I recently visited 3 of the 4 casinos operated by the Spokane Indian
tribe in the eastern part of Washington state. They were the Double
Eagle Casino and Chewelah Casino, near Chewelah, Washington, and the
Two Rivers Casino near Davenport, Washington. All of them,
particularly Two Rivers, are very remote.
These casinos offer "Nevada Style" gambling. This is NOT the Type 3
gaming found at other Washington casinos. Many machines, but not
all, have bill acceptors, and every machine spills coins. There is
no "Players Club" system, but there are drawings, senior discounts,
and assorted other "specials" offered.
Many of the machines I saw are by IGT ... probably the machines you
would see in Nevada 10-15 years ago. Many are the same machines you
see in Nevada today, but older versions, such as Double Diamond and
Wild Cherry slots. I did see a few machines that I believe are
fairly new, but most are quite old.
As far as VP is concerned, well .... pretty bad pay schedules. But I
didn't have time to check them all. If I find something good later I
will mention it. I did play an 8/5 Bonus Poker game (10 cent
denomination!) that had "Arizona Charles" written on the back of the
cards before the deal button is pressed. I also played a Hot Aces
games with a very awkward key placement. The "Max Bet" key was next
to the "Bet 1" key (on the left) and the other keys did not line up
with the cards. Very easy to make a mistake, which I did.
All three casinos have some very interesting slots ... many I've
never seen before. Double Eagle Casino, in particular, has a huge
number of very unusual slots. In a way, this seems to be sort of a
dumping ground for machines Nevada no longer wants. If anyone has a
machine from years ago that they loved, tell me and I'll see if I can
find it. Maybe you can buy it from them.
It would be interesting to know if these machines still have the
same "randomizing" chip they had in Nevada, or if the payoff
percentages were revised. I think the VP is random (based on my
experience playing), but who knows about the slots. Judging from the
situation, my guess is the slots are unchanged. We did very well
playing Keno machines, so I think they were random. We played 4 Keno
sessions and broke even on 1, doubled our stake on the 2nd, tripled
our stake on the 3rd, and ended with 8.3 times our stake on the
4th. We played slots briefly, and they seemed poor, but many people
were playing.
The Chewelah Casino was recently remodeled and very nice, with a good
restaurant. The other two ... well, they seemed pretty "rough" if
you know what I mean.