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Home / Games / Online Roulette Game and Basic Roulette Strategy

Online Roulette Game and Basic Roulette Strategy

John P.

October 20, 2007 By John P.

RouletteRoulette is a casino and gambling game named after the French word meaning “small wheel”. In the game a croupier spins a wheel in one direction, then spins a ball in the opposite direction around a tilted circular surface running around the circumference of the wheel. The ball eventually falls on to the wheel and into one of 37 (in European roulette) or 38 (in American roulette) colored and numbered pockets on the wheel.

Albert Einstein is reputed to have stated, “You cannot beat a roulette table unless you steal money from it.” And indeed he was mathematically correct. Roulette is an absolute game of chance in which the house odds are stacked from 2-5% against you. Still, the little game I’ve embedded here is awfully fun to play!

How to Play

The Roulette wheel has pockets numbered from 1 to 36 alternating between red and black. They are not in numerical order around the wheel, and there are instances of consecutive numbers being the same color. There is a green pocket numbered 0, and in American roulette there is also a second green pocket marked 00.

The house average or house edge (also called the expected value) is the amount the player loses relative to any bet made, on average. If a player bets on a single number in the American game there is a probability of 1/38 that the player wins 35 times the bet, and a 37/38 chance that the player loses their bet. The expected value is:

-1*37/38 + 35*1/38 = -0.0526 (5.26% house edge)

For European roulette, a single number wins 1/37 and loses 36/37:

-1*36/37 + 35*1/37 = -0.0270 (2.70% house edge)

Roulette Odds Table

Bet nameWinning spacesPayoutOdds of winning
(against)
Expected value
(on a $1 bet)
0035 to 137 to 1-$0.053
000035 to 137 to 1-$0.053
1135 to 137 to 1-$0.053
2235 to 137 to 1-$0.053
……………
363635 to 137 to 1-$0.053
Row 000, 0017 to 118 to 1-$0.053
Row 31, 2, 311 to 111.667 to 1-$0.053
Row 64, 5, 611 to 111.667 to 1-$0.053
Row 97, 8, 911 to 111.667 to 1-$0.053
……………
Row 3634, 35, 3611 to 111.667 to 1-$0.053
Cornerany number from the corner of any 4 numbers8 to 18.5 to 1-$0.053
2 Rowsany number from two rows5 to 15.33 to 1-$0.053
five number bet0, 00, 1, 2, 36 to 16.6 to 1-$0.079
Column 11, 4, 7, …, 342 to 12.167 to 1-$0.053
Column 22, 5, 8, …, 352 to 12.167 to 1-$0.053
Column 33, 6, 9, …, 362 to 12.167 to 1-$0.053
First 121, 2, 3, …, 122 to 12.167 to 1-$0.053
Middle 1213, 14, 15, …, 242 to 12.167 to 1-$0.053
Last 1225, 26, 27, …, 362 to 12.167 to 1-$0.053
Odd1, 3, 5, …, 351 to 11.111 to 1-$0.053
Even2, 4, 6, …, 361 to 11.111 to 1-$0.053
Red1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 12,
14, 16, 18, 19, 21, 23,
25, 27, 30, 32, 34, 36
1 to 11.111 to 1-$0.053
Black2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 11,
13, 15, 17, 20, 22, 24,
26, 28, 29, 31, 33, 35
1 to 11.111 to 1-$0.053
1 to 181, 2, 3, …, 181 to 11.111 to 1-$0.053
19 to 3619, 20, 21, …, 361 to 11.111 to 1-$0.053

Note also that 0 and 00 are neither odd nor even in this game.

The Story

In 2004, Ashley Revell of London sold all of his possessions, clothing included, and brought US$135,300 to the Plaza Hotel in Las Vegas and put it all on “Red” at the roulette table in a double-or-nothing bet. And here is the actual video of what happened:

So, if you’re feeling lucky, have a go at it yourself!

The Game

In order to play the game, grab the chips by clicking on them, then click again to place them on the spot on the table you want to bet on. You can bet on Red, Black, Even, Odd, or any individual number. You can also put multiple chips on different spots to spread out the risk. Refer to the odds table above to determine how much the payout will be for any given spot you choose on the table.

Related

Filed Under: Games Tagged With: Casino, Gambling, Games, Las-Vegas, Roulette

About John P.

