The Five Best Casino Games for Beginners
Added on November 27, 2024, in Gambling Articles by Gambling Gurus
People play online casino games for fun and in hopes of securing a win. Some games are easy to understand, whereas others challenge the player with their intricacy.
Some of the easiest games to play also offer the biggest payouts. Games of pure luck like slots don’t require a game strategy, but they can award nice jackpots.
Other games that take more effort to master, like blackjack, rarely create instant wealth, but players can sometimes learn to find an edge after developing an optimal strategy.
Video poker, on the other hand, requires not only a good strategy but also a bit of luck to win a decent jackpot.
You don’t need to master mathematics to be successful, but you should have reasonable expectations if you want to get the most enjoyment possible from your entertainment budget.
The cold hard reality of gambling is that players will lose more often than they win in the long run – it’s just the nature of the game.
We’ll take a look at the following games, ranked as the best casino games for beginners with the easiest games listed first:
- Baccarat
- Slots
- Roulette
- Video Poker
- Blackjack
Baccarat – The easiest casino game to play
For all of its mystique and its well-earned reputation as a game for high rollers and James Bond characters, baccarat is actually the easiest game to play in an online casino.
The reason the game is so easy to play is that it is purely a game of chance, or luck. While some people swear that past results influence future results, that belief has no basis in mathematics.
Playing the game is about as easy as flipping a coin and betting on heads or tails. Simply bet that the Banker hand or the Player hand will win. To be fair, there is also a tie bet, but the odds aren’t that great.
One reason that playing baccarat online is so easy is that all of the mathematical considerations are already taken care of for you. The game simply follows the rules and “plays itself” by adding cards or ending the draw according to the game structure.
Gameplay: Two cards are dealt to the banker and two cards are dealt to the player. The hand with a total closest to “9” wins.
Let’s look at the three bets!
Banker – Thanks to the ‘second card rules’ which you don’t have to worry about online, the Banker hand wins more often than the player hand. The casino also takes a 5% cut but you still end up with an advantage over the Player bet when you bet on the Banker hand.
Player – If your hand amounts to “5” or less, you will be forced to take a second card – otherwise you will stand. If you stand, the Banker hand must take a second card if the count is “5” or less. Therein lies the Banker hand advantage – the Player hand is counted first.
Tie – This bet pays a handsome 8:1 but only occurs once in every eleven hands on average.
Baccarat conclusion
While the game looks complicated, it really is not – especially online. Your best bet is to simply place your stake on the Banker’s hand every time.
Of course, you can play a hunch and bet on Player, but in the long run, that’s not the best bet. You can also bet on a tie, but the averages are not in your favor.
Slots – The second easiest game to play
One great thing about a game of luck like slots is that you don’t need any special knowledge to play and sometimes win. You don’t even have to know how to read the paytable, but you might want to.
What does a slots paytable tell us?
The full answer to this depends on the game provider as well as the casino you are playing at. Every online slot game has a back page of sorts that describes what each winning combination will pay when you line it up.
There should also be information about the bonus rounds – how they are triggered, what occurs, and any special rules that only apply during the feature will be explained.
Players in some jurisdictions also have the luxury of seeing the RTP or theoretical return to player percentage. This is the amount the game is programmed to give back to players over all of time or at least after millions of spins.
Another element related to the paytable is usually found in the game’s description. That is the volatility, or risk index of the game.
Novice and advanced players might want to examine the paytable to help determine volatility if it isn’t listed elsewhere.
Otherwise, all you need to do is set your bet amount and spin the reels. If you get lucky, you win!
Is there more to slots than pure luck?
The answer is complicated. The RTP is written in stone so to speak, but there are still choices to be made.
If you take a bonus, you’ll be committed to playing within a set of rules that could include game restrictions, max bet amounts, wagering requirements, and other terms and conditions.
If you decline the bonus money you will have more freedom to play slots however you want to, within reason.
The key understandings needed to take slots from pure luck to deliberate risk are as follows:
Bankroll Management – Whether you come into a casino with $20 or $2,000, it would be wise to have a bankroll management plan. What that plan will look like depends on a variety of factors.
