Understanding Free Spins In Online Slots

November 27, 2014

You will hardly find a video slot today that does not offer a free spins bonus feature. The latest online slots continuously include innovation in the way the free spins are triggered and also in their payout mechanisms. However it was not always that way. This article traces how the free spins feature has evolved over time.

In the earliest video slots, three scatter symbols appearing on the reels triggered the free spins feature. You are awarded a prescribed number of free spins for which you did not have to place additional bets but could claim the payouts. One of the earliest innovations in this feature was the introduction of multipliers that enhanced the payouts.

Many online slots today do not prescribed the number of free spins or the multiplier up front. In order to make the game more interesting by keeping up the suspense, players are asked to pick objects in bonus games and these randomly determine the number of free spins and the multiplier. This also introduces volatility in the slot game because sometimes you will be awarded more free spins and sometimes fewer free spins. To introduce a degree of interactivity some contemporary video slots give players a choice of free spins packages. Options with fewer free spins have larger multipliers and options with larger number of free spins have smaller multipliers. There are even a few slot machines that offer different randomly determine multipliers for each of the free spins.

The mechanism for triggering the free spins also has had a few changes. When the designated combination of symbols appears on the screen, the free spins are not immediately triggered. Instead a counter increases by one. When the counter reaches the set value then the free spins are triggered. Though this method makes it more difficult to activate the free spins, enhanced payouts are usually offered compensate for the delay. In some slot games the free spins are triggered randomly after any spin and this often comes as a pleasant surprise.

Features other than multipliers are now being used to make the free spins more attractive. Sometimes another symbol becomes an additional wild or scatter symbol. At other times the wild symbol takes on some attractive properties. For example it may appear stacked on the reels during the free spins, or may independently multiply payouts or may remain frozen on the reels for the remainder of the free spins.

This evolution of the free spins has made online slot games more interesting and has also helps in differentiating slot games of different software providers.

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