Everyone loves the majestic and glamorous atmosphere of a casino. That is, until you lose everything and are reduced to crawling on your hands and knees, desperately searching for one last token that maybe somebody dropped. No, you’re right, you know that elusive jackpot is just one slot handle away.
In better times, however, casinos offer suspense and excitement, unless of course you choose the wrong type of game. Here are five games that offer no real reason to fork over your change, unless you truly are THAT addicted.
1.
War
Yes, War. That War. That never-ending card game you played when you were seven and stopped playing when you were eight is, in fact, available as an honest-to-God casino table game. And the best part is, it’s not even close to the same game!
For those who don’t remember, War is played by dealing one card to each player. Highest number wins, and the winner takes both cards. In case of a tie, the players each burn three cards and display one more while chanting “I. DE. CLARE. WAR.” Winner takes all the cards, and if it’s a tie, you do it all over again. This game goes on until one player wins all the cards in the deck. The problem is this game can take forever and ever. Cards go back and forth time and again to the point where, if you started a game on Christmas Day, you’d be lucky to finish next Christmas Eve.
The game took longer than they thought
So when casinos decided to make money off this game, they turned it into a one-hand deal. Basically, you give the casino money, they give you one card, and if it’s higher than the dealer’s one card, you win. If it’s a tie, you can give them MORE money (for nostalgia, it’s helpful to scream I. DE. CLARE. WAR as loudly as possible) and hope for the best. But since it’s a casino, don’t hold your breath.
So basically, the charm of War, that being a fun little game you could play if you didn’t have anything else to do for the next six months, has been butchered in favor of turning up one card and seeing if the number’s bigger than the other guy’s card. And that’s it! If you wish to keep playing, fork over more beans and start the whole shebang all over again. Sounds like a party!
2.
Wheel Of Fortune/Money Wheel
Pretty much every casino in the US has some variation of this game and, much like War, there’s absolutely nothing behind it. You give up your money and they spin a wheel. You choose the dollar amount you think the wheel will land on. If you win, you win money; if you lose, you win shame and disgrace.
This game is pointless for two big reasons. For one, the popular name for it is “Wheel Of Fortune”, which can sucker people into thinking they’re going to play something vaguely resembling the game show. Unfortunately, the only similarities are a wheel, numbers, and fifty-year-old women clapping along as the wheel is spun. Sadly, they’re almost always drunk, rarely look like Vanna, and unless you’re incredibly desperate, you don’t want them there.
Sorry, she is not standing next to you
In addition, it’s basically the worst game you can play if you actually hope to win something. The house odds are 1:1 if you bet that the wheel will land on a $1 symbol. What does 1:1 mean? Well, if you bet a dollar, you win a dollar. That’s it. You get your money back and, if you’re like most people who play games like this, you’ll just end up wagering that money again and again and again in the usually-vain hope that you’ll win something more than what you had in your pocket to begin with.
Even then, the casino tends to win roughly 11% more than the player does. And while the special spots on the wheel (typically The Joker and the casino’s logo) have roughly 40:1 odds, the chances of winning that kind of dough are slim to none, since each design only tends to occupy one tiny spot on the wheel, while there are tons of chances to win your money back and try, try again.
3.
North American Baccarat
Some readers might be a tad confused why we would include baccarat on the list. It’s a fairly famous, fairly popular game, and it’s James Bonds’ favorite! So why include it? Because it’s useless, and since this is an article ABOUT useless games, it probably deserves this spot.
Baccarat is well-known in the sense that, if you ask somebody if they think baccarat exists as an actual game, they will probably say yes. However, there’s a real good chance that, unless you’re Asian, you haven’t played it. So here are the rules: the player and the dealer both get two cards. Their score is based on the final digit of the sum of their cards. So if you get a 4 and a 9, you’re score is 3. If the dealer gets a 6 and a Face Card (Royalty or an Ace), their score is 6, since the Faces count as Zero. In this hypothetical scenario, you lose.
Maybe. Because the whole gimmick behind baccarat is that you’re not out to beat the dealer Nope, the whole point is to bet your money based on who you think will win: you, or the dealer. So, in the hypothetical scenario above, you only lose if you wagered money on yourself; if you have an inferiority complex and bet that you would lose, then you win! It’s the perfect game for people who hate themselves and who think they’re losers. Just bet money on the other guy; they probably know how to play better than you anyway.
Isn’t that right, Rondell?
So, in short, baccarat is based entirely on chance, the player has no influence whatsoever on the outcome, and you’d do well to put money on the other guy, and not yourself. If that’s not enough, the first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, had an extremely pivotal scene involving baccarat. But, since nobody found baccarat interesting enough for a movie version, the game was changed to Texas Hold ‘Em. Never heard of it.
