Let’s be honest, no matter how rarely you gamble, you’ve pictured yourself winning a huge jackpot in a Las Vegas casino. I know the reason I went to Vegas was a bet with a friend that if I went there, I would win the mega jackpot, then meet Justin Timberlake when I cash out and eventually marry him in a Cinderella-inspired fairytale of my own. Needless to say that never happened but at least I’m still hoping for a humongous jackpot. I can even hear the clinking-clanking sound of the coins falling from the slot machine…Oh dream on…Are you still with me? Okay, return to the reality and let me tell you about the 2 biggest jackpots ever won in Las Vegas so you can keep daydreaming later having some solid proof that some day this could be you. (And if Sin City is too far away from you, don’t give up on your jackpot dream because online slots sometimes have even bigger jackpots.

Let me first give you some background information. There’s this network of jackpots in Las Vegas – Megabucks, which is owned and run by IGT (International Gaming Technology). Megabucks is a dollar coin machines, but you are required to use 3 coins or in other words $3 to compete for the progressive jackpot. When the jackpot is won it starts growing back from…wait for it…$10 million. Got your attention already? Great, now here’s 2 lucky players you can envy to your heart’s content. Well, at leas one of them.

Excalibur – $39,710,826.36 – March 21, 2003 – It’s been 12 years and this is still the biggest jackpot ever won. We don’t know the name of the winner because he requested anonymity but we do know he is a 25-year-old software engineer who visited his family in Las Vegas. Someone told him about the Megabucks and he decided to try his luck. He had wagered around 10 bucks when he looked away for a moment and when he turned around he saw he had won the gigantic jackpot. He said that: “it doesn’t seem real” and we can totally understand how he feels. What he said he intended to spend part of the jackpot on will warm your heart, the young winner said he was going to fund his parents’ retirement fund with it .

Desert Inn – $34,959,458.56 – January 26, 2000 – This is one of the biggest slots jackpots ever won and the reason for one of the biggest urban myths in Las Vegas. Cynthia Jay-Brennan, a 37-year-old cocktail waitress, was in Vegas to celebrate her future mother-in-law’s birthday. They were joking that she would win big but no one really believed it when she racked the nearly $35 million jackpot. It was like she was on top of the world. She married her fiance and made plans for a world tour. Two weeks later she was out with her older sister Lela celebrating her marriage when a drunk driver rear-ended into her car smashing her into another one and leaving her paralysed forever. Even worse, her sister Lela died at the scene. This shocking tragedy became one of Las Vegas’ most popular urban myths – that the jackpot is cursed and if you win it bad things are going to happen to you. However, you saw that 3 years later a bigger Megabucks jackpot was won and the winner is doing pretty well. What can I say, this was just bad luck. Ironic, isn’t it?