Singapore is actually a pretty crappy place to go for video games. There's lots of awesome non-game related shit that I did but most people over there play PC or mobile. This means that the need for actual game stores that sell hard copies of things basically don't exist. Granted I wasn't looking THAT hard for it but even my Singaporean buddies said that the prospects for physical content is pretty shitty.
However one thing I did do was hit up a Casino located on a resort island called Sentosa. I know that Casinos aren't video games but its a kind of gaming that I've never talked about here on the blog and since I recently tried my luck with a couple dollars why not spend some time talking about it.
Before I continue about the casino though, let me tell you about the gambling situation in Japan. It's illegal to gamble for money out here but there are many Pachinko and Slot Machine places dotted around everywhere. The idea is that you use money to receive balls (Pachinko) or medals (slots) and you bet that currency on the machines. If you win you can exchange your balls or medals for a ticket that will allow you to purchase prizes in the parlor. That said, round the side of these places there's usually blacked out window where you can go exchange your ticket for cash. As far as I know these windows are run by 3rd parties so it's not TECHNICALLY illegal, it's some weird loop hole and the police don't seem to give too many fucks.
Proper casinos though are a different story, these places are really cool. They have a sort of nice atmosphere and I've heard that they pump oxygen into these places so that people have more energy to keep going. The casino I went to was a little on the small side so the choices of games were a little limited. I noticed there was an absolute shit ton of Baccarat, some kind of card game that I have no idea how to play. Ideally I wanted to play Blackjack but I was there only for a short time and didn't feel like betting anything over than about $10 and the minimum bets were a little too high for me so I fucked off from my favorite casino game to play my two least favorite games, Roulette and Slots.
The roulette was all digitized, large banks of screens with the betting board on them and you used a touch interface to place your chips. There was a real roulette wheel in the middle of all the machines where a staff member would spin the ball round. Not only was I using the minimum amount of money possible but I was also only betting on red/black because fuck roulette and the chances of me winning anything on individual numbers are basically 0. After a little while of that shit and winning a little bit I tried my hand at the slot machines. Proper casino slot machines are very different to Japanese ones. Japanese ones have 3 reels and there's all sorts of weird rules and conditions to make the shit pay out. These ones you just had to get certain numbers of symbols to land on the board and shit would happen. I put $2 in the thing and after a few spins and some weird alarms and shit going off and I ended up getting $18 out. I had no idea what I was doing so once I saw that I was in the green I just fucked off.
Casinos are cool but these games can be a lot of fun and when you're betting with real money it's easy to get lost in the moment. I got lucky a little bit on my holiday but more often than not you're probably going to lose so you gotta be real careful or you may be looking at debts you cant pay. While enjoyable, I'll stick to video game casinos for fake money because if I lose I can just go and grind monsters or whatever to make it all back. I need all my money for paying bills and buying games so I don't feel like taking my chances too much.
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