Winning a bet or a game of roulette has a lot to do with your knowledge of the game. But it also has a lot to do with luck. Maybe that is why there are so many myths and legends surrounding gambling. But there are also some stories and facts related to casinos that could be even harder to believe than the actual myths.
These surprising things can be found all around the world, as well as gambling after all. But for this article, we decided to concentrate on the country where the gambling capital of the world a.k.a. Las Vegas is located – the United States of America.
Las Vegas is not what it seems
Many are the nicknames of Las Vegas. But gambling is probably the first thing that comes to mind when this city is mentioned. Hence, no wonder it is often called, as we already mentioned: The Gambling Capital of the World.
However, in reality, it does not deserve that title. At least, not anymore. The Chinese city of Macau should be named this way now. It won the title fair and square, considering how high the revenues of the casinos in Macau are and how many high-profile players can be found there.
Slots and the boredom fight
Slots were invented in the late 19th century. They were made by a man called Charles Fay. No surprise there, right? What probably comes as a surprise is that this creative man had nothing to do with casinos and gambling.
Mr. Fay was a car mechanic. He noticed that his customers were bored in his shop while they waited for their cars to be fixed. So he invented the first slot machine and called it Liberty bell, to give them something to do.
It is a very interesting and humble beginning for a game that will “grow up” to become a favorite, with people approaching it very seriously and preparing for their spins professionally, taking into consideration volatility vs variance, and similar slots’ characteristics, before deciding what slot to play.
Many of them probably do not know that slots found their way to a casino to fight boredom too: they were meant to be played when all the spots on game tables were taken.
The difference between online and offline gambling
When it comes to gambling in brick-and-mortar casinos, Las Vegas and Atlantic City, followed by Native Tribe Casinos, are favorites and most famous places to go. Even if you have never visited the USA, you probably know this.
This is partly because old-school gambling is legal on the federal level, but every state has a right to decide whether it will allow gambling on its territory. The result of this is not too complicated. In Utah, it is completely illegal. In Hawaii, you can only play poker at your home as a part of a social gathering. And Alabama, Alaska, and Nevada only forbade state lotteries.
But online gambling is where things get complicated, and this might come as a surprise. Online gambling in the States has only been legal since 2011. This is quite late for a country that usually sets the trends rather than just following them. The reason behind it is an old act from 1961. that interfered with making online wagers legal.
And, thanks to the fact it was written before the Internet even existed, in 2011 finally another act was passed that decriminalized online gambling. Since then, much like with offline gambling, every state decides whether it’s legal or not. And they differ very much, from New Jersey that allows it completely, Nevada that bans it probably not to interfere with its brick-and-mortar casinos to, again, Utah and Hawaii that still consider it completely illegal.
And speaking of illegal gambling, there is another surprising fact connected to it. It refers to the time when gambling was illegal in all of the States. People were still playing, of course, doing their best to hide it. Most of the games they played at the time included dice. This led to a rule: for a person to be convicted for this crime, police would have to find the dice. No dice, no conviction. This gave us the phrase: No dice.
To conclude
These were the three most surprising facts about casinos and games of fortune in general in the United States of America. Many more can be found for sure, but we tried to select the ones that surprised us the most.