Online casinos strongly favor recreational players who don’t know much about playing online casino games. As an online casino enthusiast, you might not think there is much to know about playing Slots. You are correct if winning isn’t important to you. If you want the best chances of winning in spite of the house’s built-in advantages, you need to know this: Knowledge is King.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to play online slots. All that is required is reading the rules, depositing the money, and pressing the Spin button, right? Wrong!! You can really move yourself forward as an online slot player if you do one very important thing: Learn your slot special features vocabulary and how certain special features can lead to big wins.

Furthermore, you’ll want to make the most out of welcome and sign-up promotions from a no deposit bonus casino. These incentives allow players to play slot games with essentially free credits for the chance to win real money. Such bonuses can be used up very quickly so it’s best to have as much insight on slot features as possible.

Special Features Vocabulary

Slot special features are exclusive of basic game-play features. These special features go beyond what standard wild and scatter Symbols will offer. We are referring to special features that lead to EXTRA opportunities to win more money more often. 

Regular slot players know most special features are prompted by certain reel alignments, wild symbols, and or scatter symbols. Putting that aside, the following information is going to focus more on how special features work once prompted. Here we go!

Expanding and Stacked Wild Symbols

Some games use wild symbols that appear on the same reels in multiples. Expanding wilds are wild symbols that will expand to create one symbol down all rows of the same reel. The full reel coverage offers more chances to win bigger amounts.

Stacked wilds are slightly different. They also appear down multiple rows of the same reel but since they are individual symbols, they might not cover all available rows at the same time. Again, the increased reel coverage offers more chances to win bigger amounts. 

Sticky Wild Symbols

Some slots allow for the reels to respin after the initial base spin. When this happens, there are circumstances when the wild symbols that appeared during the initial base spin will “stick” in place as the reels respin. While some slots only allow this to happen once after an initial base spin, there are a few games that will allow this to happen multiple times until a prescribed conclusion is reached. Note: As wild symbols stick, they create more chances to win bigger amounts. 

This special feature is often tied to bonus rounds. 

Cascading Symbols

When symbols settle from an initial base spin, they might create winning configurations. Some slots will record those wins, allow the winning configuration to crumble/disappear, allow for new symbols to replace them, and create new winning configurations. This process is referred to as cascading symbols. Typically, symbols will keep cascading until no new winning configurations are created.

Free Spins

Most online slots will offer free spin rounds. Free spin rounds are typically initiated when scatter symbols align in certain configurations. With the right configurations, players might get as few as 8 free spins up to a maximum of 25 free spins. It’s common for free spin rounds to incorporate special wild symbols and multipliers (see below). 

Multipliers

Some slots give players a chance to gain extra value from certain spin results. This extra value is created by multipliers, which are used to boost the value of a win by the number of multipliers that have been awarded. Multipliers are typically earned via features within the game-play mode. 

Re-Triggering of Free Spins

During free spins, the player might land a particular reel/row configuration that earns them more free spins. Typically, it’s the same reel/row configuration that initiated the free spins round. This process of earning more free spins is referred to as the re-triggering of free spins. 

Interactive Picking Features

When a bonus feature requires that players make some kind of choice with a variety of different results waiting, this is referred to an interactive picking or selection feature. Such features are typically initiated vis certain reel configurations or an accumulation of prescribed results.

Gamble Feature

Some slots will refer to the gamble feature as a double-down feature. This is a feature that allows players to take their winnings from a base spin and gamble those winnings for even bigger winnings. Usually, players are given a chance to keep doubling up their winnings by choosing a 50/50 option like a red card or black card. In slots where this feature is available, players can keep doubling down until they lose everything or decide to claim their accumulated winnings. 

Conclusion:

This list doesn’t come close to defining all of the possible special features you might encounter across hundreds of online slots. What you have here is a base special features vocabulary you can use to get started as a better-informed online slot player.