Tag Archive for "gambling"

[Kicking Back with Jersey Joe LIVE] Fun in Atlantic City

(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Posted by :Jersey Joe On : June 26, 2015

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There’s lots of fun to be had on the Jersey Shore this summer and Atlantic City has plenty to offer. The casinos are open, along with the beach, and the Boardwalk. Jersey Joe and his friends hang out at a beach bar and bring you all the happenings in this special rebroadcast of a live web show.

THE 411

What: Atlantic City

Where: New Jersey

Year Founded: 1894

JERSEY JOE RECOMMENDS:

Atlantic City may have lost 4 casinos, but there’s more going on in town than just gambling. The city continues to add additional attractions to bring the fun back to the shore. It’s kind of neat to see the city in the state of transformation, as more attractions are added. They just need to settle the mess with the Revel casino and fix that black eye.

Have you ever visited AC? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

The Two State Lottery Challenge: The Rematch [Kicking Back with Jersey Joe]

(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Posted by :Jersey Joe On : May 1, 2014

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Category: Been, Columns, Going, Kickin' Back with Jersey Joe, Topics, Travel

Tags:Bingo, bodega, gambling, instant games, Jersey City, lottery tickets, lotto, New Jersey, New Jersey Lottery, new york, New York City, New York Lottery, news stand, PATH, subway, vending machine, Wawa, winning, Zuma

Last year, I put the New York Lottery and the New Jersey Lottery to the test. I wanted to find out which state’s instant scratch off tickets paid off the most – The Empire State or The Garden State. Using the same amount of cash and a random selection of tickets, I joined the ranks of millions who are scratching off to win big bucks on these instant games.

Instant lottery scratch off tickets: they’re meant to play a fast game and to make a quick buck. It’s portable form of gambling that states have relied on for extra revenue since the 1980’s. (You can read about my original discussion of instant lottery games here). The instant games are more popular than ever, to the point where states are now installing vending machines to attract commuters to play on the go.

Lottery player uses the vending machine to purchase scratch off tickets at the 33rd Street subway station in New York City.

Last year, I invested $55 and stopped first at the New York Lottery vending machine at the 33^rd Street Herald Square station in New York City. I put $30 into the machine and randomly selected a number of tickets. Once I got off the PATH in Jersey City, I stopped at a local newsstand and had them randomly select tickets with the remaining $25.

After over 40 minutes of scratching, the New Jersey Lottery $25 investment earned me $42, while my $30 New York Lottery investment earned me only $4. I declared New Jersey the winner and the whole experiment left me with a net loss of $9.

You can read the full report of last year’s challenge here.

Now, these are supposed to be random games of chance, so to be completely fair, I decided that another challenge would be needed and I did just that last week.

Once again, I stopped at the New York Lottery vending machine at the 33^rd Street station and deposited $25. I again picked one large $5 ticket and then randomly chose a selection of lower denomination games. Once back off the PATH in Jersey City, I again stopped by the same newsstand and had the clerk select $25 in random games, with the only rule being that I needed one $5 ticket to match what I had purchased in New York City.

Upon arriving home, I examined the stack of tickets and here’s what I got:

From the New York Lottery – 12 tickets

$5 Million Dollar Money Clip

$3 Spin 3

$2 Lucky 8’s

$2 Happy Birthday

$2 Win $1,000 a Week for Life

$1 Loose Change

$1 Amazing 8’s

$1 5x Cash

From the New Jersey Lottery – 10 tickets

$5 Money Match

$3 Power Play Crossword

$3 Zuma

$2 Love to Win

$2 Classic Bingo

$2 Big Money Spectacular

$2 Win $1,000 a Week for Life

$2 10x Money

$2 Fire & Ice

$2 Hit $50’s

Since there were more tickets in the New York Lottery stack; I went with those, first.

I started with the lower denomination tickets and first up was the $1 5x Cash. To win, all I had to do was match 3 symbols. And…. a loser.

Then went with the $1 Amazing 8’s. Same deal, match three 8’s and win. Too bad, I lost again.

Next up was the $1 Loose Change. This game was a little different. The player is presented with six boxes containing coins. After scratching off the six boxes, the total of what’s inside must go over $1 to win a prize. Mine did! My total was $1.05. I scratched the prize box to reveal I had won my $1 back!

Finally, a winner!

