Slot Talk: My Picking Strategy

Many times in slot bonus games you need you are provided with a "Pick" screen and need to make a choice. The classic example of this is with the ubiquitous Quick Hit titles where you must choose squares until you match 3 in order to determine your number of spins.

People have strong feelings with regard to whether or not where you pick matters, and regardless of what I say, the debate will continue and while not the focus of this article, my short answer to that is where you choose DOES matter if the remaining choices are shown after you make your selections. That's not to say your overall odds change in any way, but that some Pick Bonuses are fair and others are not. Many times the game instructions will explicitly tell you when everything is predetermined and what you do does or doesn't matter.

Unless playing with friends, many fans have noticed I follow the same pattern which is corners if there are any then sequential, such as what you see here:

If there aren't corners, then I just go right to left.

This bores some, amuses others, and still makes many wonder if there's an advantage to following this "strategy" and the answer is "sort of" although likely it's not what you think!

The answer is that I follow this pattern to reduce my personal anxiety as I feel if I remove my choice from the equation , I won't be disappointed with the outcome, it's as simple as that. By doing so, I never get into that vicious cycle of "Always Choosing Wrong" which many players can relate to.

Check out my Jackpot on Midnight Matinee which I scored by following my pattern:

Imagine if I would have chose The Mummy: I would have been sick!

And now, Penn & Teller - the Ultimate Pick - the Pattern comes through!

So ultimately for me, I enjoy myself more by playing this way: it doesn't give me an edge other than stress reduction when forced to choose although I can say there are a number of times when following this pattern worked out well- for example in scoring this Golden Ticket for $2000!

Yeah, it was all Luck, but whatever works, right?!