Slots in South Africa

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RTP here is the figure the studio publishes. Some studios let the casino choose one of several settings, and in some games the bet you pick or the moment you cash out moves the return; each game guide says which applies.

What a slot is

A slot is a game of reels and symbols: you set a stake, the reels stop on a random result, and the paytable says what each combination pays for that stake. EGT Digital's rules for 10 Crown Hot put it plainly: the game is random, and skill does not affect the outcome. Screens range from three reels and a single line, as in Lucky Lucky, to grids such as the seven-by-seven of Sugar Rush. Slots differ in how they decide that symbols have won, and in what they add on top.

Lines, ways, Megaways and grids

Paylines are fixed paths across the reels, usually read from the leftmost one. Wolf Gold plays all 25 of its lines on every spin, and Starburst reads its ten from both ends, so a win can start on reel 5 as well.

Ways games have no paths: matching symbols on neighbouring reels, usually counted from reel 1, win in any row. Twin Spin has 243 ways, by our arithmetic three positions on each of five reels multiplied together. Egyptian Dreams Deluxe starts at 243 and grows towards 3,125 as pharaohs open the stone tiles above them.

Megaways, a Big Time Gaming trademark that other studios use under licence, lets the reel heights change from spin to spin. Fruit Shop Megaways lands two to seven symbols on each of six reels, and the ways, by our arithmetic the heights multiplied, run from 64 to 117,649.

Grid games look at the whole screen. Sweet Bonanza and Gates of Olympus pay for eight or more of one symbol anywhere on a six-by-five grid; Sugar Rush pays for clusters of five or more joined across or down. All three tumble: winners vanish, fresh symbols fall in from above, and the spin continues while each new screen pays. Habanero calls it a cascade in Hey Sushi, NetEnt an Avalanche in Parthenon: Quest for Immortality.

Re-spins, money symbols, free spins and multipliers 🎁

Starburst has no free spins round. Its wild lands only on reels 2 to 4, fills its reel and holds it for a free re-spin, and each new wild adds another, three at most.

Money-symbol rounds are called Money Respin in Wolf Gold, Hold and Spin in Hot to Burn Hold and Spin and Hold and Win at 3 Oaks Gaming, publisher of 3 China Pots. In Wolf Gold six or more moons start three respins, in Hot to Burn Hold and Spin five or more money symbols start four; each new one sticks and resets the count, and the values are added up and paid when the round ends. A full screen adds Wolf Gold's 1,000x Mega Jackpot, or starts the Big Money Wheel in the other.

Free spins in Gates of Olympus and Big Bass Bonanza come from scatters: four or more anywhere on the screen give 15 in the first, three to five give 10 to 20 in the second. Fruit Shop Megaways awards them for ordinary fruit wins. Big Bass Bonanza stops retriggering after the third time; Wolf Gold's rules set no limit.

Multipliers differ in where they work. Sweet Bonanza's bombs land only in free spins; the orbs in Gates of Olympus land in ordinary spins too, and their total is applied once to what the tumbles paid. A Sugar Rush spot takes x2 the second time a winning symbol explodes on it and doubles with each win after, up to x128. Fury of Anubis doubles its multiplier after every tumble, up to 1,024x.

RTP and volatility: whose figure is it? 📊

Our guide to RTP and volatility explains both; on a slot, ask whose figure you are reading. A studio can ship one game in several RTP versions: Habanero's settings for Egyptian Dreams Deluxe and Nuwa are about 86%, 92%, 94%, 97% and 98%. Official sources can differ too: Diamond Strike is 97.02% on Pragmatic's page and 96.48% in its demo's rules. The figure that counts is on the game's information screen at your casino; our casino reviews cover the brands.

Volatility labels are each studio's own words. Pragmatic's rules screens call Sweet Bonanza low and Sugar Rush high, Habanero uses very high, Nolimit City rates Duck Hunters extreme, and Red Tiger's badges run past extreme, the label on Wings of Ra, to insane. One game can carry two labels: NetEnt's page rates Starburst medium and Evolution's games site low to mid, while Vault Cracker is high on Red Tiger's badge and low on Evolution's site; both studios belong to the Evolution group. Compare labels within one studio.

A jackpot is not a max win

A jackpot is one prize in a game; the max win is the most a round can pay. Diamond Strike's jackpots, four fixed prizes of 10x to 1,000x the bet, come from a pick game, and its rules state no win limit. Wolf Gold pays its 1,000x Mega on top of the moon values, and 10 Crown Hot's Clover Chance is progressive, funded, according to the game's help, from a percentage of wagering.

A max win is a cap only where the rules say so: Gates of Olympus ends a round that reaches 5,000 times the bet. Sweet Bonanza's opening screen reads 'WIN OVER 21,100X BET', yet its rules state no limit, and Red Tiger lists 3,166x for Wings of Ra beside 'up to 3,000x' in the same page's description.

Eight slots side by side 🔍

The first three checks, game by game. Labels and figures are the studios' own; a dash means no single figure or label.

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