Next up, was the three $2 Win $1,000 A Week for Life games. I was really hoping for a big win on this one. I could use a grand handed to me every week! Who couldn’t?

These tickets contain two games each. The first game is a classic beat the house game. The player is given a number, if the player number is higher than the house number – you win the prize shown on the line. On my first ticket – a hit! I bet the house 12 – 7 and won $2!

The second game on the ticket is the classic New York Lottery standard of matching three like dollar amounts. On the next two tickets, I did just that winning $2 and another $5!

Four winners in a row! Things were starting to look up for the Empire State!

I then went for the $2 Happy Birthday… another dud.

I then had 3 of the $2 Lucky 8’s games. In this game, you scratch off the player area which features a number and a prize amount. If your number matches one of two house numbers, you win the prize. If an 8x symbol appears, you win 8x the prize! A coin picture also denotes an instant prize win.

I scratched the first two tickets – and nothing. Finally, I went for the third ticket. Right away, I matched the house number of 16 and won $10! Further down the line, I uncovered an 8x symbol with a $5 prize that paid off $40! That’s a total of $50! I’ve never won that much on a scratch off lottery ticket in my life!

I still had two of the biggest tickets to go.

Next was a $3 Spin 3. This game was kind of lame, there’s no spinning involved. You are presented 10 different games. All you have to do is match three like symbols in each game to win the prize. Think of it as a slot machine on a scratch off card. It didn’t matter, I got squat.

Finally the big $5 Million Dollar Money Clip game. Match your number to one of the house numbers and win that prize. A 10x awards 10 times the prize and a coin icon wins that prize. Sadly, I got nothing here.

So, for my $25 New York Lottery investment, I walked away with $60!

Then it was time to do battle with the New Jersey Lottery. I started in the same order with the lowest tickets first and that was a $2 Hit $50s. (New Jersey doesn’t seem to offer $1 scratch off games.) Again, you have to match your number to one of the house numbers and win the prize shown. I matched with a 12 and won $2! Things were already looking up once again for the Garden State.

Next was a $2 Fire and Ice game that was definitely icy cold. Nothing. Same deal for $2 10x Money, $2 Win $1,000 a Week for Life, and the $2 Big Money Spectacular. The win $1,000 a Week for Life is a popular game that is available in many different states. I’ve played that in Pennsylvania in the past.

A New Jersey Lottery Bingo scratch off instant game ticket.

Now it was on to the $2 Classic Bingo. This game took a long time to play. You are presented with 25 Bingo Ball numbers on the left. You scratch them off one by one and play the numbers on one of your four Bingo cards. Payouts are different for each card and each way you get a bingo. There are 12 different payouts that are printed next to each game. After scratching off all the ball numbers, I had to transfer them to the game board. After 10 minutes or so, I had a diagonal bingo on card 2 and that scored me $2. Had that been on card four, that payout would have been $5.

I then went for the $2 Love to Win, which was a classic match the house number scratcher. No love here, I got nothing.

Next up was a $3 Zuma ticket. Have you ever played this game online? In the online game, you have to shoot at multicolored balls rolling along a track to make them disappear before reaching the end. I was surprised to see how well this turned this into a scratch off game.

It was one of the more unusual layouts. You are presented a circular game board with six games of balls presented in groups of three. If your three balls match the color, you win. Sadly, mine did not. It was a great nod to the online game, though.

Next was the $3 Power Play Crossword and this thing took a long time to complete. You uncover 10 house letters. The player is then presented with a completed crossword puzzle. You task is to take the 10 house letters and scratch them off anywhere they appear in the puzzle. If you complete three words, you win a prize. The prizes go up with the more words you completely uncover. A pay table is posted on the back. It was useless to me; I only rubbed off two words.

Lastly, was the $5 Money Match game. Same deal as many other tickets. You get 5 house prize amounts. If you match one, you win. If you match an amount, but yours is in green color, you win double the amount. Find a money bag and win $50. Find a green money bag and win $100! I matched and won $5.

So, the total won in New Jersey from my initial $25 investment was only $9. I lost $16 to the Garden State.

Many of the New Jersey games that I played were quite involved. Instead of just finding three like symbols as in most games, here you are required to use some thought. Matching the letters in the Crosswords game took some time as did the Bingo game. So, if you’re looking for instant gratification with matching three symbols, then look for the simpler games as some of the choices can get quite complex. The bonus with selecting one of these tickets from a vending machine is that you can take a closer look at what’s required before making your selection. It’s a little hard to do when there’s a ton of people in line at the bodega waiting to play their Powerball numbers and pay for a jug of milk.

