Great Blue is a high-variance online pokie from the famous game provider Playtech.
Many people know Playtech from the (now discontinued) series of Marvel slots (Spiderman, The Fantastic Four, The Avengers) and the successor, the Age of the Gods series. But in the UK two more pokies are unprecedentedly popular: Great Blue and White King. The theme of Great Blue is the deep blue ocean, with an immense giant Orca in the lead.
Great Blue is mainly played by the real thrillseekers: this video pokie can be incredibly ruthless and hardly give anything. But just when you want to throw the mouse right to your computer monitor, you get a bonus round that pays 2,000 times your bet. Or even more.
With the stacked wilds, free spins, and multipliers that can go up to 15 x, the possibilities are almost endless.
Graphically Moderate, but with Unprecedented Possibilities
Of course, it doesn't all look that graphically. Great Blue was released in 2013 but has a hint of the 2000s hanging around it. And the jerky way in which the symbols stop after every spin is not really evidence of impressive programming.
But the great power of Great Blue is not in the fancy artwork. You can win big prizes with this pokie, up to 150,000 coins per winning combination.
That's what this Great Blue from Playtech is all about.
How Does It All Work?
The basic game of Great Blue is pretty straightforward. There are 5 reels with 3 symbols per reel and 25 fixed paylines. The betting range is between 0.25 and 12.50 dollars per spin.
The payment percentage is quite high: 96.02%. Certainly, if you compare it with other Playtech slots, which often pay out around 94% - 95%.
The symbols consist of a mix of all sorts of sea residents and the ever-present card symbols.
Among others, we see fish, turtles, seahorses and grey sharks, all drawn in a cartoon style. The Orca is the most important symbol of all: it is wild and replaces all symbols except the oyster. The Orca symbol is wild, and it is also stacked, and that can come in very handy, especially in the bonus round. And to top it all off, every winning combination with a wild in it is doubled. 5 wilds on an active payline pay out a cool 10,000 coins.
The turtles and sharks are the most worthy of the premium symbols: they both pay 750 coins for a 5-of-a-kind. The other premium symbols are good for 250 to 400 coins with the same 5, and the card symbols 9, 10, B, Q, K and A pay out 100 to 150 coins.
Free Spins Bonus: Grab 33 Spins with a 15 x Multiplier
Do you roll 3 or more scattered oysters on the reels? Then you have earned the free spins bonus. And that is, as they say, when the magic happens.
You always start the free spins bonus with 8 free spins and a 2 x multiplier. But you always get some extras. To determine how tasty those extras are, you can open 2 of the 5 seashells on the screen.
Extra free spins and extra multipliers are hidden in these seashells. The highest number of extra spins that you can choose is 25, and the highest extra multiplier is 13 x. So in the very best scenario, you can win 33 free spins with a 15 x (!) multiplier, a15 x multiplier, on all your free spins. If you now manage to get 5 wilds in a row, you can add 15 x 10,000 = 150,000 coins to your balance!
Unlimited Retriggers
You can retrigger the free spins unlimited in Great Blue, keeping the number of free spins and the multipliers intact. So if you have 33 free spins with the maximum 15 x multiplier, you will get this one more time with a retrigger.
What Do We Think of Great Blue?
Despite the moderate graphics, Great Blue is a real hit from Playtech. You actually play Great Blue for the bonus rounds - due to the almost unlimited potential. Thus game causes an adrenaline rush that we do not often experience with other online pokies.
4 out of 5 stars.
