Thinking somethings changed at Microgaming

[brianzz]

Maybe MG has seen the RTG crooks going crazy and cheating players and getting away with it making more and more money so they decided they can do it too.

After the past few updates the games have pretty much played worse and worse, you either win nothing or you win the farm, there's really no steady ups and downs anymore... all or nothing.

I avidly play Mega Moolah and after the most recent update at the first of the month I've been seeing something I've never seen before, the mini and the minor jackpots going through the roof. And even after one or the other is won it doesn't reset to the base values of $10 and $100 respectively, it resets to 10X 20X 30X 40X and 50X the base value which means it's won less often than indicated.

So if you're still thinking MG hasn't changed anything the behavior of this game should pretty much show you that they have.

 

[anniemac]

Dang, why couldn't they have been paying that the fews times I hit the mini jackpot. I got $10.

 

[LaurieJim]

Dang, why couldn't they have been paying that the fews times I hit the mini jackpot. I got $10.

thats what i got, 10.00 also, i would prolly hit the floor if i hit anything bigger, even my favorite m/g haunt wildjack casino hasnt been playing so good this past month................................laurie

 

[tim5ny]

Losing is in vogue...haven't you heard?

 

[Rusty]

Losing is in vogue...haven't you heard?

Yup Red is the new Black, ask my Bank manager

 

[slotplayer]

I think the MG's changed something months ago and I've mentioned before.
It seems to me anyway the games started behaving differently around April before that they were pretty good.

When there is inflation, shops raise their prices, how do casinos raise their prices to counter inflation? Just a thought.

 

[chuchu59]

Throw in Lehman Brothers and AIG

 

[davidkohcg]

I lost USD1600 in MG casino this month. Give up playing there.
Pay out is low and free spins is dry. Why is it so differently form last time???

 

[pubjoe]

MG is my favourite software without doubt, I hope there is nothing fishy going on, it does seem strange.

Just a thought. I notice that the main jackpot on that screenshot is almost at a staggering 4 million! It's not filtering out further jackpot growth by bumping up the other jackpots' lower limit is it?

 

[Mick114]

I played MM the other day and noticed the same.The mini was 36 bucks when I started to spin.Then I noticed no annoying message " jackpot was won by another player"?.The mini got up to 90 and change and stopped for like 5 mins...weird.I know one thing........it's all changed at MG.I think I'm on my 12 deposit with nothing to show.Also went through 30 bucks in free chips.......nothing.Every MG casino is the same.Lack of free spins , missing a good hit by one reel ,constant 2 scatters , when free spins do come u get nothing.I miss the good ole days ( 3-4 months ago) when you had fun playing MG casinos.Now it just pisses me off

 

[vinylweatherman]

I played MM the other day and noticed the same.The mini was 36 bucks when I started to spin.Then I noticed no annoying message " jackpot was won by another player"?.The mini got up to 90 and change and stopped for like 5 mins...weird.I know one thing........it's all changed at MG.I think I'm on my 12 deposit with nothing to show.Also went through 30 bucks in free chips.......nothing.Every MG casino is the same.Lack of free spins , missing a good hit by one reel ,constant 2 scatters , when free spins do come u get nothing.I miss the good ole days ( 3-4 months ago) when you had fun playing MG casinos.Now it just pisses me off

I noticed Munchkins seemed to change. I thought this was just one of those dry spells, it happens occasionally. Now, this change has lasted a solid 4 months, so it seems more of a definite change, rather than a fluke of variance.

Now, Mega Moolah is the "smoking gun" for MG, it gives proof that OLD games change in these updates. Something I found out long ago when watching updates through Dependency Walker - it never showed WHAT changed though.

The tournaments changed, hard to spot, and hard to prove, but they HAVE, and if you had a fast PC and played before & after, you will KNOW what the change was.

With Mega Moolah, they have changed the probability of triggering the bonus wheel, there is no other way they can build that fast and the slot to make a profit. The Golden Goose slots were alleged to have changed a few months after release to reduce the frequency of getting the Golden Goose, now I believe they really WERE, just that there was no way to prove it as with Mega Moolah.

If they have simply changed the variances, the payout figures will show nothing, however, if payout rates have also changed, the figures should show a trend, which will show that SOMETHING has changed.

Many slots have had the reels analysed and cracked BEFORE this change. Mega Moolah included I wonder if mega Moolah REELS have been changed as part of the changes to the behaviour of the jackpots.

 

[pubjoe]

Many slots have had the reels analysed and cracked BEFORE this change. Mega Moolah included I wonder if mega Moolah REELS have been changed as part of the changes to the behaviour of the jackpots.

Well if they have reduced the amount of scatter symbols on the reels then it's a change but it's not the biggest crime in the world. Rather that than there being a "percentometer" that can be adjusted to change the frequency.

None of you think the mini growth has anything to do with the 4 MILLION jackpot then?

 

[oyw7862]

I think this is due to less and less players/deposits, so MG raises the rate of casino holdings (not payout rate).

