Ambition Project

 The Adult Arcade


At a certain point of our lives, we as a society (or those stupid enough to waste their money… ie me) seem to move on through phases. Sort of like puberty or your love for Justin Bieber. But in this case it went from Chuck E. Cheese, to Lucky Strike, to Dave and Busters, to then, the nearest casino within your 50 mile radius. At what point did we stop trading money for tickets and start trading it for chance? At least when putting your money into the bright and loud arcade machines, you can almost always ensure that you get something in return. Versus in an adult arcade (the casino) you put your money in, and it disappears within not even 5 minutes. 

But I guess it's fine right? The casino takes all of your cash plus the money you then withdrew from your checkings account, plus the $8.00 atm fee… that's how they get you. Don’t worry though! Feel free to help yourself to a free drink brought around about every 20 minutes by the waitresses and your trashy, free monthly membership gift that collects dust in your junk pile. 


You can't resist


For many or at least myself, getting into gambling at a young age, might say it’s a freedom thing. Not being able to get into 21+ clubs without a fake ID at the ages 18-20, make nightlife pretty boring. It’s 1:00 am and the only things open are Dominos and McDonalds. All of the clubs we can’t get into and the gambling age in Massachusetts is 21+ but you know what we can get into? A casino 45 minutes away over the border of Rhode Island. 

One summer night after me and my friends spent the entire day together, we didn’t want it to end. We were brainstorming ideas of where to go but couldn’t think of anything. That’s when one of them suggested the Encore casino in Everett. Then, another friend countered that by suggesting, “why not just go to Twin River in Lincoln, RI where we can actually gamble?” Then before we knew it, at 1:00am, we were on our hour drive to the casino. 

We arrived at around 2:00 am and walked in and I remember the feeling was almost like sitting at the adult table at Thanksgiving dinner for the first time. It almost felt like we were imposters. A cloud of smoke just hit us in the face. It was an instant headache but the good kind. 2 of my friends tried the slot machine with no luck, but me and one of my girlfriends headed to the tables because we thought we would have a higher chance of winning. 

We sat down playing blackjack for hours on end. I didn’t leave my seat the as I began to believe it was the “lucky seat.” We became friends with the dealers as they switched in and out every 30 minutes wishing us good luck each time they left. They would give us faces if they thought we made a dumb decision because they knew we were just kids who were still learning. They were telling us all of the strategic ways to have better odds at playing and kept saying, “I want you to win.”

We stayed in that casino till 7:00 am. I walked away with $600 after only putting in $60. Are you kidding me? This is like 2 weeks of paychecks from my part-time job. This is like a second job. Were my thoughts. We were back the next week. Twice. The next week I walked away with, I wanna say $400 and then $600 again. Some may say beginner's luck but at the time, I was so excited. After that, more of our friends would start coming and it would become a weekly thing. Each time, I would start to lose. It started with losing $60 then it turned to $100 then it just got worse and worse to the point where I was now losing $600. I don't have $600 to lose. I haven’t been to the casino since the summer.



The odds are not in your favor


“The casino always wins.” This is something, my friend (who doesn’t like to gamble), would always tell me as I was losing. I find it so interesting because of how true it is. I decided to look into the odds of it because you really don’t see a lot of people walking away with wins. I was interested in seeing the odds for my two favorite games: Roulette and Blackjack. The odds for Blackjack I found were actually 42.22%. The chances of a dealer winning is 49.1%, and then 8.48% goes to the odds of a tie. I guess I can understand this one because with Blackjack, you have more room for strategy and decisions. The house edge for Roulette was 5.26%. I understand roulette you have a 37-1 chance at winning but still it's just insane how much people really lose. I was also interested in checking on slot machines since I never play them nor do I know anyone who has hit big on them. I found that “slot machine odds are some of the worst, ranging from a one-in-5,000 to one-in-about-34-million chance of winning the top prize when using the maximum coin play.” This was absolutely insane to me because at the end of the day, people still play them, knowing their chances. That’s less than the odds of you being eaten by a shark. I also found that around only 13.5% of gamblers end up actually winning. Yet we still take that chance.


