Books have been stated on this issue, and the disquiet and squabbling about where the "hot" slot machines are positioned in the casino are still bubbling – over sixty yrs after slot games were first placed in casinos.
The standard rule is that the best one armed bandits were installed just inside the main foyer of the casino; so that casino fanatics walking by would be able to see jackpot winners and be impressed enough to come into the casino … play. Our assessment is that this is definitely no longer the case.
Many of the mega casinos these days are magnificent complexes … it is not possible to see inside from the sidewalk, so there’s no longer a reason to position the ‘loose’ slots near to any entrances or exits.
An additional traditional rule is that loose slot machine games are placed on the major aisles inside the casinos, again so that more persons could see winning jackpots and be roused to play. However, we find that this also is no longer a universal rule.
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!
Nowadays, casinos are constantly changing their philosophy about where to place the loose slots.