As I most time play thunderstuck, and very often 1 reel missing of 5OK.

Also, it is very average, ever 3.7K I deposited, I got 1.2K cashout.

Needless to say Auguest and this month is really blood bath.

 

[Jasminebed]

Random Features

For bonus features like the Mega Moolah wheel, Golden Goose games and the Gift feature on the Osbornes, there is no way to know what kind of expectation of hitting is. I thought I was just in a slump with Golden Goose Crazy Chameleons.

And it seems to be reputably established that your bonus round payoff is predetermined no matter what you pick, but as I mentioned elsewhere, I like the "illusion" of control picks have.

But when they muck with old favourites, they should give notice, especially for something as heavily promoted as Mega Moolah.

No reason they can't spin it "Now bigger jackpots at MM", and if you can't figure out where those bigger amounts come from, well...

Just hope they have not reduced the feature bonus pays to raise the base levels, and the since the 3X's is where I've got most of my MM wins, but other posts indicate that may be the case. That's too bad, because MM is my Sunday morning favorite...it's graphics and music are very enjoyable, and I love hitting the wheel for the heart-pounding excitement for that chance at the really big one.

 

[lauram]

2 other slots i noticed a big change was frankencash and boogiemonster.
Over the weekend both slots vanished from the game area to play as they made their return they seem to play much different then before. Noticed the pay table changed on them also and lack of scatters or symbols matching on the reels are void.

 

[zebedy]

with the recession and credit crunch happening in many parts of the world i expect the online casinos are also feeling the strain, with fewer people depositing
they have to make there money from somewhere, they still have the same overheads to pay and if people are not depositing where are they going to make there money from to pay the bills ect,

cutting down on the payouts is one way they keep a revenue coming in, they have to make there money from somewhere or go bust

 

[luckydabberbingo]

i use to hit the 25,000 credits on bars and stripes in the hat bonus couple times a week and at least once a week see the 5 balls for 50,000(bidding 2 cents of course!).now it does not seem to matter what casino i play that game i cant get them.

 

[brianzz]

Another MIA for a day game and coming back with crap pays is Mad Hatters. It disappeared for awhile Sunday but was back Monday with about a 30% return over the course of $300

 

[slotplayer]

Another MIA for a day game and coming back with crap pays is Mad Hatters. It disappeared for awhile Sunday but was back Monday with about a 30% return over the course of $300

did you ever think somone could hit the 50 free spins?

You do not have permission to view link Log in or register now.

 

[vinylweatherman]

2 other slots i noticed a big change was frankencash and boogiemonster.
Over the weekend both slots vanished from the game area to play as they made their return they seem to play much different then before. Noticed the pay table changed on them also and lack of scatters or symbols matching on the reels are void.

That's VERY damning indeed!

MG ARE changing the old games, and Mega Moolah is no "one off"!!

I have seen it for some while now. When I was analysing all the update issues with the MG lobby I stuck a program called Dependency Walker into the running of the update process. I found the problems that were causing the failures of the lobby, but I ALSO noticed that CAB files (these contain the UPDATES) were routinely being downloaded for some of the OLD games, and this was EVERY MONTH. They have been changing "something" on the old games for years now, but never, it seemed, the paytables or the reels. Maybe they were changing the payouts in another way, perhaps by tinkering with the VARIANCE.
If the reels have not changed, then maybe ALL MG video slots are "weighted", not just the early ones and the classic slots.

The early ones can be shown to be weighted simply because the reels are so short that if unweighted they would pay over 200%!!

The later ones had long symbol strips, and unweighted were calculated as having around a 95% return, so it was asumed they were indeed unweighted. Many players disputed this though, pointing out all the "streakiness" where you either constantly hit, or constantly missed, in a session. The counter argument was simple, MG didn't NEED to do this since the games paid 95% anyway, but this doesn't mean they DIDN'T do it, and the motive would be to play to the gambler's desires. Make variance artificially higher, and players would play more because they would KNOW that these big wins came. This would have to be at the expense of enhanced LOSING streaks though, because the overall payout had to still be close to 95%.

Mega Moolah was calculated to have a base payout of under 90%, with the rest being contributed to the 4 jackpots. The changes to the lower two increase the variance, and far fewer players will win higher MINI jackpots.

The resets seem messed up too, sometimes they reset far higher, and then they reset to what they always were if they are hit twice quickly. This can be explained by the addition of a "reserve pot", often seen in UK Club Machines, where part of the contribution feeds a reserve, or reset, pot. This means that when won, the main pot starts fairly high up already to interest players into continuing to play. Only when hit twice do these machines reset low, and this indeed DOES put players off - I have seen machines left well alone after BOTH pots get taken out.

MG really have to fess up to at least Mega Moolah, this is something they CANNOT brush aside with their usual platitudes (you were simply unlucky, all our games are completely random........etc.....).

