Progressive Jackpot Games

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Slot machine games have been used since the late 1880s when Charles Fey built the first slot machine game, the Liberty Bell, in his workshop. Progressive slots came along about 100 years later in 1986 when IGT (International Gaming Technologies) released Megabucks, the first progressive game.

Until Megabucks all slot machine games paid a fixed maximum jackpot prize. The progressive technology IGT developed allowed games to gradually increase their jackpots over time.

I think it’s fair to say that progressive games have become common and popular across the world. Players love the big jackpots.

But are they worth playing for?

I’ve put a few dollars into those million dollar machines just to see what would happen. I didn’t win the progressive prizes but I didn’t like the results of my game play either.

Who Pays for Progressive Jackpots?

Whether it’s a slot machine or any other kind of gambling game, a progressive jackpot is paid the same way as a traditional prize. The money comes from players’ wagers.

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The only time a casino risks its own money on a game is when it first introduces the game. The very first player could win a prize and the casino must cover it. Industry experts say it takes only a few weeks for a casino to earn a cash reserve on each game that covers all future payouts.

And that means all those progressive jackpots are covered by players’ wagers.

There’s too much debate and disagreement about how much the casinos make on progressive games to go into the details. The important thing to know is that a progressive jackpot is rarely paid out of the casino’s net worth.

How Progressive Games Work

The idea behind the progressive jackpot is simple. It starts out at a minimum level and as more wagers are played a little bit of each is allocated toward the jackpot.

The jackpot will only be rewarded on a random basis when an extremely rare combination of factors occurs. In slot games this is a combination of winning symbols. In other games it’s a combination of cards or die rolls depending on the game.

Most progressive games require that you make a maximum wager to win the progressive jackpot. So if you make anything less than the max bet and the winning symbols come up you’re only awarded a fixed prize.

The progressive jackpot may be increased by less than maximum wagers.

I know some people believe progressive games are designed to pay only after certain intervals but that can’t be true for all of them. I doubt it’s true for any of them. I say that because I’ve seen two people win progressive jackpots on the same machine within an hour of each other.

That poor second winner had to settle for slightly more than the minimum prize. But she was happy just the same.

A friend showed me an online slot game that had 4 or 5 progressive jackpots. It was a dizzying display of numbers increasing gradually over time. He asked me what I thought about all those jackpots.

I asked him if he was winning any money without the jackpots and he shrugged.

The slot game still pays smaller prizes. Progressive games can pay big or small prizes just like non-progressives. The idea is that the progressive prize retains a small, small percentage of every wager to cover the next jackpot.

Progressive Jackpot Table Games

The more progressive prizes the game pays the less likely it’s going to pay larger non-progressive prizes. But that’s just my opinion.

When a random number generator decides the action anything can happen even if that means the casino loses money on the game for a while.

Should You Play Progressive Games with Higher Jackpots?

The working theory among many players is that you should wait for a progressive game’s jackpot to climb to a ridiculously high value.

This expectation is based on the classic Gambler’s Fallacy, and just as with lottery games whose jackpots go unwon for several weeks or months, the amount of the jackpot doesn’t matter.

That was a “local” progressive jackpot. There were about 6 games networked together. They were very popular with the casino’s regular slot players.

I’ve never heard of a national progressive game paying jackpots close together but it could happen. The more machines you network together the less money overall each machine need to contribute to the jackpot.

Of course, if the gaming company wants to offer a really big jackpot then it needs to siphon off more money from the wagers. They can do this by offering progressives only on higher wager machines or by increasing contributions from each wager.

Either way, you’re risking more money to win the biggest progressive jackpots than when you play for the smaller ones.

Is Winning a Progressive Jackpot Worth the Trouble?

If a slot machine game offers a fixed top prize of $10,000 why would you not be satisfied with that?

Your chances of winning a $10,000 jackpot are much better than your chances of winning a $1,000,000 jackpot – all other things being equal.

The percentages on these two hypothetical games could be different. You might have a higher RTP on a $25 progressive slot machine game than a $1 non-progressive slot game.

You could also have a higher variance on the non-progressive game – where the big prizes are paid less often but they are larger than the big (non-progressive) prizes on the progressive game.

I don’t know of a simple way to decide between two slot machine games. You should study the help screens. You may need to look up their PAR sheets and see if you can calculate the odds based on their published specifications.

My rule of thumb is that the larger the prize on the table the less likely I’m going to win the prize. It doesn’t matter what the game is.

How Much Do Other People Win from Non-Progressive Prizes?

When you’re learning about a game for the first time look at how it’s paying other players. The frequency of payouts should have nothing to do with the progressive jackpot. That jackpot is being covered by a percentage of each wager just like the other prizes.

Instead, what you want to know is how enjoyable the game is. Everyone enjoys winning so how often that seems to happen is an important clue.

Other people’s results don’t guarantee you’ll win just as much or more than they do. All you want to do is get an idea for how many wagers you must make before you can bring your balance back up to where you started.

Some games pay partial wins. These are called losing prizes. If you wager $5 and the game pays $4 you lost on that prize. You just didn’t lose your entire wager.