The total time I spent scratching 22 tickets: 41 minutes 31 seconds. It was thanks to some of those complex games I got from New Jersey that added took extra time.

All the mess left behind after 40+ minutes of scratching off instant lottery tickets.

And here’s a look at the pile of shards left behind from all the scratching. Wonder if this stuff is toxic?

THE 411

What: Instant Lottery scratch off games

States played: New York, New Jersey

Denominations: $1 – $5

JERSEY JOE RECOMMENDS:

This was a completely different outcome from the last experiment. I won $60 in New York and only $9 in New Jersey. It was that one large hit on the NY ticket that changed everything. For my $50 investment, I walked away with $69. Not a life changing amount, but still a winner none the less.

The New York Lottery games also offer a second chance drawing. By going online and entering the code on the ticket, players have a chance to win more random prizes. That’s a great feature more state lotteries need to adopt.

The New Jersey Lottery has also gotten into the ticket vending machine business. They recently signed a contract with Wawa convenience stores to have machines installed in all of their Jersey locations. I hope this program extends to other stores throughout the state. Judging by the popularity of the New York machine at 33rd Street, New Jersey could make some big bucks putting these in train stations targeting commuters who are just standing there waiting.

With the second match now complete, the lottery challenge series is tied 1 – 1. It looks like I will have to do a tiebreaker in the future to find out which state has the loosest scratch off lottery tickets.

For more information:

The New York Lottery

The New Jersey Lottery

[Kicking Back with Jersey Joe] The Final Moments of the Sands Casino Atlantic City

(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Posted by :Jersey Joe On : January 9, 2014

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It becomes a big deal when a legendary casino shuts down and in just a few days, another will fold up in Atlantic City. It got me thinking back to the night in 2006, when I was there for the final roll of their old Sands casino. It’s kind of a surreal moment to be there when security pushes everyone out the door.

The hotel tower of the Sands Atlantic City

On that night, I had my old cell phone, and did my best to document the final moments of the casino. I caught on camera everything from the final blackjack bets to the employees saying good bye. I uploaded these to the web years ago, but decided it was time to take another look back at that historic moment caught in time.

The Atlantic City Sands casino opened on August 31, 1980 as the Brighten Hotel & Casino at the corner of Indiana Avenue and Brighten Park. Shortly after opening, it was bought along with the Las Vegas Sands and was officially renamed the Sands Casino Hotel Atlantic City to cash in on the famous “Rat Pack” name.

The resort featured 532 rooms in a 21 story hotel tower. The casino was 2 levels, with a 3^rd floor restaurant area. After opening and become a sister to the Las Vegas property, it attracted big name entertainers including Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Cher, Whitney Houston, and more.

Inside the people mover that connected the Atlantic City Boardwalk, Sands Casino, and Claridge Casino.

While the resort was set back from the famous Boardwalk, a block long people mover was constructed featuring three Dunlop moving belts to take people directly inside either the Sands or neighboring Claridge Casino. The belt was kind of springy and you could actually bounce up and down a bit on it.

The flashy exterior of the Sands Atlantic City at night.

The Sands was quickly surpassed by the newer resorts that opened in town and went bankrupt in 1998. The property block was purchased by Pinnacle Entertainment, with their own plans to demolish the resort, and create their own $1.5 billion mega-resort known as Pinnacle Atlantic City. They erected billboards all around town advertising their coming and gave Sands employees 60 days lay off notice in September.

My friends Simon, Chris, and I decided to be there for the Sands final night and with my old fashioned camera phone in tow. We arrived around 10pm and the place certainly wasn’t a ghost town. In fact, it was quite packed. In the madness, I tried to snap as many phone shots as possible and here’s what I captured that night. I apologize in advance for some of the blurry photos.

From the people-mover, the O in casino had lost part of its covering. Nobody cares; this will be the last time this sign is lit.

To access the Sands, you had to take a sharp right after the second long belt on the people mover. You would then descend down a high flyover ramp, decorated in white and blue K-Mart rope lights. The next day, this flyover was sealed with a temporary wood partition. Only a few weeks later, the entire people mover to the neighboring Claridge was closed.

