UK Slots - Best Casinos Online. £1000 Multiple Bonus Offer

The History of Slots

The slot machine was developed on the west coast of America in 1987- in San Francisco to be more precise. A man called Charles Fey developed the first "1 armed bandit" and since then the popularity of this game has mushroomed making it the most popular casino game in the world. The first machines took their cue from card games and had reels displaying the 4 suites: Hearts, Spades, Clubs and Diamonds. This then evolved into fruit (an evolution that stuck in the name of slots in the UK which are called fruit machines or fruities to this day).

There are estimated to be around 30 million Slots afficionados on the planet. This is probably the most popular casino game both online and in land based casinos.

Fey's first stab at a slot was unlike anything that you would come across today. Weighing in at over 100 lbs and made of cast iron, it paid out at 50%. What the casinos of today would do for that kind of margin! (Most modern day slots payout at arpund 97-98%). You can see the very first machine at The Liberty Belle Saloon and Restaurant in Reno.

Next on the production line for the Grandfather of Slots was the Operator Bell machine. This is where fruit first made an appearance. There was soon a body of people who had it in for the slot machine, so Fey made them out to look like vending machines. The Bell-Fruit Gum Company, made a gum vending machine that spat out gum for every pull of the arm on the one armed bandit. The BAR symbol was a branding device for the gum- and this is where this famous symbol comes from which is still used on slot machines to this day.

"Bugsy" Siegel, having built his famous Flamingo Hilton on The Strip in Las Vegas (where no limit tables were making quite a stir) also had another innovation up his sleeve. He furnished his new gambling palace with slot machines for the wives and girls of his High Rollers. Then quickly realised that more action was going on at the machines! The rest, as they say, is history. You need only to see how much space has been allocated to slot machines in today´s casinos to realise how incredibly popular they are.

Electronic slots arrived on the scene in the late sixties. They were harder to defraud and more exciting to play with more bells and whistles. Then the RNG (randon number generator) makes an appearance in the seventies. Buttons replaced the arms (although you can still play traditional one armed bandits at most casinos today) and by the eighties the slots machines were developing into microcomputers as microchips were installed to bring even more variety and excitement into game play.

Now of course, you can play all manner of slots online in your pyjamas at home on the Internet. You can play slots on the plane, on your phone, on your PDA and on you iPod.
Slots now generate around 70% to 80% of casino revenue in Vegas. They are here to stay.