Importance

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Abstract

A game machine has a win judgment table. The table stores win information corresponding to each integer in a range of integers. An integers assigned to one special win paying the largest prize is located at the end of the range of integers. In the first game of a win cycle, one integer is randomly selected from the range of integers, and the win information corresponding to this integer is used to determine the outcome of the first game. In each subsequent game of said win cycle, the integer used to determine the outcome of the previous game is incremented and the resulting integer used for the current game. When the end of the integer range is reached, the special win occurs, and the next game becomes the first game of a new win cycle. It is thus assured that the special win occurs in each cycle of games, and that the number of games between special wins never exceeds a certain value. BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a win control method and apparatus for a game machine, and more particularly to a method and an apparatus capable of generating a special win with an ensured frequency. A typical such game machine is a slot machine and the present invention will be described and illustrated by way of example in connection with a slot machine; but it is to be understood that the invention is applicable to other game machines as well. Slot machines are so designed that, when a start lever is operated after a coin or coins have been inserted, a plurality of reels, for example three reels, are rotated simultaneously. After the reels have reached a steady angular velocity, the reels can be controlled to stop. In a manually stopped type of machine, the reels are separately stopped by operating corresponding stop buttons. In an automatically stopped type of machine, the reels are stopped one after another by an automatic stop mechanism. If the symbol combination consisting of three symbols arranged on a prize-winning line after the reels have stopped is a winning symbol combination, a prize corresponding to the rank of that particular win is awarded to the player. Among the winning symbol combinations, a combination e.g. of triple '7', i.e., 7-7-7 is the special win, in other words, the so-called big win or big hit, and the most valuable prize is awarded to the player for it. Taking into consideration the paying ratio, win control is performed according to probabilities, so that the big win occurs only once in one cycle of games (for example, a cycle constituted by 4096 games). In order to control winning, a table (win judgment table) is provided for indicating whether or not there is to be a win with respect to each random number and if so, the rank of that win. Sampling is carried out for each game and a judgment as to whether there is to be a win among the sampled random numbers is made with reference to the win judgment table. Therefore, although the big win should occur once during one cycle of games in terms of probabilities, it is in fact possible that no big win might occur during several cycles. If this should occur, the players' enthusiasm or interest in the game would be lost. There is also a video type of slot machine, in which reels are simulated so as to display rows of symbols on a CRT. The above problem is the same in this type of machine; and so the present invention is equally applicable to both slot machines with reels and slot machines with a CRT display. OBJECT OF THE INVENTION The object of the present invention is to provide a win control method and apparatus for a game machine, in which a special win necessarily occurs in one cycle of games. SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION To achieve the above and other objects and advantages, the present invention provides a win judgment table in which a special win is allotted or assigned to a numerical value at the end of a series of numerical values or to a numerical value in the vicinity thereof. A numerical value included in the series of numerical values is sampled at random only for the first game, and a win judgment is made based on such sampled numerical value in the first game. The game is controlled in accordance with the result of this judgment. In a second game and in the games thereafter, the sampled numerical value is used as an initial numerical value and the win judgment is made using a numerical value (prearranged or predetermined numerical value) specified by the number of times the game has been played. This prearranged numerical value varies in such a manner as to be shifted toward the end of the series of numerical values including the numerical value of the special win. When the prearranged numerical value has reached the end of the series of numerical values as a result of a large number of games having been played, one cycle of games is over. The next game is the first game of the next cycle and numerical values are sampled at random again. In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the series of numerical values is a series of integers including the minimum numerical value M and the maximum numerical value N, and the special win is assigned to the maximum numerical value N. In a second game and in games thereafter, such sampled numerical value is used as an initial numerical value, and numerical values which have been shifted one by one toward the maximum numerical value N become the prearranged numerical values for such games. According to the present invention, sine all numerical values included in the full range of the series of numerical values are used for the win control, a special win will occur in one game cycle without fail.

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First Claim