This review nearly didn’t happen. Not because we couldn’t be bothered, but because we felt that it’s almost impossible to apply a score. After much deliberation, however, we came to the conclusion that, retailing at a measly tenner – or £5.99 if you shop at Morrisons – it represents good value for money. How long would that money last in a real fruit machine? Unless you’re really lucky, probably five minutes. If that.
Although you’d be pushed hard to tell from the shots, the six machines on offer are rendered in full 3D. The rest of the presentation isn’t quite as elaborate though, with no tutorials or such to speak of. And boy could it have done with some. On one machine, “Bonus Game! – Press X to Stop!” kept appearing, so we assumed that pressing X stops the reels. It wasn’t until later that we realised that X stopped the bonus game altogether. Seriously, why would anybody want to skip the chance to win lots of virtual money and extra goes?
At the start only one machine is available, with the rest becoming unlocked once you’ve achieved enough credits – you start off with 100, incidentally. In addition to bonus games you can hold reels and change the number of credits to gamble, while some machines have three win-lines instead of one. Unfortunately you can’t get on the board and play wildly erratic games of higher and lower, but each machine is reasonably different from the last.
You can save your progress too, meaning it’s possible to amass a bounty of credits then come back another day to blow them all willy nilly. It’s just a shame that the music plays on a continuous loop. Well, that and the fact that you won’t get filthy rich by playing it.