Automated Single-Player Zyngo – a Game of Skill or Gambling?
by Alphaville Herald on 25/09/09 at 7:54 am
Is Linden Lab making millions from online gam(bl)ing again???
Second Life High Roller Gam(bl)ing – part 3
by Father Jones, investigative reporter
In the previous two parts of this series we looked at the amazing number of high stakes gaming parlors in Second Life and the history of online gambling in Second Life. Although gambling was supposedly banned, games that appear surprisingly similar to gambling have become common again, and this series concludes with a look at the current state of gam(bl)ing in Second Life.
The creative bypass: games of skill !
Not long after Linden Lab wiped out almost all existing casinos, something strange happened to the joy of many: Linden Lab claimed that games of skill were not considered gambling, so those games could continue.
Soon after this revelation, a bingo style game called ‘Zyngo’ made by the Second Life resident Aargle Zymurgy was allowed again by Linden Lab – even though Zyngo was first banned as were other game of chance. Linden Lab ruled the Zyngo game was no longer a game of chance, but was considered a game of skill, despite the fact that the game is a simple bingo game with some extra bonuses. The numbers for every round in this game are randomly generated, as well as the playboard itself.
With Zyngo, new kind of casinos popped up, but they did not call themselves casinos anymore and gave their places more innocent names like ‘Jungle Games’, ‘Snoopy’s Games’, etc. The games that are put out in such gaming-places are far less innocent: they cover a range from low roller games up to very high roller games you can not even find in real life casinos. This new so-called skilled based gaming became actually a form of hardcore gambling.
Doing magic tricks with game settings
The creator of the bingo game Zyngo apparently pursued Linden Lab to allow his game with a simple ‘skill-based test’ – he had put out 10 Zyngo-games and set them up as they will produce exactly the same game session on each Zyngo. He then invited 5 experienced Zyngo-players and 5 players who never played the game before to play the exact same game sessions. He and Linden Lab saw that the experienced players produced higher scores as a proof that Zyngo was a game of skill. After that simple experiment, Zyngo was approved by Linden Lab and the show could go on.
This test only focused on the difference in scoring results, and it was a test only for a multiplayer contest where the one with the highest score could win an L$ prize. But the game of Zyngo machines can be set up in many different ways – including an automatic self-running single player mode.
autoplay – pay the machine and the game plays itself
The multiplayer contest mode of the game is actually almost nonexistent in Second Life. There are hundreds of places with ‘Instant payout’ Zyngo-machines that are setup for single player game sessions: if you beat the score set on the machine, you win a certain L$ prize. After some experimenting, owners of the Zyngo game discovered that there is a ‘chart of probability’ to be made about the outcome of ‘instant payout’ Zyngo games set to a certain score to beat. For example: Zyngo owners found there is about a 10% profit to be made when you set a Zyngo with a score to beat of 50000 points with a prize to win of 5 times the pay-in (for example a prize of 5000 Linden Dollars for a 1000 Linden Dollar payment into the game). This chart of probability looks like this:
| Score to beat | Winning chances | L$ Pay-in | Multiplier | Prize in L$ |
| 35000 points | 40% | 1000 | 2X | 2000 |
| 40000 points | 30% | 1000 | 3X | 3000 |
| 50000 points | 25% | 1000 | 5X | 5000 |
| 55000 points | 20% | 1000 | 7.5X | 7500 |
| 60000 points | 12% | 1000 | 9X | 9000 |
| 65000 points | 10% | 1000 | 10X | 10000 |
| 70000 points | 7.5% | 1000 | 15X | 15000 |
| 80000 points | 5% | 1000 | X20 | 20000 |
This chart of probability suggests two things:
The game of Zyngo is used in such ways that it can not be called a game of skill since winning a game session in ‘Instant payout’ mode depends more on probability and less on skill.
The multipliers used in combination with the high scores to beat are making this a clear gambling device. If one only has a statistical 10% chance to beat the score of 65000 points, can we still talk about an innocent game of skill ?
Linden Dollar farms
No wonder that Linden Lab looks the other way - the new casinos are huge L$ farms for not only the owners – but also for Linden Lab.
Where a typical well run Second Life business selling virtual goods or services can make up to about L$ 50,000 ($188 USD) a day, a successful Zyngo parlor can generate up to L$ 5,000,000 ($18,800 USD) in one day.
These numbers sound unreal, but how else can the owners afford to pay $240 USD per week for classified ads?
Classifieds ads: casino’s pay up to L$138888 ($243 USD) weekly to attract high roller gamblers
Beyond weekly ad costs, the casinos are a cash cow for Linden Lab inland fees – they use full private sims (servers) and pay Linden Lababout $250 USD a month for rental of these sims.
With monthly fees paid to Linden Lab by top casinos running around $1000 – $1,200 USD for ads and land tier, the Lab's yearly take works out to $12,000 - $14,400 USD per casino. At this rate, it only takes 70 – 80 high-end casinos to add $1M USD to the Linden's balance sheet overthe course of a year.
