Pokies and Slot Machine Information

How to make pokies play fair

January 23, 2006 on 6:27 pm | In Slot machine overviews |

There is a way to make pokies at least reasonably fair, but governments won’t like it. Governments tend to take an enormous amount of the profit made by pokies without regard for the consequences.

A five point plan might reduce losses:

1. Reduce maximum bet amounts to $1/spin.
2. The removal of note acceptors from gaming machines.
3. Legalise private ownership of gaming machines in all States. Such machines to have all coin/note/payment mechanisms removed and internal return to player percentage setting to be no less than 100% - this protects jobs in the gaming machine manufacturing industry.
4. Reduce the government tax take on gaming profits to 1% of annual turnover - sufficient to cover costs and make a little on the side.
5. Reduce the venue gaming profits to 1% of annual turnover.

If the government take on pokies is reduced, the overall payout rate for pokies could increase and players would lose less. Two examples are provided from the pokies simulator:

Link to the Pokies Simulator

Playing a $1 bet over 20 paylines for 900 spins on a 1 cent game with return to player (RTP) setting of 85.06%.
Results: Your estimated win/loss: $134.82 Loss per hour of play

85% is the current minimum return to player percentage in New South Wales, Australia.

If this minimum percentage was raised to 98%, the same player would have the following experience:

Playing a $1 bet over 20 paylines for 900 spins on a 1 cent game with return to player (RTP) setting of 98.00%.
Results: Your estimated win/loss: $18.00 Loss per hour of play

The above scenario is overly simplified and uses only approximate figures, but it does show that it is at least possible for pokies to be playable without most players generating out of control losses.