Buffalo King Megaways — Game Details

A Megaways conversion whose sharpest rule opens the bonus

Buffalo King Megaways is a conversion, not an invention. Pragmatic Play took the original Buffalo King and rebuilt it on the six-reel tumbling Megaways frame that also carries Great Rhino Megaways, another wildlife game built on Megaways and tumbling wins. 5 Lions Megaways, from the same stable, pairs multiplier Wilds with a selectable bonus; this game shares the multiplier Wilds but offers one Free Game and nothing to choose between. I find the most distinctive thing here is not the free spins but the moment that opens them. A trigger that pays 5×, 20× or 100× the stake before the first free spin is a sound piece of design. The round that follows is ordinary, because its multipliers are spent on the tumble where they land and its retriggers add length five spins at a time. That split, a sharp trigger in front of a plain round, is why the game sits at 6.2 and no higher.

Base-game spins exist to find Bonus symbols

The base game is tumbling ways and little else. A winning combination is removed, new symbols fall into the gaps, and the same wager gets another chance across up to 200,704 ways. Multiplier Wilds are a Free Game rule, so between triggers the tumble wins of a base-game spin pay at face value.

That puts most of the interest of a base-game spin on whether four or more Bonus symbols arrive, and this is where the game does its best work. The trigger pays its own scatter award: 5× the stake for four, 20× for five, 100× for six. The ladder climbs by a factor of four and then a factor of five, so a six-symbol trigger pays twenty times what a four-symbol trigger pays. Even the smallest natural trigger banks 5× before the round begins, which means a Free Game reached from the base game never starts from zero. A naturally triggered round that goes on to pay little still has its opening award behind it, and the top rung is an award with real weight of its own: 100× for six Bonus symbols is the same figure the game charges to buy the round.

I rate that highly. It turns the trigger into a payout rather than a doorway, and it scales the payout with how emphatic the trigger is.

The Free Game multipliers are spent where they land

Every Wild in the Free Game carries a 2×, 3× or 5× multiplier. When several Wilds sit on the same tumble their values accumulate, and the total is applied to that tumble's win. Two consequences follow from that rule.

The first works in the player's favour. The smallest value is 2×, so any Free Game win that includes a Wild is at least doubled.

The second is the one that holds the round back. The single highest value is 5×, so anything above 5× on a tumble needs a second Wild on that same tumble. The multiplier on a tumble is built from the Wilds counted on that tumble and nothing earlier: a tumble that gathers three Wilds pays its boosted win, and the board it built does not carry into the next tumble or the next spin. A multiplier that climbs through a round turns length into value, because each spin of a long round starts from a higher figure than the last. Here the last spin of a long Free Game works under exactly the same 2×, 3× and 5× rules as the first. Length adds more chances at the same values, not bigger values.

Five spins is a thin reward for a retrigger

Retriggers are where the rules try to compensate. Three or more Bonus symbols during the Free Game add five spins, one symbol fewer than the base game needs to open the round, and there is no limit on how many times that can happen.

Five is a small top-up. Against the 12-spin low end of the opening award it adds a little over two fifths; against the 22-spin top end it adds under a quarter. The entire spread between the smallest and largest opening award is ten spins, which is exactly two retriggers' worth. A retrigger adds the same five spins however many Bonus symbols land beyond the three it needs, so an emphatic retrigger is paid the same as a bare one. That is the reverse of the base-game trigger, whose award scales with every extra symbol, and it is the least generous rule in the game.

Put beside the multiplier rule, the shape of the round is plain. From spin to spin the only thing that builds is the spin count, it builds in fives, and each added spin carries no advantage over the spins before it. Unlimited retriggers make a long round possible. They do not make it a building one.

The 100× purchase is the wrong way into this game

Where the operator and jurisdiction permit it, the Free Game can be bought for 100× the stake. That is the same figure six Bonus symbols pay as a scatter award on their own, and twenty times what a four-symbol trigger pays. Measured against the opening allowance of 12 to 22 spins, the price comes to between roughly 4.5× and 8.3× the stake per free spin, and that has to come back through tumble wins whose multipliers apply one tumble at a time.

I would not pay it. The part of this feature I rate highest is the natural trigger, which adds 5× to 100× before the spins start. What the purchase buys for certain is entry to the part I rate lowest: Wilds fixed at 2×, 3× and 5× that never carry between tumbles, and retriggers worth five spins. A round that built as it went would give a 100× entry fee something to grow into. This one repeats itself instead.

It suits readers of simple rules, not hunters of a building bonus

The game is a clean read. It has high volatility, one bonus round, one set of multiplier values and one retrigger rule. A player who wants the familiar Megaways tumble loop and a free spins round without extra layers gets exactly that. A player looking for a round that builds across its spins should look elsewhere, and one who wants a say in how the bonus plays will find a selectable bonus in 5 Lions Megaways rather than here.

The rating follows from the split I started with. The trigger award is a good idea, well scaled, and it lifts the game above a bare reskin of the format. The Free Game behind it is competent and unambitious, and the purchase asks 100× for the weaker half of the feature. That is a 6.2: competent, not memorable.