Why Is Roulette Called the Devil’s Game?

Roulette is a casino game named after the French word meaning little wheel. In the game, players may choose to place bets on either a single number or a range of numbers, the colors red or black, or whether the number is odd or even.

To determine the winning number and color, a croupier spins a wheel in one direction, then spins a ball in the opposite direction around a tilted track running around the outer edge of the wheel. The ball eventually loses momentum, passes through an area of deflectors, and falls onto the wheel where it ends up in one of 37 (in European roulette) or 38 (in American roulette) colored and numbered pockets on the wheel.

The devil’s game? Roulette has been called that for many reasons. One reason is that if you add up all the numbers on the roulette wheel (from 1 to 36), you get 666, which is known as “the number of the beast” in the Bible.

Some people believe that roulette was invented by Blaise Pascal, a French mathematician and physicist who was trying to create a perpetual motion machine. Pascal’s experiments eventually led him to develop one of the first computers, but he never did achieve his goal of perpetual motion.

Roulette has also been associated with Satan because it’s seen as a game of chance with no skill involved. And because it’s possible to lose everything you’ve wagered on just one spin of the wheel, it’s also been called “the king of casino games” and “the most brutal game in the world.”

So why do people keep playing roulette if it’s so difficult to win and so easy to lose? Part of it has to do with the excitement and anticipation that comes with every spin of the wheel. And part of it may be because deep down we all hope that we’ll be lucky enough to beat the odds and walk away from the table a winner.