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Carnival games: Which ones are probably not a total scam?

J

jtvang125

Diamond Member
As we all know many of these games give the players an unfair advantage by using shady tactics or rules. Some do have better odds of winning than others though. What are some of the games that an average person has a good chance of winning? Here's some from the top of my head:

-Pop a balloon with a dart
-Coin toss (get a coin in any glass cup and you win that cup)
-Horse racing (first to fill up balloon or other variants to get their horse across finish line wins)
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They're all a scam to one degree or another. The racing games like filling up a balloon with a water pistol are probably the best bet because someone wins every time. But all that means is that you lose less slowly than in other games. You're still paying a whole lot for nothing.
 
Watch Randy Rausch's last lecture and see which game he played to win all those stuffed animals. I don't remember but you can win at the games.
 
Usually the cheaper the prizes (like stuffed animals), the more likely the game isn't fixed/more likely you are to win.
 
-ping pong ball into a jar and win a gold fish
-throw a dime into a circle on a platform without touching the line. (not a scam but all luck)
 
I use to win at the OC fair EVERY time playing pool. The break and run game isnt really a scam you just need to know how to do it right. The cues suck the tables are really close together but its still easy if you understand pool.
 
Some of them aren't so much a scam as they are taking advantage of people's inability to estimate probability. i.e. tossing a coin and having it land completely in the red circle. The circle is clearly larger than the coin, but people mistakenly believe that the relative area of the circle is their relative odds of winning. i.e. they think that since the circles make up about 1/30th of the total area, their odds are 1/30 of winning.. Also, because the circles are bright red against a background of white, they woefully overestimate the percentage of the surface that's actually red.

Here's the math for 1 1/2" diameter circles spaced only 6" apart (edge of the circle to edge of the circle). Of course, with a bunch of quarters scattered about, it's obvious that these circles are significantly larger than a quarter (15/16"). (Suckers!) From center to center, it's 7 inches, so if you draw a square connecting the 4 centers of circles, you end up with 49 square inches, of which you have 4 quarter-circles = a full circle. Of that, Pi * .75^2 is the area of the circle, 3.6% of the total area (49 square inches). And, even if people did this calculation, most would assume that it means that they have a 3.6% chance of winning; roughly 1 in 28.

But, if you calculate how much of the area where the quarter can actually land & win, it's significantly smaller, since the quarter has to be completely within the circle. The easiest way to calculate this (2nd easiest once someone posts an easier way 😛 ) is to figure out where the center of the circle can be. The center of the quarter has to be at least equal to its radius away from the edge of the red circle. That is, it has to be 1/2 of 15/16" away from the edge of the circle = at least 15/32" away from the edge of the circle. If you draw a circle inside the red circle, to denote the region where the center of the quarter can exist, you'll find that this new circle is 18/32" in diameter. (The entire circle is 48/32" wide; in 15/32" each from the left and right sides leaves 18/32" remaining). So, the actual area where the center of the quarter can be is
Pi * (15/64)^2 = .1726 square inches, out of that 49 square inches.

That makes the actual odds of winning 0.352% or 1 in about 284.
So, for every $71 spent by suckers, they average giving out about 1 prize that costs them $10 or less.

I don't know what the actual sizes of those circles are, and it varies, depending on what coin you're allowed to throw & the size of the prizes. But, I believe the probabilities I calculated here are in the ballpark (if not generously more in favor of the person playing the game than they actually are.)
 
The fishing one is usually decent. The one where there are a bunch of white circles floating with a couple of red ones in a water ring that is pumped around. A couple of bucks, a white circle gets you some crap, a red one a stuffed animal

I've been ~80%. I just aim for right after the water jet where the circles separate and have a little patience.
 
I played the one where you toss a ball against a target on a board, and then the ball has to fall into this area. The board is at a 45 degree angle and it is hard to do. You normally just bounce it right out on the floor.

Well third try and I get it. And the cabbage hand carnie tells me I hit the border of the target and it was a non valid toss. I argued and he ignored me and walked away. I got nothing.
 
Cooder: Hey, you lost your money fair and square! I didn't scam nobody!
Homer: [laughing] Put down your stick. We're here to work.
Bart: Starting today, we're Carnies, just like you.
Cooder: Well, in that case, let me show you how I scammed you.
 
My favorite was at Waldameer in Erie, PA. There's a golf putting game; if I recall correctly, you got 2 shots for a dollar. Pretty big stuffed animals - but not the incredibly huge ones that you have no place to put in your house. I used to play a lot of miniature golf. I played for money - sometimes dollar a stroke, dollar a hole. The place I worked at owned a miniature golf course; we'd get out of work at midnight on Fridays, grab a case or two of beer, and play miniature golf til 5 in the morning.

3 holes on the green. One very difficult, one incredibly difficult, one damn near impossible 30 feet away or so. It was early evening, the midway area was packed as usual, big crowds of onlookers. I whacked the first two shots toward the farthest hole, to get a decent idea of the breaks. Played again. Two consecutive shots... <chevy chase> na na na na na na na na</chevy chase> Plunk. <chevy chase> na na na na na na na na na </chevy chase> around the rim and plunk. The guy's jaw dropped, gave me two of the big stuffed animals. I turned around and handed one each to my little boys in the doublewide stroller. Big "awwwwww" from the crowd, big grin from me. 🙂

But, of all the parks I've ever been too, I think that park had the fairest games. I'd bet they didn't do much better than breaking even after paying for the prizes & workers. Well, maybe a little better, but certainly not like paying out only about 5-10% in prizes like at most parks.
 
ping pong ball in the gold fish bowl game.

almost always guaranteed to take home a sickly goldfish that will be dead in ~1 week.
 
the red circle, in which you place red circles to cover all of it, is very possible. there is a specific way to do it every time, but i cant remember it.
 
they are all rigged against you to a certain extent. Like the darts you mentioned, the darts are intentionally blunted and the baloons are under-inflated to make them hard to pop.
 
i do relatively OK on the basketball hoops where its way higher than regulation or the hoop is way smaller than regulation.
 
I've already given away eight pencils, two hoola dolls, and an ashtray, and I've only taken in fifteen dollars.

Navin, you have taken in fifteen dollars and given away fifty cents worth of crap, which gives us a net profit of fourteen dollars and fifty cents.

Ah... It's a profit deal. Takes the pressure off. Get your weight guessed right here! Only a buck! Actual live weight guessing! Take a chance and win some crap!
 
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