I thought I'd seen them all! (I'd never heard of John Francome either, but apparently he's quite a nice chap.)
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Right I've got behind a bit so a quick one-liner for each video.
CASH BUSTER - A JPM machine with a true skill stop & step feature that paid jackpots from a low down feature to those who were good enough to hit it.
CPU FINAL - A great old football themed BWB with a fantastic sound and music package.
FIREBALL + CROWN JESTER - A couple of great old lo-techs at two extremes of the volatility scale.
AUTOPLAY - A very powerful feature that Wizard added to the emulator.
AUTOPLAY GUIDE - How to use said feature.
CASH BUSTER - A JPM machine with a true skill stop & step feature that paid jackpots from a low down feature to those who were good enough to hit it.
CPU FINAL - A great old football themed BWB with a fantastic sound and music package.
FIREBALL + CROWN JESTER - A couple of great old lo-techs at two extremes of the volatility scale.
AUTOPLAY - A very powerful feature that Wizard added to the emulator.
AUTOPLAY GUIDE - How to use said feature.
Reelsoffun
When it comes to gambling, timing is everything.
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You was nearly right about fireballs in that they were very rare to be in a pub but I did see them in a few in the midlands.
There was two quite different versions, single site and arcade, ( ROM change not an option switch ) luckily you could tell which was which by the sounds and needed to avoid the single site ROMs at all costs as it was super hard to make any profit. Also generally it wasn’t worth going for the fireballs as they didn’t repeat as many times as the sevens, but of course if it offered them early you would try em. IIRC my biggest wins by far was the £4.40 repeater that could do well over 10 repeats but the flamed 7’s were a very good second.
Quite a underrated low tech game for sure.
There was two quite different versions, single site and arcade, ( ROM change not an option switch ) luckily you could tell which was which by the sounds and needed to avoid the single site ROMs at all costs as it was super hard to make any profit. Also generally it wasn’t worth going for the fireballs as they didn’t repeat as many times as the sevens, but of course if it offered them early you would try em. IIRC my biggest wins by far was the £4.40 repeater that could do well over 10 repeats but the flamed 7’s were a very good second.
Quite a underrated low tech game for sure.
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Fireball was here, there and everywhere (arcade wise) here in Wolverhampton
The one arcade had a strange program in that no flamed symbols carried a repeat chance and the Fireball symbols offered the Yes/No repeat rather than the spin back in repeat (we asked them to change it as regular, they did lol!)
These did not streak as such by way of a series of nudges and wins but did repeat to "top the bank" often and I'd say were the most needing refilling in Quicksilver arcades!
Made lots of cash for the arcade but cost them a load in tokens would be the easiest summary (ideal for the arcade, no?)
One trick I learnt a little too late (may want to try it in the emu) is that having an un-flamed yellow 7 on reel one and a matching pair on reels 2 & 3 after nudges all used, it would hold after nudges a LOT more often, as we know guaranteeing the win next spin. Of course this could not be used for 777's based wins but was great for boxed bars, cash wins and the Fireball repeater itself.
I popped into Quicksilver Queen Street one day before work for a quick punt and topped both machines for £33.60 each (cost me "pennies" as best I recall) nice and early no one had been in yet, trousers almost round my ankles with token weight but decided to pull a sickie and have a good days slotting
The one arcade had a strange program in that no flamed symbols carried a repeat chance and the Fireball symbols offered the Yes/No repeat rather than the spin back in repeat (we asked them to change it as regular, they did lol!)
These did not streak as such by way of a series of nudges and wins but did repeat to "top the bank" often and I'd say were the most needing refilling in Quicksilver arcades!
Made lots of cash for the arcade but cost them a load in tokens would be the easiest summary (ideal for the arcade, no?)
One trick I learnt a little too late (may want to try it in the emu) is that having an un-flamed yellow 7 on reel one and a matching pair on reels 2 & 3 after nudges all used, it would hold after nudges a LOT more often, as we know guaranteeing the win next spin. Of course this could not be used for 777's based wins but was great for boxed bars, cash wins and the Fireball repeater itself.
