If you like the thought of casting out a fishing line and catching your food rather than buying it from a shop but aren't keen on braving the elements or getting fishy smells on your hands, online slots have you covered. For a spot of virtual angling, here comes Big Bass Bonanza from developer Pragmatic Play and partners Reel Kingdom. In what turned out to be a major success story, Big Bass Bonanza, provides the sort of action popularised by Fishin' Frenzy all those years ago yet freshened up by a new multiplier feature during free spins.
Grab a life jackpot because Big Bass Bonanza is played out in the ocean, its five-reel game panel floating just below the surface. The game grid is see-through, where behind it, murky blue depths contain schools of fish off in the distance, alongside bubbles and weeds. Fish show up on the reels too, where they may be used as pay symbols, or in the bonus game, they each carry an instant prize value that may be collected by fisherman wild symbols. The view is oddly neither old looking nor new, perhaps contributing to the broad appeal the game has garnered.
Players grab a seat on the boat by selecting a stake from 10 p/c to $/€250 per spin. Any device is suitable for this medium-high volatile trip, where RTP tops out at 96.71%. Keep in mind, RTP is variable, so it's worth verifying which version of Big Bass Bonanza you may be about to play.
Instant cash prizes are the central thrill maker, but regular wins occur when matching pay symbols land left to right from the left side of the panel. Ten to ace card symbols make up the lower pay tiles, where all are worth 10x the bet for a five of a kind hit. Next are fish symbols, tackle boxes, dragonflies, rods, and floaters worth 20 to 200 times your stake for five of a kind. No wilds appear in the base game, though one does make its way into free spins.
To use a fishing metaphor, Big Bass Bonanza's base game is the sitting around on the boat with your line in the water waiting for something to happen phase. The bonus game is when something starts nipping at the line, and the battle between angler and fish can begin.
It all starts when 3, 4, or 5 scatter symbols land in view to award 10, 15, or 20 free spins, respectively. A fisherman wild symbol is added to the reels, which replaces any of the regular pay symbols to complete winning lines. In addition, when the fisherman lands at the same time as the fish symbols, he collects each one of their prize values on behalf of the player. It is possible for more than one fisherman wild to appear on a single spin. When this happens, each fisherman reels in the fish prize values in turn.
So far, so Fishin' Frenzy, but Reel Kingdom has added a twist to set the games apart. Whenever a wild symbol hits, it is collected on a meter located above the reels. For every 4 wilds collected, additional spins are doled out, and a win multiplier is awarded. This can occur 3 times, and +10 free spins are added each time. As to the multiplier, the first trigger introduces an x2, the next one bumps it up to x3, while the final is an x10 multiplier. After the third trigger, no more can happen. Keep in mind the multiplier applies to money symbol collection wins, not regular line wins. One last point is when a single fisherman hits, there is a chance random fish money symbols are added to the reels.
Big Bass Bonanza goes to show there are a lot of players who aren't super bothered by providers borrowing each other's ideas, provided some new bit is wedged in there somewhere to satisfy the desire for novelty. Mixing in the new multiplier feature, the relaxing seabound atmosphere, and an unnameable x-factor means Big Bass Bonanza turned out to be a major hit. Perhaps bafflingly so for some, but there you go, that's the magic of creating something and letting it loose in the world to take on a life of its own.
In Fishin' Frenzy, the fisherman was already a highly sought out symbol in free spins due to his cash collection abilities. With the introduction of the wild collection meter, he's more highly prized than ever since he leads directly to those coveted win multipliers should enough wilds accumulate. It might be something of a surprise to know that with all the extra multipliers in free spins helping increase the value of the catch, the winning potential in Big Bass Bonanza is relatively similar to what is found in the original Fishin' Frenzy. Pushing things to the limit here results in wins as high as 2,100x the bet. Not a massive result, though one which has proven more than enough to entice loads of keyboard anglers in for a bash.
Pragmatic Play and Reel Kingdom certainly stumbled upon something of a cash cow with Big Bass Bonanza, whether unwittingly or not. Its success went on to spawn several remakes such as a Bigger Bass version, a Megaways rendition and a Christmas special. Sometimes you just can't tell which slots will go on to be hits. Big Bass Bonanza packs plenty of unnameable star quality, and its piscine powered action struck a chord with players keen on taking to the virtual high seas to reel in its prize-bearing fish.
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