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A friend "hacked" a similar betting gaming machine. The game cost $2 to play. It loosely followed the payout rules of the TV show "who want's to be a millionai
by lysp 8y ago
A friend "hacked" a similar betting gaming machine.
The game cost $2 to play. It loosely followed the payout rules of the TV show "who want's to be a millionaire". There were about 10-12 levels and every 2-3 wins you'd get to a checkpoint where you could cash out or continue playing for more money.
Each level was slightly harder in difficulty/time with 3 "prize/payout" levels, which changed based on how much the machine had paid out recently. You could generally win anything from $10-$40 per play.
It had about 8 different games you could play (one being sports trivia). One of the games you could choose was "spot the difference" where you have 2 images side by side and you needed to touch the screen in a set amount of time to find the 5 differences.
The method my friend worked out to "hack" the machine was to cross his eyes and merge the 2 images into one, similar to the stereogram "Magic Eye" images you can find. By crossing his eyes and merging the images into a single one - the differences stood out really clearly.
This lasted a few months with him and his friends cashing in on all the machines in the area, whenever their prize level was high. Eventually the software company worked out there was a problem with that specific game and updated their software.
It didn't pay out as high on that game. And the top prize level had to be completed in under 2 seconds. Which when you're trying to press a not-so-great touch-screen 5 times in 2 seconds, was not possible as not all presses would register if you touched it really quickly.
- adrianN 8y agoAmazing that people would code up a "spot the difference" type of game where you can win money without reading up on the techniques used to solve that type of game.
- jakobegger 8y agoInteresting that they "fixed" it by making it impossible to win. Gaming / betting companies are pure evil.
- jhanschoo 8y agoWell, gambling is a luck-based game and this pretty much puts the luck in what is supposed to be a luck based game. Casinos aren't obliged to give their customers money if those customers know a neat trick, y'know.
- YokoZar 8y agoThey are, however, expected to make the machines fair and up front about what they're doing. Randomly rejecting the user's inputs because of knowingly bad hardware isn't part of that deal. The reasonable thing to do would be to disable that play mode altogether, not rig it.
- justinpaulson 8y agoThis was a skill based game though, not gambling.
- SmellyGeekBoy 8y agoCasinos are obliged to give their customers money if they win the game. If there's a "problem" with the game that makes it easier to win then it's in the casino's interests to change it and eliminate that problem.
- gadders 8y agoThe thing that really pissed me off is that the claw-grab machines are now based on payout percentages and rather than actually being a game of skill.
- acct1771 8y ago"Stacker" as well. Learned that the hardest way possible.
- cgag 8y agoAnyone who hasn't used this cross eye method on a spot the difference game needs to try it, it's a very interesting experience to see the way the differences are highlighted.
- spappal 8y agoAgreed, I just tried it. Two good examples for this are the ones in the Wikipedia page [0]. The size in the page is maybe a bit large, if it requires a too large angle of eye crossing: hit Ctrl - a few times to zoom out. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spot_the_difference https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spot_the_difference
- abluecloud 8y agothat's amazing. thanks.
- Elte 8y agoWow, it took me a bit of trying, but I was surprised at how clearly I could see the "compound" picture with the right amount of "cross" when the rest of the world was blurred. And at how well the differences stood out. I've learned a new party trick :D.
- justinpaulson 8y agoI realized this method when I watched this guy on superhuman. I figured this is what he was doing... https://youtu.be/1YWC-K8LvxM https://youtu.be/1YWC-K8LvxM
- tgarv 8y agoCheck out https://www.reddit.com/r/CrossView/ https://www.reddit.com/r/CrossView/ for some other cool applications of that technique! Though I admit that using it to spot differences is the best application I've seen :)