The game is called Ocean Magic, and it had long been among the most exploitable casino slots games — you just needed to know what to look
for.Summed up in five words: “Wild” bubbles are your friend. If you
start with them in certain positions on your screen, you have an
opportunity to play with an edge over the house.
“I’ve been playing Ocean Magic pretty much since the day I was made aware of the game,” says Max, a professional gambler based in Las Vegas.
The problem, as Max knew well, is that the stakes available at
brick-and-mortar casinos are limited. And so, in turn, is the upside.
The B&M version of the game isn’t necessarily worth a deep-pocketed
player’s time.online casino review
It was in late January that Max received a call from his friend Jay back east in New Jersey. Ocean Magic was available at legal online
casinos in the Garden State, and whereas $500-a-spin was considered an
extremely high limit on the brick-and-mortar machines in Vegas, online
in Jersey, spins with favorable odds were available for up to $3,000.
There was a unique exploit specific to this online version. And Jay could only do so much to take advantage of it by himself.“When Jay made
me aware of Ocean Magic in a playable game state for nosebleed stakes,”
Max says, “I was very excited to get involved.”
Max wasn’t the only friend who got the call. Jay says there were “about 10 people that played.” Each opened his own account at numerous
sites and made four-figure or five-figure deposits and bet as big as
possible.
But sometimes the house just hands over an edge in an effort to get gamblers in the door. Some casinos have been known to offer a promotion
with a “triple down” option in blackjack, which gives players who
understand when to double down a positive overall expectation. Others
have offered special “happy hour” rules such as a 3/1 payout, instead of
3/2, on suited blackjacks.
Then there are promotions like one SugarHouse Casino in Philadelphia experimented with a few years ago, offering double jackpots on slots
for a specific time period. Instead of the house having about a 5% edge,
players who know which machines to pounce on could temporarily enjoy an
edge of about 40%.
