Santas Wild Ride

Santas Wild Ride Review

Santas Wild Ride Reviewed December 7 2010 by Casinogamesonnet.com

The traditional view of Santa is a jolly old man who rides his sleigh across the sky. But Microgaming’s Santa’s Wild Ride puts Saint Nick behind the seat of a Harley. This biker angle on Santa presents a fun take on an old story.

But does this 243-ways slot have more to offer than just an interesting theme? You can find out by reading about Santa’s Wild Ride’s atmosphere, bonus features, game rules, and more.

Gameplay and Atmosphere

On the surface, this game looks like any other Christmas-themed slot. You’ll see a snowy landscape in the background, complete with pine trees, bulbs, and a nighttime sky. This game also plays a variety of Christmas jingles during spins and payouts.

Symbols include a game logo, motorcycle keys, Santa riding his bike, a woman in a Christmas outfit, an elf, motorcycle, cake, beer, cupcakes, presents, and a North Pole sign. The game logo is both the wild symbol and highest-paying icon. It substitutes for everything except the scatter to form wins. The logo also offers a payout worth 800x your stake for five symbols.

This game features 243 ways to win, instead of the traditional payline model. Therefore, payouts are formed with matching symbols in adjacent reels. All winning combinations must start in the first reel.

Betting options range from €0.30 to €7.50. You may be a little disappointed in the max bet if you’re a high roller. Return to player (RTP) for Santa’s Wild Ride is 96.47%, which is good in comparison to other online slots.

Santas Wild Ride Features

In addition to being wild, the game logo also offers a random win multiplier. This multiplier can be worth 2x, 3x, or 4x.

A “Free Gift” bonus is triggered when presents land in reels 2 and 4 simultaneously. The two presents icons remain onscreen. You select one of them (a.k.a. pick’em bonus) to reveal your prize.

If three or more motorcycle keys land on the reels, you’ll trigger 25 free spins. You will also able to pick one of the following features to enhance your free games:

• Expanding Wild – The wild symbol expands to cover the entire reel.
• Stacked Wild – You can land stacked wilds (already expanded) across any of the five reels.
• Trailing Wild – The wild icon will move down one space after every spin until it exits the reels.

Through a combination of the free spins and features, you can win a massive payout worth up to 1,900,000 coins or 12,666x. That said, this game offers a very large top prize.

Final Thoughts

Numerous Christmas slots have been produced over the years. Therefore, Microgaming took a slightly different approach to the Santa theme here by presenting him as a biker. Their bold move has paid off when considering that Santa’s Wild Ride is more entertaining than the average Christmas slot.

They’ve managed to create a new take on Saint Nick without going overboard. Microgaming also added enough features into this slot to make for the possibility of huge wins — including a massive 1,900,000 coins payout. This huge prize is somewhat dulled by the low €7.50 max bet. Even still, Santa’s Wild Ride is definitely worth checking out around Xmas or any other time.

Release Date

Santas Wild Ride was released on December 7 2010.