We’ve certainly come a long way since the first slot machine was invented back in the 1800s. Slot machines started out as basic 3-reel contraptions with nothing but base game wins. To play, you would need to insert your coin, pull the lever and hope for a winning combination to appear. Over the years, one-arm style bandits have remained a popular choice of game for players looking for nostalgia, but when it comes to big wins, all eyes are on the 6 reel slots machines!
Best Casinos to Play 6 Reel Slots
6 Reel Slots Reviewed
A Brief History Lesson
The way we play slot machines changed forever when in 2016, Big Time Gaming (BTG) revolutionised the iGaming industry with their Megaways reel engine! Nik Robinson, CEO of BTG, and his team of industry leaders in innovation in online gaming produced a ground-breaking video slot with never seen before mechanics! Bonanza was its name and it was an instant hit! Their flagship slot machine was the very first 6-reel engine to boast a host of features that could literally produce wins that were out of this world! It’s 6-reels with varying symbols and pays offer the potential to win as much as 10,000x your winnings – not your stake, on as many as 117,649 win lines!
With its gold mining theme, symbols appear in the form of rocks and those rocks need obliterating if you’re to stand any chance of winning big! Dynamite can Aprea on any spin to help blast you to new winning heights, there are gemstones to benefit from along the way, but to get your hands on that gold, you need to land the free spins feature. The letters G, O, L and D will award a set number of free games with an increasing multiplier – this is the key to winning big. After each winning cascade, the symbols that created the win will be removed from the gaming area with new ones falling into place. A consecutive multiplier is applied on each win – as long as you keep on winning, that multiplier increases! Only, the multiplier is not applied to your bet, but applied to the win!
Due to the popularity of the Megaways reel engine, BTG decided to lease it out to rival software companies and as a result, we’re seeing more and more Megaways slots appearing on the market.
What Do 6 Reel Slots Have in Common?
Megaways 6-reel slots may look different in terms of themes and pays, but they all have a few things in common – the number of ways to win and how much you can win! The 6-reel, 117,649 ways to win engine come as standard so does the 10,000x maximum multiplier (or £250K max winnings!), but just because it bears the ‘Megaways’ mechanic, doesn’t mean you’re able to benefit from cascading symbols nor are you able to buy-in to the free games feature! Buy-in? What’s that? Many operators offer a facility whereby players can choose to bypass the long slog between bonus features by paying a one-off fee of 100x their stake to head straight to the action! However, just because you’re buying into a feature, doesn’t mean you’re guaranteed wins!
Each title has been developed with the mobile gamer in mind; from smartphones to tablets, you’re able to play. However, you are required to rotate your device to landscape mode more often than not and this could throw up a few problems. If you’re the proud owner of a smartphone from Apple, you may find that your screen cannot cope with your demands! Does your mobile bear the floating menu bar to the lower of the screen? If so, when rotated, this little line can become a big problem when it comes to spinning those reels, but that’s only if you manage to get beyond the ‘swipe up to play’ prompt!
Additional 6 Reel Slot Features
You can expect five things from a Megaways 6 reel slot; fun, a maximum win of 10,000x (or £250K, whichever is greater!), a free games element, an increasing multiplier and as many as 7 symbols on a reel! The majority of slot machines in this specific category offer cascading symbols (reels) too, which delivers ultimate thrills for any level of bet. When a win is triggered, all symbols that formed the win will be removed from the reels, which we already know, but there’s the potential to land win after win after win through this unique mechanism and this alone is the key to huge wins via free spins.
Free spins are typically tough to encounter. Once triggered, the consecutive win multiplier kicks in. On every winning cascade, the multiplier increases by 1x and doesn’t reset! Let’s say you have 10 free spins and on spin one, you hit three wins. That’s a multiplier of 3x carried over to the next win. Depending on the software provider behind the game, there could be opportunities to re-trigger the free spins, which help you to land a mega multiplier.
Popular 6 Reel Slot Machines
Ted Megaways
Everyone’s foul-mouthed loveable bear is back and he’s leaving the recording studios behind in favour of some downtime. Join Ted and his friends on an adventure filled with ‘high’s’ and exceptional thrills as he embarks on a journey to bring you mega wins with the help of one or two familiar faces. In between his little anecdotes and funny quips, Ted may decide to leap into action and pump those reels with up to 100 mystery symbols – the more that land, the greater your chance of winning big! The tunes may be cheesy, but the features are anything but; cascading reel engine, free spins with upgraded Megaways, unlimited win multiplier and a gamble bonus option are all waiting to be discovered in the 2020 release by Blueprint Gaming.
Beetlejuice Megaways
It was a big year for Megaways (and Blueprint Gaming) in 2020 with Beetlejuice joining the ever-growing list of Megaways titles sometime after Easter. Based on the popular, somewhat dark movie sees iconic characters coming to life on a 6-reel engine, only this time, the number of ways to win can be as much as 248,832! A spine-tingling soundtrack plays out and the star of the movie (Beetlejuice) is waiting to take you down the rabbit hole of riches, which is achieved on a single winning combination! Spin in a win and watch as the curtain lifts to reveal even more ways to win. Edge of your seat thrills intensify when four-game logo symbols appear – this then sees you awarded the free games feature with an increasing multiplier!
