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Archive for January, 2010

Sherlock Holmes Slots Game Review

January 14th, 2010

With the hit Robert Downey Jr. film out in theaters now, it is no wonder that slots players are excited to take the Sherlock Holmes slots game for a few spins.

However this slots game, created by Real Time Gaming, has been around since before the film was released and is themed around the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle stories of the famous detective. The game features elements that will bring the detective to mind: a magnifying glass, his deerstalker hat and pipe

The Sherlock Holmes slots game is a typical five reel with twenty five payline. Wagers can be placed in denominations of $0.01 up to $5, which makes the maximum bet $125. But while this slots game might appear ordinary on the surface, it will reveal that it does indeed offer slots players more.

The Watch will act as your Wild here, working as hard as Sherlock to create winning combinations. But it is Holmes himself that you will want to see on the reels.

Holmes is the Scatter symbol, paying you winnings all ways. But he will also unlock the free spins. Landing three, four or five of the detective will award you with five, ten or fifteen free spins. It is during these free spins that you can be greatly rewarded: your winnings will be tripled when they are won on a free spin. But it gets better. You can retrigger this slots game for more free spins while still in the free spins game to the tune of five more free spins for each Holmes that appears.

This slots game, while appearing ordinary, can payout up to 40,000 times, proving that nothing is as it appears to be.

Online Slots vs. Land-Based Slots

January 14th, 2010

Remember the slot machines of days gone by? You put a coin in them and then pulled the handle? That used to be the main difference that could be said between online slots and land-based slots.

But with the advent of graphic and gaming technologies, there is not a lot of a difference between the two anymore; both now run off of computer programs made by software providers. Both online and land-based slots have RNGs. There is a difference worth noting though.

And that difference is that online slots generally offer you better odds.

How is this if both types of slots are running off of a computer program?

Online slots generally offer better payout percentages. And the whole reason for this stems from the casinos and online casinos themselves. It is about overhead.

A land-based casino has a high overhead. They have to pay their employees, their utilities, maintenance on their building and for other forms of entertainment that they offer their guests. The overhead that an online casino has is significantly less. And because it is less, it gives online casinos the edge in this game of chance.

Because online casinos have a lower overhead they can offer players a higher payout percentage. In other words they can pay their players more in winnings and still make a profit because they have a lower overhead.

So as a slots player you will find that you will probably have better luck and chances at winning a greater amount of money when playing online slots than when playing with land-based slot machines.

VIP Slots to Offer Daily Slots Tournaments

January 13th, 2010

VIP Slots Casino has started offering daily slots tournaments. This series of daily tournaments is named Play for the Pot, and offers players an incredibly low entry fee of $2. They are also offering a weekly tournament series called The Slottery. The entry fee of The Slottery is only $5. And in each tournament, both the weekly ones and the daily ones, players are play for The Pot.

Play for the Pot runs from 12:01 am each day except for Sundays. And each slots tournament will in at 10:59pm on the same day. But VIP is keeping these tournaments interesting by changing the games each day. Starting with today’s tournament, the rest of this week is as follows:

Wednesday, January 13th: Cool Bananas is a five reel slots game with twenty five paylines with free spins and scatters.

Thursday, January 14th: Eastern Dragon is another five reel with twenty paylines with scatters and a wild symbol that will double the prize when a part of a winning combination.

Friday, January 15th: Fat Cat is a five reel offering twenty paylines of play and a bonus feature and scatters.

Saturday, January 16th: Magic Monkey is a five reel featuring twenty five paylines, scatters and free spins.

The Slottery has two runs left this month. Each tournament starts on a Sunday and ends the following Sunday. And like the Play for the Pot tournaments, VIP Slots is changing the games each time here as well.

January 17th-January 24th: Solomon’s Mines is played out over five reels and twenty five paylines. This slots game also features scatters.

January 24th-January 31st: Supermarket is being used for this tournament’s run. This is a five reel slots game with twenty paylines, scatters, free spins and a bonus round.

Low entry fees of $2 and $5 make these tournaments worth checking out. Low entry fees are a part of what makes VIP Slots tournaments noteworthy.

Slots Denominations and the RNG

January 13th, 2010

Many slots players believe that the higher the denomination that is wagered, the better the payout. But this is not quite the case, and better payout does not quite mean what slots players may think it does. And it is believed that a higher denomination has a separate RNG because the denomination has an effect on the payout percentage.

When the words ‘better payout’ are heard, a good many slots players tend to think that the slots game or slot machine in question will hit on a winning combination more. A higher payout actually means that it pays out more in terms of money, not that it will hit frequently.

But then a higher denomination slots games paying out more than a lower one should not come as a surprise. If you wager more you will win more when you do hit a winning combination.

