Winning Wolf Pokie Machine
Australian pokie developer Ainsworth seem to specialise in games themed around American wildlife, and who can blame them, as it brings images from dramatic charging bulls and soaring eagles, to cute squirrels and chipmunks to the reels.
Winning Wolf has quite an assortment of creatures turning up, with a moose, owl, buffalo and that squirrel, all forming winning combinations, helped by the wild wolf symbol. Although there’s just a single bonus feature, the wolf can be of even more use throughout, as he slowly fills up the game to bring in win after win, although even in the base game there’s lots of potential to get rewarded.
Playing Winning Wolf
This pokie is laid out in a traditional format, with 5 reels, symbols in 3 rows and 100 paylines running through them. With so many lines in play, landing 3, 4 or 5 of the same symbol type across the reels should be a fairly frequent occurrence and in practice it’s common to get multiple wins in a single spin. The resulting payouts might be of a relatively low value, but it beats sitting around for ages waiting for a winning spin.
A good bet range sees the minimum wager set at just 0.01, or 1.00 to activate all lines, while the most that can be staked on a single spin is 75.00. The only other thing players need to decide is whether to set the reels spinning on Autoplay for up to 100 times, or click each spin themselves.
Reels are shown against a chilly-looking backdrop of frozen hills, typical of the images that Ainsworth like to use on their wildlife-themed games and quite effective at setting the scene.
Something else Ainsworth like to do across their range is have the playing card symbols 9 through to A as the lower value icons and get them to pay out at similar rates. Each is worth 5x the amount staked per line when 3 land across the reels, and 100x when a full line of 5 appears, but the rewards for getting 4 matching card symbols varies from 10x to 50x.
The pictures of animals are worth more, topped by an eagle who pays out 50x, 100x or 1000x the line bet when it lands on 3, 4 or 5 reels across a line, but with all symbols,these values only apply to the base game, as unfortunately, they are worth less in the bonus round, compensating for the extra wins possible during the free spins.
Winning Wolf
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Bonus Features
The wolf will substitute for any of these symbols and can therefore create winning combinations by completing lines. He can also extend a line of 3 matching symbols into a line of 4 or 5 for bigger payouts, although because the wild isn’t on the first 2 reels during normal play, it can’t create a line on its own.
A nice picture of a mountain with the Northern Lights shimmering above it is the scatter symbols for this game, treating players to not just a nice view, but also prizes of 2x, 10x or 100x their total stake per spin when 3, 4 or 5 appear in any positions.
The scatter will also start 8 free games, although should 3 or more scatter appear in a free spin, a further 5 will be added to the end of any still left to play out.
Although the value of individual symbols is reduced, to make up for this, players should be able to complete more winning lines, as the wild wolf symbol now appears on reels 2, 3 and 4, and becomes sticky, meaning that whenever it appears it will stay around for the rest of the free spins.
By the end of the 8 spins, players could see multiple wild symbols on the reels, making up lots of winning lines, and anyone lucky enough to get several wilds in the first couple of spins should see their casino account balance getting filled very nicely.
The Verdict
It may look similar to many other pokies, but Winning Wolf has enough about it to stand out a little. Not that it’s a complicated game, far from it, and that’s part of the appeal, as straightforward gameplay with just a couple of bonus symbols and a single bonus round is just what many people are looking for.
It’s got a popular, if somewhat over-used theme, along with highly realistic and appealing picture symbols, and by having 100 lines across the reels, it’s easy to get regular winning spins.
Perhaps it’s a shame that symbols are worth less in the bonus game, but this is the only real drawback on what is, overall, a pretty decent pokie.