Atlantis Megaways
Relax Gaming and Reel Play teamed up in 2020 to deliver Atlantis Megaways, ancient Greek mythology-themed slot packed with base game wins, cascading symbols and big wins, only unlike traditional Megaways slots, this one offers no free spins and no multipliers! There’s more to this release than meets the eye, that’s for sure! Set in an ocean-submerged city comes hidden treasures, aquatic wildlife and a ruler of the ocean – Poseidon who has the potential to award multiple big wins in a single spin!
The bonus game is a re-spin and Win feature which activates on the presence of 6 or more treasure chests packed with cash. All treasure chest symbols will remain locked in place while the remaining reels spin. Three re-spins are granted, and should you be lucky enough to spin in more treasure chest symbols, the re-spin meter resets to 3. The feature ends when you either have a reel engine full of treasure chests or you have no more re-spins remaining. All chest values are added together and awarded. If a sapphire, ruby, white or golden pearl appears in any of those chests, you will win an instant multiplier prize of 10x, 50x, 250x or 2000x respectively!
Fishin’ Frenzy Megaways
In 2014, Reel Time Gaming released the fun-filled Fishin’ Frenzy game where players had to try their hand at a spot of fishing in order to win big. Some five-years later, Blueprint Gaming reinvented and re-released the popular slot with a Megaways reel engine and a superb bonus game! The 6-reel engine offers 15,625 ways to win per spin as well as a free spin and Win feature. The bonus is triggered by the presence of three or more fishing boats where as many as 50 free games are awarded. During the feature, if the angler appears, he will cast his line and reel in those fish for additional wins – up to 50x per fish!
Gonzo’s Quest Megaways
It only took seven years, but NetEnt gave in to player demand and released a sequel to Gonzo’s Quest – Gonzo’s Quest Megaways! The infamous 6-reel engine saw the Spanish explorer still hunting for the elusive lost treasures of El Dorado only this time, players could benefit from increasing base game multipliers as well as cascading symbols, mystery symbols, free spins and an epic maximum win multiplier!
Reel King Megaways
Back in 2014, Greentube (Novomatic) released Reel King; a regal slot machine packed with princely riches. Due to the popularity of this title, many software developers tried their hand at releasing something similar, including inspired Gaming who in 2020 released Reel King Megaways with its cascading symbols, multipliers, free spins, gamble bonus and mini slot machine bonus! Turn the reels to gold or land either 6, 7 or 8 consecutive wins to trigger the bonus.
Mini slot machines will appear across the reels and spin to accumulate winnings. Each time the mini slot reels turn to gold; the crown will edge a step closer to those free spins. Once triggered, you’ll be awarded a set number of free games (according to the position of the crown) along with an increasing multiplier on winnings! If you can’t quite manage to land on the free spins trail, you have the option of gambling half your winnings for a shot at free spins.
Rainbow Riches Megaways
The Rainbow Riches slot has become a firm favourite at land-based and online casinos, whose mascot – the jolly leprechaun, has the potential to unleash huge prizes through a series of bonus features. Rainbow Riches Megaways by Barcrest landed in 2019 ditches the much-loved wishing well, pots of gold and road to riches bonus in favour of free spins with that increasing multiplier, only getting your hands on the free games is easier said than done! The base game offers cascading symbols, wilds and mystery symbols, but only those four golden pots can award a multiplier of up to 10,000x!
Two more six reel games reviewed here
Every game above is a Megaways title, which is where most six reel slots come
from, but not all of them do.
Bonus Island is Inspired Gaming’s pirate game, and it runs
six cascading reels with 15,625 ways to win on every spin. In place of the usual
buried treasure it uses a mystery boost mechanic, and stringing wins together is
what puts you on the bonus board.
Aztec Gold Megaways does belong to the family above.
It is iSoftBet’s Megaways game, with the full 117,649 ways per spin, three pre-set
jackpots behind the golden discs, and a re-spin round that can reach 19,200 times
your stake.
How Do You Win a 6 Reel Slot Jackpot?
The jackpot is not one by spinning in a 6-of-a-kind combination, although the highest paying symbols do have a helping hand in awarding the maximum win. Free spins are how you win the biggest of cash and you’ll need to keep on spinning and spinning until that consecutive win multiplier reaches its maximum of 10,000x! Although the chances of this happening are extremely slim, the potential is there!
Any 6 Reel Slots with Progressive Jackpots?
You may be surprised but yes! Red Tiger Gaming offers a handful of titles with an additional jackpot element – a progressive jackpot and to win, you simply need to land the three jackpot symbols anywhere on the reels! Dragon Fire Megaways is just one of the most popular games played and it also offers an increasing multiplier in the base game as well as the free spins round, only, as soon as the wins stop during the base game, the multiplier resets!
In the summer of 2020, Blueprint Gaming took one of their most popular slots and slapped a huge progressive jackpot bonus into its 6-reel, 117,649 ways to win reel engine, delivering even more thrills and ways to win! Buffalo Rising Megaways was first released back in 2018 and two years later, it became the very first Megaways slot to become part of the Jackpot King network, where three additional jackpots can be won randomly on any spin! If players witness the reels turn red with golden crowns, they could be a few moments away from landing a life-changing win!
