Slots How did people play high limit slots before TITO?

I once hit a $50 "jackpot" at Bally's in Atlantic City. I mention this because it was $50...in nickels. $50 worth of nickels fills 2 entire buckets, and seemed as if it was every nickel in the machine. The cash out process was agonizingly long, and the machine started clicking as I got to the final hundred or so nickels. I was able to get all thousand nickels before it ran out, which was good because waiting would have made me late to pick up my sister from the airport!

 

We used to do a high limit slot pull. People would send $100 with us, and we would play $5 slots until we doubled our money or lost. The $5 slots used great big $5 tokens that made a huge thunk when they landed. One time we had four guys playing at the old Imperial Palace. We had started with $1,000, and got on a roll. We cashed out with $4,000. We were whooping and hollering like fools. Quite a crowd was watching us by the end. $4,000 in huge silver tokens in racks was pretty heavy. This was probably 2002 or something like that.

Memories.

 

And MSS. 8/5 "Treasure Chest Poker" (99.56% quarters, 99.58% dollars) are still coin-droppers.

And like others have mentioned, 2003 was a significant conversion year. I know that was when St. Louis casinos primarily converted. One the best casino innovations of all time.

 

And this was when there was often a dedicated slot change station, as well. If you watch "Ocean's Eleven", you can see it in a couple scenes (since that's all pre-renovation Bellagio), including the scene where they're going over Benedict's daily routine.

 

Same, I remember being kind of annoyed by it, and also felt kinda bad for the jobs they were cutting in terms of slot attendants (though I can't remember ever encountering an attendant who didn't act like she wanted to be anywhere else but at work). But it just seems normal now. I think it's just one of those "I don't like change" things; my grandmother didn't switch away from a rotary phone her entire life because she thought pressing buttons was stupid.

 

I can imagine. I won $25 in nickels once and it was crazy enough, cant imagine $50. As I recall it was nickel tokens not actual nickels. Took me two days of vigorous and frequent hand washing to get the smell off my hands.

 

My only "hand pay" ever was at a 3-reel $1 coin-dropper in Tahoe... I hit the 3 red 7s for a $1000 win (the top pay-out for that machine).
Machine dropped $200 in coins & I was hand-paid $800 in cash. They refilled the machine and loaded 3-coins in "free" for me to spin it off of the 3 red 7s.

To the OP - I remember that the Stardust had $5 tokens for their $5 slot machines.

 

Jerry's Nugget also has a section of 9-6 jacks or better video poker with the coin droppers.

 

My very first trip to Vegas was with my best friend and his girlfriend. We just got to Vegas and we were staying at the original Aladdin. Ate lunch then we put a few bucks into the machines as we waited for check in time. I hit a row of something and the machine started spitting out quarters and making all sorts of noise. I was yelling holy shit I hit the jackpot. My buddy looks over and goes dude, you won ten bucks. From then on I never said a word, even after I filled a bucket plus half another with quarters that trip.

As someone else mentioned, the new TITO is better for me than the old way, even though one cannot replicate the rush you get with the mountains of coins pouring out. With the TITO I can just cash out with any win I want and put it in my wallet for redemption later. This helps me with my play as I typically put in $20-$50 and if I win I cash out and then put more cash in at the next machine. When I run out of cash for the day I then cash in my slips and that is the extent of my winnings or losses for the day. It is far easier to remain on budget this way and I find that I typically don't run through as much money as I once did.

 

The St. Louis casino that is now Hollywood used fake chips in their slots back in the day (when it was supposed to be on a "ship"). And they had the daily loss limit at that time ($250 maybe?). I once saw a woman sitting at the VP machine next to me there, just sitting there and not playing. I finally asked her about it and she said she had to wait until a certain time to begin playing again because of her losses so far. The machines would not operate without a slot club card inserted so they could keep track of how much you had lost..

 

It was really a pain to lug buckets of coins over to the cage if you won something decent... it seems LONG ago that there wasn't TITO...
Before TITO, I used to get up earlier than my wife, and it would take her another hour to get ready each morning. So I'd go down to the casino early, get a roll of quarters, and go down a row of quarter slots and do one coin-one pull on each machine. I did do a nice hit for $150 one morning at the Las Vegas Hilton with one quarter in one machine that paid off $150 for that one pull.

 

Oh, and before TITO you could just be sitting there popping quarters in one at a time and they would still give you free drinks. Now they want to see the balance on the machine, how many points you've played for, and the promise to name your first born after them. Hi, this is my son Luxor.

 

I miss the BANG!BANG!BANG! of the $5 machines.

 

I remember how many people complained (including me) when they started switching to TITO - we thought it wouldn't be as much fun without the sounds of coins dropping...and figured the casinos would lose money since you wouldn't just sit there dropping coins in til you had no more, knowing you couldn't use your loose coins...... but seriously, the heavy buckets-the dirty hands- people using the coin hopper like an ashtray (yuck), having to run up to the cashier to get more coins without losing your machine, have the coins get stuck and having to wait for the slot attendant was all annoying. TITO is the better way to go..

 

And remember the one-hand gloves we used to wear? (or at least that I used to wear!). That was a total thing, the style of your glove. You wore it because the coins were so dirty your hands would turn color from the dirty coins.

 

Ya I remember the white glove ladies. My Grandmother would wearing them and sit at the same machine the whole trip. Also the heavy ass change carts the ladies had to push around with rolled up change.

 

I remember reading an article about the Casino Queen in East St. Louis, IL completing the conversion to TITO and being able to take all the tokens off the boat. It said once all the tokens were removed, the boat rose 4 inches.

 

I have never met you, but I have a picture of you in my mind. This description pegs you completely! Of course you would be so sophisticated and demure as to wear gloves whilst gambling! Now I have a new image in my head. Why am I now picturing you with one of those large, gorgeous, Southern bonnets that women wear to the Kentucky Derby. You are so elegant and if you are even half as full of grace IRL as you are in your writings...you rock!

Plus you REALLY know how to Vegas!

 

As of November, El Cortez had at least one bank of machines that spot out tokens. It is a dollar machine if I remember correctly.

 

forgot to add, asking the slot change lady which slot was "hot" and tipping her if it was.