About this app
What is Sacred Stones?
The VGT dispute and construction reset are the latest chapters in a long and bumpy road for Bally’s since winning Chicago’s sole casino licence in 2022. Work has been halted for debris overflow and for unapproved contractors, and the company faced an $800 million funding gap that was eventually filled through a financing agreement with Gaming and Leisure Properties. Potential interference with city water lines also necessitated a significant redesign of the hotel plan.
At one point, the IGB ordered a temporary work stoppage at Bally’s permanent casino following reports of alleged ties between an unapproved dumpster service with organised crime.
Bally’s has been granted two years’ worth of extensions for the permanent project. State law allows for two-year temporary licences, but the Illinois Gaming Board approved an extension to three years in 2023. That pushed the deadline to this September, but Bally’s ultimately received another year’s worth of extensions through language included in the state’s omnibus revenue bill that was passed in June.
What is Sacred Stones?
Within this shared model, there was a clear preference for personalised interventions over generic ones.
Tailored, behaviour-triggered messages were seen as more effective than generic warnings, but many participants simultaneously expressed mistrust towards operators collecting behavioural data.
Finally, the study found that these needs and preferences varied widely by product type.
How to play Sacred Stones
The text also bans exploiting situations of economic crisis, unemployment, debt, emotional distress, grief, anxiety, depression, loneliness, or other conditions of vulnerability to attract, retain or reactivate gamblers.
Operators must maintain permanent mechanisms for age verification, self-exclusion, voluntary time and wagering limits, and information on the user’s own gambling behaviour. Self-exclusion must be effective with all authorised operators.
The text also prohibits bets placed using credit cards, the use of predictive models to identify moments of greater vulnerability, and platform design mechanisms that hinder a conscious decision to stop betting, leave the service, or activate limits and blocks. Operators must maintain permanent alerts about compulsive gambling, indebtedness and asset loss, and adopt verifiable protocols for identifying risky behaviour.
