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fishin frenzy the big catch megaways slot theme, stakes, pays & symbols

The Fishin’ Frenzy series of online slots has been around for a while now, though as franchises go it is a strange one – all the games are incredibly similar to one another. It’s a game that sticks out in my mind because the first version that I played had a feature in it that would trigger whenever you heard a bell sound during a spin. I confidently explained to my friend, who had advised that I try the game, that there must be something happening on screen which triggered this sound effect – a certain symbol or other pre-condition – and he, just as confidently, argued back that no, “it just happens sometimes”. Well, it turned out he was right… it was just something I had never seen before. And I’m glad too, because it was stupid – I’m not sure if the fisherman was in that first release and only collected the fish if the bell sounded, or if you won the totals of the fish ONLY if the bell sounded … whatever it was, it was garbage slot machine mechanics, and we should all be grateful nothing like that caught on in the way that Megaways did. 

Megaways slots are well known for their less than impressive paytables – the key to these games isn’t winning huge multiples of your stake right off the bat by hitting five-of-a-kind, it is winning on as many “Megaways” as possible. Secondary to this, in the original Extra Chili and many clones, is the ascending multiplier that usually accompanies the bonus round. Note that the RTP in this game is a near enough a full percentage point lower than the industry average – I would guess this is because Blueprint have so many licensing fees to pay on games like this, they simply could not make any money at 96%. Admittedly, this is speculation, but they are paying BTG for the Megaways license, they are paying “Reel Time Gaming” (is that a gag?) for the Fishin’ Frenzy license, and the casino has to make a profit too – Blueprint must be collecting whatever crumbs remain on the floor after that. And that means you, lucky player, can expect no payout for the scatter symbols, wilds that almost never appear – in fact, I didn’t think more than one could appear on screen at once for the first hour of play, when I finally saw two... I still haven’t seen three. The seagull apparently pays 200x your stake for six-of-a-kind though, the fishing reel returns half this at 100x, and the bait box and life ring both return 50x for landing all six at once. But, as with nearly all other Fishin’ Frenzy games, it is the blue squares that are going to be providing most of your winnings – I only ever saw six-of-a-kinds of royal symbols, and even those were rare.

Stakes range from €0.10 per spin to €10.00 per spin at the top end. This is a very sensible spread as far as I am concerned and reflects the maximum payout that is theoretically possible in this game. At 50,000x your stake, this is still a half-million Euro liability for any casino offering this game – and the number of players willing to bet €10.00 per spin isn’t insignificant either. In some circles, this is regarded as being a completely “unacceptably low” maximum bet. Must be nice!

base game & modifiers

It’s strange, the last few games I have reviewed have all had very little to say as far as their base gameplay is concerned. I feel like it’s a complete waste of time explaining the Megaways concept to people at this point, but JUST IN CASE, I will mention here – this is a six-row slot machine where the height of each symbol is determined randomly at the start of each spin.

For example, on my last spin I had five spaces on reel one; four on reel two; five on reel three; two on reel four; three on reel five; and finally, five on reel six. This gives a total number of “Megaways” of 5x4x5x2x3x5 = 3,000. The number of Megaways varies from one spin to the next, but unlike many other Megaways slots this is not a cascading symbols style slot, so you can only win once per paid spin, and the maximum number of Megaways is dramatically smaller as well. So, should you steer clear of “The BIG Catch” and play another Megaways slot instead? Ah, hold your horsefish – there’s just one LITTLE catch to shake things up a bit…

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fisherman feature

fishin frenzy the big catch megaways slot free spins feature

Let’s be honest – like almost every other Megaways slot, and indeed most other slots in general, this is what you are hoping for when you play Fishin’ Frenzy – The Big Catch Megaways online slot. Three scatters award ten free spins, whilst 15, 25, and 50 are awarded if you should be lucky enough to hit 4, 5, or 6 scatter symbols respectively.

When the free spins feature begins, the fish that land on screen do indeed range in value between 2x and 50x your stake. For every four fisherman symbols which land though, the values of these fish will be increased. This is in addition to the fisherman catching all the fish shown onscreen and adding their values immediately to your balance. 

I have seen a screenshot of a huge win where close to 30 fish appeared on screen, all with a 50x prize attached, and a single fisherman hoovering up all these prizes for a single spin. This won’t get you close to the games win cap of 50,000x your stake, but it does make me wonder – how crazy could things get if you hit all six scatter symbols, receive 50 free spins, and then collect enough fisherman to get to the top level where every fish is worth 50x your stake?

fishin frenzy the big catch megaways slot review final thoughts

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