Books have been stated on this item, and the controversy and discord about where the "hot" slot games are positioned in a casino are still rampant – over sixty years after slot machines were first added to the gaming floor in the casinos.
The quintessential rule is that the more favourable slots were installed just inside the main doorway of the casino; so that persons passing by would see jackpot winners and be baited to come inside and play. Our theory is that this is not so anymore.
Just about all of the big name casinos today are jumbo complexes … you no longer can see inside from the sidewalk, so there’s no longer a reason to have the ‘loose’ slot machines close-by any doorways.
An additional traditional rule is that loose one armed bandits are located on the major aisles inside the casinos, again so that more folks could see winning jackpots and be inspired to play. Nonetheless, we find that this also is not a universal rule any more.
What casinos found over the years is that people walking down the busy aisles were frequently on the way to somewhere else. If they played the slots at all, they would simply put in their loose change because they happened to be walking by. Win or lose, they would very often not stop to keep playing. And the last thing a casino wants is for someone to win a jackpot by playing only a few coins and then not stay to put it all back in!
Today, casinos are constantly changing their philosophy about where to place the loose one armed bandits.