Santa’s Fortune

As we near the start of the Christmas season, online gaming producers have begun to compete to create the most popular product of the festive period. One of the studios with a good chance of claiming this title is the Chinese company Wizard Games. As one of the premiere gaming companies, they will be looking to score big from their flagship seasonal products this year. The first is the slot we are reviewing today – Santa’s Fortune. With high-quality graphics, some novel features and a rewarding gaming experience, initial assessments look promising. Let’s see if things are as good as they look.

Santa’s Fortune Overview

The feature for this game begins with the Santa wild icons, which substitute for other icons in the game to help score more wins. They also carry a value of their own and can lead to good payouts. The main feature included in this slot, however, is the free spins game, triggered when players land three Christmas Tree scatters on the game’s middle reels. This will award you with eight free spins, which can be topped up if you land more scatters from within the bonus. Next is Santa’s collect feature. Regarding this bonus, players should look out for gift boxes representing instant cash payouts that can be collected if a sleigh collects symbol lands simultaneously. Finally, there is also a collect pots feature and bonus buy facilities. All features will be explained in more detail later in the review.

Santa’s Fortune Theme and Symbols

The theme for this game, and probably the theme for a lot of games until January, is Christmas. This game seems to have taken most of its inspiration for this game from the Coca-Cola adverts of the 1990s, with a very classic North American feel to the reels. This means that there are candy canes, snowmen, gingerbread men and, of course, Santa appearing all over the reels. Indeed, this is a very classic Hallmark-looking Christmas theme that seems to want to appeal to the majority of people in western Europe and the United States.

The background for this game is a wonderful winter tableau. The scene could be anywhere in northern Europe, perhaps Lapland, where Santa’s grotto is. Wherever this location is, the trees and ground are covered in a thick layer of snow that doesn’t look like it is going anywhere until next month. At the back left of the scene is a big house with warm yellow lights radiating from the windows. The house looks cosy and warm in contrast to the cold and white surroundings. The playing board is a large rectangle with a deep red interior and a frame made from candy canes.

The symbols are split into low-paying, high-paying and special symbols. The low-paying icons are the J, Q, K and A in playing card royals. The A is the most valuable of these, paying out at 2x the stake for the top combination. The more valuable icons, however, are the cookies, reindeer, elves and snowmen. Snowmen are the most valuable symbols in the game, and they pay 11.25x your bet for a full combination. The specials finally are the Santa wilds, the Christmas tree free spin scatters, and the Gift Box and Sleigh collect icons.

Game Play

Santa’s Fortune is played on a 5-reel, 3-row machine with 25 fixed pay lines. To win combinations, players must land three or more matching symbols on pay lines moving from left to right, starting from the leftmost reel. The betting range for Santa’s Fortune is 20p to £400 per spin. To adjust their bet levels, players can toggle their stakes up and down using the tool located at the bottom left-hand side of the screen.

Further information, including a short tutorial and a display of the paytable, can be found via the menu button in the right-hand corner of the screen. The spin and auto spin buttons are located in the centre of the screen. The volatility for this slot is rated in the low-medium range. The return to player percentage for Santa’s Fortune is 96.03%, which is above average. The biggest payout that players can win on one spin is 1,229x your stake.

Santa’s Fortune Features

The first feature in this game is the Santa Wild bonus. In this game, Santa represents the wild, meaning he can substitute for other icons to help score more wins. The wild icon also has its value, meaning it also pays out as part of winning combinations.

Next on the feature list is the free spins bonus round, triggered when players land four or more of the Christmas Tree scatters on the middle reels simultaneously. This will award players with eight free spins. These initial eight spins can be topped up by landing additional scatters from within the game.

This game also has a cash collection feature. This bonus concerns the gift box prizes and the sleigh collect icons. Each gift box in this game represents a certain cash value. Land one or more of these on the reels at the same time as a sleigh collect icon, and players will collect the values of the gift boxes and receive the payout they represent. The collect pots feature can finally be activated at any time during the game when the collection dynamic takes place. If triggered, it will take players to a new screen where players will be asked to open various gift boxes looking for three matching symbols. Find a matching set, and the game will award the player a jackpot amount. Depending on the colour of the symbol, the game might award you one of four jackpots - worth 50x, 100x, 200x, and 1,000x your bet, respectively.

This game also has bonus buy facilities. However, they may not be available in the UK.

Conclusion

With loads of features, a decent win potential and a high-end finish, this game is one of the top products to have been created so far this year for the Xmas period. Players will also be pleased to know that the lower-than-average volatility and good RTP mean that win frequency is higher than the average slot. Merry Christmas. You can also try Hot Spin Deluxe from our demo slot collection.