Slot Machine Zombies
Slot machine zombies have inhabited casino floors almost from the beginning of the modern gambling era, but they have become more numerous in recent decades. As the popularity of zombie movies and zombie pop culture has increased, so has increased the popularity of slot machines. Eventually, the two would merge and create the "slot machine zombie". (For a more serious look at this subject, see our article about slot machine addiction.)
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With somewhere between 70% and 80% of all casino profits due to slot machines, slots row has grown as a proportion of casino floor space over the years. Newer, fancier, flashier machines have been placed strategically throughout the casinos, often near the entrances and exits, near the restroom areas and money exchange counters, and near the restaurants. Today, it's impossible to walk into a casino without seeing slot machine zombies.
That's a reality of 21st century gambling. so for those who might not know what to look for, here's how to spot a slot machine zombie.
How to Spot a Slot Machine Zombie
First off, slot machine zombies look almost human. Most wear the same human clothes they wore in their life before coming to the casino and seeing their life drain away from them, so a casual glance across the casino room might not immediately reveal these creatures.
On closer inspection, though, you'll be able to separate the slot machine zombie from the rest of the gambling public. These people hide in the various slot machine areas of the casinos, often hiding behind whole banks of slot machines, as if they gain warmth and sustenance from the glow and hum of the slot machines themselves.
Slot Machine Zombie Types
What do they want? Not brains, but jackpots, of course. What the slot
machine zombie wants is lots of coins, or the lights and sounds of the
electronic jackpot. In either case, this is the only time the zombie
really seems to come to life.
Why?
Because the slot machine zombie only remembers the jackpots. All the times they lose their money, it's like they're not really alive. This seems to numb their mind and bodies, though they'll continue to feed machines coins in their single-minded pursuit of coins. Even an occasional win is enough to sustain them through hour after hour of mind-numbing slot machine gambling.
Slow Slot Machine Zombies
The largest majority of slot machine zombies are "slow slots
zombies". These people may not even appear human at first glance. You
can tell they still have some semblance of humanity, because they'll put
a new set of coins in the slot machine and hit a button every now and
then. For the most part, they are hardly human in their gambling habits,
betraying little emotion regarding wins or losses. They simply, numbly
go about their business.
Nevertheless, you'll see tremendous variety among the slow slot machine zombies.
Many continue to smoke cigarettes, for example. They will have an ashtray sitting on the slot machine they've chosen to inhabit, and the main sign they still have movement capability is when they take a puff or flick their ashes into the ashtray.
Less frequently, you'll see slot machine zombies exhibit mannerisms they exhibited in their pre-zombie life: looking in their wallet or purse, glancing at their watch, fiddling with their cell phone, or even shambling about the casino looking for a new slot machine to inhabit.
The main danger these zombies pose is when you mistakenly assume the zombie has left the area and you try to take the slot machine they have staked as their own. When entering an area full of the slot slot machine zombie type, take in the scenery and, before sitting down, make certain none consider this area their slots zombie "territory".
Fast Slot Machine Zombies
These are the slots zombies that appear most human-seeming to the casual glance. These are the most dangerous slot machine zombies, too. They are in a hurry to win, and they feed their money into the machines in the quickest way possible.
Many of the fast slots zombies using a casino card filled with credit, bypassing the need to keep feeding quarters into a machine. These players might go that next step and set the machine to automatically spin, completely circumventing the need to hit the "spin" button. That's not usually the case, though, because the fast slot machine zombie wants to go as fast as possible, and hitting the spin button manually is faster.
As I mentioned earlier, these are the most dangerous slots zombies, and here's why. Win or lose, it's going to happen fast. They win fast, whereupon they're likely to get bored and feed that money back into the machine. Or they lose fast, often much faster than they expected, and they have to either sit quietly until the rest of their group is ready to leave, or else they pull out another stack of money and play again--perhaps losing more than expected.
In either case, the fast slot machine zombie may end up with a lot of money to spend, or else with no money whatsoever, but the need to kill time. That's when the fast zombie becomes dangerous.
Crawling Slot Machine Zombies
These are the rarest and the creepiest slot machine zombies you'll find in the casinos. They crawl about the casino, dragging themselves along, seeking slot machine they can call their own. Luckily, even if you do see the crawling zombie, you'll likely to find only one in any given casino--and these are the easiest to flee from.
Real Slot Machine Zombies
Seriously, though, you might be asking, "what is a slot machine zombie?"
A slot machine zombie is a slots player who sits at a machine hour-after-hour putting coins into the machine and hitting a button, regardless of wins and losses. The term has the connotation of losing at slots, along with the numbness associated with sitting in front of a one-armed bandit without moving, stretching your legs, or talking to another gambler.
The term slot machine zombie was created by other sorts of casino
gamblers--most likely a poker player or a craps player--who walks by
slots row, sees (in their mind) nothing going on, and wonders why anyone
would continue to play the slots. They prefer the more social casino
games like poker, where you can pretend you're the next Phil Hellmuth or
Tony G and mouth your opponent, or craps, where most everyone at the
table has a bet riding on the same proposition.
These people define "action" as something derived either from layers of gambling strategy, or wild swings of fortune at the toss of the dice or the turn of a card. What they probably don't understand is that the relative lack of strategy or socializing that comes with playing slots is what allows slot machine players to relax and enjoy themselves.
So laugh if you will at the slot machine zombie, but unlike movie zombies, the lone slot player feeding coins into a machine never hurt anyone. To each his own, even in gambling.
