Archive for February, 2007
In March (like, from tomorrow…) you could win a weekend trip to Dublin!
The latest promotion of savvy Irish online Casino, DublinBet, rewards players for depositing in March. Sean and Colleen (probably not their real names) will enter you into a random draw to win a weekend trip to Dublin, Ireland if you deposit €50 in March. Easy. And, if you’re feeling lucky, well worth a crack!
The winner will receive a round trip flight and first class accommodation in the heart of Dublin City for one weekend in the spring of 2007. (I have no idea what Spring is like in Dublin… but it sounds nice, no doubt lots of four leafed clover).
And of course you’ll be able to visit and play in the Fitzwilliam Casino and Card Club in Dublin, where all DublinBet live dealer games are played! (Fancy starring in web cam?)
We have recommended DublinBet before in this blog, but just to re-cap – it’s got two stand-out features:
- The Early payout Blackjack – it not only plays basic strategy blackjack (4 decks) so gameplay is a “known quantity” but it also offers you the choice to opt out of a hand early to lock in a profit or recover some of your bet rather than playing the hand to its conclusion. This is a “must play” for those wanting to improve their blackjack skills – and it’s unique to DublinBet.
- The really well implemented live dealer games – DublinBet uses the latest webcam technology – a far cry from the usual stilted and virtually unplayable attempts at live dealer casino games. These tables are live from the Fitzwilliam Casino and Card Club in Dublin so you can wave as the winner of the ‘weekend in Dublin’ competition strolls on by your table!
>>Visit DublinBet (sorry, and we are sorry, no US bettors!)
>>Read more about DublinBet
February 28th, 2007
Yes! Deep breaths…pace yourself… 4 new Microgaming casino games launch tomorrow.
We look forward to the new Microgaming Casino games release every month – sometimes it’s just one game, but has been up to 10 in one hit.
1 NEW BONUS VIDEO SLOT: PORKY PAYOUT
Is it time to pig out on riches? Try your luck on this new 5-Reel, 20-Payline Slot. Choose the right Porky Payout Gold Brick in the ‘Pick X of Y’ Bonus Game and the base Jackpot of 150,000 can be boosted by an additional 120,000, thanks to a 600x Multiplier!
Elle’s comment: Payouts look promising but pretty naf graphics…
Mike’s comment: I’m planning to be an oinker – a 600x multipler?!
1 NEW FEATURE VIDEO SLOT: THE HIGH LIFE
Time for living La Dolce Vita (The Good Life). This new game is a 5-Reel, 5-Payline Slot featuring Ferrari’s, private yachts and sparkling diamonds. A 60,000 Jackpot is on offer and can increase to 120,000 through the Free Spins Bonus Game – up to 10 Free Spins are awarded and prizes doubled.
Elle’s comment: MMmm, more soso graphics…
Mike’s comment: Not for me – from first glance I prefer Cashville or Loaded along a similar theme
2 NEW MULTI-PLAY POKERS: Can you handle 50 hand poker? What about 100?
A BONUS POKER 50-PLAY This is the 8th offering in Microgaming’s 50-Play Power Poker series. A 100,000 Royal Flush is achievable playing 50 hands on a max bet of 125 and a further 3,200 can be won in the Double-Up Gamble Feature.
BONUS POKER 100-PLAY This is the 7th 100-Play Power Poker now on offer and features a 100,000 Royal Flush achievable by playing 100 hands on a max bet of 125 and a further 3,200 can be won in the Double-Up Gamble Feature.
Elle’s comment: wow…
Mike’s comment: kaching, kaching, kaching…. multi play poker can be mindlessly noisy but lots of fun.
Look out for them tomorrow!
If you’ve not got a sign-on to a Microgaming Casino or just want to try your ‘March luck’ (‘cos it’s refeshed each calendar month!) at a new casino – you can play with confidence at these two great Microgaming sites:
Blackjack Ballroom (full Microgaming suite of games not just BJ – US residents welcomed from 39 States)
Ruby Fortune Casino (an ultra-sleek UK-owned casino with a great reputation, sorry, no US players)
February 27th, 2007
I’m usually fairly sceptical when it comes to astrology but my Gambling Stars really have matched how I’ve felt and behaved so far this week. I’ve been on the casino equivalent of ‘on Tilt’ over the weekend – and I’m pleased to announce that it’s paid off rather well.
