What Are the Most Important Features of Slot Games?

A look at some of the most essential of these lets us see how the gameplay has evolved.

Picture 1 of What Are the Most Important Features of Slot Games?

Free Spins Are Awarded when Scatters Land

This is one of the most common features, as you will see it on the majority of slots. Free spins are typically awarded when you get a set of special symbols, known as scatters, on the screen. Unlike paying symbols, these images can fall anywhere on the reels and still award a prize.

Players then get a batch of spins, which can be as many as ten, 15 or whatever number the developer has assigned to this feature. The free spins are sometimes played in exactly the same way as the base game, but on other slots, you might see new symbols or features like multipliers and extra wilds added.

On the SuperSeven casino, the popular Book of Dead slot from Play N'Go is a good example of this. Ten free spins are awarded when three scatters line up, and a special expanding symbol is used on the no-cost spins. This makes it the game's most important feature, as it provides the chance for the biggest wins.

Wilds Come with Different Properties

The wild symbol is another valuable icon that is included on most of the popular slots these days. This is a type of joker that completes winning lines for you by replacing any of the game's paying symbols.

While standard wilds are good news for players, some slots have additional types of wilds to spice up the gameplay. These can be expanding, may move around the screen, or could have some other type of special characters to make them more useful.

Sakura Fortune by Quickspin uses a giant wild, featuring the slot's main character, that covers the full reel and also acts as a scatter to trigger free spins. Some slots use multiple wilds with different properties, to make the action more unpredictable.

Picture 2 of What Are the Most Important Features of Slot Games?

A Variety of Bonus Rounds

Special bonus rounds can be used to provide the game's biggest prizes, such as a progressive jackpot. These sections may be triggered randomly or by getting a certain number of bonus symbols on a single spin.

In Money Train 2 by Relax Gaming, based on the Wild West, there is a Money Cart Bonus Round where different characters and multipliers appear on the screen to provide instant cash wins. This allows players to try for the slot's biggest wins. Another type of bonus round gives the player various objects to pick from, with the prize revealed once one is chosen. A wheel of fortune-type round can also be used as a way of deciding what prize is won.

All of these features have helped to increase the popularity of online slots. With new games released regularly, we can expect to see innovative features in the near future, as the top developers look for more ways to make these casino games as attractive as possible. 

Marvin Fry

Update 02 July 2021