An Assortment of the Best Slots of 2021
New slots are released every single month of every single year. Sometimes, there’s so much newness, it can almost get old. Whenever that happens in life, you know it’s time to slow down and smell the roses. Because in fact, us slot players have it really good. Game providers are always innovating themes, features, and ways to win.
With that in mind, we’ve arranged a bouquet with a dozen roses for you to savour—one for every month of the past year. We’ve gone through and selected the finest, most aromatic, long-stemmed slot release of each month of 2021.
January: Madame Destiny Megaways (Pragmatic Play)
The first month of 2021 saw the release of a fortune-telling themed slot with a spooky soundtrack and tarot cards, love potions, black cats, and owls for symbols. With six tumbling reels in various sizes, this Megaways game features many different ways to win. The fortune teller Madame Destiny is wild, and she doubles any wins that involve her. Talk about double bubble toil and trouble. Land three or more crystal ball scatters to make the wheel of fortune appear with different numbers of bonus spins and various multipliers on its rotating disks.
February: Gates of Olympus (Pragmatic Play)
An all ways slot inspired by the Greek god Zeus. Land eight or more matching symbols anywhere on the 6×5 grid to win. When you do, the tumbling reels mechanic replaces your winning symbols with new ones, meaning you can win multiple times on a single spin. Land four or more Zeus Scatter symbols to trigger bonus spins where you could multiply your stake up to 500x. The Greek gods were known to be wily ones, and this game comes with a 5/5 variance rating.
March – Fire in the Hole xBomb (NoLimit City)
Like a determined miner, you’re trying to get deeper and deeper below ground in this mining-themed slot with graphics so stylized you’ll feel like you’re in an actual mineshaft. Winning combinations earn you extra rows below the standard grid, with xBomb wilds detonating dynamite to blow out even more potential paylines. Noted for its extreme variance, the max win is a weighty 60,000x your total stake. Hit frequency is just over 25%, meaning you’ll dig up a win every four spins on average. The Lucky Wagons Spins feature replaces all symbols with cash-awarding coins where wins are enhanced by a variety of modifiers located at the top of the reels, such as the miner’s bag that collects all coins on its reel for a chance to really strike gold.
April: Pirates Plenty Megaways (Red Tiger Gaming)
A treasure chest of bonus features. Land three scatters to unlock bonus spins with increasing win multipliers and a max win of 10,489x your stake. Each time a treasure map symbol appears, it
brings the pirate ship above the reels closer to Wild Ways, when another reel is added. The Lady Anne Wild fills an entire reel whenever she appears with her own multipliers, locking in place until you form a winning combination.The wild monkey stowed away on the ship removes all lower value symbols and hangs around as a sticky wild. The third game in the Pirates’ Plenty series, it does not disappoint.
May – Hippopop (Avatar UX)
Instead of wilds or scatters, HippoPop is the sixth game from Avatar UX to feature the PopWins mechanic, where each winning symbol is replaced with two new ones, increasing the size of the reel up to six rows high. Animal symbols inspired from a mishmash of cultures and regions make up the highest-valued symbols, with the golden hippo bringing in the most valuable wins with up to 4x the stake. The bonus spins feature is triggered if all reels hit their max height, with a multiplier increasing by one factor with each consecutive win. You can spin the bonus wheel to increase the number of bonus spins to a total of 12. A golden meter to the right keeps track of the number of ways you can win.
June – Jammin Jars 2 (Push Gaming)
In June, just in time for summer, came this much anticipated sequel, the second game in human history to combine fruit and disco and do it so well. The new version kept the original Jammin Jar’s 8×8 grid and bumpin’ soundtrack while adding several new bonus features. The slot features collapsing reels and cluster wins. Land a cluster of five or more to make the winning symbols disappear and the reels collapse, adding room for new symbols on the same spin. The tutti-frutti Wild Jar symbol can replace any symbol, acts as a multiplier, and also works as a scatter. Get three or more Wild Jars to trigger bonus spins and see the jars shuffle around the board in time to the music. Instant prize symbols in clusters of five or more award cash prizes and are also available during the fruit blast feature, randomly triggered after any collapse or cascade covering the entire board in giant fruit.
Let’s get some jamm in’ those jars.
