Winter Gold is a game dedicated to the Winter Olympics, a theme which doesn’t get as much attention as it should. A few other titles are also available on the same topic, from other developers, but I found the Microgaming version to be quite satisfying on its own, thanks to both the graphics and the features which were used in its case.
Once Winter Gold loads, you will discover a 5 reel game, which has 15 bet lines and can trigger a feature which has free spins, multipliers and bonus games. Scatters and wilds are also provided in the base game. The largest prize awarded is worth $20,000.
Features of Winter Gold
You will take advantage of all the usual features which a modern slot has, like wilds, scatters and a bonus game which can trigger cash prizes or free spins.
The game’s wild would be my favorite feature in this case, mainly because besides acting as a substitute it can award the slot’s biggest payout as well. As far as the wild feature is concerned, the symbol can take the place of any regular symbol, no exceptions there, but the scatter is not on that list. Multiple wilds, when they appear in the correct order on the same line, from left to right, will form a combo directly and pay between 100x and 5,000x, the requirement asking for a minimum of three symbols.
The scatter symbol is another important part of the game, being the trigger for the bonus game and also awarding some impressive prizes. They reach a top value of 400 times the triggering bet when the maximum of five scatters are there, while the minimum is at 2x.
Bonus Wheel Feature
The bonus game gives you a Bonus Wheel which you spin to get free spins or cash prizes, and in order to get it started you will need at least three Gold Medal scatters present, on whatever reels they happen to land.
The Bonus Wheel has bonus games which can be triggered, cash prizes and free spins. A total of 8 potential prizes are on it, two of which will offer coins, two will have free spins and four will be occupied by just as many bonus games. A maximum of 20 free spins with up to 4x multipliers can be won, while the Coins options can award up to 18,000 coins.
The bonus games focus on winter sports, the four being Bobsleigh, Biathlon, Ski Jumping and Speed Skating. Each game asks you to make a choice, and the reward will be offered based on the result of the feature and the option that you made.
Betting options and jackpots
Given that you have 15 paylines, you have to wager at least that many coins if you want all of them active. However, you can increase the wager to up to 20 coins for each line if your budget allows it, while also being possible to change the denomination between $0.01 and $0.20. A $4 line wager and a $60 maximum total bet are allowed.
The jackpot’s 5,000x multiplier will give you $20,000, the cash equivalent of about 100,000 coins.
Design and symbols
Despite the fact that you have playing cards on the reels, they don’t look as bad here as they do in other slot machines. Winter Gold looks like a modern slot, with high quality themed symbols and with a background image which you can’t make much sense of, but which still has plenty of things going on in it. I’d say it’s one of the better looking winter games inspired slots you will see these days.
Symbols: Winter Gold Logo (wild, 5,000x), Gold Medal Scatter (scatter, 400x bet), Bobsleigh (1,250x), Speed Skating (1,000x), Ski Jumping (750x), Biathlon (500x), Ace (150x), King (125x), Queen (100x), Jack (80x) and 10 (60x).
Is It Worth Playing?
You should try out Winter Gold, and don’t do it only if winter or the Olympics are close by. It’s a good enough game to play anytime you feel like it, both design and feature wise.
This Winter Gold slot is offered by all online casinos with Microgaming software, playable either in practice or in real money mode.