Author: Chris

Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells, Jingle all the way, Microgaming released a slot called Happy Holidays hey!

Yes it’s that time of the year again when Santa dons his red suit, straps on the reindeer and delivers presents in double time across the globe and what better way to enjoy this special time of the year than with a brand new slot from Microgaming.

You’ll never fail to be in the festive spirit given the wealth of seasonal items spread across the 5×3 reels. Santa, Christmas Trees, a stocking packed with presents, a snowman, turkey and even a gingerbread house, if it’s something that celebrates Christmas it is there on the reels.

The base game sees an amazing 243-ways to win on every spin and you can get the reels going from just 0.30 per spin, although higher rollers can pay significantly more to up the potential winning amount. There’s also a jackpot of 88,000 coins available to be won which would make your Christmas go with a bang.

For every non-winning spin on Happy Holidays, there is a chance you can activate the Frosty Feature. When you land this, by landing a snowman on the reels, every high symbol awards a cash payout and if you land a single scatter on the reels you’ll launch the free spins round right away.

Speaking of free spins, land three or more scatters and you’ll earn yourself 10 free spins, though that’s not all as during free spins the reel size increases to 5×4 reels and there is an incredible 1024 ways to win on every spin. Land the snowman symbol in free spins and it will transform into any other high symbol to complete the highest possible winning payline.

With a festive soundtrack to complement the on screen action, Happy Holidays is a slot that you will continue to enjoy long after the festive season has come to an end.

The upcoming game Basketball Star is getting launched at a time when fascination is growing worldwide with the basketball game, laid-back luxury lifestyle and sports-inspired fashion. The winning combination is characterised by hip, robust and expressive individuals. Players of this game can look forward to getting captivated by its flashy demographics exhibited in the thrilling sound track carrying a hip hop theme and game atmosphere enriched with detail.

Basketball Star focuses on capitalizing on the runaway success of Break Away as well as Football Star Online Slots. Players familiar with these games should find its tweaked maths engine quite appealing and worth attempting to play. Basketball is now a very popular sport and the launch of this game will definitely attract the thousands of individuals who enjoy the sport in real life.

The design adopted by Basketball Star is player-friendly and offers a serene environment for amateurs seeking to learn the moves. The game affords players high-adrenaline action via Rolling Reels™, a feature that explodes all winning symbols, thus creating room for the symbols above to roll down and provide a bigger chance to win. Should you get a winning combination after the roll, the winning symbols will explode again and the rolling will continue until you run out of winning combinations!

Basketball Star also comes with the fantastic Wild Shot feature where all symbols in a reel can explode to give even bigger chances of winning. Players also get Test Spins through the Multiplier Trail feature. This leaves the new player sitting back to enjoy wins from multiple outcomes, while the more seasoned players can expect some variation from the typical Online Slots experience.

The opportunity of replay remains a crucial area of focus for Basketball Star that also introduces an array of additional features meant to peak the interest of players and keep them spinning. Test Spins Multiplier Trail ensures that players end up having a different encounter of the Basketball game with each application of this feature while working towards the 10 times multiplier.

Overall, Basketball Star boasts being unique in several ways and among this is making a contribution to the sport-themed genre of games available. Another advantage is improving ability of Operators for creating seasonal promotions dealing with global sports events. It equally enriches the portfolio of games that feature Rolling Reels™ and is powered by an engine that is inspired by the one found in Break Away.

When it comes to finding the most powerful card counting strategies in blackjack, the Omega II Counting System is certainly amongst the best. Especially when compared to some of the other systems, it is relatively new and only became famous in 2001. The Omega II Counting System begins with a multi-level count style, making this a more advanced, yet powerful system when compared to the many other systems on the market. Despite that, it is not overly complicated and has a moderate difficulty level.

Efficient and accurate
The Omega II Counting System is extremely efficient and accurate. Players that are able to master it can benefit from one of the largest advantages possible with any counting strategy. The system offers an efficiency level for betting that is near 99 percent. It is similar to the Canfield Master and Zen counting systems.

Card Value Points
2, 3 +1
4, 5, 6 +2
7 +1
8, A 0
9 -1
10, J, Q, K -2

What level two means
As you can see, there is a wide variety of count values assigned to each of the different cards. If you use a level one system (the most basic system), there are far fewer count values to have to worry about. Because players have to remember a wider range of count values, the system is a bit more complicated than other systems.

A balanced system
The Omega II Counting System is also a balanced system. This means that the count starts at zero when the deck is first dealt, and the end count must also be zero after all the cards in the shoe or deck are dealt out. This provides a quick failsafe to determine whether the player lost track of the correct count at any point while playing.

When to go high or low
When using the Omega II Counting System, the strategy is not unlike other card counting methods. It is important to wait for a high positive count while the player avoids betting anything more than the table minimum if the count is low. Especially when the count is negative, it is important to bet as little as possible.

The Mentor Counting System was first mentioned in 2003, meaning that this is not one of the oldest systems around. This is a relatively advanced card counting system, and it is a multi-level count system. There are more numbers to keep track of with this system than with some of the other, easier to learn methods.

The system itself is relatively balanced, meaning that when the player starts, the count starts at zero with a newly shuffled deck. The player should ultimately end up at zero after all the cards have been dealt. This is especially helpful during the training stages because it provides immediate feedback about whether the player kept an accurate count all through the deck.

It works well on multiple decks

Especially playing multiple decks or medium sized shoes, the Mentor Counting System also works exceedingly well. Three or four decks would not be an issue, primarily because the Mentor Counting System is made for any number of decks ranging from single or double hand-held games to big shoe games (eight decks).

Complications with the True Count

One complex factor that most beginners are going to find with this system is the fact that a conversion between the Running Count and True Count is a necessity. Players will need to divide their Running Count by the remaining double decks in order to find the True Count.

Final considerations

If the count is low and negative, it is important to lower the bets to the table minimum. Meanwhile, if the count is high and positive, it is important to bet more money to be able to win big. Even though the Mentor Counting System works just as well as other styles, it does offer a 97 percent betting correlation, extremely high for blackjack. Especially when using it for medium sized shoes, the Mentor Counting System offers a powerful system with excellent playing efficiency.

If you are a keen blackjack player then you’ll already be aware that one of the ways a player can turn the odds in their favour on a bet, is to use a process called card counting.

While not strictly illegal, many real world casinos frown upon this technique and if they catch players using it, or suspect they are using one of the myriad of card counting systems out there, they may even ask the player to leave the establishment.

Of course, the advent of online gaming and software gaming meant that card counting on computerised version of blackjack was impossible as the pack was shuffled after every deal.

However, now increasing numbers of casinos offer live dealer games, so what is the deal here when it comes to card counting?

Well first off, while there’s no law against card counting in live dealer games, casinos would certainly frown upon it if it was possible, and therein lies the rub because if the live dealer is performing their role capably, then card counting even if attempted, would not be profitable.

This is because live dealers will tend to shuffle the pack after around half the cards have been dealt. What this means is that players can only saturate 50% or less of a shoe before the cards are shuffled; that is nowhere near enough to be able to card count profitably over the long term.

It is for this reason that live casinos don’t allow card counting; yes casinos may not like it and view it as unethical, but the simple fact of the matter is that how live casinos operate when it comes to shuffling their cards, means that card counting is by and large entirely pointless.

Sure, you can practice card counting at home if you like, but you can’t actually use them at a live casino to help you record a profit.