Entertainment machines

Claim 1

A coin-operated symbol-selecting entertainment machine for operation by a player, said machine activated by insertion of at least one coin to select and display a combination of symbols, whereby an award is delivered when a preselected winning combination is displayed, the machine having an operating system which pre-selects said combination of symbols from a plurality of groups of symbol positions, said operating system comprising index assigning means which assigns a respective index to each symbol position in each group, and index selection means which operates to select one said index for each position for the purpose of selecting a combination of symbols corresponding to the respective indexes, said operating system further comprising probability assigning means to assign respective rejection probabilities to each combination and, assessment means which subjects each pre-selected symbol combination to an acceptance/rejection procedure using the rejection probability assigned to the said combination by the probability assigning means, and symbol combination selection means operable to select and display a symbol combination corresponding to selected indexes accepted by the assessment means, said index selection means operable to re-select said indexes if selected indexes are rejected by the assessment means.