Fruit Explosion #1834 - Mighty but Ageing

The game of choice was slotted for de-activation last Thursday. With only 10% of the float remaining ticket sales have dried up (40,000 over the past nine days). Our hope now is that the last Grand Prize winner is laying loose in a sellers tray somewhere. Your chances to find it are 308,000:1. All of my sources are empty although a poster indicated that he found three in a location the other day. The result of his anticipation? Nada!

If you want to look down the list, all four of the top five listed games are comparable choices. Of the expensive games, Cash Blast is top rated and currently stands 8th of all games.

Top Rated Games

1. $3 Fruit Explosion #1834 - 10% of top prizes left and 21% of top prize money.
2. $3 Super Bingo #3018 - Excellent small prize availability.
3. $3 Bingo #3016 - Solid on both rated factors. 
4. $5 Cross Tripler #1830 - New Game with lots of potential. 
5. $3 Keno #1416 - There's two Keno games. Worry not - they're both good. 

Games to Avoid

1. $4 Double Cash For Life #1170 - Last Grand Prize gone; a complete dog. 
2. $2 Fast 200's #1817 - I can't buy an iPod for $200!
3. $5 Money Multiplier #1828 - Devoid of Grand Prizes
4. $10 Bejeweled #1786 - Devoid of Grand Prizes
5. $1 10,000 Spin #1802 - Poor top prize ratio. 

Games to Buy if All You Want Is the Grand Prize

1. Cash Blast
2. Fruit Explosion
3. Win Take All
4. Extraordinary
5. Fortune

Games Devoid of Grand Prizes

• Bejeweled
• Money Multiplier
• Double Cash For Life
• QFG Crossword

Comings and Goings

Looks like the OLG is cleaning up before their employees begin the summer vacation period. Three games were retired this past week: Hit Jackpot, Wheel of Fortune, and Black Jack. Black Jack was a dog right from the outset yet the OLG persisted in selling it. It left the scene with 17% of its tickets left to sell after being on sale since the beginning of January. This type of case proves that the OLG is right and I'm wrong about the habits of the ticket buying public. The game was devoid of Grand Prizes since mid-February yet it managed through a normal life cycle with folks merrily buying tickets as if those $35,000 Grand Prizes were still there.

Of the other two games, Hit Jackpot had 1 Grand Prize left and 30% of its float while Wheel of Fortune was devoid of Grand Prizes and 10% of its float. Hmmm.

Meanwhile, Crystal 7's and Cash For Life were introduced. The game sheet for Cash For Life has yet to be posted and you can find CL66's review of Crystal 7's in the comments to last week's post. I rank the game in 10th place to begin its life. Not bad.

Personal Play

Ten more Fruit Explosion tickets yielded two $9 winners. My search continues as I'll be scouring gas stations between Ottawa and Toronto to see what I can find.

In Conclusion

What's with Arnprior? No sooner did we learn that a couple in that town won the last Double Cash For Life lottery prize than we are told that another couple won $100,000 on 649. I was also interested to learn that the DCFL winners received $1,350,000 and not the $1,850,000 that I was told would be paid out. http://www.insideottawavalley.com/news-story/5691945-arnprior-residents-one-step-closer-to-collecting-lottery-prize/ . You will recall that the game's expanded prize tally was at odds with the advertised return. It was 5% short. I called the OLG and was provided with an incorrect answer. A second call sent the agent to the supervisor's office. The answer provided was that the Grand Prizes were $1.850,000 and not the usual $1,350,000. The math worked so I accepted the answer as being correct but now we know it aint so...... Somebody got some splaining to do.

Hats off to the OLG for deactivating the Double Cash For Life game almost immediately after that last grand prize was claimed despite the 2.5 million tickets that remain outstanding. I'm impressed.


Doug