Secrets of Christmas

Review of Secrets of Christmas by NetEnt

Secrets of Christmas doesn’t really aim to give us any surprises or secrets, it’s more of a traditional style game, with Santa as the main character, and with plenty of holiday-related icons spread across those 5×3 reels. The game offers 25 paylines each round, and on them, you get a lot of related icons, but also a couple of unrelated ones. Ultimately, count on a NetEnt slot machine with excellent graphics, which fits the image that people have for the winter holidays.

Several good features were also implemented for Secrets of Christmas, and you can find out more about them below:

• Santa Wild symbols
• Bag with Gifts scatter
• Free Spins with 3 to 5 extra bonus features (multipliers, extra free spins, wild reels, extra wilds)

Theme & Graphics

The theme is the classic one for a Christmas themed slot machine, with symbols revolving around Santa Claus and various objects that you would expect from such a game. It’s designed in the usual manner, with modern cartoon-style graphics, of high quality.

Among the symbols that you’re going to find inside, Santa will be a big one, since it’s the wild. Another one of note, the Bag with Gifts, is acting as the scatter. From there, we move on to the symbols of high value, which will show Bells, Candles, Gingerbread Houses, Milk & Cookies, or Gift Socks. Lastly, we get five Royals as well, but at least they were designed out of the branches of the Christmas tree, so they look appropriate for this theme.

Its surrounding graphics look just appropriate, as the reels have been placed against a cabin’s window. There is a bit of snow at the bottom, the wood of the cabin is visible at the sides, and the frosted window of the cabin is behind the symbols.

Special Features

It’s not the type of game to deliver unique features, never seen before. On the contrary, the options that you’re given are regular ones, but they have certain improvements and extra abilities, which end up making them fun to trigger.

Wild Symbols

These are the ones showing you the image of Santa Claus, along with a simple Wild logo. These wilds can be added on the reels in random positions, both in the regular and free modes. When they land in the position where they can contribute to a new combo, they will do this, by acting as a substitute for whatever regular symbol is needed there. They can’t be used to replace scatters, but that’s not unusual for this type of feature.

Free Spins With Bonus Features

Have at least three scatters on the reels, to get 10 free spins from the game. The image of the scatter symbol is that of Santa’s bag, filled with toys. A logo with the word Scatter is present as well, at the bottom.

Depending on how many scatter symbols triggered this feature, meaning 3, 4 or 5, you can get 3, 4 or 5 picks in a short bonus game, before the free spins startup. Each pick is made on a new screen, with 20 gifts to choose from. Those 3 to 5 picks will bring you just as many bonus features, for the free spins.

• 2 to 10 extra free spins
• Wild reels for the 2^nd and/or 4^th columns
• 1x or 2x extra multipliers added to the initial 1x
• Extra wilds, transforming Candle and/or Bell icons

Betting & Jackpots

As you’re playing with 25 active lines, you need to select a wager for them, and it will be done with the help of both the Bet Level and the Coin Value options. Up to 10 coins can be selected per line, by using the Level option. The other one allows for denominations of $0.01 to $0.50 to be chosen. The range of the bets which result will be anywhere from $0.25 to $125 (up to $5 per line).

The game has rewards of up to 1,250x, which it can pay using regular combinations, and apparently the cap on winnings for a single round is at 1,400x the stake. This is possible through multipliers as well, which will come during certain types of free spins.

One of the best things about Secrets of Christmas is the Return to Player, which has been calculated to be 96.70%. As a lot of other modern slots will offer returns of about 96%, this one is actually one of the better options that you can go with.

Verdict: When it’s time for the holidays, and you want a slot with a traditional feel, which gives you better than average odds at a prize, Secrets of Christmas might just be the right game for you. Designed by NetEnt, it has excellent graphics, decent features and top payouts, and overall it will be a fun one to spend some time with.

5 Mar. 2018, by Ari Waknine