Funky Fruits Slot Machine
There’s no shortage of fruit-themed video slots, and we suspect such a shortage will never manifest itself in the neon-lit world of casinos. Playtech is one software company helping to ensure fruit-based video slots not only remain a mainstay of the market, but flourish as the years go by.
Funky Fruits is a progressive slot played out on a 5x5 grid rather than the customary 5x3 set-up. In Funky Fruits, the same fruit ‘characters’ who made Funky Fruits Farm such a popular title return, and they’re just as god darn funky as ever – though the lemon is still cheesed off by the look of his phizzog.
On average, Funky Fruits is said to pay out a progressive sum once every three months, and the jackpot is usually in the seven figure bracket. Nice!
Chillin’ on the beach
In this lighthearted game, our funky fruit are on the beach. In the background of the wooden board reels, we see the golden foreshore, the ocean and a perfectly blue sky. To the right, occupying an empty glass with a straw, you’ll see the jackpot calculator along with controls for autoplay, bet and win. On the opposite end of the board, there’s an info tab stuck to a surfboard.
Funky Fruits is a feel-good, summery game with slick graphics and pleasing animations. The comically faced symbols include cherries, lemons, oranges, pineapples, plums and watermelons, and the object of the game is to land at least five of one fruit on adjacent reels. You don’t have to land these zany symbols horizontally, either – you can land them vertically, or a mixture of the two. Diagonal doesn’t count, though. When you hit five or more of the same symbols, you’ll win a multiplier of your bet amount, with a higher multiplier given for each extra icon you uncover.
Depending on how much you bet, you’ll be in play for a different percentage of the jackpot. Bet one credit to win 10%, two to win 20%, five to win half and 10 to be in with a chance of winning the whole kit and caboodle.
Regular symbols
The non-jackpot symbols are linked with some truly huge pay-outs once you can land nine, ten, 11 or more symbols. The most generous is the grumpy lemon. Land five for a x7.5 multiplier, six for x12.5, seven for x25 and eight for x50. Thereafter, with each successive lemon you find, the pay-outs jump rather steeply. It’s x100 for nine, x150 for 11, x250 for 13 and a staggering x5,000 for 16+.
Less rewarding is the watermelon, which pays just x2 for ten, x7.5 for 13 and x50 for 16+. Landing 16 or more of the other symbols wins you multipliers such as x100 for plums, x50 for pineapples and x1,000 for oranges. There are no wild or scatter symbols in this game, and nor are there any free spins up for grabs. In fact, the gameplay is rather featureless – although frequent moderate wins are the norm.
Hittin’ the jackpot
Since you’ve still no doubt got that seven-figure jackpot in your mind, I’ll tell you that matching eight or more cherry symbols is what’s needed to claim a portion of it. As stated, you can win the whole thing if you land eight or more cherries while betting 10 credits. There are still some epic cherry wins if you land less than eight, though. If you hit seven, you’ll claim x2,000. Hit six for x500 and five for x50.
Dem fruit so funky
We expected a lot from this slot, so we’re glad that Playtech didn’t, ahem, funk it up. Funky Fruits is a barrel of laughs, with cute, cheery icons that jump out the screen at you. The 5x5 grid creates the potential for frequent pay-outs, even if the eye-popping wins are trickier to come by.
It’s kinda tough comparing Funky Fruits to Funky Fruits Farm. The former has a massive progressive jackpot, which the latter lacks, but Funky Fruits Farm does have free spins and multiplier bonuses. In fact, you can win 33 free spins with a x15 multiplier in the farm-based slot. That said, if those cherries line up just right, you’re talking about life-changing money in this one. We call it a draw. Try it out and see if you agree.
