Month old Mega Millions doing well

More than $150 million were at stake Saturday night in the Wisconsin Lottery's two multi-million dollar jackpot games.

Wisconsin added the Mega Millions game to its lottery lineup about a month ago.

It's a big-money, multi-state jackpot similar to Powerball, and the two games are now played together in 40 states.

At one time this week, two different lottery jackpots each offered more than $100 million in winnings.

The addition of the Mega Millions game has excited a lot of people according to employees at the Walnut One Stop on Green Bay's west side.

“It's an alternative to Powerball on different days. I think that's a huge selling point. Jackpots are growing at about the same rate, another huge selling point,” said Manager H.T. Moore.

The dollar tickets allow players to pick five numbers, and for another buck, a Megaplier to multiply winnings.

“New games are always nice to have-like an option to pick from different things,” said lottery player Beth Jennings.

At the Walnut One Stop Mega Millions still isn't as popular as Powerball, but Moore said the ticket sales, like the jackpots, are rising.

“As more people become aware of it, and what it's about, I'm sure the sales are going to go up,” Moore said.

The Wisconsin Lottery said Mega Millions sales are going pretty well, but Powerball continues to significantly outsell the new game.

Right now--Mega Millions is making about $400,000 a week, while Powerball--averages around $1.4 million.

A spokesperson for the Wisconsin Lottery says one reason Powerball has fared better is because there hasn't been a great disparity in the jackpots.

“People don't see any reason to stop playing one versus the other because the one they're used to playing, Powerball, is performing at or a little better than Mega Millions in terms of the jackpot-so once that flips we would expect sales to change as well,” said Andrew Bohage.

40 states now offer both games--a bonus for lottery players. Lottery officials say jackpots will build faster because more people are playing.

“The question remains for both of those games whether opening them up to a whole lot more people, a larger population base, whether jackpots will get hit sooner and more often than they used to,” said Bohage.

More lottery games and bigger jackpots -- could turn a social activity into a problem.

“You always do have a risk of that new population of people becoming addicted, said Rose Gruber with the Wisconsin Council on Problem Gambling.

Gruber said more than 300,000 people in the state have some kind of problem with gambling. But she adds so far, Mega Millions doesn't seem to be contributing to those problems.

“It's definitely not an issue at this point, and I don't see us getting hundreds of calls or anything like that,” Gruber said.

Even people who don't play the lottery see a benefit from the added game, because of the lottery tax credit.

“Even if it were to perform no better down the road than it's performing now would still mean an additional $20 to 25 million dollars at the end of the year that the lottery would be able to turn back for property tax relief,” Bohage said.

Lottery officials say it will take about a year to really determine the game's performance.

Saturday’s Powerball drawing was worth an estimated $139 million.

Tuesday's Mega Millions jackpot is estimated at $12 million after Friday night's $133 million win.