Server Based Slots of the Future

prostoalex writes "The slot machines of the future won't be dumb one-armed bandits anymore, CNet reports. New generation of slot machines, to be deployed in major Vegas casinos, will feature server-based gaming with games, new features and, most important, the odds being downloaded from a central server location, not determined by internal machine algorithm any more."

Comments

Improving the experience, sure

[stefanb]

They won't have the ubiquitous spinning wheels of today's machines.

Boy, when's the last time TFA's reporter has been to Las Vegas? My girlfriend and I had real trouble to find a machine that even took quarters, let alone being mechanical.

"For instance, if on a Saturday night, they decide they'd like to change from a 94 percent pay table to a 90 percent table...right now it would take hours and hours to make that change. And now they'd be able to do that much more expeditiously."

Ah, there we go! Just quickly change the odds behind the backs of the players so you can reek in more... and market it as "personalized" playing experience. There is no step two...

I won't comment on the moronic reference to DoD encryption "to make it safe"...

Re:Improving the experience, sure

[dnoyeb]

With basic odds you already are going to loose. Computerized odds is just in your face criminal.

But it takes a certain type of person to truly gamble anyway. This will just speed them to their doom.

Wasnt there a report and a website already out there that proved the casinos already have cheating software? Honestly, I don't even care. I wouldn't have gambled before, and this certainly wont entice me...

Re:Improving the experience, sure

[mosch]

But it takes a certain type of person to truly gamble anyway. This will just speed them to their doom.

Yeah, it takes the kind of person who enjoys gambling a bit.

Oooooh right, I forgot that all gamblers are compulsives without any ability to understand odds, or to live life on a budget. You're so much better than them, since your hobbies include "being a self-righteous idiot".

The funny part about gambling... nobody thinks a thing about a guy who drops $100k on a boat or a car, or the guy who spends $200/wk on golf. But if that guy goes gambling once a week, and loses $10,000/yr, suddenly he's some sort of low-life degenerate, even if he understands what he's doing and is playing within his means.

I'm a gambler, and I despise compulsives, but they're an unfortunate reality, no different than drunks or bible thumpers.

Re:Safe and secure!

[Tyler Eaves]

I'm not nervous. Casinos make your average government mint look insecure by comparison.

Nothing new

[rhvarona]

This is old news...

I have implemented one of these systems. Many of the newer slot machines have been getting results from a central database for at least a decade. The results typically are generated from a few days to a few weeks in advance, which lets the casino confirm the payout percentages before making the gameset go live.

The way to look at it though is that the Casino does not care if you win big. In fact, the casino likes big jackpots, the bigger the better, because they more than make up for in the the extra attention they get. More attention = More players = More dollars played

They win a certain percent of every dollar played. The more dollars that get played the more they win.

Wrong

[brunes69]

Ah, there we go! Just quickly change the odds behind the backs of the players so you can reek in more... and market it as "personalized" playing experience. There is no step two...

You can't do that, it is illegal, at least in Nevada.

If you would rad up on the subject a bit more, you would see the point of this change is that the casino can compute far in advance the results for every pull of the slot, so that they can know the payout percentages in advance. This way, they can schedule the big jackpots, for instance.

Main point is, they cannot change the odds of machines on the fly - the odds need to be posted.

Re:Just changing the angle of attack...

[tacarat]

Well, for one thing, it's a single point for security updates and monitoring. If the slots are basically dumb terminals, the software load can be re-installed regularly to help minimize the window of opportunity for injected code. If it's a normal client/server deal, then there can still be scans for software tampering. Given this is /. and that SuperSAS is an open gaming protocol, I think that the "many eyes" security concept they're using is very practical. We know the casinos will be more than willing to pay for expert programmers to review the code, and that more than one casino would want to have the code checked out (get your resumes ready!).

As for the monitoring the communications, the casinos could use the strongest proven encryption possible and change the keys weekly, daily, or even hourly because they own the entire system. Each machine could even have it's own key, separate of the others (assuming PKI like implementation, the server could reply with a unique key to each node as well). Most people forget that the point of encryption is that the information assumed have been intercepted by a third party, but won't be useful by the time it's cracked. If crackers get to the point they can crack the casino's keys in 1 day, it wouldn't matter if the keys are changed hourly. Before that happened, though, they'd have long been investigating a new algorithm

As for being vulnerable to an inside job, you're right. The hard shell always has a soft, squishy center. Thing is, that's something that will never change. The only thing for them to do is have audits in place to limit the ability for people to aquire the information or access to set up a job like that by themselves. If nothing else, they should be able to do an audit and figure out who was involved after the fact.