Fruit Mania Slot Machine
Retro slot games are more popular than ever nowadays, as more and more players want game that they can start playing fast and that pay well at the same time.
Fruit Mania by Gamomat (formerly Bally Wulff) is yet another addition to this game family. You can expect familiar casino reel symbols, simple commands and a straightforward gameplay all bundled together in a tiny little package that should be accessible to any player.
If you feel like getting to know the game a little bit more before starting up the reels, read our full review of Fruit Mania and you will know all there is to know about this slot game.
Simple and Clean
As promised, Fruit Mania looks and feels like the archetypal retro game that most players are already familiar with. Forget about complex animations and sound effects here, the Gamomat team has kept things extremely simple.
An almost uniform orange background is all it takes to set the mood, with a regular reel set enclosed in a rectangular, dark frame. The symbols have been redesigned to give off a more modern feeling, but otherwise Fruit Mania is as retro as it gets.
Add vintage sound effects on top and you will feel like you are sitting in your favourite land-based casino, facing your lucky machine. No real immersion there, but hard-core will be dying to start spinning the reels at that point, so let’s see how that can be done in the next section.
A Couple of Clicks is all it Takes
Fruit Mania follows the standard Gamomat gameplay, that is to say a simple and straightforward set of rules that allow players to customise their settings and little before getting started.
The matrix is a common 5-reel 5-payline setup, with three symbol positions per reel. Players need to land winning combinations of symbols on any of the paylines to win the corresponding cash prize. Use the (+) and (-) buttons below the reels to adjust your wager, or click the max bet shortcut to go all-in, while keeping in mind that bigger bets also mean bigger rewards. Hit start when you are ready and hope for big wins in the near future. Each win gives you the option to play one of the two optional mini games. The first one is a double-or-nothing challenge where guessing the colour of a card double your win, and the second is a more complex ladder-based game that can increase your reward exponentially. Play wisely, as wrong choices can cancel all your progress.
You might also want to skip the settings and mini games altogether to concentrate on the spins. In such case, simply activate the autostart game mode and Fruit Mania will take care of spinning the reels on its own, with your settings saved.
Most Iconic Paytable Ever
In terms of reel symbols, Fruit Mania sticks to the very basics of the genre and only offers a small selection of classic icons.
It all starts with cherries, lemons and oranges. These first few fruits are the most common in the game, especially the cherries, and their rewards are the lowest at the same time. You will need plenty of combinations to reach decent rewards with them.
It will take significantly less time with watermelon, grape, bell and red seven combinations. Although a little less common, these symbols are enough to make you richer within seconds. Keep your eyes open especially for the red sevens, as a five-of-a-kind combination with them is worth no less than 500 times your original bet.
Perfect for Some Fruity Fun
Fruit Mania is your textbook vintage slot game. The developers at Bally Wulff put just what was necessary in it so that it could qualify as a slot game, and nothing more. For beginner players, Fruit Mania could be the perfect gateway to the broader and infinitely richer world of online slot games. No need to worry about complex rules and other technicalities, this game has just the basics.
Whether you consider this a strength or not depends entirely on what you are looking for in a slot game. Most players will regret the total absence of classic bonus features such as wilds and scatters, which could certainly have been added without necessarily turning Fruit Mania into a nightmare for total beginners. A progressive jackpot would also have been an easy add-on that would have risen the stakes much higher than they actually are with the current game configuration.
