The Best Ways to Play The Games of The Massachusetts State Lottery

Instant Win Scratch Tickets

Have you ever been to a corner store and witnessed an unusual flood of people there, many in and out of their cars, some just sitting mesmerized in a trancelike state, and wondered, 'what on earth is going on here'? What you have just witnessed is the result of a new release of an Instant Win Scratch Ticket from the Massachusetts State Lottery. I'm sure it comes as no surprise to you that it's all about entertainment and money. There really is only one thing capable of generating that type of excitation at corner stores and 'quick stop gas stations' throughout the state so, there's also no wondering why the state holds a 'legalized monopoly' on the industry.

You may however, have wondered, 'how do all those people know when a new instant win game is released'? The answer is, they watch for new release announcements on the New Lottery Instant Game Tickets page of the Massachusetts State Lottery Official Web Site. In this way they are always apprised of new opportunities to hit the jackpot.

As for the mysterious furor of it all, it can be explained simply with what's well know through the 'scratching community', in an attempt to gain popularity for a game, each new instant games release is scheduled with winning tickets.

So, now a week as gone by and the crowds have dissipated at the 'scratching posts' and you have some former candidates burning a hole in you pocket. Short of a cold shower, you decide what to do, buy yourself some instant win lottery tickets! Now comes the dilemma, which games tickets to buy? Before extinguishing those fiery historical figures, refer to the Instant Prizes Claims page of the Massachusetts State Lottery Official Web Site. Additionally you may want to check the Instant Prizes Under 1,000,000 page.

What you are looking for is the claimed vs. total columns on the right side on both of the listing pages. By scanning those two columns you can easily see how many prizes are both available and claimed. Now at this point it becomes perfectly obvious that you only want to purchase tickets for games that have more unclaimed prizes than claimed prizes. After all, why throw away your hard earned money on a 46 claimed prizes out of 50 available prizes game ticket when you can purchase a 28 vs.. 66 or 18 vs. 80 and have something on the order of 30 to 60 more chances of winning the grand prize amount! Granted though, all those winners will not be in circulation at the time of your purchase.

This begs the question of how much money to spend on your instant win ticket purchase. Most "professional 'scratchers'' remark, you must spend at least $ 100 on one game at one time to have any real chance of winning a jackpot, claiming, you really need some full fresh sheets of tickets in order to better your chances of your scratching revealing that jackpot. However conviction dictates you can only buy as many scratch tickets as your budget will allow. So, if spending $ 100 simply is not in your budget today, sometimes over time, putting some money aside for a 'new instant win release treat day' would be an acceptable way to both play by the 'rules' and, make it relatively' affordable 'to do so.

Cash WinFall

A 'one wheel' game, Cash WinFall, being the Massachusetts State Lotteries newest game, has an interesting twist on its jackpot. The money is rolled down to lesser winners! If no grand prize has been won before the jackpot pool reaches $ 2 Million, that $ 2,000,000.00 or more then gets dissipated through to all lower level wins of that draw. Meaning, if the jackpot is $ 2 Million or more, and there is no jackpot winner, that $ 2 Million goes to all the prize winners in that drawing. Pretty neat! Now it's quite obvious when to play Cash WinFall!

Mega Millions

A two wheel game, Mega Millions is the Massachusetts version of the highly popular multi state game PowerBall. Being a 2 wheel game, the odds are quite high against picking all 6 winning numbers. In fact they are quite a bit higher than PowerBall odds. One would naturally assume because the odds are higher, there would be less frequent winners with higher jackpots. That simply is not the case. PowerBall has jackpot winners, on average over the past year, approximately once every 6 weeks (8 winners) with 9 figure jackpots numbering 4. While Mega Millions has jackpot winners, on average once every 4 weeks (14 winners) ) with 9 figure jackpots also numbering 4. One can reasonably assert that those figures are a result of the participation states population and economic demographics.

So how do all those people win? The Official Web Site of Mega Millions states quite clearly on its Winning Picks page [http://www.megamillions.com/winningpicks/download_numbers.asp] that 'Lottery games such as Mega Millions are random and it is impossible for anyone or any lottery analysis software to predict exactly what will be the next drawn balls. However, patterns can still be observed from the balls that are randomly drawn for different periods of time ' . That being said, you can obviously have a better chance of winning through a lottery related form of Statistical Analysis . For more information on Statistical Analysis and how it applies to the Massachusetts State Lottery, visit MassLotteryResult.com. So, when should you play this game? You should really only play Mega Millions about the 4th week after every jackpot winner!

The Numbers Game

A 4 wheel game and the oldest of the Massachusetts State Lottery Games, The Numbers Game has been in operation since 1975. More than 10,000 drawings have made players the happy winners of tens, hundreds and, thousands of dollars every day. Number odds being quite reasonable, one would assume winning this game to be reliably easy. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The fact is, the way you are forced to play this game aids in stacking the odds much farther against you than you may think. With it's all 4 any 4, first 3 last 3 any or exact, 2 digit combinations, .25c, .50c, $ 1, $ 2, and $ 5 play options, coupled with payouts less than $ 10,000, playing this game is a real challenge, as too is it's worthiness of being played. What the designers of this old lottery game seems to have overlooked is, it's not how to play but what you win, something the newer games embrace fully. That being said, The Numbers Game does have its merits. There are lots of people out there who only want to bet .25c or .50c and, not even Keno offers that option. What this game really needs is a simple 'any 3' option including a '$ 5 only' bet and a maximum $ 500 payout. That alone could catapult the popularity of The Numbers Game to stratospheric levels. So what's the best way to play this game? .25c and 50c bets only, any combinations you want. The layman perspective is, pick 4 out of 40 on The Numbers Game and maybe win $ 10,000. Pick 5 out of 35 on MassCash and definitely win $ 100,000, spending $ 1 or more should be saved for MassCash.

MassCash

An older 'one wheel' game that, since its inception in 1991, has paid its $ 100,000 jackpot to more than 2500 winners! With its reasonable odds and reasonable payouts it's easy to see why this older game continues to be popular. With jackpot winners nearly every drawing, and multiple winner too, you can play this game whenever it's drawn!

MegaBucks

An older 'one wheel' game that, since itsception in 1982, has paid more than 1700 winners varying prize amounts totaling about $ 2.5 Billion. A fairly tough game to win, jackpot winners are, on average, paid out every 10 -12 drawings. So, naturally you only play this game every 10 - 12 draws after a jackpot winner.

Keno

A 'newer one wheel' computer driven game and a masterpiece of modern gambling Keno, is designed for people with a lot of time on their hands. After all, where else can you have a chance to win $ 1 Million every 5 minutes 21 hours a day, 6 days a week, and 13 hours on Sunday! When should you play this game? Whenever you've had just enough to drink to think you can actually pick 12 of the 20 numbers drawn from a pool of 80. Seriously, Keno is a very fun game and, when played correctly, can create hours of enjoyment for little to no money spent. In fact people have been known to play all night and leave no poorer than when they started! How is that? Keno allows you to win if you do not pick any of the winning numbers! Amazing! Well, maybe not all that amazing as Lottery Officials have obviously figured out that it's harder to not pick any of the winners than to pick 1, 2, 3 or 4 winners when playing a 12, 11 or 10 spot game as you do not win anything for picking less than 5 winning numbers. But, if you are the unluckiest person around you could win all night long! So how do you play this game? The odds are just as good winning a prize on the 7 spot wager as the 1 spot wager so play the 7 spot although the best over all odds are on the 2 spot wager. Simply show up, pick you numbers, pay for however many games your visit will cover and, cash out when you leave.

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Source by Jim Corbett