I popped into Quicksilver Queen Street one day before work for a quick punt and topped both machines for £33.60 each (cost me "pennies" as best I recall) nice and early no one had been in yet, trousers almost round my ankles with token weight but decided to pull a sickie and have a good days slotting
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Interesting stuff thanks for the information
I assume we have the arcade ROMs emulated as they seem streaky to me and can do some big holds when they want to? As I say in the video, we still had a few of these in an arcade on the IOM in around 1996 or so - (the £10 jackpot was out at this point I'm sure, which would mean 1996 or later) - and despite their relatively small £4.80 jackpot I learned to be careful around them!
It's just a shame this generation of MPS2 machines had such weak sound hardware.
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Fireball was here, there and everywhere (arcade wise) here in Wolverhampton
The one arcade had a strange program in that no flamed symbols carried a repeat chance and the Fireball symbols offered the Yes/No repeat rather than the spin back in repeat (we asked them to change it as regular, they did lol!)
These did not streak as such by way of a series of nudges and wins but did repeat to "top the bank" often and I'd say were the most needing refilling in Quicksilver arcades!
Made lots of cash for the arcade but cost them a load in tokens would be the easiest summary (ideal for the arcade, no?)
One trick I learnt a little too late (may want to try it in the emu) is that having an un-flamed yellow 7 on reel one and a matching pair on reels 2 & 3 after nudges all used, it would hold after nudges a LOT more often, as we know guaranteeing the win next spin. Of course this could not be used for 777's based wins but was great for boxed bars, cash wins and the Fireball repeater itself.
I popped into Quicksilver Queen Street one day before work for a quick punt and topped both machines for £33.60 each (cost me "pennies" as best I recall) nice and early no one had been in yet, trousers almost round my ankles with token weight but decided to pull a sickie and have a good days slotting
Ahhhh yes hitting the big token streaks, which gave you an entirely legitimate reason to carry on playing as you couldn't 'cash out' with tokens so had to carry on playing to try and turn them into actual money!
Or, many pubs allowed you to spend the tokens on beer so you could get completely hammered.
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Yes this was certainly an option and me and Mrs Chopley definitely did that many times back in 94-96 (it was never a thing on the IOM as it's always been all-cash here, we had special all-cash ROMs), but if you were in a pub with two machines, and both of them did a token streak, drinking £60-£100 worth of beer when a pint was about £1.30 was a pretty tough proposition
There's a video about tokens on the channel:
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Latest two reuploads, 'The Day I Started To Win On Fruit Machines' is rather self-explanatory, and chronicles the period of time, over 20 years ago now, where I got my first proper 'trick' and actually started to be able to consistently win money playing fruit machines, as someone who had been a terrible addict for a decade at that point, it was quite the turnaround moment.
The New York New York video is me having a good old rant about the unspeakably horrible shit of a machine called New York New York by Maygay.
The New York New York video is me having a good old rant about the unspeakably horrible shit of a machine called New York New York by Maygay.
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More things. If you enjoy my anti-Brexit and Socialist CM content I'm sure you'll get a blast out of these.
NOTE - VIDEOS CONTAIN ZERO POLITICS, don't cross the streams innit.
CLUEDO/PINK PANTHER - A salute to Maygay who knocked out some incredible fruit machines in the £4.80 and £6 jackpot era, before resolutely disappearing up their own arseholes from the £8 era onwards.
THE IMPULSES - CM's very own @trancemonkey was involved with these! I loved them on the £15 jackpot but the £25 'upgrades' were skanky and dangerous, although it was nice if you could land the £25 plus three repeats for a straight £100 cash back in 2004 or so.
DOND THE BANKER RINGS TWICE - Cashpots were free on this era of DOND machines and maintained separately per stake, of which there were three. You can work out the rest.
NOTE - VIDEOS CONTAIN ZERO POLITICS, don't cross the streams innit.
CLUEDO/PINK PANTHER - A salute to Maygay who knocked out some incredible fruit machines in the £4.80 and £6 jackpot era, before resolutely disappearing up their own arseholes from the £8 era onwards.
THE IMPULSES - CM's very own @trancemonkey was involved with these! I loved them on the £15 jackpot but the £25 'upgrades' were skanky and dangerous, although it was nice if you could land the £25 plus three repeats for a straight £100 cash back in 2004 or so.
