When Free Play Stops Being Fun

Free play has stopped being fun when you spend more than you meant to, buy coins to get back to where your balance was, hide purchases from the people around you or open the app to get away from how you feel. Any one of those is worth taking seriously. No real money can be won in a social casino, but real money can still go in, and the habits are the same ones that cause trouble with gambling.

What are the warning signs?

Saskatchewan’s government lists early signs that someone is at risk of problem gambling, and they translate directly to coin stores:

• Wondering whether you have a problem. If the thought has crossed your mind, that is a sign in itself.
• Guilt after a session or a purchase.
• Trying to win back what you lost. In a social casino this looks like buying another pack because your balance dropped, to get back to the number you had.
• Criticism from others about how much you play or spend.
• Keeping it secret, such as hiding purchases on a shared card or clearing receipts.

Canada’s Responsible Gambling Council adds signs drawn from gaming, in its guide to gaming and gambling: feeling restless or irritable when you cannot play, lying about how long you spend, pulling away from family and friends, skipping work or school, losing interest in things you used to enjoy, and neglecting sleep or meals.

Two more worth adding: spending more than you budgeted (see setting your own limits), and playing mainly to escape stress, boredom or a low mood rather than because it is fun.

How do Canada’s Lower-Risk Gambling Guidelines apply?

In 2021 the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction published Canada’s Lower-Risk Gambling Guidelines. There are three, and the guidelines say to follow all of them at once:

1. Gamble no more than 1% of household income before tax per month. At $70,000, that is no more than $58 a month.
2. Gamble no more than 4 days a month, which works out to about once a week.
3. Avoid regularly gambling at more than 2 types of games.

The guidelines also say these limits may not be suitable for people with problems with alcohol, cannabis or other drugs, people with anxiety or depression, and people with a personal or family history of gambling or substance use problems. For them, the advice is to gamble less or not at all.

They were written for gambling with money, and a social casino never pays out anything of cash value. But the guidelines single out fast games with frequent bets, such as slot machines and many online forms of gambling, as the ones that can lead to problems more quickly, and social casino slots are built on that same fast, repeat-spin design. If you spend on coins and also gamble for real, count both against the same limits.

Does social casino play lead to real-money gambling?

The research is limited and should be read carefully, but it is not reassuring.

• A 2015 study in the Journal of Gambling Studies surveyed 409 social casino players who had never gambled online and contacted them again six months later. About 26% had started gambling online in that time. Of the factors measured, only making in-game purchases uniquely predicted the move.
• A 2017 study in the Asian Journal of Gambling Issues and Public Health ran focus groups with 21 young adult online gamblers from two large Canadian universities. Several described moving to online gambling soon after playing social casino games, and the researchers identified advertising and the inflated payout rates in free games as possible reasons.

Neither study proves that social casino play causes gambling. People who buy coins may already be more drawn to gambling, and both studies were small. What they do show is that the step from free play to real money is one some players take, and that buyers appear more likely to take it. If you have found yourself moving towards sweepstakes sites where coins can be redeemed for prizes, read our guide to sweepstakes and prize casinos with that in mind.

Where can you get help in Canada?

Every province and territory has a free, confidential line, and several gambling lines answer around the clock. Our responsible gambling and helplines page lists them all, checked against official sources, along with provincial self-exclusion programs for real-money gambling.

A few starting points:

• Ontario: ConnexOntario at 1-866-531-2600, or text CONNEX to 247247.
• Anywhere in Canada, in crisis: call or text 9-8-8, the Suicide Crisis Helpline, any time.
• On your own phone today: block in-app purchases and remove saved cards, using our step-by-step spending controls.

You do not need to be sure you have a problem before you reach out. Describing what is happening is a fine place to start.

For the bigger picture on spending in these apps, go back to spending and staying in control, or read how coin stores price and push offers to see the tactics that make overspending easy.