Your Guide To The Most Common Types Of UK Online Slots Bonus Games And Features

Are you someone who last played a slot game several years ago when the only features that were available were the famous Hold and Nudge buttons? If you are and you were to load up one of the myriad of online slots available today at many of our UK no deposit online casinos, then you may be forgiven for thinking you are playing an entirely different game altogether.

It is fair to say that the modern slot game has changed radically from the days when three reels, a nudge and a hold button were the height of technological achievement. Now many slots have five reels and allied to this wider variety of combinations, there are also a huge number of additional bonus games and features available on slots.

After reviewing hundreds of the most popular slot games, we’re going to give new slot players a rundown of the most common types of bonus features that you will find on most modern video slots, as well as explaining what some of the key terms prevalent in modern slot gaming mean.

Progressive Jackpot Slot

Progressive Jackpot games are the ‘big money jackpot’ games of the slot world and examples of them include games like Mega Fortune, Mega Moolah, Major Millions and Jackpot Giant.

In these slots, a small proportion of your stake (usually around 10%) is added to a prize fund which climbs with every spin made on the game. When one player manages to land the sequence required to land the progressive jackpot prize, then they win the large pot of money, which in some cases can often amount to millions of pounds, euros or dollars depending on where you are playing.

The longer the amount of time that passes in between progressive jackpots being won, the greater the size the jackpot can grow to and of course, the higher the jackpot grows, the more players tend to play the game to try and win it, increasing the speed at which the progressive jackpot increases.

243/1024 ways to win

If you are familiar with older style slots then you will also be familiar with the term pay lines, which is simply the number of ways symbols can be organised across the reels to create a win. In the oldest slots, there was just one payline (the horizontal central row), but on more modern slots the number of paylines has increased. In modern video slot games, you can now play games with up to 100 paylines.

In some games you can select how many paylines to have in play at any one time, in others the number of paylines is fixed at a set amount.

However, there are other ways in which slots can now offer players the chance to win and these slots are the ‘ways to win’ slot. In a typical 5x3 reel slot, you can play 243-ways to win games and on a 5x4 reel game, this increases to 1024-ways to win.

With paylines, you have to wager at least one credit per selected payline in order to get the reels spinning.  However with the Ways to Win slots, you have all lines in play on each spin, and you can vary the size of your wager to suit your bankroll.

There isn’t a huge difference in gameplay between a ways to win and a payline slot, only that with a ways to win game, you will win if symbols appear across the reels in any sequence, not just on what is deemed a pay line within the game.  

Bonus game and in game features

Wild symbol

The Wild symbol is probably the most common symbol in the modern video slot. This is the one symbol on the reels that can be used as any of the other symbols to help create a winning payline. The more Wild symbols you land on a payline, the better your win tends to be.

Most slots have a way to identify the Wild symbol very easily, or you can check in the Paytable to find out what symbol is the Wild symbol in your game.

In many non-progressive slots, landing five Wilds on a payline will bring about the biggest base game win.

Scatter symbol

Most modern video slots have a scatter symbol in the game. In some games, scatter symbols are simply used as a high paying symbol that offers a payout if just two scatters are landed anywhere across the reels. The more scatters you land across the reels in a single spin, the higher the payout you can receive.

However, in some games, scatter symbols also serve an additional purpose in addition to awarding a cash win. That is when you land three or more across the reels, you will trigger a bonus feature on the slot. This is usually in the form of a Free Spins game or a Pick ‘Em bonus game.

In some cases you can select which type of games you play and in some recently developed slots, you play through a number of different bonus games as you play in order to unlock each one in succession.

We’ll explain more about the most popular type of bonus round below.  

Free Spins Round

When a free spins round is triggered you either receive, or can select a number of free spins (sometimes with a multiplier attached). Occasionally too, another bonus may be awarded, such as having symbols stacked on the reels, or having additional Wild symbols in play.

During free spins, you spin the reels at no cost to your balance and at the same rate that you were playing on your last wager in the game. So if you were wagering £2 per spin on the slot, all your free spins will be at the same rate.

Free Spins round are the goal in many games as it is through these rounds that players can generally hit the biggest cash prizes.

Sometimes, you can re-trigger free spins from within the free spins round by landing three or more scatters on the reels once again, although this feature is not available on all slot games.

Pick ‘Em Bonus Game

Another popular feature is the Pick Em bonus game. These games come in a huge variety of different formats and themes but they all essentially operate in the same way.

The most common type of Pick ‘Em bonus is a game where the player has to pick from a number of objects, which reveal a cash prize when selected.  However one symbol will reveal the symbol to end the bonus round and the player needs to avoid selecting this symbol, while collecting the cash from under the other symbols. The round ends when the player picks the round ending symbol.

A less common Pick Em bonus game is when a player picks from a number of objects and a cash prize is revealed. The player can then elect to keep that cash prize, or discard it and pick again from the remaining options.

Multiplier

A multiplier is when a player wins money but instead of receiving the standard payout for that win, the amount they win is subject to a multiplier, which gives them a greater win.

For example, if a player landed a win of £10 when a 5x multiplier was active, then they would receive a win of £50.

During a free spins round, the multiplier may be in place for all of the free spins, meaning all spins are subject to the same multiplier, or random multipliers may be selected for each individual spin.

Gamble feature

Some slots also offer a Gamble Feature for any win a player has on the reels, during free spins or in any other bonus game. To access this feature, if it is available, players simply click the Gamble button when they have achieved a win.

These games take many forms, but they all essentially offer a player the chance to double or even quadruple their winnings, by successfully performing a task. This is often selecting the correct colour (to double) or the correct suit (to quadruple) of the next card drawn at random from a pack of cards.

If the player successfully predicts the next card, they win and receive the additional cash. If they lose, they lose the money they had previously won.