Many licensed themes live on them, but a popular and premium theme can as well.īig Bang Theory, an Aristocrat licensed theme, is now available in a Mighty Cash variation, which includes multipliers in the Mighty Cash bonus based on the number of symbols you land and unlocking more rows, sort of similar to how Ultimate Fire Link can unlock prizes on higher rows when the right conditions occur. Neither of these are licensed themes, but they raise the bets on their fancier/more attractive cabinets. More subtle versions of this can be seen on IGT games if you compare Reef of Riches to Jungle Riches, or Ocean Magic to its premium cabinet sequel, Ocean Magic 4D/Ocean Magic Ultra.

Presuming payouts are the same, it’s making you bet a third more for a shot at some long shot progressives and a harder to secure bonus. Now, Wheel of Fortune 4-D adds in a jackpot option, with a shared progressive if you’re betting at least $3 a spin (which, compared to the $1 minimum, is another effort to drive higher bets). Golden Egypt’s minimum bet with all lines is 75 credits Wheel of Fortune 4-D is $1 for the same 75 lines.Wheel of Fortune 4-D forces you into the highest volatility choice. Free spins on Golden Egypt gives you a volatility choice.Wheel of Fortune 4-D goes to a wheel that pays credits more often than a bonus. Three bonus symbols on Golden Egypt guarantees you a bonus.Golden Egypt gives you a choice of line counts.

You can examine the two machines side by side and see a number of changes that IGT made to make the licensed version more volatile:

My favorite recent example is Wheel of Fortune 4-D, because its base game design is based on another casino game we can easily examine, Golden Egypt. In short, you can expect licensed and premium themes to be on the more volatile side. That’s not really the case anymore, as games with licensed are designed with higher bets to expose more money to the house edge.īut aside from a higher bet raising volatility as a general rule, are licensed themes more likely to be a higher volatility slot? It used to be a “common knowledge” element that games with a licensed or premium theme would have a lower payback.

Ocean magic ultra slot machine