Does simple math explain how automated single-player Zyngo became a game of skill – at least in the eyes of Linden Lab?
Kristal
Sep 23rd, 2010
Zyngo rocks… I 80% of the times win… I pay my RL water and electric bills with what I win on the zyngo machines.
Anon
Sep 23rd, 2010
well then share us some tips
Nelson Jenkins
Sep 24th, 2010
Holy shitting christ, $18,800 a day? Damn, I’m in the wrong business.
Jayd3n
Sep 24th, 2010
There are a few games in Second Life called A GAME OF SKILL.
Zyngo, and a few others I have played, and let me just say, I consider any game that requires a payment of any type gambling. Although their creative circumvent is a game of skill by giving people a chance of two bumps.\
Gambling Machines use Closed Source LSL code which unless hacked can’t cant be seen by anyone else but the creator. These codes can be altered and hacked so that owners could take control of who wins who looses and such, for example a bet of 1-5k = possible win anything above = over 80% Loss ect. control by web database, however they would have wins sometimes to make people feel lucky and keep playing of course but they would be generating a big profit for themselves, this may, or may not be true though.
Although honestly I don’t really care about gambling people want to do it its their choice its not really causing harm, however I would like it to be fair gambling, not cheated systems.
Anon
Oct 2nd, 2010
Any game play strategies?
Anon
Oct 2nd, 2010
Want to increase my average score
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 2nd, 2010
@ Anon
I hope you’re not being serious.
Anon
Oct 3rd, 2010
I wanna improve my zyngo scores
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 3rd, 2010
@ Anon
Shut up and troll elsewhere.
Anon
Oct 3rd, 2010
You’re mean
Kiddoh
Oct 3rd, 2010
I would also like to improve my zyngo scores as well. Is there perhaps a video walkthrough?
Glenn Beck
Oct 3rd, 2010
You know who else used autoplay because he sucked playing himself?
..Hitler.
Anon
Oct 6th, 2010
Are you saying we shouldnt use autoplay?
Anon
Oct 16th, 2010
not like there’s any good ways to make L anymore without buying it which is stupid
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 16th, 2010
@ Anon
Or you could, y’know, become a productive member of society and actually do something instead of gambling and demanding handouts.
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
never said I wanted a handout
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 17th, 2010
I need to unsubscribe from this trollfest…
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
just think paying for fake money is stupid
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 17th, 2010
@ Anon
So is gambling.
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
not when it’s fake money that has no real value
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 17th, 2010
@ Anon
US$ is fake money that has no real value, either, right?
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
the initial conversion rate was all just made of crap and it went on from there
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
and if/when sl ever completely dies you really think any of your stuff will be compensated for?
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
not against there being an economy i just think paying real money into it and then trying to get real money back out is stupid
Anon
Oct 17th, 2010
especially when the company seems to be dying
Zyngoz
Oct 20th, 2010
does anyone know why alot of places now basically force you to have group tags on to play on their freeplays, i tbh hate them because it makes me feel like a giant advertising banner my name is zyngoplace joe smith my name is joe smith.
Zyngoz
Oct 20th, 2010
i mean my name isnt my tag + my name it’s my name plus i get spammed to too much on groups now so i try not to join any
Nelson Jenkins
Oct 20th, 2010
@ Zyngoz
They’re just making further idiots out of the tools that play Zyngo.
Zyngoz
Oct 20th, 2010
Well there are other games to play besides zyngo which i like that are more fun like Jtris
Alpha
Oct 21st, 2010
There is a thread interesting:
http://blogs.secondlife.com/message/455774#455774
up it on sl forum to show the sl what are skil games now…
Zyngoz
Nov 15th, 2010
How lame LL has gotten rid of autoplay
Nelson Jenkins
Nov 15th, 2010
@ Zyngoz
You can stop commenting here now.
Zyngoz
Nov 16th, 2010
linden lab is very mean company
had enough
Nov 16th, 2010
@ nelson “You can stop commenting here now.”
.
Damn who died and left the fur fag in charge?
Nelson Jenkins
Nov 16th, 2010
@ had enough
I was hoping you did. Oh well, guess I’ll have to put up with another troll here.
Blue4u Nowicka
Dec 1st, 2010
The DEATH of AUTOplay!! Finally I am FREE! No auto play is sooooooooooo booooring!
Anon
Dec 1st, 2010
I like the new rules where the devil no longer takes from the top score just from your possible for that round
Frank Sopor
Feb 3rd, 2011
Father Jones, aka Cash Mildor, aka Aryou Lykin. This writer of this article was a former casino owner in SL and went bust. Out of frustration, he perpetrated the biggest zyngo cloning scam ever. This is what prompted Aargle to create slysense. Now Father Jones is sending notecards in world to game owners with mis information that zyngo is now banned. Just google “father Jones zyngo” and you will see that he copy/pastes the same propaganda over and over again. Lolz
Flavius
Aug 25th, 2011
My best score of zyngo is 79200 :http://img.prounionrp.ro/images/benjmbzvlv5w8fbb45.jpg