Winners & Losers: The Mirage Volcano Memories and $1.6 million ‘Giveaway’

Why Trust Techopedia Gambling
Why Trust Techopedia Gambling
The Mirage: Advantage Players
Image: Alexander Migl/Wikimedia Commons

There was a time when The Mirage ruled as the splashiest place in Las Vegas. Upon the casino resort’s opening in 1989, it defined Vegas luxury.

Tropical-themed and opulent, it was opened by Steve Wynn and built at a cost of $630 million. It reigned as the biggest budget casino in town and set a new standard, both, for Wynn (who previously owned the Golden Nugget downtown) and for the entire city.

The first new resort to be built on the Vegas Strip in 16 years, The Mirage was fronted by an artificial volcano that erupted multiple times per hour.

You waited for your car to come up from valet parking while the famous volcano rumbled and shot fire from a few feet away. You felt the heat whenever it went off.

Admittedly, I haven’t stayed there in years and the volcano came to seem kind of corny.

But when the place shuts down this week and gets recast as a Hard Rock I’ll feel a little sad. Especially since that volcano will be dismantled.

The property has gone from Wynn to MGM Resorts International to the Seminole Indian Tribe, which owns the Hard Rock brand.

And, the new spot’s guitar-shaped tower, due to open in 2027, will not do much to cheer me up.

Also feeling sad, no doubt, are advantage players who like to capitalize on exploitable gimmicks that casinos cook up.

When news of the temporary shutdown (to allow for a remodel) went public, it was revealed that the casino has bonus cash to give away and that it is mandated by law to do so.

The bonuses derive from money taken out of wagers and used to fund progressive jackpots. With $1.6 million hanging around, The Mirage had to distribute its dough to players.

Management could have done it by juicing up the progressive jackpots and making them easier to win. APs (advantage players) who understand how progressives work and know how to leverage them would have besieged the place. But it was not to be.

What is an Advantage Player?

An advantage player (AP) is a gambler who uses skill, knowledge and strategy to gain an edge over the casino. Unlike traditional gamblers who rely primarily on luck, advantage players meticulously study and exploit weaknesses in games, betting systems, or promotional offers.

This can include card counting in blackjack, identifying biased roulette wheels, exploiting favorable poker conditions, or taking advantage of casino bonuses and rewards programs.

The Mirage’s $1.6 million ‘Giveaway’

Instead of opening an AP candy store, The Mirage is distributing the money by pure chance, pulling cards out of a drum, calling names of gamblers and paying whoever’s name gets chosen at random.

“Nobody who actually knows what they’re doing is playing it,” an AP told me. “It’s worth about $20 an hour.”

Another pointed out: “Whenever someone is giving away $1.6 million, there should be an advantage play. But not here. There are better ways to make money.”

The Mirage Volcano Show
Image: Guillermo Moreno/Flickr

Bummer for the advantage players, but a fair shake for everyone else.
Besides, the APs have plenty of opportunities to cash in on gambits that seem like sucker bets, but, if you know how to play them, can be plenty worthwhile.

I’m thinking of an ill-conceived Keno promotion at the Plaza downtown, where advantage players stayed put for 24 hours, loathe to give up any edge.

There’ve been real money slots deals, blackjack games where BJs paid 2-1 instead of the standard 3-2 and lottery draws for cars that a guy I know figured out how to game.

The Mirage Memories

Back at The Mirage, a fond memory I have is the casino having the coolest poker room in Vegas. While on a quest to find the late great Stu Ungar for a story, back in the late 1990s.

I went there and convinced the woman who ran the room to give me a lead and it paid off big-time.

Also residing at The Mirage were Siegfried & Roy’s white tigers, who were almost as famous as the volcano. But as Norm Macdonald‘s great joke on it goes:

“I stayed at The Mirage and people asked me if I saw the white tigers. I said, ‘Only if they were sitting at the Let It Ride table’.”

Another time I was there with two boyhood friends. Through a connection of mine, we got set up at Bare, Vegas’s classiest top-optional pool club.

We were in the water and a woman who was refreshingly uninhibited approached one of my friends and asked, “Are you Steven Spielberg?”

He has a beard like Spielberg’s and a similar hair color, but you’d need to be a little tipsy to mistake one for the other. Gent that he is, my pal disabused her of the notion.

I congratulated him for letting her down easily and truthfully. That said, I wouldn’t have minded a little bit of innocent artifice.

After all, isn’t that what a place with a phony volcano up front and a bogus Jungle Habitat in back is all about? Why not have a make-believe Spielberg in the topless pool?

Michael Kaplan
Gambling Author and Journalist
Michael Kaplan
Gambling Author and Journalist

Michael Kaplan is a journalist based in New York City joined Techopedia in November 2023. He is the author of five books ("The Advantage Players" comes out in 2024) and has worked for publications that include Wired, GQ and the New York Post. He has written extensively on technology, gambling and business — with a particular interest in spots where all three intersect. His article on Kelly "Baccarat Machine" Sun and Phil Ivey is in development as a feature film.