Slots Adventures

ah, so today i decided to wander straight into All Slots.  this is Halloween, the last day of the english harbour slots tourney on the wheel of chance.  the new tourney starts tomorrow, so i have a bit of time to kill, and i was wondering how the microgaming fruit machines stacked up compared to those at intercasino.

the first of the fruit machines i’m testing out is the Pandemonium game.  the slots part of the game is a three reel, single payline machine.  there is both a nudge feature, and a hold feature that are active from time to time.  you can’t count on the hold feature, it just shows up randomly.

the nudge feature is also random, and shows up in increments of one to four nudges usually, although it can go as high as 15 nudges. 

the game itself has a screen that reminds me of a pinball machine, with flashing values for tons of different bonus games and counters.  for instance, there is a trail counter that increases every time you land a symbol that has a small number drawn in the bottom of it. 

so, there’s a cherry symbol, and a cherry “sub 2″ symbol, etc.  those numbers light up the lights in the “trail” across the bottom.  at the end of your spin, if the “trail held” light comes up, the lights in the trail stay on.  get far enough into the trail and you’ll win some bonus prizes. 

the fourth stop on the trail unlocks a bonus round where the names of bonus games flash in the digital display.  you press the stop button to land on one of them, and then play it. 

the trail is only one of the basic bonus features.  between the flashing lights, and the digital readout (when in doubt on this machine, read the digital display.  it shows the options you’ll have, often flashing options that you choose by pushing the “stop” button), there is a LOT going on with this machine.

 of course, there is a BIG bonus game on Pandamonium.  it’s the Wheel game, which is like the board game on the cryptologic ruit machines.  you spin, and land on a slice of the wheel that either lets you play a bonus game, adds to your cash, or adds to your nudge total.  you can choose to collect your prizes at any point in the bonus game, or keep going in the quest for even bigger payouts.

the Pandamonium fruit machine (errr, Amusement with Prizes game?) has a rock and roll theme about it, and enough action is packed into this one game to entertain for hours on end.  while the slot itself is simple, figuring out the bonus games, and playing through them all can chew up quite a bit of time, and provide quite a bit of entertainment.

i’m glad that i went through the trouble to find the AWP games that microgaming has available.  they certainly are a sharp left turn away from most of the slots i’ve found online.

that’s right.  apparently the $5,000 freeroll at english harbour went well enough to warrant a follow-up event.  and this time, they’re doubling the prize money, so that’s even better.

this new event will run during the month of November, but registration is already open for the early birds.  and that includes me, i’ve signed up so i can secure a spot.  that makes me just like 3,525 other people.  i’m expecting this to be a popular event. 

the Novemeber $10,000 slot tournament is taking place on the Reel Deal slot machine.  so, not only is it going to be a lot of cash out there, it’s on the newest bestest slot they have at the casino.  it just sounds like a good deal all the way around.

of course, this new tournament opening up means that the first big slots freeroll, the October event on the wheel of chance machine, is about to come to a close.  i was lucky enough to land some winning combos on that machine, and i’m standing in 87th place in that one.  that’s above the money line by a good bit, so i’m feeling pretty sure that when the final bell goes off, i’ll be fine.  there were over 9,000 players in the Wheel of Chance event, so being in the top 87 is a pretty good showing!

i’ll be posting up a recap of the Reel Deal slot tourney as i start to take spins in it.  i do know that the starting totals are pretty good for the upcoming event.  everyone gets 400 in credits to begin with.

the prizes reach all the way down to 288th place, with the top spot pulling in $1,000 in bonus money! the top 88 get at least $50.  i’m not sure if they’re putting a cap in this event.  it’s probably going to be the biggest slot tournament EH ever had, and perhaps the biggest ever online.  i wonder how big those events at intercasino get?

either way, i’d consider signing up for this one as soon as you could, if you’re interested in events like this.  it’s a good one not to get locked out of.

wow.  i just had an eye opening exerience on the net.  i logged into intercasino to check out the last of the fruit machines, the HULK slot game.  by last, i mean the one i didn’t play yet.  and, it’s the same engine as the other two i did play, just different pictures on the reels.  so, that wasn’t looking to be terribly exciting. 

so, remembering that i heard the phrase “Amusements With Prizes” first associated with microgaming, i thought i’d pull up the recent microgaming to hit my ‘puter, All Jackpots Casino, and test out their AWP games (what they call fruit machines).  well, oddly, there weren’t any listed. 

 i was specifically looking for the Pub Fruity slot, figuring that’d be as good a place as any to start.  so, once i did the once, twice and three times over of the slots listed in the casino, i left.  and i opened up the next microgaming on my machine, Vegas Slot.  They had to have it.  or so i thought.

so i checked the internet just to make sure that i wasn’t making things up in my mind.  and sure enough, i found a review of pub fruity on one of the slots review sites, it wasn’t slotAdvisor, hmm, it’ll come to me later.  but anyway, there it was, plain as day, screenshot and all.

so, i’m off to look for this game on the net.  with hundreds of machines at the different casinos where i’ve played, i just couldn’t believe that i wasn’t able to find any fruit machines at the microgamings.  it just wasn’t right.