DOND THE BANKER RINGS TWICE - Cashpots were free on this era of DOND machines and maintained separately per stake, of which there were three. You can work out the rest.
Banker Rings Twice was around the time I started playing fruit machines, I dread to think how many hours of my life I spent in front of them as they were absolutely everywhere for years back in the day!
My 'tactic' back in the day was generally just whacking Cash Or Bust as it liked to land on cashpot (although 25p stake was an absolute bugger for some reason!), Win Stepper was very common too along the way and it could even land on jackpot every now and then, they also loved springing a GO ALL THE WAY out of nowhere (sometimes back to back!)
I think the more seasoned players eventually started to knock up all the pots to 70 (if at a reasonable level to start off with of course which wasn't too uncommon back then either as they just got so much casual play), then force out a GATW and take the Deal game where it would seemingly on a 50/50 basis chuck the 70 cashpot in the box rather than the 70 value (obviously a plug was a vital requirement of this plan!), rinse and repeat for all the cashpots then just take out the mega streak from GATW plus probably a few after boards
There are still a handful hiding around but either the pots are stone cold dead or there are so many bulbs out you might as well just play it wearing a blindfold!
It was a surprisingly profitable machine overall considering how it was basically just a clone of the dreadful Double Deal Or No Deal machine with a cashpot bolted on!
My 'tactic' back in the day was generally just whacking Cash Or Bust as it liked to land on cashpot (although 25p stake was an absolute bugger for some reason!), Win Stepper was very common too along the way and it could even land on jackpot every now and then, they also loved springing a GO ALL THE WAY out of nowhere (sometimes back to back!)
I think the more seasoned players eventually started to knock up all the pots to 70 (if at a reasonable level to start off with of course which wasn't too uncommon back then either as they just got so much casual play), then force out a GATW and take the Deal game where it would seemingly on a 50/50 basis chuck the 70 cashpot in the box rather than the 70 value (obviously a plug was a vital requirement of this plan!), rinse and repeat for all the cashpots then just take out the mega streak from GATW plus probably a few after boards
There are still a handful hiding around but either the pots are stone cold dead or there are so many bulbs out you might as well just play it wearing a blindfold!
It was a surprisingly profitable machine overall considering how it was basically just a clone of the dreadful Double Deal Or No Deal machine with a cashpot bolted on!
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Latest reuploads.
BARCREST UPGRADE MALFUNCTION - On how Barcrest managed to massively fuck up just about every single one of their £35 to £70 'upgrades' and made them massively exploitable by players in the know. Alas I never got to do these for real as they were all chipped by the time they got to these shores, which was extra annoying as I had all the info on them!
DOUBLE BLUE CHIP - A low-rent rebuild 777 Heaven knock-off that took over the arcades for a brief period of time in 1990/91 (seriously, these things were EVERYWHERE) and then disappeared again.
MONOPOLY IN A SPIN - Utterly dire £70 jackpot machine from Mazooma that infuriated players (including me!) with its semi-random shenanigans.
BARCREST UPGRADE MALFUNCTION - On how Barcrest managed to massively fuck up just about every single one of their £35 to £70 'upgrades' and made them massively exploitable by players in the know. Alas I never got to do these for real as they were all chipped by the time they got to these shores, which was extra annoying as I had all the info on them!
DOUBLE BLUE CHIP - A low-rent rebuild 777 Heaven knock-off that took over the arcades for a brief period of time in 1990/91 (seriously, these things were EVERYWHERE) and then disappeared again.
MONOPOLY IN A SPIN - Utterly dire £70 jackpot machine from Mazooma that infuriated players (including me!) with its semi-random shenanigans.
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- Mar 29, 2013
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Mortal Wombat was done just before I left Impulse... we did some weird and wonderful games at impulse, some just a bit too weird! But it was a fun time working there...
And you're right... the jackpot increases didn't help. But to be honest, I hated all fruit machines after it raised to 35 quid. 25 was just about OK.
And you're right... the jackpot increases didn't help. But to be honest, I hated all fruit machines after it raised to 35 quid. 25 was just about OK.
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For me £15 was about the outer limit of a viable jackpot for a compensated machine set to crap percentages, in fact speaking specifically about the Impulses I think the £25 jackpot completely upset the balance of previously great machines like Gridrunner and Wipeout.
