Double Happiness by Aristocrat – Slot Machine Review
Double Happiness, beyond the promise that it makes through its title, is a slot machine that is available from Aristocrat, one of the world’s largest creators of games for land casinos. Their online efforts are often based on the slots that you’d see in casinos around the world. This is a Chinese themed game, with many of the usual elements that you can find in slot machines which delve into the culture of that part of the world.
In a lot of ways, I found this to be a slot machine that uses many of the things that are popular in other titles, and this is true of its layout as well, as it relies on the same 5 reels & 25 paylines combo that is so popular. It’s a game with regular and roaming wilds, with scatters and free spins, so I think that it’s going to be enjoyable. The ultimate goal for a game like this will be a jackpot of 25,000x, which you get with help from exciting 10x multipliers.
Betting
30 coins will get you 25 active lines, and the wagers for each one will start from a minimum of $0.02. They go up as needed, even up to $4 per coin, so they allow for bets of $120 to be made each round. Your minimum bet in the game is $0.60.
Double Happiness Jackpot
For a really big prize in Double Happiness, you need the Chinese Lion Wilds forming combinations, and paying 2,500 coins to you, or up to $10,000. That could be improved further, via the special features available here, and 10x multipliers should be able to take that reward up to $100,000.
There is a big downside as well with this game, beyond its huge potential. The game offers an RTP that marks it as something you’d play in a regular casino, which is where it originates from. It’s at 93.05%, which is way too low for an online slot machine. A good game would offer 96% or more, so Double Happiness is quite far from that mark.
Special Features
Aristocrat wasn’t happy just providing the player with a couple of regular features, and made sure that in this area at least, they had something to be excited about. There are a couple of good features which contribute to the game, as you will discover below.
Golden Dragon Wild Symbols
An important symbol in any game, the wild Golden Dragon has the added benefit of also triggering some very good payouts in Double Happiness. Their combinations offer up to 2,500x the line bet back to you for each win of up to five wilds, while naturally being available as substitutes as well on the other lines.
Free Spins With Roaming Wilds
Scattered Chinese Signs are your feature triggers, symbols that you need to see in 3, 4 or 5 spots on the reels, so that you can get their free spins. They deliver 10, 15 or 25 free spins, for each of the three variants I mentioned. All these spins benefit from Roaming Wilds, which will appear and will even get you paid when they appear on top of a scatter.
The Double Roaming Wild feature, which requires that you get wild symbols in the same position for two spins in a row, will deliver a 10x multiplier for the wins of those two rounds.
Design
This is where things get tricky. While Double Happiness is not a badly designed slot machine, and it’s not going to be annoying to play on, it’s not exactly unique or modern either. The type of graphics you see in it were great about a decade ago, and in land-based casinos they’re still loved by many. Online, they don’t compete well with the likes of NetEnt, Playson, Play’n GO and others that specialize in online slots.
Theme wise, you have a Chinese themed game, one which features images of Dragons, Chinese Signs, Men, Drums, Firecrackers, Paper Lanterns and music instruments, things you’d perhaps see during a festival. Royals from 9 to A are there as well, at the bottom of the paytable.
Summary
If it wasn’t for that 93% RTP that the game advertises, I would’ve recommended the game based on its features mostly, nothing else. As it stands, I wouldn’t play it myself, and I don’t think you should either. There are better alternatives out there, even from Aristocrat.
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