July – Spicy Meatballs Megaways (Big Time Gaming)
From the original creators of Megaways comes this Italian cuisine-themed flamin’ hot slot with not one but TWO wilds. Roll up your sleeves and get chopping in the game’s industrial kitchen with its shiny copper pots and all the vegetable symbols you need to make a delicious sauce served over this Megaways slot. The meatballs come soaring out of the piping hot multiplier saucepans at the top of the reels and land on the grid to serve as both wilds and multipliers as long as you keep spinning wins. That’s a-one spicy meatball. Get five wins, or “reactions” in a row to trigger a minimum of five bonus spins, each one of which is guaranteed to start with a spicy meatball. Think you can take the heat?
August – FireBlaze: Blue Wizard Megaways (Playtech)
Playtech’s first stab at a Big Time Gaming Megways licence turned out to be, well, magical. With a background showing the Wizard’s House set in a foggy hollow, this Megaways slot distinguishes itself right away with a five-reel grid (most Megways slots have six reels). Don’t be fooled, however. This sorcery-themed slot is quite powerful. Land three or more Castle Scatter symbols on the same spin will conjure six bonus spins to start, with the potential for unlimited respins. Six or more Crystal Ball symbols with cash prizes attached trigger the Fire Blaze Respin feature where the Crystal Balls turn into sticky symbols, staying in place to award on-reel cash prizes and the possibility win mini, minor, major, or grand jackpots. That last one is worth up to 2,000x your stake.
Discover the World of the Wizards
September – Bigger Bass Bonanza (Pragmatic Play)
We squeezed the last rays of summer out of September out on the water with our fishing tackle, or that’s how it seemed anyway as everyone sat up and noticed the sequel to Big Bass Bonanza. It’s right there in the title; this slot is much like the original but BIGGER with speed boats, an extra row, up to 50 bonus spins, and heftier cash prizes. The max win is 4,000x your stake. That’s some pretty nice bait. The humble fisherman from the original with his brown wool cap has been replaced with a brightly dressed bay fisherman in mirrored sunglasses cheesing for the camera. A polaroid with him holding up his catch serves as the wild in this bigger version. He only appears during bonus spins, hauling in the cash prizes from any Money Fish that land on the same spin with him.
October – 9 Masks of Fire: Hyperspins (Microgaming)
Gather around the primordial campfire for this re-release of the runaway favourite 9 Masks of Fire (2019). If this game was fiery before, now you can spin each reel separately with the hyperspins mechanic. Depending on the symbols on the grid, you can try to land masks, bonus spins, or use a diamond wild. Line up a win and listen as the drumming speeds up in the background. Three or more masks award a cash prize, up to 2,000x your stake if you land nine masks on the same spin. Three or more scatter symbols will grant you a chance to try your luck on the Bonus Spin Wheel, where each wedge contains a number of bonus spins and a multiplier. Just in time for the chillier weather, more choice and more prizes in this hyperspins game sure heated things up.
November – Age of Gods: Wheels of Olympus (Playtech)
Just before the end of the 2021, we were able to squeeze in another Olympus-themed slot to accompany February’s Gates of Olympus. Part of the Age of Gods series, this slot’s main character and highest-valued symbol is Fortuna, goddess of luck. Any of the game’s symbols can appear covered in gold, and if Fortuna smiles upon you, you might get three or more gold symbols in a row and trigger the Wheels of Olympus feature, for the chance to spin one of the three golden wheels. There’s no bad option here; the wheels land on wilds, bonus spins, or cash prizes up to 500x your stake in the 5-in-a-Row Wheel. As if that’s not enough, Wheels of Olympus is part of Playtech’s Age of God’s progressive jackpot network. Each of the four jackpot values are displayed at the top of the Parthenon. The largest is the Ultimate Power jackpot, which drops six-figure prizes every 40 days on average.
December – Moon Princess Christmas Kingdom (Play ‘n GO)
‘Tis the season for girl power, and you’ll find it all here in this Winter Wonderland version of the original Moon Princess slot. Your favourite princesses — Storm, Star, and Love — are back and they’ve brought their superpowers with them in this festive slot complete with mistletoe multipliers. Moons are wild and shine down with cascading wins, replacing the middle symbol in each three-of-a-kind set of symbols. Each princess has her own superpower that can be activated randomly on a non-winning spin. Experience all three at once with the Trinity Feature by landing one White Fox Scatter. If you manage to clear all the symbols using the three princesses’ powers during the Trinity round, you’ll unwrap the gift of bonus spins enhanced with the powers of the princess of your choice.
Celebrate Christmas with the Moon Princesses
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