John P. is a former CEO, former TV Show Host, and the Founder and Wizard behind Texas Metal Works. You can find him on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Feel free to send shoutouts, insults, and praise. Or Money. Money is good.

Comments

  1. james covert says

    June 6, 2010 at 4:00 pm

    Remember that roulette is none variable by fluctuation, meaning that a downswing will sooner or later run you down. The trick is sticking with 50/50 betting and having a reserve value within your bankroll, use the reserve for lost bets to recover and use the normal for double or nothing. Then aim for around a fifty percent profit within any one session, leave and repeat, this is quite possible with patience.

  2. drfugawe says

    December 6, 2008 at 10:25 am

    So where’s the strategy?
    doc

  3. dzed says

    February 4, 2008 at 10:24 am

    I rtopped out at $3899, and then my luck went down haha lost alll of it!!! Fudge!!

  4. Urbanist says

    October 23, 2007 at 3:43 am

    As a rule of thumb if the video doesn’t work you can always try double-clicking to go to the original on YouTube. If the original wasn’t there it probably means it violated copyright laws and was removed. At that point your best bet is to Google the title and try to find it elsewhere :)

  5. Urbanist says

    October 23, 2007 at 3:40 am

    As a rule of thumb I find that if the video isn’t playing on the site itself you can simply double-click it to go to the original on YouTube. If the original isn’t there chances are it was removed for violating copyright laws, etc… though even then you might be able to Google the title and find a version :)

  6. Brandon says

    October 22, 2007 at 6:06 pm

    nice game,
    I made a post, it didn’t stick ?
    no links or anything either.. hmm, maybe it was bad on my end.

    anyways,, thanks for the game :)

  7. Brandon says

    October 22, 2007 at 6:05 pm

    nice online game :)

    by the end of the year, I’ll be able to leave the casinos in the green from playing all these…lol

  8. Derek Wong says

    October 21, 2007 at 6:03 pm

    Well for some reason it had said that the video was no longer on youtube when I first tried to play it. But now it seems to work so…who knows.

  9. JasonJ says

    October 21, 2007 at 5:35 pm

    That was a really nice post. Thanks for taking such time to explain roulette… I would stick to betting on red or black….

  10. JasonJ says

    October 21, 2007 at 5:30 pm

    I made $454 in four spins… and guess what? I’m walking away… with pretend money!

  11. MG says

    October 21, 2007 at 11:39 am

    Forwarded this on to my friend John, he’s a gaming theorist and this is crack for him :)

  12. John P. says

    October 21, 2007 at 1:30 am

    Hmmm. I’m not sure what you are seeing because the video is still playing here for me. But if it ends up stopping I’ll replace it with the version you found.

    John

  13. Derek Wong says

    October 21, 2007 at 1:22 am

    Although I’ve never played it in Vegas, what little exposure I’ve had to roulette has shown me just how lucky you’d have to be in order to win at it. And I am definitely not lucky.

    Oh and the youtube wouldn’t play from your embedded player because it said that the video was no longer up. Perhaps try http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGCdBsOIKYA instead? In any case, that’s a pretty crazy story! (I hadn’t heard it before.)

  14. Rhoody says

    October 20, 2007 at 10:34 pm

    I am rich !!!! Beer for everbody … hehe
    Somehow the clip looks a bit faked to me…
    Your article and the list is very informativ, thank you

  15. TheDane says

    October 20, 2007 at 2:42 pm

    It takes some balls to sell up everything and go to Vegas to gamble your life / life savings in one spin of the wheel…

    I lost the $999 playmoney in the flash game here in 4 spins… woot!!!

    Kim:)

  16. Urbanist says

    October 20, 2007 at 2:47 am

    The man in the video played it exactly right: unless you have an advantage over the house (which I’ll get to in a second) your best bet is to bet everything in one shot. The other way to go is to play one of the few games you can get a definitive lead with: either poker (playing against other people) or blackjack (if you know how to count cards). Counting cards sounds like a trick for someone with RainMan’s capabilities but in reality there are much simpler card counting systems anyone can learn.

    Still, if you think that’s all fun and games, think again: most of the time a card counter turns a 52% house advantage into a 48% one. If you were betting 5-20 bucks per hand, ranging your bet based on the count, you’d still only make 10-20 bucks per hour. So in a nutshell: learn a system or be bold like our guy in th video and let it all ride!

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