Wheel of Fortune
- Wheel of Fortune Slot
- Overall Score: 3.4 /5
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- Sounds:
- Engagement:
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Dammit, IGT… You’re like the M. Night Shyamalan of online slots! Sure, you used to be good back in the 90s and you made a handful of good ones, but now you’re just getting jobs out of pity and royally messing each and every single one of them up. You rarely bring anything new to the table, and yet for some strange reason a group of dedicated fans is still playing your lazy, uninspired slots like Wolf Run and Kitty Glitter. I don’t get it… The only slots I’m reviewing are those that are so popular that they enter the top 50 in the UK, and there are SO many IGT slots in here that it’s ridiculous! Do you guys see some sort of hidden appeal that I’m missing here? Am I actually playing the wrong version of, say, Kitty Glitter, with the right one being spectacular and all kinds of amazing? Does the elusive good version contain stellar graphics, interesting mini-games and a jackpot that would make even Mega Moolah say “Whoa, dude, that’s way too much”? What am I missing?! While some of IGT’s slots have sorta slipped into the “decent” territory, I’m afraid Wheel of Fortune is not one of them.
Basic Features
Keep in mind that, just like with several of IGT’s slots (such as The Wizard of Oz), Wheel of Fortune has several different versions circulating around, but the one I’m going to be reviewing is called Wheel of Fortune: Triple Extreme Spin, and as far as I know it’s the most popular one out of all… But that doesn’t mean it’s very good. First of all, “Wheel of Fortune” is just a very odd license to use for a slot machine – I mean, sure, they both involve spinning something in order to win cash and prizes, but that’s about it, really. As a result, the slot might as well have been called something completely different and it wouldn’t have changed anything.
| Wheel of Fortune Slot | ||||||
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Software: | IGT | Double option: | No | ||
| RTP: | 96.08% | Mobile version: | No | |||
| Progressive: | No | Coin value: | £1-£20 | |||
| Autoplay: | Yes | Bet value: | £50 – £1000 | |||
| Quick spin: | No | Max. bet: | £1,000.00 | |||
| Reels: | 5 | Free spins: | Yes | |||
| Paylines: | 720 | Bonus round: | Yes | |||
I have to give credit where credit is due – the layout of Wheel of Fortune is very creative. Instead of the standard “3 rows, 5 columns” layout that we’re all used to, this slot utilizes a much stranger shape where the rows and columns aren’t too easily distinguished, allowing for a whole lot more paylines than usual (720 – the most I’ve ever seen in a slot). The shape kind of reminds me of some physical slots I’ve played, and it’s pretty rare to see online slots experiment like their physical brethren do. Sadly, the effect is ruined by rather subpar visuals and the most annoying music I’ve ever heard online, which you just can’t turn off!!! I swear, the person who thought that a mute button was too high-tech for this slot deserves a pay cut.
Paytable
We can’t really talk about the paytable of this slot without mentioning its ridiculous asking price. If you want to spin it just once you’ll have to part with at least £50, which is absolutely ridiculous. Slots are all about a low entry price. Unlike blackjack and roulette, where you need to wager larger sums of money if you want to have the chance at winning an impressive reward, slots give you a chance of winning much more than what you have wagered. It’s very disappointing to see that this one requires you to pay the price of a full, retail videogame for just a single spin. I don’t really mind it if the upper limits are high – hey, there’s gotta be at least one highly eccentric billionaire who enjoys betting £1000 on a single spin. But a high lower limit is the fastest way to get me to sign out.
You’d think that with such a highly expensive slot the rewards ought to be amazing, but they’re actually fairly standard – even below standard at times. The lowest you can win is 5 times your bet, and the highest you can get from standard symbols is 1000 times your wager, which is actually pretty low. Sure, a £50,000 win sounds amazing, but considering the gigantic investment that would inevitably be required for you to even have a chance at winning that prize may not be worth it at all. Most of the symbols are represented by fruits, which makes this slot’s inspiration rather clear, and those can net you up to 125 times your bet. The highest you can possibly win is 10,000 times your bet, if you manage to line up 5 special “Wheel of Fortune” symbols, but those almost never appear.
Bonus Rounds/Free Spins
Going by the paytable, Wheel of Fortune has lots of bonus games and bonus features available, but the truth is a lot more disappointing than it sounds. Because of course it is, it’s IGT, what in the world did you expect? Really, there’s only one bonus round, which happens when you get three “Wheel of Fortune” symbols anywhere on the board. That activates a game where you need to pick envelopes and find diamonds inside. Now I’m no expert on “Wheel of Fortune”, since I don’t watch a whole lot of TV, but I don’t think that at any point the players were required to pick envelopes and find diamonds inside. If it was up to me I would’ve made a game inspired by the crossword section of “Wheel of Fortune” (you know, the main part of the show), but I only get paid to complain about slots and not actually make them.
Depending on what diamonds you find in the envelopes you may win multipliers or free spins, but unlike literally every single slot ever made, they don’t apply to your game – they apply to a SECOND minigame where you spin the titular Wheel of Fortune and get rewards based on that… Or something. I don’t know, the payout table isn’t too clear about what’s going on, and in over 600 spins in practice mode I couldn’t activate the bonus game once. So really, it’s anyone’s guess what really happens, but my best guess is that you just win a certain amount of coins from the wheel, which is a terrible idea overall, since it draws focus from what people are supposedly here to play – the actual slot. Overall, the bonus game is way too complex, way too complicated for its own good, doesn’t draw nearly enough inspiration from its source material and is rarer than Bigfoot.
Experience of Playing the Slot and Other Recommended Games
Overall, this slot really isn’t worth your time. While its layout is, in fact, quite intriguing and unique, almost nothing else has been done right. The graphics are pretty terrible (which is nothing new for IGT), the music is grating and can’t be turned off unless you disable the sound of your computer entirely, the winnings are fairly average and, worst of all, the lower limit for a single bet isn’t anywhere near “low”. If you’ve got £50 that you’re intent on wagering on a slot, you’d just be wasting them on one spin here when you could invest them in a slot that could actually bring you a big win, such as Mega Moolah. If, for some odd reason, you’re absolutely intent on playing an IGT slot, then Da Vinci Diamonds is their least-bad one, so I would have to recommend it. But I don’t get why you would want to play anything they made when slots by Playtech, NetEnt and Microgaming are SO much better overall.