ReviewOnlineCasinos.co.uk

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO ONLINE SLOTS 

  If you are a total beginner to online slots games, here’s your best guide to where to start and how to work out what all these seemingly complicated buttons do. Like anyone new to online slots games, it’s best to start off with a straightforward game, and work up from there. Online slots are available in a huge range of styles, themes, and options, and can appear daunting, but once you have grasped a few basics, they all work in pretty much the same way.

One of the first questions you will ask yourself is where should I play online slots? Some online casinos let you practice for free, and you should start at somewhere like Ladbrokes Casino, or Bet365 Casino which allow you to play a wide range of online slots without having to deposit any money, or even register your details. For players from the USA, try Cherry Red Casino, which welcomes US players.

So you are at an online casino site, and want to start practicing. Here, we have picked a standard 5 reel slot game, Avalon. If you area beginner, don’t worry about the style, this is just a walk-through of the game, and once you have had a go at it, you will feel more confident to try other online slots of your choice. We have just chosen Avalon, because it’s quick and easy to learn.

If you are in ‘Free Play’ mode, you will not be betting any real money, but of course, you will not win real money either.

Have a look at the picture above. You will see 15 symbols, in 5 vertical reels of 3 symbols each. This is makes Avalon a ‘5 reel’ game, the most common type. To the sides of the reels, you will see coloured numbers, 4 to 5 on the left hand side, and 14 to 15 on the right. The highest number in these is 20. These are the ‘paylines’, and these make Avalon a 20 payline game.

Your first action is to choose how much you want to bet, and this involves three steps. You need to choose ‘Coin Size’,  ‘ Coin Value’ and  ‘Lines.’  Let’s have a look at what each one means.

Coin Size – When you are looking at your slot game, you will see a ‘+ / -‘ button.  Coin sizes usually range from £0.01 up to £5.00 or so, as a guide, you want to choose no more than 1% of your bankroll, and as a beginner, you want to bet the minimum amount. Click + or - .

Coin Value. – ‘Select Coins’ button. This selects how much you bet per payline. Usually from 1 coin, to 5 coins per payline. Each click on this button increases your bet per payline by 1. Again, just practice with the minimum value.

Select Lines. – You can choose to place your bet on any number of lines, from 1 to 20. The more lines you select, the more winning combinations you will get, but the higher your stake per spin will be. It’s up to you to decide, if you bet on just a few lines, your wins will be less frequent, but you will have spent less, and if you bet on all lines, your wins will come often, and you will have spent more. It actually makes no difference to how much you win or lose, but by betting on all lines, the game will be more exciting.  

  If you want to see which combinations of symbols will win, just click ‘View Paytable.’  Study the paytable to see how much you will win if certain combinations appear, you will see 20 little pictures of how to win.

The paytable also shows a number of special symbols. These are called ‘Wild’ and ‘Scatter’ symbols. In this game, the Wild symbol is the mist covered island of Avalon. If this symbol appears on the reels, it will automatically help you to make up a winning combination by substituting for any other symbol. If, for example, you needed 3 ‘K’ symbols to make a win, and you had 2 ‘K’ symbols and a Wild symbol, you would win. This is all done by the machine, so you don’t need to worry about it. If you get 5 Wild symbols on a payline that you have selected, you win 5000 times your bet amount.

The Scatter symbol in this game is the Lady of the Lake. If you get 3 Scatter symbols, a bonus game is activated. In Avalon, you get 15 free spins, but this varies from game to game, as of course, do the Wild and Scatter symbols.

So you have chosen your bet amount, and paylines, now just click ‘Spin’ and enjoy the game. It takes some practice to get comfortable with online slots, but the thrill of winning makes the practice all worthwhile. Once you have tried a game and got the hang of it, you are ready to play for real money, and win a potential huge jackpot.

We have covered just one, straightforward game here. There are numerous different types, with progressive jackpots, bonus games, 100 paylines, and as many various themes as you could hope for, from ‘A Night Out’ to ‘The Lord of the Rings’, ‘The Osbournes’  to ‘Frankie Dettoris’ Magic 7’ literally thousands, that would take a lifetime to play.

Welcome to the world of online slots, we hope this guide will prove useful, it can only be a very basic introduction because the games are so different, but each one has it’s own appeal 

Back to Articles