Finally . . .

i stumble into All Slots Casino, and whew, there is a line up of the different AWP slots.  there’s a handful off them at least, so i’m guessing that this type of slot is available, but just never caught on at a lot of the online casinos or more people would carry them. 

i know i’ve played at All Slots before.  i’m nearly positive it was for real money because they offer a great signup bonus, but for the life of me i can’t find it on my computer.  so, maybe i was  a player there one computer ago.  now that’s going back a stretch.  instead of downloading and going through the process of finding out all my old player info, i’m just going to hit the Flash casino at All Slots, and test out the games in free play. 

well, i knew this day would come.  i’ve decided that now is the time i’m going to make my move in the tournament on the Wheel of Chance slot machine. i’m talking about the big $5,000 free slots tournament over at English Harbour/Superslots in case you’re just tuning in.

 i took my warm up spins, and have had $373 in tournament credits sitting there almost all month.  that has me in 198th place, out of over 7,500 participants.  and while that’s not bad %-wise, it’s not in the money either.  the money comes down to 132nd place, so i have to jump up 60-some spots to make it.

my plan is to bet some more at $.50 a coin, making it $10 a spin.  hitting a winner then wouldn’t put me in the top, BUT i bet it would get me a lot closer to the money.  that’s the plan at least.

woo-hoo, a $135 winner!!  now i’m up to $487, and 156th place.  so, it worked!  but, i’m still not where i need to be, so i have to hit another winner.  at $10 a spin, a cold streak still puts me out of the tournament.

wow - up to $494, and 145th place!  i’m getting very close!

BINGO BABY!!!!

ok.  maybe that’s a little overexcitement, but i gotta love it when a plan comes together!  i kept spinning at the $.50 coin/$10 bet level, and ended up hitting three scatters, which pays off and unlocks a bonus spin session.  during the bonus spins i caught a couple of more winners.  nothing huge, but at this point every little bit was welcome!

now, i’m up to $693 and, ta da - 103rd place.  which is . . . in the money!

there’s definitely a chance i could get knocked out, but i’m thinking this is a pretty solid place to be standing with 3/4 of the players already entered and played out.

now, even though i didn’t win yet, and it’s only going to be $25 in bonus money if i do keep my ground, that’s still the kind of excitement i was looking for to start my day! 

good morning, this is the second of the fruit machine slots that i’ve tried out at intercasino.  the Super Sideshow slot game is essentially the same game as Fruit Fight, but with a different set of graphics.

the slot machine part of the game is a single line, three reel slot.  this time, instead of a boxer, there is a clown to take you through the games. 

the same hold button and nudge buttons are available.  and there are symbols that have a small clown in the corner.  land three of these and you’ll be whisked off to the bonus game(s) screen.

the bonus games are just like those found in Fruit Fight, so, if you enjoy that machine, you’ll find more of the same in the Super Sideshow fruit machine.  basically, there is a board with squares on it, like from a Parker Brothers board game.  you hit the start button, and a stream of numbers comes up, when it lands, you are moved that many squares on the board.  you then perform whatever action is written on that square.

if you collect enough Super Side Show symbols, you’ll be moved over to the higher stakes board game, the Super Side Show. 

besides the bonus board games, there is a whole list of other bonus games that can be unlocked.  they all offer the chance to land some bonus credits.  add to that the whole hi/low double up gamble feature that is available constantly, and there is a lot of action going on in this slot, just like on the other fruit machines.

just by personal preference for the theme, i prefer the Fruit Fight game.  but, i can see a lot of players enjoying the Super Sideshow because, after all, who doesn’t like the circus?

now, to me, this is new stuff!  i had been talking with my wife about some of the English “fruit machines”, and she confused me.  i shook my head, made some noises, and that was the end of that. i never got farther than AWP stands for Amusements With Prizes.  what that means exactly, i dunno.

at intercasino there are a list of games they call fruit machines, even though there aren’t any fruit on the symbols.  the machines themselves are totally different than traditional slots.  they are like half feature-filled slot game, and half bonus games.

the Fruit Fight slot is the first of these games I’ve tried.  here’s a quick snapshot of the game . . .

the slot itself is a three reel, single payline.  the paytable is pretty basic, no WILD symbols or multipliers to be found.  the slot itself though, has a lot of features built into it. 