After exiting the people mover flyover, you would descend down an escalator to the main floor of the casino. There was a large atrium where a three story escalator would take hungry gamblers to the dining level. By the time we were there that night; only a small deli was still open.

It’s only 10pm, but this part of the casino floor was nearly dead… that will change as we delve further in.

Just steps from the door – this place is happening. Gamblers are trying to make the most of every last second the Sands is open!

The band plays on at Swingers, a bar/nightclub that was located in the center of the casino floor. Only 6 hours later, this place would be dead forever!

These signs were posted all around the properly informing players of the Sands closure. These signs would be up for months after the doors were locked.

We took a quick walk outside to check out the impressive front facade of the building. This was the final night for these signs and logo to be lit. Within 7 months, all of these signs went up for auction, and what was left was bulldozed 9 months later.

We went back inside to play the slots. Check this old machine out! It’s a unique nickel slot that offers a gold watch as a prize! Hit the right combination on the screen, push the button, and it’s yours. Two of the watches were already gone at this point. Too bad, they don’t have slots like these anymore!

We decided to explore the property a bit and came across this little used walkway to their hidden kids’ arcade. It looks like they didn’t want kids anywhere near the casino floor!

Here is the last open place to get a bite to eat… a late night deli. The Sands used to have a really neat themed buffet, where you sat on chairs that were designed to resemble the rolling chairs on the Boardwalk and the whole room was boardwalk/ocean themed. I ate there once; it wasn’t bad from what I remember.

Nobody was around in the poker room on the last night!

We took a final ride from the 3^rd floor dining area down the long escalators back o the casino floor.

We took a stroll up the Boardwalk to the Irish Pub and returned at about 4:30am.

We again circled the casino to find that many of the machines had already been taken offline, such as this machine at 4:41am. There was quite a buzz floating around the floor as the casino had paid off many of their progressive jackpots earlier in the evening. There were stories of quite a few gamblers who hit it big!

By 5:11am, lines were forming at the casino cages as many of the tables began to close.

By 5:20am, one by one the tables were closing. Most of the staff began saying goodbye and swapping stories with one another.

By 5:21am, only two table games were available for play. $25 baccarat and $250 blackjack! The tables that were open now had rows of spectators.

…and at 5:22am, here’s one of the last blackjack tables that was open.

At 5:27am, I sat down at a still working Hollywood Squares slot machine. At this point, security was walking around telling players to cash out.

…and at 5:35am – a big win! My $20 turned into $186.50! Thanks Sands! A security guard stood next to me to finish my bonus round, then asked for a third and final time to leave the machine. Seconds after I got up, an attendant disables the machine.

…at 5:37am one of the last blackjack tables still going strong. At one point in the last years, the Sands had removed all of their table games. Some players said that was the final nail in their coffin. They brought them back not too long before closing.

One of the very last slot machines that was still online. You can tell by the red lights on top, which machines are offline.

At 5:43am, here’s that Hollywood Squares machine I was playing… now locked off!

Another view of that great win!

Here’s a bank of disabled Price is Right nickel slot machines. Funny, how the sign says TEMPORARILY OUT OF SERVICE.

Someone should take a Sharpie and change the sign to PERMANENTLY OUT OF SERVICE. These machines were probably shipped to another casino. I doubt they’re still in service in 2014!

…and at 5:46am here it is – the very last deal at the very last blackjack table. An announcement is made over the intercom – the Sands Casino is now officially closed. The woman won the last hand with a 20!

The staff says goodbye as security begins to usher patrons out of the building. A series of rope barricades had been put up at the edges of the casino floor. Once you crossed the line – you couldn’t get back in! Local news crews were waiting outside.

More of the staff taking pictures, hugging, and saying goodbye. There were still guests in the hotel rooms and they had to leave the building by 9am.

It’s now 5:54am, a look at one of the many security barriers in place.

Security ushering everyone out.

…and past the security barricade to the outside. The casino is nearly empty and closed. It’s 5:56am.

A cameraman from CBS 3 in Philadelphia takes some b-roll shots.

Another of the many signs announcing the casino’s closure.

A reporter from CBS 3 Philadelphia doing interviews.

It was $10 admission to get into the Sands Casino liquidation sale in 2007.

