The Razzle
The razzle is notorious as one of those games that a person should not play, because there is no winning this game. This is due to the fact that majority of the time, this game is played dishonestly, and also due to the fact that the game has a structure that kind of guarantees the loss of a person. If you are a businessmantrying to make money out of games, though, then this is a very profitable option for you – if you can get people to play it without realizing the scheme of things behind the game.
The setup for a game of razzle consists of a board with about 120 holes in them, and numbers which indicate the points for every hole. These points, when added up, correspond to a particular prize value, which is displayed on a chart where the players can see. To play the game, a player must pay a particular amount per roll, and he rolls eight marbles from a cup onto the board and waits to see where the balls fall. Each hole where the ball falls gives the player a point, and the trick to win is to play continuously in order to build up points. The game sounds pretty easy, but that is only because the trick is not in the gameplay itself – the trick is in the structure of the chart which indicates the prize value.
The chart wherein the prizes for a particular number of points are indicated also contain values for different bonuses you can achieve throughout the game. When your ball falls into one of those bonus holes, then you either get double the value for your next play, or you get an extra roll for free. Since most of the holes either contain low values that do not amount to much in your game, and a good part of them contain bonus rounds, then a person is only coaxed to play more. However, each rounds costs ten percent of the payoff for that round, and the payoff rises each round, so your payment to roll rises for each round, but your odds of winning stay the same. The structure of the chart and the board do not make it possible for a person to win, and even if he does, he still spends a lot of money in the process.
This game is usually found in carnivals, and is not played as a professional game. It did have a history at the casino for awhile though – it was played in Havana casinos sometime in the past.