the first is the HOLD button.  from time to time, you will be allowed to hold a reel in place.  some machines have hold buttons and respins built into them, so you can always hold a reel, and you’re always respinning.  this game has them as a “feature is active when lit” option.  so, they are active from time to time, not all the time.

the second cool feature of the Fruit Fight fruit machine is the NUDGE Button.  this is another option that is active when lit, so you can’t rely on it.  it shows up once in a while.  It allows you to “nudge” the reels down a notch.  And when it is lit, there can be anywhere from one to four nudges available. 

so, if there are four nudges, you can nudge one reel four times, or two reels twice, or whatever.  you’d get four total nudges, use them however works best.

what are you nudging for?  well, you’re trying to either land a winning combo on the payline, or get three symbols with “KO” on them to appear (one in each column) so you can move on to the bonus game.  these symbols do not have to line up, just appear, one on each payline!

what’s the bonus game like?  well, there are lots of bonus games on this slot!

you can see in the picture that there is a superKO game on the left, and a super HeavyWeight feature on the right.  the games are like board games.  you roll the dice, and move around the board, performing whatever action is written on the square you land on. 

those actions could be things like, unlocking another bonus game.  like the lucky dip game . . .

at the end of most rolls you’ll have the option to choose hi or low.  that’s a wager on whether the next dice roll will be higher or lower than the last.  if you guess right, you’ll have the option to play a higher paying bonus game.  the bonus games are listed on the screen.  they go from the lucky dip and cash attack games up to “saved by the bell” and  “power punch”.

this slot is truly something else!  all of these bonus games and features really take advantage of the video screen to add more games of chance to one slot than i’ve ever seen.  the machine doesn’t have coin sizes you can change on the fly.  instead, you choose the coin size before you start spinning. if you want to change coin sizes, you’ll have to back out to the game lobby to choose a different version of the machine.

i don’t have a lot of cryptologic powered casinos on my computer, so i’m not sure if this machine is found at every one of them, but i know it’s found at intercasino.  these machines are certainly something else, and now having tested one and gotten a feel for them, it’ll be interesting to test out some more of them.

while i haven’t been playing that often at Intercasino, this morning for some reason that’s where i ended up after coffee.   they have a pretty developed line-up of slot machines to play, and i haven’t played many of them.  so, it’s a chance for me to try something new for a change.

the first game i downloaded (i had already downloaded the casino, just not all of the slot machines), was the Around the World slot machine.  it’s a video slot, so there are 5 reels on it.  here’s a shot of the gamescreen . . .

there are a lot of interesting things about this slot game.  first off, the winning combinations, that intercasino refers to as “win patterns”, work going left to right or right to left. the first time i hit a backwards winning combination i was wondering what kind of wild symbol was involved because it didn’t look like a winning combination.  playing on microgaming and vegas technology slots for the past three months, this paylines going in both directions idea caught me off guard!

the “Around the World” theme of the slot is apparent in the symbols on the reels.  there are landmarks from around the world including the big ben clocktower, mt rushmore, and the opera house in sydney.   the symbols do jump to life when you land a winner, so there’s some flashy entertainment going on when you play Around the World. 

the paylines on the game, besides going in both directions, are plentiful.  there are 20 of them.  and, i think that intercasino has a line-up of 20 line slots, so i’ll probably be testing out more games with this same payline arrangement.  here’s a look at the paytable for the slot . . .

the different winning combo’s also have their own little sounds.  the winning combinations that include a wild symbol come out at you in stereo, as you hear the airplane symbols whizzing across your computer screen.  it’s a nice touch.

i played in “practice mode” this morning, which the casino states is available offline.  that makes these the first offline fun play slots i’ve ever found.  usually you need to be connected to the casino’s computer to play as a guest.  so, the games at intercasino are different than a lot of casinos.

in the real money mode, the coin sizes range from a penny up to $5 per coin.  on a 20 payline machine that means you can put $100 on each spin.  that’ll keep the high rollers happy.  the max win is 30,000x, which is just insanely large.

well, try as i might, i couldn’t unlock the bonus screen today.  sorry, no snapshots of the “game within a game” on this machine.  well, ok, one more try of 20 spins.  i’ll just put the game on autospin (a feature which is built right into the face of this machine, not hidden in the “expert” mode like the microgamings).

oh well, no dice on the bonus screen.  the Around the World slot game is certainly familiar enough to enjoy, but the little twists in it make it different enough to be fresh (to me).

this is the new freeroll slots tournament going on at English Harbour.  it’s being held on the Triple Triple Gold slot machine, which i’m familiar with from previous slots tournament action.

