Introduction to Wizards of Wild Wood
Wizards of Wild Wood is a casino slot from DreamSpin, and the third release in this aspiring provider's portfolio. Following the interstellar colonising dreams of bees in Buzz Thrill and vengeful fruit in Smash Street Wilds, we now travel to a fantasy realm permeated with magic woven by powerful spellcasters. Wild Wood seems like a place to which mages retreat in order to replenish their mana, rest, and prepare for the hardships of the next adventure. This time, we'll meet just one representative of the mysterious community on his well-deserved R&R, during which he likes to test his new enchantments on a 7x7 grid equipped with a cluster-pays mechanism. Alchemy is his speciality, so you can expect some spectacular mixtures to emerge from steaming cauldrons and spill exciting features onto the board. Moreover, randomly increasing multipliers in individual positions will provide further help in gathering lucrative wins, so let's step into the Wild Wood and feel the true power of magic.
If you don't yet feel proficient in using spellbound tomes and enchanted staves, you can practice your wizardry in the demo mode available at the top of this page.
Theme, Gameplay & Payouts
Wizards of Wild Wood is a video slot from DreamSpin with 7 reels, 7 rows, and a cluster-pays system that requires 5+ matching symbols to land horizontally and/or vertically adjacent. In the bet selection panel, you can set your active stake, choosing from a Min.bet of 0.2 up to a Max.bet of 25. The game's default RTP of 94.00% is quite far below the industry standard that oscillates around 96.00% - 96.50%, so keep in mind that average long-term returns may be lower. Wins might be less frequent but more valuable due to high volatility, while the top prize from a single spin may reach 250,000 EUR/USD/GBP or an equivalent in the respective currency.
Wild Wood is a pleasant place, inhabited by odd creatures, filled with omnipresent runestones and set amidst picturesque natural landscapes. Open spaces, fresh air, and the company of animals are surely essential components to recharge and regenerate, so everything fits the picture. The friendly wizard welcomes us in front of his modest yet undoubtedly cosy domicile, proudly presenting the playing grid in the middle of a cobbled path leading to the hut. The host himself will keep us company throughout the gameplay, standing watchfully next to the panel and ensuring that the magic flows in the right direction. If you're ready to start casting spells, you can launch the game on any modern device, whether you prefer to play on a desktop, a smartphone, or a tablet.
In the paytable, you'll find regular symbols split into two categories. Regardless of the hierarchy, to achieve a win, you'll need to connect at least 5 matching ones into a cluster by landing them horizontally and/or vertically adjacent. The low-paying icons are represented by four runestones in different colours: yellow, green, blue, and red, which award 8x the bet for matching 20 or more in a cluster. A wolf, a frog, a bat, and a mushroom represent the high-paying symbols, which bring payouts of between 15x and 25x the bet when you form a cluster containing 20+ instances. In addition, there are Wilds represented by a golden letter 'W', Scatters in the form of a group of crystals, and four Cauldrons in different colours.
Special Features & Slot Mechanics
What is the max win in the slot Wizards of Wild Wood?
You can win up to 250,000 EUR/USD/GBP.
What features are available in the slot Wizards of Wild Wood?
The features are Cascading, Cell Multipliers & Wizard Enhance, Modifiers, Free Spins, and Ante Bet.
Cascading
The cascading feature comes into play each time you hit a winning combination. This is followed by the winning symbols being removed from the grid, causing all the remaining ones to drop to vacant positions. New icons then come down from the top to take their place and complete the view. This process continues until no new wins can be created.
Cell Multipliers & Wizard Enhance
At the beginning of every spin, random positions on the grid may receive a multiplier increase. The total number of boosts is 3, and it can be applied to different cells as well as a single one. The increase occurs in a specific order of values, following the range of 2x, x3, x5, x10, or x25. In addition to the random increase, the Wizard may also randomly empower certain multipliers. Any winning cluster covering positions with active multipliers will have its payout multiplied accordingly. If more than one multiplier is included, their values are added together before being applied to the final win.
Modifiers
Magic Cauldrons appear in 4 different types, each in a different colour. Whenever a Cauldron lands, it transforms into a Wild and it's collected on the side of the board. Once all cascades are finished, Cauldrons trigger their respective modifiers in the order they were collected.
Magnet (blue) = chooses a random symbol from the board and attracts all its instances into one area to form a cluster. Then, it removes all remaining symbols, drops the formed combination to the bottom of the grid and populates the grid with a new set of symbols.
Alteration (purple) = changes all instances of a randomly selected symbol into another type.
Add Wilds (yellow) = adds up to 5 Wilds in random positions.
Guaranteed Win (red) = a cluster of at least 5 matching symbols is formed in the random area on the grid.
Free Spins
Ending up with at least 3 Scatters at the end of a spin activates the bonus round with 10 free spins and an additional one for every Scatter beyond the initial 3 in the triggering sequence. Each spin guarantees 3 or more positions to have their multipliers increase, and all values remain persistent until the end of the round. Every Scatter scored during the bonus awards 1 extra spin.
Ante Bet
For a 50% increase in the active stake, you can activate the DreamBet, which boosts the chances of triggering the bonus round.
Final Thoughts on Wizards of Wild Wood
The name Wild Wood sounded somewhat familiar when we first approached the game, and a quick memory scan brought to mind The Wildwood Curse slot by Hacksaw Gaming. However, the association is purely verbal, as Wizards of Wild Wood is nowhere near a horror theme and focuses primarily on the mystery of magic. That said, it's a well-done setting, showing a lot of quality behind the polished, cartoony artwork that competently dresses up the game. And while the content itself may not be utterly original, with an orthodox wizard guarding the reels and a few runestones and woodland creatures making up the symbol hierarchy, the scene feels welcoming. On the whole, it's the kind of game that won't make your jaw drop with any unexpected curveballs, but it will also not irritate with the impression of being unfinished or improperly synced. It's a calm, magical journey that flows at its own pace and lets everyone join in at any given moment.
When you come across a slot with a large, symmetrical grid, a cluster-pays win evaluation, and a bunch of modifiers that randomly trigger throughout the gameplay, it's hard to shake the feeling that you've seen it before. Since Reactoonz by Play'n GO, this has been a go-to format for numerous titles and Wizards of the Wild Wood follows suit. Granted, you don't need to fill up the meter for the Cauldrons to appear and trigger their features, which may feel like a difference on the front end, but ultimately boils down to a similar experience once the features go off. To shake things up a bit, the Dreamspin team has included position multipliers, a feature massively popularised by Pragmatic Play and its Sugar Rush release. However, it's slightly modified here, not relying on wins occurring on the grid but on random increases. Also, the cap per position is relatively timid, tapping out at 25x. Needless to say, the bonus round keeps all the base game mechanics present but additionally turns all the multipliers persistent. This is where the change in the increase method impacts the gameplay the most (positively) given the guaranteed growth on each spin, even if the increments are lower than in the classic format. Altogether, we can see the effort from the studio to deliver something different, but ultimately, it's hard to assess if those changes will make players perceive this release as an original product. Plus, the generic fantasy theme doesn't help the whole thing stand out more despite the respectable design quality.
Wizards of Wild Wood is a composition of familiar mechanics with a few tweaks to diversify the experience set in a pleasant, magical world.
