Originally Posted by
accountinquestion
I doubt many places require changing out chips at this point, at least not on modern machines like the ones that would be "nerfed". The software is likely upgraded like anything else. Perhaps they have a USB stick. The manfacturer can use cryptography to "sign" the executable which would be controlled by the manufacturer. This would prevent any unauthorized version of the software to ever be created.
It seems a bit silly to have eeproms or whatever and swap them out. Embedded systems have relied on 'flashing' for probably a decade now.
Don't claim to be an expert, but I'd be surprised as fuck to ever see a chip swapped out on one of these nerf situations.
But that doesn't make any sense. Why would they set a game up so that a knowledgeable player can beat the game but have a "nerfed" version sitting at the ready to pounce on "that same unwary player." What would they think they are accomplishing?
If a knowledgeable player has the ability to tell a new game can be beaten he has the ability to tell that a new tighter version has been introduced and quit playing or tighten up.
I don't think the game designer is thinking "I'm going to set this game up where the hustlers make a bunch of money then I'm going to change the configuration and bushwhack them so they lose money." The hustlers are going to figure it out. If they could figure out the first version they can figure out the second version. They are not going to dump a bunch of money.
If you see a hustler continue to dump money on a "nerfed" game then I take exception to anyone calling that person a hustler in the first place. If they don't have enough sense to quit playing a game they can't beat they are a ploppie, not a hustler.
Take a game like Harley-Davidson which is a revenue shared game that has a payback in the 87% range. The house is making about 13% on the action. The ploppies are losing bigtime on the game, but a few hustlers that will only play when they find high numbers, and that occurs only a very small percentage of the time. So the house is making good money on the game. Why would they change anything because of a few knowledgeable players that play the game sparingly? It doesn't make sense to change anything on a game holding 13%. If they cut the payback the ploppies will lose even more money. The one thing ploppies do notice is how fast their money is disappearing and will quit playing the game. So nobody is playing the game anymore.
If they "nerf" a game it's after they see what's going on, not before. That means they have to reconfigure the game on a new chip.