the tournament has $485 in cash prizes which is awarded to the top three finishers.  This part of the prize pool could grow, as monies from rebuys are added to the pool.

there are also $250 in bonus monies to be distributed to the top 23 finishers. 

 right now there are over 3,500 participants in the tourney, and since it’s ending today i’m not expecting the player count to grow much larger.  3,500 players is enough though!

 every gets $350 in machine credits to start the tourney.  i’ve grown my starting balance up to $450.  that puts me in 103rd place at the moment, so there’s a good deal of territory still ahead if i plan to get up into the money. 

i’m playing $5 coin sizes and betting max, so if i do hit, it’ll make a difference.  glancing at the players ahead of me, the person in the number 10 spot is over $14,800.  so, hitting a nice winner with only $3 wager on the spin might not move me high enough to make any difference.

one thing i had an eye on during this tourney was the triple goldmine symbol, that acts as a 9x WILD is you use one symbol to complete the winning combo, and an 81x WILD if you use two.

one spin i saw a bar, a bar, and a oh-so-near miss on that wild symbol.  now that one would have made a difference!

as it turns out, i spun off all of my credits, never really hitting a big enough winner to put me any closer to the top.

but, because of the good fortune i had on the new Reel Deal video slot the other night, i still have some credits to work with out on the casino floor.  if i manage to make anything happen with them, i’ll post up the good news

stopped by EH tonight to check up on how the big tourney is going, and see if any other ones opened.  and also, to see if the new Real Deal slot went live or not.  i wasn’t really expecting that it would have, but, there’s always hope.

sure enough, it’s up and running.  so, i downloaded it, and got the chance to play the game!

first off, here’s a screenshot of the 20 paylines.  they are interesting, and since i’m not used to them, winners were popping up at me from the strangest of places the whole time i played the machine.

there are some “stacks of money” symbols that are kindof like bar symbols on most of the classic machines.  they come in single, double, and triple stack sizes.  but, there is no winning combo for say, three of any stack.  so, i’m seeing the screen nearly filled with piles of cash, but i’m not landing enough of the same sized piles on a payline to hit a winning combo on the machine.  that’s a bit confusing.  hopefully i’ll get past it.

 the symbols on the reels do spring to life when they’re part of a winning combination.  the whacky cell phone dance may be my favorite.

ah . . . i’ve just unlocked the bonus round! 

oh brother.  this is an honest game of Deal or No Deal going on.  there are a stage full of suitcases, and i’m sure the amounts in each are based on the coin size you’re using when you take the spin.  i’m playing pennies (hey, bankroll management is part of it all.  besides, i has some bonus cash lying around and didn’t feel like depositing).  the prizes start at one cent, two cents, etc. all the way up to $100.

i choose a suitcase as mine, then i start eliminating suitcases from the stage.  after i toss off a couple of suitcases, they make me an offer.  i toss of more briefcases, they make another offer.  i get all the way down to where there’s only two suitcases left.  the missing amounts are $100, the top prize, and $.05. 

the offer they made me was a smidge over $50.  so, i could take the $50 (and remember, i’m honestly playing for pennies here), or chance it to see if i actually chose the $100 breifcase out of all of them at the start. 

well, being the gambling man i am, i take the cool $50.  and they promptly show me that the briefcase i chose had the $100 winner in it.  heh.  i should have taken a screenshot of that!

but, i started with about $20, and now i’m over $60, playing a penny slot.  hard to harbour complaints about that.  hehe. ok, there is no such thing as a good pun.  i realize that now. 

anyway, i test drove this slot at english harbour casino.

ahhh, i’m uncovering things in my email box this evening (i tend to get buried a little more each day, but i try from time to time to get to the bottom despite the overwhelming turth of it all).  AND, i come across a “heads up” from the fellas at English Harbour.  nice chaps.

turns out they’re shooting me a sneak peek at their upcoming slot, the Reel Deal slot machine.  as always, a big thank you for turning this humble blog onto a sneak peek, so thank you English Harbour Casino. 

The Reel Deal slot game is the (probably unofficially) Deal or No Deal slot game to hit the online market (that i know of - and i’ve been waiting for the official one from another operator for months and months now). 

 I just logged back into Harbour and tried to find the game, so it really isn’t quite live yet.  and, i can’t give you too much of a background on it, since it wasn’t really a full press release that i got.  but from the looks of the screenshots, shich i’ll thumbnail up here in a moment, it appears to be . . .

a 20 line video slot with a wild symbol, and a very familiar bonus game. i have a couple of bucks lying around (bonus and cash) that i’m sure i’ll pump into this baby when it goes live, so i’ll put up a more full review then. 

in the meantime, here’s some screenshots of the new game . . .

and the bonus screen(s) . . .