Account balances at my favourite three online casinos are up handsomely after good slots wins (Heaven and Hell at Premierbet Casino and the new release, Prime Property at Zodiac Casino), plus some late night Blackjack (single deck gold series at Blackjack Ballroom).
As I share my star sign (Libra) with Catherine Zeta Jones and Will Smith – I wonder how their luck is holding…
This is what Zodiac Casino posted for me – suss out your own stars each week. It’s free and you can even subscribe to the RSS feed so it pops up in your Google browser (or whatever) as soon as a new horoscope is posted.
- LIBRA
This week is all about living extremes, and gambling will be no exception to that. Your options won’t be predictable in any reasonable way except on Friday. Your best chance for profit will be through the weekend, so don’t miss this opportunity. After the weekend, even though things will be unpredictable again, you’ll have built up your confidence from the wins and will be ready to face the challenges. Your hard work will be necessary, but it will pay off in the end. Just pay attention to details, or you risk missing something important. Pay attention to this week’s lucky numbers: 4, 20, and 38.
Good luck!
Elle
February 26th, 2007
I like getting something for nothing and suspect you do too. I got a pleasant surprise today when I logged onto Blackjack Ballroom for a quick fix before doing some work… my account balance was higher than when I’d signed out. Nice.
I am generally not fussed for casino player promotions as I like to play the games I LIKE – not the ones they want to promote – and there are some games, especially certain 3-reel slots that you could not force me to play at gun point.
Today I’d been one of the 48 lucky players drawn randomly for a $50 casino cash bonus. (They are apparently giving away $14,000 this week) It’s funny, $50 is not much – but it put a smile on my face all morning, especially as I’ve now played it up to $450 on my favourite Blackjack game 🙂
Anyway – I’ve always liked Blackjack Ballroom. Canada licensed & Microgaming based, Blackjack Ballroom is CasinoLabRat.com’s top rated casino across all games categories as they have the whole suite of Microgaming games on offer not just the best blackjack on the net…
I started out playing only blackjack at this casino (there are like, 33 or 35 blackjack game variants to choose from). I then taught myself Vegas Craps – fun, if not that lucrative! I moved on to European Roulette for a couple of months. My favorite game at present is Multi-hand 3-card poker Gold Series.
…and the next classic casino table game I’m going to master is Baccarat.
If you’re looking for a new online casino with some class try Blackjack Ballroom – so many online casinos remove all the elegance and dignity that I associate with in-the-flesh casino play. Try BJBR, I think these guys have got it right. 
KJK
February 25th, 2007
Dreaming of a sunny day ? What about a holiday ?
It’s not too late to enter Ladbrokes Casino’s lucky draw to win a free holiday for 2 to Sun City, South Africa (a mega resort where the sun always shines).
This prize includes return flights, and 7 nights accommodation at a 4 Star hotel in Sun City, South Africa for two people. The winner will also receive £1,000 spending money so you can wine and dine in style!
The closing date for this offer is 28th February 2007 and winners will be notified by 5th March 2007 so you need to be in quick!
So how do I enter?
- You just need to play £25** on any two of the following Microgaming casino games: European Roulette Gold, Fortune Cookie slot or Oriental Fortune slot. OR Play £25 on this week’s bonus game Tomb Raider Slot and get a DOUBLE entry into the prize draw!** or currency equivalent (eg if you are playing in Singapore Dollars and the minimum stake required is 200 casino chips, you must stake at least 500 Singapore Dollars to qualify)
- You then need to complete to claim form online (under casino promotions) to register your entry and they’ll send you an acknowledgement of your entry.
It’s a ‘winner takes all’ lucky draw – and Ladbrokes are probably THE safest and securest online Casino in the UK – so if you’re feeling lucky and like the sound of a Sun City break visit Ladbrokes Casino today!
February 23rd, 2007
Here’s a challenge for NASA fans, space cadets, astrologists and UFO spotters!
We thought we’d put the latest casino promotional freebie at Zodiac Casino to the test just to see how lucrative the ‘50 free spins, keep what you win’ offer could be.
The spins have to be taken on Starscape, a fairly classy Microgaming slot – nice spacey sounds, good strong space-themed graphics.
Starscape the basics:
A 25 payline 5-reel slot with wild symbols, multipliers and scatters. You can win up to 70,000 coins in the base game and the bonus game offers a potential win of 37,500 coins.
