Magic Boxes Slot Machine
Set in a Victorian-style theatre, Magic Boxes is another enchanting slot from Microgaming that sees players spin for a top prize of 50,000 coins by matching symbols over 5 reels and 25 fixed paylines.
The game featured a slightly confusing theme that is half focused on a magician and his on-stage equipment and half concerned with the old-timey toys that you might find in the boxes that are alluded to in its title, but don’t let that discrepancy put you off – the slot features wild symbols, a free spins bonus round and prize multipliers that can all help you on your way to substantial profits.
Tricks of the Trade
Magic Boxes is an incredibly straightforward slot to play as – unlike a lot of other Microgaming titles – the 25 paylines are fixed at all times. This means players need only concern themselves with how much they bet each spin, with coin amounts ranging from €0.01 to €4 on each of the slot’s paylines.
As such, Magic Boxes can be played for between €4 and €100 each turn, making it the ideal game for those on low-to-medium bankrolls. For their investment, players will have the chance of chasing a top prize of 100x their line bet or matching five of the game’s jackpot icons, while a host of smaller prize payouts are also available for any three-of-a-kind combination that appears on a valid payline.
Additional winnings can also be secured by matching three or more magic eight-ball scatter symbols anywhere on the gameboard, with this combination also rewarding players with between eight and 24 free spins. All winnings can be gambled in a handy double-up feature at the end of each game, but should players pick incorrectly during this bonus picking round, they’ll forfeit their entire prize.
Smoke and Mirrors
As mentioned above, we’re not convinced the designers of Magic Boxes were particularly set on any one specific theme when they chose the slot’s range of unique symbols. On the one hand, the game features playing cards, a magician’s hat and three brightly coloured boxes, but on the other a number of toys including wooden trains, spinning tops and magic eight-balls also jostle for attention.
Sadly, like a lot of other Microgaming slots, the minor symbols in Magic Boxes are comprised of the standard Ace-through-Nine numerical icons, but as a deck of cards is a pretty standard component of any serious magician’s arsenal, this is at least somewhat consistent with the game’s overall theme.
In terms of sounds and animations, winning combinations in Magic Boxes are greeted with a short graphical sequence that is unique to each symbol, while a range of mysterious audio effects help build the atmosphere in what would otherwise be a fairly uninspiring slot to look at and listen to.
What’s in the box?
In terms of features there is only one bonus round in Magic Boxes, but it can be a pretty generous one thanks to the presence of multiplier wilds. Activated whenever three or more eight-ball symbols appear anywhere on the reels, players will receive 8, 16 or 24 free spins as the feature gets started.
During these bonus games, the magic box wild symbols that feature in the base game will become multiplier wilds, with a red box doubling your prize when it features in a winning combination, the green box tripling it and the blue box quadrupling it. If more than one coloured box features during a spin, it will always be upgraded to the most valuable multiplier, resulting in some pretty tidy returns.
As in the base game, at the end of the free spins feature players can choose to gamble their winnings in Magic Boxes’ double-up feature. Here, they’ll have to pick whether the colour of a random playing card will be red or black, with the first correct answers doubling your prize and the second quadrupling it. A wrong answer, meanwhile, will return you to the base game with nothing.
Boxing clever?
All things considered, Magic Boxes is an enjoyable slot with a bonus round that offers players the potential to take home some decent winnings. Though the game’s theme seems a little confusing at first, it is an incredibly simple title to get to grips with and casual gamers will be drawn to its pick-up-and-play appeal and the fact that all winnings can be gambled for even greater prize payouts.