7 months later, after the casino was officially closed, the entire property, and everything inside went up for sale at an auction. I was able to check that out as well. It was neat to walk through every nook and cranny of the place. People were buying up everything. from old TV’s, to copper pipes, to hot tub parts, everything (except slots and table games, which were gone by this point) had a price tag on it. I originally went there, hoping to score a deal on an HDTV, but those were gone early in the auction. I did pick up a few small kitchen items: a serving dish, some wine glasses, and salad tongs! Every room in the building was open to explore. We even found a secret elevator that only went between the top three floors for high rollers to access their exclusive lounge.

Pinnacle made $31 million from the sale, including finding an additional $17,193.14 in found cash when the original slot machines were removed.

The entire property was imploded in a big Las Vegas style spectacle on October 18, 2007. Numerous viewing parties lined the Boardwalk for the festivities.

After being the smallest Atlantic City casino when it closed, Pinnacle had big plans to open their mega-resort by 2012 at the latest. Those plans never happened. Shortly after the building was imploded, the housing bubble burst, and Pinnacle was no longer interested in opening in the AC market. The site has sat vacant, except for an art installation, ever since. In March 2013, Pinnacle sold the land to developer Boardwalk Piers who has plans to build another casino or a family friendly complex.

The Dizzy Dolphin video poker bar inside The Atlantic Club.

It was a fun time at the Sands that last night and now sadly, another Atlantic City casino is closing their doors. The Atlantic Club Casino, at the very southern end of the Boardwalk, will shut down on January 13^th. The casino was originally built at the Golden Nugget and helped casino mogul Steve Wynn fund his Las Vegas empire. The Atlantic Club is currently the smallest of the city’s casinos.

The Atlantic Club will be the third Atlantic City casino to ever close, after the original Playboy Casino/Trump World’s Fair site and the Sands. The only portion of the original Sands that still remains is the adjacent Madison House Hotel that was once used as an overflow hotel tower and a parking garage.

THE 411

What: Sands Casino Hotel Atlantic City

Operating Dates: 1980-2006

Rooms: 532

JERSEY JOE RECOMMENDS:

Pinnacle made a mistake closing the Sands Atlantic City. While they had big plans for their mega-resort, even the city’s newest resort Revel, is having trouble making a buck.

The Sands could have stayed on as a local’s casino and certainly had enough space to expand or re-brand. Pinnacle should have waited until they had all the proper funding before imploding the place. They could have at least flipped the property over to someone else.

It’s only a matter of time, until Atlantic City loses another of their smaller casinos and only time will tell what will happen to the Atlantic Club property after the doors are sealed in a few days.

Image credits – iirra, Laura Gomez, Mori Claudia, Cavalier92

[Kicking Back with Jersey Joe] New Jersey Antes Up to Online Gambling, But Not Without Glitches

(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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Posted by :Jersey Joe On : December 5, 2013

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Category: Columns, Kickin' Back with Jersey Joe

Tags:Atlantic City, betting, Borgata, casino, Delaware, gambling, Las Vegas, Nevada, New Jersey, online gambling, online wagering, player, Tropicana, Ultimate Casino, Virgin Casino, wager

Real online casino games are now legal in New Jersey and two other states.

Last week, after days of beta testing, anyone inside the borders of New Jersey can lawfully sign on to one of the state’s 13 online casinos and place a bet. While online gambling is seen as a boon to the state’s casino and tax wallets, the launch has not gone without technical difficulties.

Commercials advertising the online casinos have saturated TV stations, radio stations, mailboxes, and the internet. Every time I sign onto Facebook, I see at least a couple of ads for the new casinos.

On November 26^th at 12:01, 13 online casinos were allowed to start taking real money wagers inside New Jersey’s borders. All 13 online casinos are connected to six real brick and mortar casinos in Atlantic City. AC has been losing gamblers for years, since neighboring states began opening casinos of their own a few years ago. Now, each is legally allowed to open multiple online casinos and take a share of the profits. Most have already affiliated with existing online casinos that were mostly barred from the US, after a silly law was passed and their domains seized by the feds in 2006. While these operators couldn’t run sites in the US, they ran at full force overseas.

The Atlantic City skyline as seen in a recent episode of American Dad on FOX.

So far, three states in the US permit online gambling: Nevada, Delaware, and New Jersey. This is the first major expansion of gambling in the Garden State, since it was legalized in 1978. Over 52,000 online accounts have been created since the beta test started and 5,000 being opened on Thanksgiving Day, alone.

