You may remember my 2008 Birthday at Hard Rock Biloxi Story; They had a dinner and a giveaway of 40 free play prizes from $100 to $5000. I never had won ANYTHING in a raffle before and I was all bummed out at the idea of sitting in a crowded room watching others grab prizes (selfish, I know) so I wasn't gonna even go. Dan convinced me otherwise and, long story short, not only did I win a prize but it was the grand prize of $5000.00 Free Play which I parlayed into well over $7000.00 cash that we actually took home! Then, a year later we went to another draw and they drew 20 names for prizes from $200 CASH to $10,000 CASH, with the lowest prizes drawn first then progressively higher each draw. I was called up about the 5th name and won $400 cash but the amazing thing is they then drew my name a second time about ten places later (the $1200 level) but they said only 1 prize and u had to take whatever was the first one you won. Bummer, sort of. So, NOW I always enter draws, just in case. I recommend all of you do the same unless you have to make a special trip or spend money you wouldn't have anyway...

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Surrounded by South Florida Casinos. HELP!!!

Four Winds has its "W Club Windfall" jackpots. There are 3- the small one has to hit by $500, the medium by $20,000, the large by $100,000. You just make sure you use your player's card and you have a chance. So once I was playing "Sheeploads of Cash" and that noisy thing just totally stopped. I tried every button, nothing worked. I tried to cash out and that didn't work, so I pushed the service button. Two attendants came by and started saying stuff like "how did you break this machine? What did you do ?" Got a little concerned, but then realized they were kidding me. I had won the small jackpot which was $263. I was really grateful and said so. One of the attendants told me that often people would get really pissed off when they found out they'd won only the small jackpot. She said one angry person had tossed the cash back at her!!!

Also Four Winds does a "Mystery Money " promo , promising (for me)at least $20 and up to $10,000.(free play). Usually I receive the minimum they quote, but once I received $275 in free play. The service desk lady was just delighted to tell me. I had a great time on my weekly free play of $90 plus the additional $275 that visit.

And once at Horseshoe Hammond, I won $250 cash. I had to go to their service desk and pick an icon out of 3 on their computer monitor. I've never gotten anything more than the guaranteed minimum since.

All of these lucky wins took place in early 2009. Nothing much recently, but at least I know it's possible to get these things!

Nor

SpinNor...that's weird that it just locks up the machine without telling you that you won. When I was last at the Four Winds, I freaked out because someone won the small jackpot while I was sitting at a machine and I looked down at the display next to my player's club card and it said something like "small jackpot of $400 won." Because I was between spins when I saw it, I thought maybe that was how it told you you'd won...but no, it was just letting me know that someone else had won it. Sigh. I guess I can't complain because that night was the first time I ever walked out of Four Winds ahead (came with $200, went home with $240).

Hi Sotr,

Yeah,it is weird. And since it happened to me, there have been a couple times , when my machine locked up for other reasons(the attendant said a tilt)---and I thought I'd won again! But no...

I wouldn't be surprised if some folks just get up and walk away when the slot stops, especially if their credits are really low. Probably saves the casino some money!!

I'm glad you finally came out ahead at Four Winds. It makes all the difference in so many ways. Went there with my husband last Friday for his birthday and just wiped out our bankroll. They comped him $150 toward dinner at the Copper Rock. That dinner was the high point of our stay, but it would have been more enjoyable to have some nice wins.

We hit Ameristar today for a bit, held on to our bucks for quite a while. Enjoyed the penny slots and got a lot of play, but went home way down in the bankroll.

Hoping for better luck for us all!

Unfortunately for me, I live in the province of Quebec, Canada, and since we are soooooooo special, I can not participate in any draws or sweepstakes in the rest of Canada and in the United States of America. That is truly a bummer and it makes me sick.

We had a really exciting one tonight. $75,000 total in cash drawings, with drawings every hour 7P-11P. The way this one worked, everyone had 1 entry automatically activated by any play on the card after 4PM. So, on this one, everyone had an equal chance to win.

Four names were called each hour, and they split the prize pool. If only 1 of the 4 showed up, that 1 winner would take all. Winners are announced and they have exactly 10 minutes, NO MORE, to show up at the Guest Services counter.

The drawings got bigger as the night went on, with the big one at 11PM, $40,000. So, we draw 4 names. Within a couple of minutes 1 winner shows up. At this point, if no one else shows up she would keep the entire $40,000. The whole time she's jumping up and down hoping against hope no one else shows up. The counter keeps counting down, tick-tock, tick-tock, tick tock.

It's getting down to the wire.....less than a minute to go. Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock. Then, literally in the last 10 seconds a roar goes up through the crowd (we've probably got at least 5,000 people in the casino at this point) A guy is running towards the counter waving his arms. He arrives at the counter with 5 seconds to spare!! So, they split the $40K, $20K each.

I have NEVER seen the timing cut that close, and probably never will again.

Twice I have been picked to put on an apron with a front pocket and go into a glass booth with money blowing all around. You then have 1 minute to capture as many bills as you can and put them in the apron pocket. The first time I tried this I got only about $60. The second time, the attendant gave me some tips on how to do it. Basically, what you must do is hold your hands down low while kicking up at the bills down at floor level. This allows you to get quite a few before they are flying up around your ears. So, the second time I got $276. (There is no charge for this info. Feel free to try it yourself).

I personally have never won, but My Great Aunt had won some kind of a Lincoln sporty type car, And my Uncle won a bass fishing boat package. They both said if they would have known about all the red tape and taxes they had to pay on the prizes, they would have taken the cash option.

When French Lick first opened up, A close friend to the family won a Corvette on the 2c progressive slots. In February, 2 months later, he won another Corvette on the same machine he was playing 2 months prior. Took the cash option of $35000 and paid off the taxes he owed for winning the first car.

He too said, he wished he would have taken the cash option with the first car win. He said they valued the car at $45,000 and come tax time he had to pay taxes in the range of $14,000!!! as he put it, "Yeah, paying $14,000 for a $45,000 car is a heck of a deal, but when your lifestyle and income only allows you a $15,000 car over 5yrs worth of payments, Coming up with an extra $14,000 in 3 months is a real hard pill to swallow."

I've also won a couple of times at Finger Lakes, $300 in cash, and $200 free play. Both were those types where all you do is to put your player cards in any machine and they will call your name. The thing that I noticed was that I was playing on end machines both times, so it was easy for them to me. And both times they had a cart with some envelopes on it, and 2 casino workers came around with their microphone as I did my pick and talked to me over the loudspeaker.