Goldilocks

It’s not often that we see developers go back to clean up an old title to bring it to the modern day, but Quickspin rather pleasantly surprised us when they said they were going to go back and give Goldilocks a small face-lift and bring it onto HTML5 to make it run smoother and better than before. As such, that release date up there should probably say rerelease date, but it sticks true to how the old title used to play. Wilds that increase your multipliers, a free spins bonus that allows the three bears to transform into Wilds, and a whole lot of mischief with our golden haired menace.

We can oftentimes complain that some developers are trying to cram in as many shiny things as possible rather than make their slots fun, but we’re more than willing to admit Goldilocks was in dire need of one. Just looking between the two shows the minor update was well worth the effort. The bears no longer seem to be soulless husks staring into your soul waiting for a chance to deprive you of it, and the girl doesn’t look like a spoon wielding psychopath anymore. The fact they went through the effort to update these certainly won them a few points from us.

Meanwhile, the gameplay front has changed remarkably little. Like the last time around, special features are king, with normal spins being boring and full of no wins or really minor ones. A major departure is the fact you can no longer adjust how many active paylines you have. Instead, you’re locked to 25 active paylines at all times in the new version, which doesn’t bother us that much. After all, less paylines active means you’re effectively hampering yourself, but gamblers who like that choice will no doubt be disappointed.

Thanks to free spins and Wild multipliers, Goldilocks and the Wild Bears was balanced from the get go to assume some players will undoubtedly get lucky and chain a few of these together. As such, it’s clear to glance through the paytable and find it really isn’t particularly exciting. Instead, the real fun comes when the multipliers get involved that can boost your winnings, or during the free spins round where you can unlock the bear symbols to become Wilds as well. As such, the game does require a bit of time until a win rolls in, but once it does, you’re usually good enough to at least get your money back, if not go above to score a sizeable win.

As it’s based around the old fairytale, it has all the elements you would expect. Some boring poker card symbols are thrown in as filler, but alongside them you have a ragged bear doll, the three bears, the little girl that sneaks into their house that acts like Scatter and two different Wilds. One Wild is a house and acts like a regular Wild, awarding a cash win. The second is a bowl of honey, and instead of cash, it rewards a multiplier, from 2x to a 4x increase depending on how many you can find.

Beyond multiplier Wilds, you also have free spins that require 3 Scatters before giving you 10 extra turns. On top of this, it also unlocks a counter that keeps track of how many times the little girl appears again. With enough unlocks, you can get the bears to become Wilds one at a time and for the second and third unlock you also get some more free spins.