Reviewed on December 14, 2016
LIKED
Christmas is getting closer and closer, and soon, you can hear the merry bells jingling. Nah, I couldn't wait for that to happen, so I made the jingling of the merry bells come earlier for me, by playing Pragmatic's game 'Merry Bells'. Ahh, the sounds of those bells, reminding me of the lively christmas atmosphere, but ahead of its actual time. Hmm, better than nothing, right?
This 25-paylines Merry Bells game has all the requisites for a Christmas atmosphere - Santa Claus, reindeers, elves, snowmen, christmas trees, presents and whatnots. Even the overall presentation has lots of red colours too. The only setback is that the graphics aren't as good as I would expect it to be. They are more cartoonish in nature, perhaps more suitable for games from yesteryears. Come on Pragmatic, surely you can come up with a more contemporary game, perhaps with some 3D renditions thrown in, or perhaps with just astonishingly beautiful graphics and overall presentation. That would bring more joy for Christmas slot players.
The House is the Wild symbol, paying a marvelous 10,000x the line bet for 5 of them, and substitutes for other symbols except the Scatter and the Bonus symbols. Sadly though, it is still a dumb Wild symbol for not doubling any wins with it, not becoming stacked, and not becoming expanded either. The Christmas Tree is the Scatter symbol, 5 of which pays nothing, yep, nothing, argh! Getting 3, 4 or 5 of them triggers 10, 20 or 50 free spins with all wins x5, and more free spins can be retriggered, at least something good to replace the missing Scatter payout. The Sleigh is the Bonus symbol, appearing only on reels 2, 3 and 4, and getting all 3 of them on any active payline triggers Santa's Presents Bonus game, to win from 300 up to 2700 coins. As for the other symbols, Santa himself pays 1000x, the Elf pays 500x, the Snowman pays 300x, the Penguin pays 300x, the Reindeer pays 200x and the rest pay from 200x to 50x, all per line bet for 5 of each kind. A good paytable.
This 25-paylines Merry Bells game has all the requisites for a Christmas atmosphere - Santa Claus, reindeers, elves, snowmen, christmas trees, presents and whatnots. Even the overall presentation has lots of red colours too. The only setback is that the graphics aren't as good as I would expect it to be. They are more cartoonish in nature, perhaps more suitable for games from yesteryears. Come on Pragmatic, surely you can come up with a more contemporary game, perhaps with some 3D renditions thrown in, or perhaps with just astonishingly beautiful graphics and overall presentation. That would bring more joy for Christmas slot players.
The House is the Wild symbol, paying a marvelous 10,000x the line bet for 5 of them, and substitutes for other symbols except the Scatter and the Bonus symbols. Sadly though, it is still a dumb Wild symbol for not doubling any wins with it, not becoming stacked, and not becoming expanded either. The Christmas Tree is the Scatter symbol, 5 of which pays nothing, yep, nothing, argh! Getting 3, 4 or 5 of them triggers 10, 20 or 50 free spins with all wins x5, and more free spins can be retriggered, at least something good to replace the missing Scatter payout. The Sleigh is the Bonus symbol, appearing only on reels 2, 3 and 4, and getting all 3 of them on any active payline triggers Santa's Presents Bonus game, to win from 300 up to 2700 coins. As for the other symbols, Santa himself pays 1000x, the Elf pays 500x, the Snowman pays 300x, the Penguin pays 300x, the Reindeer pays 200x and the rest pay from 200x to 50x, all per line bet for 5 of each kind. A good paytable.
DISLIKED
Honestly speaking, this was my first ever play on Merry Bells, so my experience on the game may only be on the surface, so to speak, and cannot be exhaustive at all. Nevertheless, from my only play on the game, I could only get 1 Free Spins game of 10 free spins with a 5x multiplier. Out of that 10 free spins, only 3 spins paid something, all the other 7 free spins were empty and useless, with no retrigger achieved, and with a final payout that was disappointing low of 17x my total bat amount. All my credits went bust soon after, never getting any decent wins at all. Well, perhaps my first play on Merry Bells may not be good, but I might give it a few more tries later on, just to see how the Free spins game would play and pay.