Nice one, for years the Mini never goes much past 100, and suddenly in the space of 36 hours it does it ALL THE TIME!!! No way will I believe this was just a fluke of the normal variance of these pots. I will believe only "change" or "error".

I believe CAP is not too far off, so maybe MG will be able to explain IN PERSON to someone about what happened to Mega Moolah, maybe to Bryan or Max.

 

[Rusty]

The most pertinent question for MG to answer would be what is the purpose of the updates to the older slots?

We know it is not for aesthetic reasons.
We know they were no bugs to iron out.
We know the pay-tables were not altered.

I do not expect MG to answer that question on the grounds that it would indicate that slot outcomes are not just the result of an RNG with no manipulation of data.

There is an element of anthropomorphism when we play slots but if we play a slot enough we do see behavioral patterns and I have never believed this is just down to our perception.
For me it is the observable effect of dynamic weighting and becomes most apparent when scrutinising the "behaviour" of bonus triggering and wild symbols.

When we play online slots we are simply playing glorified AWP's.
How high or low the payout is and whether the games are fair are different questions IMO.

Disclaimer:
It is at the viewers own risk if they wish to pronounce the word anthropomorphism in public.
The author takes no responsibility for injuries to tongues or beatings incurred as a result of using the word in the wrong company.

 

[oyw7862]

In the past month and this month, I indeed saw changes on few slots of MG game. You all know me, I am a thunderstuck mad man. And I do play daily.Every day, I play at least 2K spins on the thunderstuck.
Usually, I will be able to do just fine, sometime even with a little bit wins.
However, since August, I have continued losing steak on this game.
Features become far more rare and payout of a single free spin is about 10 times of your bets and more interesting thing is that in one session I got 3 free spin features completely paid nothing. How big is that chance.

And 1 reel missing from 5OK appears every 20 -30 spins,and actually times you got it dropped sharply.

At start , I thing it maybe due to the currency I played(AUD), so I changed to GBP/USD, but I got the same results.

I can not say anything about other slot games but for thunderstuck, I can as for a year, I have played more than 2Million spins on this game(big enough?), it do behave differently since August updates. I think MG(not casinos) do owe us a explain what happens.

 

[RobWin]

So now we are back to the age old question of "dynamic weighting vs true randomness" and now it appears that this is not only happening at RTG but MG also...so maybe, just maybe Rusty we can now convince a few of our peers here that this was not just our imagination but actually happening... what we have been seeing all this year with RTG...

 

[Rusty]

So now we are back to the age old question of "dynamic weighting vs true randomness" and now it appears that this is not only happening at RTG but MG also...so maybe, just maybe Rusty we can now convince a few of our peers here that this was not just our imagination but actually happening... what we have been seeing all this year with RTG...

I don't know about that Rob, people ultimately believe what they want to believe and those that do still think online slots are not weighted will say the same about us.
Forgive the pun but there is a weight of evidence out there that suggests we are right though.

Now, I have just played 5 different Casinos using 3 different types of software and made multiple deposits at some.
Here is a fact, not One of them returned over 70% and I was never 1c up in any of them except the last Casino I played where I was briefly $3 up lol.

This thread being about MG, i played Cashapillar over 3 deposits and wow was that bad.
I have played this game a lot and lately it takes me an average of around 250 spins to trigger the feature.
This time my first trigger was dead on 400 spins and it payed 18c (3K on 1 line)at 13 linesX2c=26c bets
(trigger win excluded)

That was a little hard to take but things didnt get any better after that.

I sat there over all these Hours playing and watching spin after spin of nothing and because there was no entertainment I suddenly thought to myself what the hell am I doing?
I mean just sat there pressing a mouse for hours and it was costing me money for the privilege. Durrr

One thing I can say for certain is that it will be a good few Weeks before my next deposit at an online Casino.
I am spent.

 

[RobWin]

I don't know about that Rob, people ultimately believe what they want to believe and those that do still think online slots are not weighted will say the same about us.
Forgive the pun but there is a weight of evidence out there that suggests we are right though.

Now, I have just played 5 different Casinos using 3 different types of software and made multiple deposits at some.
Here is a fact, not One of them returned over 70% and I was never 1c up in any of them except the last Casino I played where I was briefly $3 up lol.

This thread being about MG, i played Cashapillar over 3 deposits and wow was that bad.
I have played this game a lot and lately it takes me an average of around 250 spins to trigger the feature.
This time my first trigger was dead on 400 spins and it payed 18c (3K on 1 line)at 13 linesX2c=26c bets
(trigger win excluded)

That was a little hard to take but things didnt get any better after that.

I sat there over all these Hours playing and watching spin after spin of nothing and because there was no entertainment I suddenly thought to myself what the hell am I doing?
I mean just sat there pressing a mouse for hours and it was costing me money for the privilege. Durrr

One thing I can say for certain is that it will be a good few Weeks before my next deposit at an online Casino.
I am spent.

I hear you bro and I can empathize with you in that respect for sure...:notworthy