Carnival Games: Do you think they’re rigged?

[Darkesque_]

I have heard that people think that most or all carnival games are rigged. Some people think that the basketball game is impossible because the rim is smaller than the ball. Do you think the games are rigged, or do you think they are games of chance?

 

[Belle T]

If I'm not mistaken, wasn't it actually confirmed by the FTC or some other such organization that many of these games were, in fact, rigged? At least, back in the golden age of carnivals and fairs. I'm not sure about these days. It stands to reason they wouldn't want to draw unnecessary legal troubles upon themselves again, but at the same time, it's not impossible that they just... you know, ignore legislation or find some other, more subtle way to cheat people out of their money.

I don't think that they are rigged in the sense that they are literally impossible to accomplish. What generally happens, from what I know, is that they allegedly bring out different equipment for different guests. So they'll pick someone out at random (or have someone posing as a guest but who is actually a hired employee), give them a much easier (but not conspicuously different) challenge so that people will see how easy the game is and convince themselves that they can win, too. Then, when other customers are lured in, they swap the equipment with something different, i.e. a different sized ball, heavier props, and etc. It's not that you can't do it if you're both skilled enough and are aware of the defect, but that your expectations and knowledge of the task are vastly different, which is going to naturally impair your abilities.

 

[daringred_]

maybe it's the pessimist in me, but i do think they're rigged to some extent. kind of like how crane machines are rigged to only strengthen the claw's grip every x tries, so it's more luck-based than skill. (and basically gambling.) so, i would imagine weighted cans, heavier/lighter equipment, balls just small enough to pass through the hoop but with a huge margin of error. seems like it would be illegal for them to be outright impossible, but i don't doubt that there are some carnival stalls/grounds out there that make them so.

 

[Millysaurusrexjr]

Almost definitely... Doesn't stop me from being tempted to try though!

 

[Bob Zombie]

I think they are rigged to the extend they think they can get away with... the old days of the milk bottles being glued together to prevent someone throwing a baseball through them are long gone, but if they can offset some of the sizes between projectile and target they probably still do.

 

[Sheando]

Like others, I don't know that I think they're literally impossible, I just think they're designed to look much easier than they are. Like a claw machine. Can you fish something out? Sure. Has it been deliberately designed to grasp in a way that makes it really unlikely that you'll seize a plushie, and to swing in a way that makes a grabbed plushie fall out? For sure. So you end up spending $12 trying to get a $2 prize out of the machine, and even if you finally win, the owner of the machine still made quite a good chunk of money off the interaction. Same for ring tosses or skee ball or whatever--designed to be technically possible, but hard enough that the average cost of participation across all players will be far higher than the expense of the small number of prizes won.

 

[Croconaw]

They’re designed to get kids to pay money. Carnival games are definitely rigged without a doubt! Kids see something they want and parents can’t resist letting them try their hand at a game. Once turns into a few times, and the stand makes quite a bit of money.

 

[Aniko]

Yes to some extend, I caught the staff at the boot cheating and saying people didn't get the star when they did, they were just talking a lot trying to get the attention somewhere else while removing the darts touching stars.

 

[MiniPocketWorld]

I think they use tricks to make it alot more difficult than it normally would be. But I also don't play them so I'd take the opinion from someone else who does more.
I'm not even sure how popular those games are now days with video games being so widely available.

 

[Emolga59]

Carnival games are made with the goal of having the customer come back and spend more money. A lot of games intentionally make prizes extremely difficult to win. Crane games are the definition of rigged because the hook is not meant to extend very far to make it more difficult to win the bigger prizes.

 

[Flicky]

My mind goes to some of the Hook-a-Duck ones, where they used to advertise a big prize for hooking a certain duck that didn't actually exist. But you can buy the jumbo prizes if you want. So yeah, definitely rigged, some entirely, others to a certain degree.

 

[Snek]

Are you trying to say the TBT events are rigged too?
....
Jk. On a serious note, yes, irl carnival games are pretty much rigged, which is why I don't do them if I ever go to a carnival. I'm a lover of food anyway so I'd drift over to that section instead lol

 

[Captain Jigglypuff]

Some definitely are while others like the plastic fishing game isn’t.