

Near misses fuel gambling addiction - ai09
http://scienceblogs.com/neurophilosophy/2010/05/near_misses_fuel_gambling_addiction.php

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joezydeco
Having worked in the slot machine biz, I can tell you that a good number of
slot machines are set up to create the "near miss" situation a lot more often
than is statistically possible. And it comes down to the granddaddy of modern
slot math: the IGT/Telnaes patent (US 4,448,419).

The idea is simple: if you have three reels on a machine with 11 symbols and
11 blanks in between those symbols, there are only 10,648 outcomes (22 x 22 x
22) when there is an equal chance of stopping somewhere on a reel (local
gaming laws usually dictate this to be "fair" to the player). Assuming one
combination is the "jackpot" position, that still only means you can pay out
less than 10,648 times what you got in...if you want to stay profitable.

Telnaes proposed a radical change: let's make the reels _virtual_ , which a
much higher number of stops per reel (say, 1000). Then let's map those
positions to spots on the physical reel. Voila! Now you have a billion
possible outcomes. You can award higher jackpots. The gaming board is happy
since the virtual reels are still evenly spaced.

The gaming companies eventually realized those mappings don't need to be
equally spaced to be legal. So now every one of those losing outcomes can be
mapped to BAR-BAR-space, if you want. Oooooh, so close. You almost had it. But
in reality, you were miles away.

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pyre
Sounds similar to a recent comment that someone made on HN about how irregular
rewards are more addicting than regular rewards.