The test:
Right… to test this 10 of us each played Starscape at Zodiac Casino and then at 2 other unrelated Microgaming casinos, just ‘cos we could. Each tester had to complete 50 spins ten times at each casino (that’s 5000 per casino = 15,000 spins) and then we compared results.
The results:
Not great financially. While our sample size and method was far from statistically significant, it was still interesting that Zodiac Casino proved the luckiest of the 3 Microgaming casinos in our test – with a bonus game triggered 42% of the time (ie of the 500 groups of 50 spins at least 210 resulted in a bonus game). Play at Ruby Fortune Casino resulted in a bonus game 34% of the time and 32Red game play, only 29%. (That’s a 35% average across the 3 casinos)
As you’d expect, as the bonus game is triggered with 3, 4 or 5 space ships, almost all of bonus games were at the lower level (3) and so payouts were less accordingly. We did have 3 ‘4 space ship’ games but no ‘5 space ship’ bonus games triggered. Our average bonus game payout was around 4000 coins compare to the 37,500 maximum possible bonus win.
None of our play testers scored anything like the potential 70,000 coins from the base game and 90% of all sets of 50 spins resulted in a net loss.
Moral of this space saga:
If you play for free, ie no outlay whatsoever, getting a buzz from the potential to get something for nothing is what it’s all about.
Recommended, for the entertainment value alone.
>>Visit Zodiac Casino to suss out this offer, or to just play the game for real money or for free.
PS: Zodiac also give you an extra $40 to play with if you then go on to deposit $100.
February 22nd, 2007
CasinoLabRat.com comprises a team of 12 avid online casino players. We are based in both Northern and Southern hemispheres and I’d have thought we were fairly much like chalk and cheese when it comes to our casino game tastes and preferences.
The team never meets – we are virtual, and submit site content remotely.
This week I asked the crew to recommend their top slots game – at any casino, from any software provider. I found the results kinda interesting.
Of the 12, two came back immediately with fairly scathing comments including “I never play slots… slots are for the mathematically challenged.” (Wow, how useful 😉 )
Several immediately responded (as this was an open email thread) that these 2 needed to ‘get over themselves’ and cited a range of relatively recent and fairly sizable wins along with the fact that you can play for hours for very little, and sometimes it just takes one lucky spin… (yep – that sounds like a slots fan!)
Anyway, I was surprised at the consistency of the choices for “favourite slots game” from the remaining 10 members – and confirmed that none of them actually conferred to make their decisions.
Best Slots – Telling the Men from the Boys?
The guys tended towards Ultimate Fighter – a Playtech slot with bonus fight game available at BetFred Casino. Microgaming’s Stallionare came in second place with Microgaming’s 3-reel Pub Fruity third (the one with the darts bonus game). All very ‘laddish’ I thought!
Best Slots – Lady Luck!
The gals preferred Premierbet Casino’s Heaven and Hell 5-reel slot. It was unanimous except for the US based female in our team (who, due to recent US legislation changes, can’t play at this casino). This surprised me a bit as the theme is fairly dark and some of the images pretty nasty (hellish).
Second choice was not so clear cut, but Microgaming’s Cashanova and a recent release, Prime Property scored well. No romantic flowers or chocolatey themed games for our girls!
In general members of our team prefer slots games with free spin features AND bonus games and all of the crew opted for slots with top graphics. Note to slots designers: please just don’t waste our time with drossy looking games…
All players really looked forward to the new slots releases when they come out but often reverted back to old favourites once the gimick had worn off. The draw of new games releases far out weighed the incentive of casino joining bonuses.
You can play all of these slots for real money – or for free at the following Casinos:
>>BetFred Casino (Playtech) – Sorry, No US players
>>Blackjack Ballroom (Microgaming) – US Players from 39 States welcome
>>Yukon Gold Casino (Microgaming) – US Players from 39 States welcome
>>Premierbet Casino (OpenBet) – Sorry, No US players
February 21st, 2007
We were pleasantly surprised this week with the quality of the latest 5-reel slots games launched at 49er Casino – (yeah, yeah, the rootinest, tootinest, casino still accepting US players… and hosted by Yosemite Sam the wild west cartoon character).
We’ve previously been fairly ‘sniffy’ about the slots on offer at Real Time Gaming software-based casinos and tended towards playing their blackjack and table game selections only (some of the fastest to play on the net).
