Real Money Video Slots
Slots are the most popularly played games at online real money casinos around the world. Though much younger than most of the casino games, they proved to be a favorite game for players right from the beginning. In about a hundred years since they were first invented, many variants also evolved.
Video slots are possibly one of the more popular variants of the slot game. Video slots are powered by a computer chip, programmed to generate numbers randomly. To ensure the randomness of the numbers, an RNG (Random Number Generator) is used. This gives everyone an equal chance of winning, regardless of whether he got a hit in the previous spin or not. Unlike the traditional slot machines, which had tangible reels and buttons, all the controls and reels in video slots are virtual. Video slots can be played at both traditional casinos and at online casinos.
Best sites to play video slots
If you plan to play video slot games at an online casino, you must make sure that you find the right casino first.
How are video slots played
Though the game is not unlike traditional slots in that the primary object of the game is to win money from the slot machine by inserting a coin and spinning, there are a few areas where the forms differ. Since video slot is essentially a computer game, the game is far more interactive, with video graphics and bonuses. The lack of mechanical constraints in these machines increases the number of possible combinations, the odds going as far as 300 million to one.
In video slots, players are encouraged to take up multiple lines instead of the usual middle line in traditional slots. A line could go from bottom left to top right, diagonally or even in a zigzag manner, although not all video slots provide that facility. This facility gives more flexibility to the player to increase his/her chances of winning. The betting amount is also slightly higher compared to traditional slots.
Another unique aspect to video slots is that they offer bonus games to players, both on the land based and the online version. The bonus games give players a chance to win multiple times the amount entered in the machine. This is done by casino operators so that players don’t feel their money is being drained away.
Video slot machines do not come only with symbols used in the traditional slot games. A lot of video slots are also theme based, with various themes drawn from popular culture, like films and television programs.
Precursors of video slot machines
Although video slots made their arrival only during the 1990s, experiments were on for a number of decades. The earliest precursor to the video slot can be traced back to the electromechanical slots that were introduced in the 1960s. The electromechanical slots were the first to hand the payouts automatically without the need of a helper. In fact, experiments for electromechanical slots had already begun during the 1940s.
With the invention of video technology, manufacturers strived to find ways of infusing this into slot gaming and finally, the first video slot machine was introduced in the 1990s. The introduction of video slot machines and online slot games occurred in the same decade. The first company that designed software for online casinos was Microgaming, which also designed slot games.
Random Number Generators
Video slots, both online and offline, generate their results using RNGs (Random Number Generators). The RNGs generate numbers at the rate of hundreds or thousands a second. Once a player presses the play button, the result is determined by using the most recent random number. This means that the possibility of winning a game changes with each second. This makes it all the more complicated for a player to make calculations like the probability of getting the winning combination.
It is however, important that a video slot machine contains an RNG implementation of the most professional quality. After a while, all RNGs eventually repeat their number sequence, so if the RNG system is flawed, a regular player may be able to predict the next combination. While the early RNG systems faced this drawback, they are being improved upon constantly. Most of the machines these days have RNG programs that keep generating numbers even when they are not being used, making it harder for the player to predict the next combination.
From the mechanically driven slots that were termed the “one-armed bandits” that could nearly make a man penniless due to their addictive quality, to the push button activated and now video slot machines, the journey of the most popular casino game has been quite a remarkable one. With better technology, the game just got more exciting and more entertaining.