For example, if you wager $0.25 and hit a combination that multiplies your wager by 100, you will win $25. Now let’s say that you only wagered a penny per payline and hit the same combination—you would only win $1. See how a higher denomination does pay out more than a lower one? It has nothing to do with how often a slots game of slot machine will hit.

And what about the RNG, denominations and the payout percentage?

A slots game is not going to have a separate RNG for a higher denomination. And the RNG does not have an effect on the payout percentage. The R stands for Random. And the RNG is just that, random.

The only thing that can change the payout percentage on a slots game or slot machine is if the reel layout is changed or the paytable is changed.

If the symbols on the reel were changed then the payout percentage would be changed as a result. For example, if the wild symbol is changed to appear more often, the chances of winning would increase, and the payout percentage would change.

Likewise, if the amount won for combinations on the paytable is increased, you would win a higher amount of money, and the payout percentage would change again.

What is important to remember is that the payout percentage does not have anything to do with how often you will win. It only speaks about how much the slots game or slot machine pays out.

Get Rocked! with Slots

January 12th, 2010

There is nothing quite as exciting as a rock concert.

And if video games can tap into that excitement for games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band, then so can online casinos. Microgaming has been the one to create an online slots game that is packed to the reels with all the glam and excitement of a rock concert.

Get Rocked! offers players five reels and thirty paylines to play on. The denominations open for play range from $0.01 to $0.25 per payline, giving you a maximum bet of $7.50 per spin. The graphics are what light up this slots game, which is set at a rock concert. Symbols include rockers, singers and instruments. And like any rock concert, this slots game has its own star: the Singer, of course.

The Singer is the Wild here, taking the place of any symbol on the reels. But he does not just play the part of any symbol, he also has the best payout when the game is in its normal mode of play. Getting five Singers means that you are getting paid—to the tune of 5,000 coins.

And like any thrilling game, this slots game does indeed give us a bonus feature. The Singer is the one that brings you to the stage for the bonus game Solo Pick and Win. Players are able to choose a musician to play for them and who can win another prize that is added to what you won on the spin that triggered the bonus game.

Like at a rock concert, when you ask for more, you get more. For more excitement the scatter symbol not only pays all ways, it can activate 10, 15 or 20 free spins. The more scatters you get the more free spins you get; and you can retrigger the free spins for more chances to win more. Prizes are also tripled when on free spins.

There is another bonus game as well. This one gives you the chance to double or quadruple your winnings. In this side game you try to guess the card color and suit; correct guessing will increase your winnings.

Whirlwind Slots Game: Triple Twister

January 12th, 2010

As implied by its name, Triple Twister is all about rewarding the player. Designed by Real Time Gaming, this slots game is packed with ways for players to win more between the free spin bonus and the scatters.

Triple Twister is a five reel slots game with, not twenty, not twenty five, but with fifty paylines. Players can wager anywhere from $0.01 to $5.00 per payline, making this a versatile slots game that can be played by high stakes players and lower stakes players alike. The maximum that can be bet per spin is $250.

Taking place in Hurricane Country, this slots game is full of action packed yet amusing graphics. Symbols range from barns, windmills and tractors to frightened animals. But the two symbols that you want to keep your eye on are the Twister Logo and the Weather Vane.

The Twister acts as the Wild symbol in Triple Twister. It can take the place of all the symbols in game. The Twister will expand to cover the whole reel that it landed on. But it does not stop at standing in for other symbols. Here’s where the triple part of this slots game comes into play. The Twister will also triple all the payouts on winning combinations that the Logo is a part of.

When at least three of the Weather Vanes come up on the reels you can activate the nine free spins. But not only do you get free spins, the Weather Vanes. Wins made during the scatters are multiplied by the total bet too. During the free spins, there is a chance that the Twisters can clone itself up to three times for more payouts.

Triple Twister can be found at Club USA.

Brighten Up the Cold with Winter Wonderland Slots

January 11th, 2010

With all the chilly weather and having to stay indoors, some might find themselves thinking a little poorly of winter. But there is a way to enjoy winter from inside your own home and without having to put on cold weather clothes.

Vegas Technology has given slots players just the thing to enjoy the cold without leaving the comforts of home: their Winter Wonderland slots game.

Winter Wonderland is a five reel, twenty payline slots game with a bonus round and free spins. Winter images abound on this slots game, including a snowman, mittens, presents, skates and gingerbread men to name a few. The minimum denomination is $0.01, costing $.20 to activate all twenty paylines. And the maximum amount to be wagered on as spin is $200.00 at $10 per line.

There are three symbols to keep an eye open for in Winter Wonderland: the Skier, the Snowman and the Snowflake.

The Skier appears on the first, third and fifth reels, and will activate the bonus round. Three Skiers have to appear on an active payline in order for the bonus game to start. The prize for this bonus round is multiplied by the number of paylines that cross through.

The Snowman is your Wild symbol in Winter Wonderland. He can act as any symbol on the reels other than the Skier and the Snowflake. He will do a nice job of filling in your paylines and increasing your chances of hitting a winning combination.