Gridrunner for example could do a straight £100 streak (£25 plus three repeats, I had it more than once) but by jiminy you had to wade through a lot of crap, and £5 block boards, to get there.
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Latest reuploads, the two videos about emulator releases will probably be of little interest to anyone (including the people who watch my channel, if the view numbers are anything to go by ), but they are part of the history of FME and my old channel, and also made all the more poignant by the fact that Wizard (the emulator's author) passed away a little over two years ago.
The other reupload covers a few machines in a sort of reimagining of my old 'Web Hovel' website that I ran in 2001/2002, the first fruit machine emulation site on the internet, fact fans!
), but they are part of the history of FME and my old channel, and also made all the more poignant by the fact that Wizard (the emulator's author) passed away a little over two years ago.The other reupload covers a few machines in a sort of reimagining of my old 'Web Hovel' website that I ran in 2001/2002, the first fruit machine emulation site on the internet, fact fans!
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Poker Face was definetely one where Betcom (or Games Media or whatever they were known as back then!) were still finding their feet with the paint by numbers profile, I remember it doing some very odd things on 70 presumably because they did a rush job on upgrading it from 35!
The 70 era of Bank Job and the million clones of that (some having such good quality control they still said 'B A N K J O B' for the top feature on the alpha even if the machine was themed something else entirely!) were definetely where the money was, not as many players going round forcing them for the sake of it and also you could often watch someone with perhaps slightly less knowledge force one, get a flat then just walk away and then you could jump on for an after board which loved to give a game for either 50 quid or another B A N K J O B
The early 100 era was an interesting one as you could trap them into giving you the top feature via add again / extra life and then just taking a risk on hi/lo when landing on the required square so you essentially didn't want to force them as it was more profitable trying for a trap (you could trap the 70 ones in the same way but it wasn't worth it as much considering the fairly often 140 potential of the top feature) but at least if the trap didn't come in you were still putting money towards the force if that makes any sense at all!
Then they just started releasing stuff like Oliver's Twist which is just a straight out force and you're probably not going to be making any money although I have had some go in amazingly cheaply (I think £3 is my record!), although that leads me to my next point it was probably because some poor punter had experienced the dreaded NOTE MECH ERROR the night before
Also they did try a machine profile that did a 200 top feature once (Bank Job The Getaway or something like that!), it was bloody awful so I can see why they stuck with 150!
There was also that 'Immortal 300' release which you always wonder if they were anticipating a jump up from a 100 jackpot at some point and it would have had the potential to do a 300 quid top feature!
My best ever Betcom result is stuck in my mind forever, Slug and Lettuce in Durham, 50p in Bank Job for a board, first move ?, credit broke for the 140!
The 70 era of Bank Job and the million clones of that (some having such good quality control they still said 'B A N K J O B' for the top feature on the alpha even if the machine was themed something else entirely!) were definetely where the money was, not as many players going round forcing them for the sake of it and also you could often watch someone with perhaps slightly less knowledge force one, get a flat then just walk away and then you could jump on for an after board which loved to give a game for either 50 quid or another B A N K J O B
The early 100 era was an interesting one as you could trap them into giving you the top feature via add again / extra life and then just taking a risk on hi/lo when landing on the required square so you essentially didn't want to force them as it was more profitable trying for a trap (you could trap the 70 ones in the same way but it wasn't worth it as much considering the fairly often 140 potential of the top feature) but at least if the trap didn't come in you were still putting money towards the force if that makes any sense at all!
Then they just started releasing stuff like Oliver's Twist which is just a straight out force and you're probably not going to be making any money although I have had some go in amazingly cheaply (I think £3 is my record!), although that leads me to my next point it was probably because some poor punter had experienced the dreaded NOTE MECH ERROR the night before
Also they did try a machine profile that did a 200 top feature once (Bank Job The Getaway or something like that!), it was bloody awful so I can see why they stuck with 150!
There was also that 'Immortal 300' release which you always wonder if they were anticipating a jump up from a 100 jackpot at some point and it would have had the potential to do a 300 quid top feature!
My best ever Betcom result is stuck in my mind forever, Slug and Lettuce in Durham, 50p in Bank Job for a board, first move ?, credit broke for the 140!