Many experts agree that your bankroll should be 100x to 300x your average slot bet. In general, the lower the bet the longer your bankroll will last.
Volatility – If you can find the volatility of the games you will be able to choose high, medium or low-risk games to meet your playstyle.
In general, slots can be characterized as having the following levels of risk or volatility:
- High: These games provide bigger wins, but fewer of them. Great for those who seek a thrill, have reasonable expectations, and like to quit as soon as they get ahead.
- Medium: Games with this level of volatility will return a mix of higher and lower wins with varying frequency. These are probably the most popular games because they give extended playtime and still offer a decent chance to hit a good jackpot.
- Low: These games provide a lot of wins, but most of them are small. This the best type of slot game for beginners. You will get the longest possible playtime, plenty of bells and whistles, and a real but slim chance of taking home a jackpot!
Informed players have the choice to bet small for longer playtime but less chance of a big jackpot or to bet big and hope for a crushing win before they go broke. Alternately, choose a middling slot and get the best of both worlds.
Slots conclusion
The games can be played by anyone! Novice and advanced players can always discover something new to pique their interests.
Roulette – Simple, fun, and potentially rewarding
The first thing to mention is that there is more than one kind of roulette.
American roulette has the worst odds because there are two Green Zeroes. These spaces on the wheel and the table represent the house advantage over the player.
European Roulette is identical to the American version except that there is only one Green Zero. This cuts the house edge in half.
French roulette is structurally the same as Euro roulette except it offers pre-placed bets and can include a special rule that allows you to reduce the house edge even more than you can simply by choosing European roulette over American roulette.
One great thing about the game of roulette is that you can choose your own risk versus reward formula or volatility with each bet.
Betting on odd or even, black or red gives you almost a 50/50 chance of winning. Without the Green Zero(es) it would be 50/50. An ‘even money’ bet on roulette pays 1:1 – you win one unit and your bet is returned.
You have a 97.3% chance of winning any bet on a single zero table and a 94.74% chance with two zeroes.
There are a wide range of bets in the middle of the risk spectrum but on the end with the most risk, and therefore the highest return, is the single number bet.
Betting one unit on a single number pays 35:1 and returns your stake.
Roulette conclusion
This is a very easy game for anyone to play. Simply choose your appetite for risk and bet ‘even money’, somewhere in the middle, or go for the gusto with the single number bet.
Video Poker – Easy to learn, possible to master
Video poker is effortless to play as far as the mechanics of betting are concerned. However, there are as many strategies as there are varieties of digital poker games.
In order to win consistently, you will need to choose a game and play it using the optimum strategy for that game. Jacks or Better is the easiest game to learn and the easiest strategy to memorize.
Most online video poker games are programmed to suggest a strategy. The game will suggest certain cards to hold and others to discard and replace on the draw.
If you want to extract the highest possible chance of winning a jackpot, you might wish to modify the suggested strategy in just a few instances. Strategy cards are easy to find online and some casinos actually provide “cheat sheets” for you.
While it’s not a great idea, you can also play a few hands as if it were the lottery, and hope you hit a Royal Flush or another jackpot out of sheer luck.
Video Poker conclusion
Video poker is easy to play because most of the games suggest the next move. Beginners and novices have nearly as good of a chance to win a jackpot as experts do.
Blackjack – easy to learn, harder to master
Most online gaming software does not make suggestions for your next move in this game.
Much like video poker, there are as many strategies as there are game variants. Basic blackjack strategy is easy to learn and it’s also possible to use a strategy card when you play.
Gaining an advantage with advanced play (card counting) is not really possible online.
One great thing about online blackjack is that you can play animated random number generator games, or play in real-time with a live casino stream.
Blackjack conclusion
As one of the top five easiest casino games, blackjack offers entertainment for almost everyone. However, you can also master the game with enough study and practice.
Blackjack aficionados are some of the most passionate about playing their game of choice. The more skill you put into your play, the more you will win.