Ooooo pretty




The casino knows what it is doing though. Almost every casino you walk into has these bright red carpets, bright lighted machines, loud sound effects, etc. Clearly there are things drawing people in. After doing some research I found quite a few things. 

  1. No clocks. The casino has no clocks so you lose track of time. This obviously is going to keep people there. I never thought about this until reading it.

  2. No decorations. The casino heavily focuses on bright lights and certain color choices that draw you directly to the machines. They avoid any decorations because these machines act as decoration enough. They want them to grab you full attention.

  3. Loud noises. If you ever notice, you are constantly hearing sounds of pennies dropping coming from the machines. Coins haven’t been used in years at casinos, but the sound effect of money, psychologically attracts you.

I have also heard a rumor that the casino pumps oxygen into the air to force everyone to not be tired. I have learned this was a rumor but at the same time, the casinos keep the air freezing cold at all times which ultimately, gives the same effect.


Gamblers Anonymous


“Gambling can stimulate the brain's reward system much like drugs or alcohol can, leading to addiction.” I never realized how easy it was to get addicted to gambling. Now I'm not saying I had a gambling addiction, because I don’t, but I can see now how much of a rush of adrenaline it gives you. I would always call my grandparents and they would be at the casino but I figured that’s just because I mean they’re retired, what else are they going to do with their time, ya know? I knew they weren’t addicted but then I started to actually wonder if they are constantly there without an addiction, what would it look like for someone with an addiction?

I wanted to see how common gambling addiction was in the U.S (especially with how poor we all are right now). I found that “three to five gamblers out of every hundred struggle with a gambling problem” and that “As many as 750,000 young people, ages 14 to 21 have a gambling addiction.” This was even a little crazy to me because gambling isn’t even legal in all 50 states for anyone under the age of 18 but you mean to tell me, children at the ages of 14 have gambling addictions? 

One of my friends who was coming to the “sino” with me all summer would never play. She had told me her family has had gambling problems in the past so she likes to stay away from it. I had respected her self control as she was surrounded by Blackjack fiends. She had told me a story about one of her family members and how bad his problem got. She had mentioned how he had gotten so much money by betting so much money and things were dandy. And then he started losing everything. It was to the point where he signed a contact with Encore to never let him step foot into the casino ever again. I didn’t even know this was a thing until she told me about it. 

I looked further into this to find the “Voluntary Self Exclusion Program.” Which basically has 3 options in the state of Massachusetts. You can either be, “prohibited from entering the gaming area of any Massachusetts casino and from gambling on casino games within the designated area” or “prohibited from entering the sports wagering area of a retail sports wagering operator, and from placing a sports wager with any Massachusetts licensed sports wagering operator, including retails and sports wagering platforms.” And then the third option would be to just be banned from both. I thought this was so interesting and honestly helpful but at the same time, nobody ever knows when to walk away before it’s too late.


What about us?


Encore opening in Everett in the last few years was arguably one of the worst places to put a muli-million dollar project. Not only did they put it in a city that is 3 square miles long, but they also put it right into the only route directly from Everett to Boston. Traffic since the casino was built has skyrocketed causing so much excess traffic when trying to enter Boston. There have also been rumors that they plan on expanding the casino across the street. Many sources say they plan on adding “20,000 square feet of restaurant space, an additional sports betting space, a dedicated poker room, a live entertainment venue and a nightclub, a 2,200-space parking garage, and a 400-foot elevated pedestrian bridge connecting the existing casino to the new facility.” 

Encore has already bought some small businesses and other land over there for additional parking lots. If they expand any further, they will be buying peoples homes, leaving hundreds of people with no home. Not only that, since the opening of the casino in 2019, rent in Everett as well as its surrounding cities has also skyrocketed in which becoming unlivable for most.

But hey,  it’s still a good spot to take prom pictures at, amirite?



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