
Roulette is one of the games that people most identify with traditional casinos. The games name is French for “small wheel”, which describes the central device used in the game, traditionally a wooden wheel with a raised, rotating central spoke. The croupier sets the wheel spinning and then sets a small ball circling around the inside rim of the wheel in the opposite direction. Once the ball looses momentum and the wheel slows down enough, the ball will come to rest in one of the numbered pockets on the wheels surface.
Players place can place bets on which pockets the ball will end up in, either betting on specific pockets, or on a particular subset, e.g. all even or odd numbered pockets. Beside the roulette wheel is normally an area of the table marked with the various numbers and subsets, onto which the player places their casino chips to place a bet. The presence of the ‘0’ on the roulette wheel prevents even/odd or red/black bets being 50/50 bets and guarantees the house at least a small edge.