The six casinos offering online gambling sites are:

Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa

Trump Taj Mahal Casino Resort

Trump Plaza Hotel & Casino

Tropicana Casino & Resort

Bally’s Atlantic City

Caesar’s Atlantic City

The Golden Nugget Atlantic City is working out some technical issues (rumored to involve social security numbers) that kept its license on ice. They should be back online soon.

A game of online roulette in progress.

New Jersey governor Chris Christie expects online gambling to bring more than $1 billion to the state by July 1. $160 million of that would directly go to the state in taxes.

The casino software uses geo-tracking to make sure the computer or mobile device is within the states borders. If the software cannot verify the location, it will not permit any real wagers to be made. Unfortunately a little known hiccup of this limits all wagering to be done on Wi-Fi networks. No hard wire computers are able to make bets, since the location cannot be verified according to state law.

A typical error message players will see if they try to play from outside New Jersey’s state borders.

When opening an account, the player is required to enter their name, address, social security number, and wireless phone number. The wireless number is used to send verification texts to the account holder. Another red flag happens to players who have multiple addresses which can cause the software to be unable to verify their location via a background check.

Since I live in the Garden State and have for years, I tried three different sites. But, even I had a great deal of trouble signing on.

Star Trek online slot as featured in the Borgata online casino.

BORGATACASINO.COM

The casino that made Atlantic City hip has opened two online casinos, borgatacasino.com and borgatapoker.com. While both use the same account, two different software downloads are required to play. Borgata does offer a few games to play directly on their web sites, downloading the software gives access to more games and richer graphics.

Borgata has partnered with IGT Gaming (a legend in the business and their games are all over casino floors.) This allows the Borg to offer authentic casino video poker machines, but also big name slots that you would find on a real casino floors such as Star Trek, Ghostbusters, Kitty Glitter, Wolf Run, Cleopatra, and more.

Star Trek online slot bonus round from the Borgata online casino. Most of the online slots feature bonus rounds.

Once you open an online account, the Borgata offers you $20 in free play. During signup, you will be required to download a small plug-in that will verify your New Jersey location. It’s safe and you have no choice but to activate the plug in or you can’t play by law.

I also deposited an additional $20 via electronic check from my checking account, which was very easy. All they require is your bank account and routing number. Borgata, along with other sites, also offers credit card deposits.

They also have an online player card loyalty system that offers comps similar to what you will find in the MyBorgata slot card program. They offer the same tiers, such as Red, Black, and Titanium level that rewards comps and free play the more you wager, but on a monthly basis. Unfortunately, it is NOT connected to the physical Atlantic City account. Hopefully, that will change immediately. I would like to use my comps across both platforms, online and in the real casino in Atlantic City. I might be inclined to play more, if I know there is a chance I might be offered a free room at the hotel.

In fact, I just noticed while signing onto their site to write this blog, they just added a new Monopoly online slot. Applause to them for already upgrading!

Borgata online casino error message.

Unfortunately, many of the games have the tendency to crash and completely lock up the software. They offer a rich, graphic environment, complete with bonus rounds – but the slots constantly crash. Sometimes, you only get in a spin or two before the game peters out.

That gets even more frustrating when you are in a bonus round and the software loses connection to the server and causes a major crash. You don’t lose any money and the game usually will re-launch and continue your bonus. But, many times, I was only offered a blue screen and had to CONTROL+ALT+DELETE to hard crash and relaunch the entire application.

If the software crashes in the middle of a bonus round, it’s OK — it will start off where you stopped once the game is reopened.

Last Saturday, most of the games were offline and offered weird errors as “the game could not be played with the current currency selected.” Even though, I was playing in American dollars. I called the 800 number for help and was on hold more than 20 minutes both times before I gave up.

When the games do work, I’ve had quite a bit of fun, and have gotten a ton of play for my $20 investment, plus the $20 bonus. In fact, I’m up!

Sadly, all of their technical glitches may permanently turn off some players, who can easily sign on to more trustworthy sites. I would suggest waiting a bit and letting the Borgata completely overhaul their software before giving their site a try.

Rating: Average (Excellent once glitches are fixed)

Borgata also operates borgatapoker.com

VIRGINCASINO.COM

Partnered with the Tropicana Atlantic City, Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin empire has moved into the online gambling business. Virgin Casino offers up to a $50 reimbursement of your initial loss within the first seven days.