The last symbol to keep your fingers crossed for is the Snowflake. Getting three or more Snowflakes will activate 15 free spins, and you can win more free spins while playing out your free spins. Your winnings, other than those won in a bonus, are tripled during free spins.

But the Snowflake is also the scatter symbol. Here your winnings are multiplied by the total bet amount up to 250 times. So if you bet $0.25 per line for a total bet of $5, that would be 1250 awarded to you. So with the free spins and the scatter possibilities, this is defiantly the Winter Wonderland symbol to keep an eye open for.

So if you are looking for a fun way to enjoy the cold without having to bundle up, check out the Winter Wonderland slots game.

Can You Test the Long-Term Payout Percentage on Slots?

January 11th, 2010

Many slots players often wonder about machines’ long-term payout percentage. Is there a way that players can test a slot machine’s percentage? Do higher denominations payout more? And if they do, does that mean that a higher denomination has a separate RNG because the denomination is the only thing that can change the payout?

Long-term payout percentages are not as complicated as we would like for them to be. In our minds, the more complicated that something is, we take it to mean that there is something that we can do to affect it. In terms of slots, if we believe slots games to be complex then there is a way that we can affect them, or find a strategy to overcome to beat them. This is not true.

Despite all the technology at work inside the machine, the concept behind slots is still the same as it was in the beginning: put money in, start the machine, and sit back to see whether you win or not.

But we still try to find a way to beat the machines. And the technology has given us other things to look for.

So is there a way that you can test a slot machine’s long-term payout percentage? Yes, there is. Just total the amount of money won on each spin. Then divide that number by the total amount you bet on all your spins. But to get an accurate picture of the long-term payout you would need to do this for something like ten million spins.

Or you could watch the symbols. Try keeping track of how often each symbol stops on a payline. From that you can estimate the chance of those symbols landing on the payline. But keep in mind that slots are a game of chance—there is no predicting their outcomes, but you can try to get a sense of how often a symbol could come up.

That is as close as you can get to testing the long-term payout percentage of a slots game.

Microgaming Mixes Slots and Spas

January 8th, 2010

Microgaming has come up with an inventive new aspect to put into their online slots games. It is a token reward system worked into one of their newest slots games, Wealth Spa. This new token rewards system brings another level of fun to online slots.

With online gaming software providers looking to create advances in their games to give players the best online gaming experience possible it is no surprise that Microgaming has given us this with Wealth Spa.

The way that the token rewards feature works is that there are gold coins randomly dispersed over the reels. But these gold coins must land on the center spot on Wealth Spa’s fifth reel. If one lands there it is rewarded to the player. The player can then immediately redeem it for a spa prize that is a game bonus. If the player does not want to redeem a reward immediately he can save the gold token, win more tokens and then redeem them for larger rewards. Players can accumulate up to five coins before they have to redeem them.

Once a player decides to redeem a token, he is taken to a bonus screen with a pick-a-box game. He then chooses a box from a selection matching the redemption level of the tokens he is turning in. Hanging on to tokens in Wealth Spa can pay off nicely as some of the highest level prizes to be redeemed are free spins. A player can have up to twenty five free spins won from the token prizes; and the free spins can cause wins of up to 200,000 coins.

Wealth Spa is a five reel, twenty payline slots game. Players can play in denominations of $0.01 up to $0.05, making the maximum bet $20 per spin. There are wild and scatter symbols for players to look forward to in addition to the gold token rewards. Players can win a maximum of $7,600 in regular play, and $27,400 from free spins.

Rival Gaming Releases iSlot Heavyweight Gold

January 8th, 2010

As far as the online gaming community goes, iSlots are the next step in the technological progression of online slots. Rival Gaming, a gaming software provider who is known for their cutting edge technology, has been releasing iSlots out into the wilds of the online gaming world.

An iSlot is an interactive video slots game—a video slot much like what we see online at most casinos. What makes iSlots different is that they have interactive story lines that players play through as they are playing the slots. The story lines can have alternate endings that can change depending on how you play. They also have multiple bonus rounds.

The latest from Rival Gaming’s iSlots line is called Heavyweight Gold.

This is a twenty payline iSlot whose story follows a boxer through his training and rough spots as he works towards winning the most coveted prize—the Heavy Weight Gold Belt. The interactiveness of this slots game can almost be experienced by the players as they get caught up in his quest to win the belt.

Rival Gaming has given this iSlot a bonus round in which you play to help the boxer defeat one of three opponents. This game is so interactive and well put together story-wise that each of the three opponents have their own style.

The whole point behind these new iSlots that are starting to show up in online casinos, is to create a not just a great player experience, but to surround the player with the story and the visuals to further the main character along. It is like giving slots games story lines like video games do.

I am sure that we will see more and more iSlots released throughout the course of this year.