Try a couple of these new games – they’re quite stylish and if you’re missing playing at Microgaming casinos as a US Player, these might just make you feel a bit better. The Louisiana and NY-based members of our CasinoLabRat.com test team were almost relieved to be able to play slots of this calibre again…
You can play for free to suss them out or for play real money if you like them.
1. Treasure Chamber is a bit of an adventure with a galant explorer and his female side-kick trying to unlock ancient treasures. A twist is added with a shifting symbol – it comes up as a question mark and dissolves once all icons from the 5 reels are displayed to reveal more potentially winning icons. 3 or more roses triggers the bonus feature – lots of free spins on this game.
2. Enchanted Garden is a pretty girlie slot with the nice touch of Ivy growing up the dividers in the 5-reel slot. If you like unicorns, butterflies, crystals and enchanted fountains this slot is worth a look.
3. Crystal Waters made me feel like abandoning mid-winter for a tropical dive holiday. Coral, sea horses, turtles and dolphins…
4. Tiger Treasures has some really great graphics. I know we blogged on this slot yesterday (Chinese New Year) but it really is worth a look. I especially like the snarling tiger and the tiger lilies – but if you like Pandas you’ll like it too. This 5-reel is fun to play.
>>GO TO 49er Casino
>>COMPARE 49er Casino to the top 20 casinos on the net
February 19th, 2007
Gong xi fa cai ! Happy Chinese New Year ! Wishing all CasinoLabRat.com readers a fantastic Year of the Pig.
We went hunting for Chinese slots games to celebrate but Microgaming Casinos only offer 4 Japanese-themed games and have yet to launch the new Porky Payout… (as in Year of the pig). Our favourite Playtech casinos (Bet365 and BetFred) have Chinese Kitchen on offer – but it’s not quite what we had in mind!
Three lucky slots games you might like to try just to celebrate are:
Tiger Treasures and Crazy Dragon, both at 49er Casino (you know, the casino hosted by the Yosemite Sam cartoon character)
The graphics in Tiger Treasures are right up there with some of the better Microgaming Casinos – the panda and tiger lilies are lovely – and this is the best snarling tiger I’ve seen at a casino! He blinks and snarls. There are lots of free spins won on this game… You can play this game for free or for real.
Crazy Dragon (not pictured) is more a classic style 3-reel slot complete with one-armed bandit mechanism and coin noises. Fun – and we found it lucky too!
MANSION Casino has an auspicious five reel slot called Chinese Horoscope.
This game is unique to MANSION Casino and this casino as whole is just a bit different (for example they have a weird mini/midi/maxi approach to game jackpots but some excellent blackack on cool beige tables).
You can play all of these games for free but you need to register.
February 17th, 2007
I’m a Libran and my stars look OK for a flutter at the casino a couple of days this week – but as the astrologer couldn’t pick what the weather’s going to do, I guess I’ll put away the barbeque! As my lucky numbers include a 51, and our lotto only goes up to 40, I guess it’s not going to be my week for the ‘life changing win’ …again! (SEE BELOW)
Funnily enough I had not noticed my Aquarian partner performing well under pressure last week – but hey, perhaps I was just not observant enough or his performance did not involve me! (SEE BELOW)
How do your gambling stars look? Have a look at Zodiac Casino (no obligation to play, even for free… especially if it’s not looking like the fates will be behind you!)
>>Visit Zodiac Casino The Free Gambling Horoscope link is at the bottom of their entry page. You can even subscribe to their free gambling stars so you get an update each week. (Zodiac is Microgaming based and licenced in Kahnawake, Canada).
Libra – February 15, 2007
No matter the weather you see this week – flurries, sunshine, or an all-out storm – you have a great opportunity this week for cozying up in your favorite corner with your favorite games. On Thursday and Tuesday your gambling will bring you the greatest comfort, and if you keep your eyes open, each move you make will be guided by some sign or another. Keep control over your excitement, and just relax to let the fates take you along the right direction.
Pay attention to this week’s lucky numbers: 10, 22, and 51.
Aquarius – February 08, 2007
The lesson that you learned throughout last week was that you are able to perform well under pressure. Don’t let specific doubts that you may have about your abilities interfere with the achievement of your goals. There will be some exceptions to be expected about your gambling successes, but these are not out of the ordinary. Don’t blame yourself or think that it is something that you have done if you don’t win every time, especially when you know you’ve tried every option.
Pay attention to this week’s lucky numbers: 5, 14, and 31.
February 16th, 2007
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