I don’t play slot machines very often but I avoid games that pay losing prizes. It takes too much effort to calculate how likely they are to let you get ahead. But I’ve never walked away from playing a game like that with more money than I put in.

Conclusion

Playing a progressive jackpot game is a personal decision. I think you should play the game because you enjoy the experience.

I don’t make extra wagers in blackjack so I never play for the progressive prize. I’ve only once seen anyone win a progressive prize in blackjack but I don’t think it’s a common game.

Even in slot machine games you have a choice. You can choose to play non-progressive or progressive games. You can choose to make qualifying wagers or not.

As long as you’re not forced to pay extra for the prize do what you feel is more entertaining. After all, you just might be the next winner.

If you’re looking to win a jackpot that could change your life, then progressive slots are the game to play. Let’s face it—you’ll never win several hundred thousand playing blackjack or roulette. The payouts just aren’t high enough.

The purpose of this page is to provide an explanation of what progressive slots are, how they work, and why you might be interested in playing them. We’ve also included descriptions of some of the more popular progressive jackpots available both online and in traditional brick-and-mortar casinos.

What Is a Progressive Slot, and How Does It Work?

On most slot machines, the jackpot is a fixed amount, but on a progressive game, the jackpot rises as players put coins in the machine and spin the wheels. A tiny percentage of each coin played is used to “feed” the jackpot. There are three types of progressive slot machine games.

Standalone Progressives

A standalone progressive slot machine has a jackpot ticker on the game, but only bets placed on that specific machine feed the jackpot. This was, at one time, the only kind of progressive slot machine game available, but most progressives feature multiple machines that are linked together. Still, so many standalone machines were manufactured that these games are still easily found in casinos throughout the world. Usually the jackpot on the games will be under $10,000.

Local Progressives

Local progressives were the next step in the evolution of this type of game, and they’re still commonly found. These games feature jackpots within a specific casino that are linked. This network can include as few as a dozen or so machines, or it can include a hundred machines—it just depends on the casino. Usually the jackpots available on these games are under $1,000,000, and often they’re under $100,000.

Wide Area Network Progressives

These are some of the most popular casino games on the market today. A wide area network jackpot links slot machines from multiple casinos in the same state. This allows the jackpot to accumulate into astronomical sums of money, often over $1 million and sometimes even over $10 million. The most well-known brand of wide area network progressives are the Megabucks games from IGT, which is the most successful slot machine design company in the world.

How Do You Win a Progressive Jackpot?

No strategy or system can increase your chances of winning a progressive jackpot on a slot machine game. The odds of winning are similar to the odds of winning the lottery, although you get many more chances of winning per hour with a slot machine game than you would get playing a lottery game.

An important thing to keep in mind about progressive jackpots is that they don’t become “due”. The chances of winning are astronomically small no matter how large the jackpot has gotten. It’s possible for a jackpot to grow large enough that a bet on a particular slots game will be a positive expectation bet, but it’s not a practical opportunity to win. A 1 in a million shot is still a 1 in a million shot, even if the jackpot is up to $2 million.

Online Progressive Jackpots

With the rise of online casinos, progressive jackpots on the Internet have become just as popular as the games in actual land-based casinos. Microgaming is one Internet casino provider which has established its fame and reputation based largely on its large assortment of fun, colorful, and relatively loose progressive jackpot games.

Online progressives work just like their land-based cousins. Every wager you make on your computer feeds a tiny amount into the progressive jackpot for that game. Since lots of players are now gambling from the comfort of their homes, these jackpots can become just as large and life-changing as the progressives in Vegas or Atlantic City.

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Most Popular Progressive Games

Megabucks is one of the most popular progressive networks available. The probability of winning this jackpot has been estimated at 1 in 50 million. The amounts won on this machine vary from $10 million into the hundreds of millions. Like many lottery games, Megabucks is paid out as an annuity over 25 years.

Jackpot Games Online

Wheel of Fortune is a popular brand of slot machine, and it’s available in multiple denominations. One of the most common versions is the quarter version, which has a starting jackpot of $200,000. The jackpot on this game has gotten close to $2 million in the past, but it’s usually won when it’s still under $1 million.

The dollar version of Wheel of Fortune progressives starts with a $1 million jackpot. It’s not unusual for the game to reach $5 million or more, and it’s almost reach $10 million on occasion. Like Megabucks, this jackpot is paid out as an annuity over time.

Elvis isn’t just the king of rock and roll. He’s also a symbol of classic Vegas, so it’s entirely appropriate that he has a progressive slot machine network named after him. The game starts with a $100,000 jackpot, and it costs 25 cents per spin. Keep in mind that to be eligible for the jackpot, you have to make the max bet, which is 3 coins, or 75 cents. We don’t recommend playing progressive slots without making the max bet, because you usually won’t be eligible for the top prize unless you do.

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Mega Moolah is an online-only progressive jackpot available at Internet casinos powered by Microgaming software. Multiple games feature the brand name, and the jackpots and betting limits vary. This progressive network features some of the largest jackpots online, often reaching $1 million or more.