Virgin’s site does not require any software downloading. While they offer all of the same IGT games as the Borgata, playing inside a web browser can make the games appear small on the screen. A recent software fix seems to have addressed this as the games are now appearing in a larger size.

The Ghostbusters slot machine at the Virgin online casino. Virgin makes it easy to understand your total balance by constantly displaying it near the top of the screen.

Virgin offers Virgin points for the money you wager. These can be cashed in for free money to play the games. I opened my account with $50 (which I was able to deposit via electronic check from my checking account) and went through that in a couple of days. They instantly added the $50 bonus.

I somehow earned 6 points for my $75 in play. It seems to take thousands of points to get any online cash back. They have the exact offers posted on their site.

The Virgin online casino withdraw screen. This was a fairly easy process.

I played for some time longer and cashed out with $25 remaining. The cash out was fairly easy and they sent an email the following day noting the withdrawal had been processed and would be in my checking account in 3-5 business days. Why is withdrawing so easy, but depositing taking several days?

Rating: Average

ULTIMATE CASINO (UCASINO.COM)

They have the flashiest commercials for online gambling airing on TV.

Their site offers a large selection, but not all, of the IGT games from Borgata and Virgin casinos.

Sadly, I was unable to play.

What happens if an online casino can’t verify your location… you get this.

I was successfully able to open an account in which they offer $5 in free cash and $20 in poker table play (only said in the fine print, their splashy ads offer a flat $25.)

According to their site, the games can be played online in a web browser or by downloading their app. Unfortunately, their app is online for Android devices, so sorry IPhone users.

The Loki plugin installing over and over again, with no luck.

Like Borgata, in order to play you are required to download a browser plug-in known as Loki to sign up and play. However, the plug-in would not work to locate me, even though I’m inside the Garden State and installed it again and again. I tried for over and hour rebooting the computer, checking their help FAQ, installing Mozilla Firefox as they suggest… but nothing.

Another option on their FAQ was to change the Windows registry to allow the games to play. Sorry, I am not a computer programmer and the registry file they offered for download won’t launch, either. There’s no reason to ask any player to alter their Windows registry. That’s just asking for trouble and its way more time than the $25 in free play is worth.

After two hours and two different days of attempts – I gave up on them.

They need to redesign the software, so installation is not this complicated. There are easier sites to sign onto out there.

Rating: Fail

I’ve also briefly checked out caesarscasino.com and harrahscasino.com, both operated by parent company Caesars Entertainment. These sites offer their own non-copyrighted slots and a few games found on the other sites. Many of the bigger slot games seemed to be missing here, however.

There are several more sites that I plan on checking out in the future and will report back here. My early findings seem to be that most operate with the same IGT games.

Sure, not everyone is ready for online gambling and it can be very easy to get in trouble. Some of the slots offer wagers as high as thousands of dollars on a single spin.

One night, in research for this blog, I was lying in bed playing the slots. While it is fun, it isn’t a substitute for a night out at a real casino. However, it does make it easy for those with a gambling problem to play at any time. You definitely will need self control, especially now that you can basically turn any dorm room, hotel room, service plaza, kitchen, and library into a casino.

New Jersey state law has online account deposits capped at $2,500. The online casino is required to contact the player at this point and verify if the player wishes to deposit more. Once the total reaches $15,000 in accounts across all state casinos, another warning check will be issued. The player also has the ability to control how much they can deposit at once as well.

As inside a real casino, a gambling hotline is available for anyone who needs help at 1-800-GAMBLER. While that’s a creative number, spelling out your troubles on a touch tone keypad seems to be the last kick in the teeth.

Playing Star Trek while watching Star Trek… only in New Jersey!

THE 411

What: online gambling

Where legal: Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware – other states coming soon

Wagers start at: 1 cent

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New Jersey is by far not the only state that is looking to ante up to online gambling. Eight other states are working on similar laws: California, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, and Texas. New York representative Peter King is also working on making it a federal law.

It looks like this technology is here to stay. Just as I’ve told you before – it’s up to you to bet with your head and not over it. If gambling is against your nature or religion, then you will most likely not be happy with this latest online offering.

And in full disclosure, I have shared with you my experiences signing up with these three particular online casinos. As with any form of wagering, your experience may differ. I’d love to hear how it goes for you!

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