Sakura Fortune

Kick-ass female warriors, a far-away oriental culture and a chance at untold riches beyond our wildest dreams? Sign us up for the Quickspin release Sakura Fortune, a 5-reel 40-payline slot that rather clearly seems to be pandering to the Japanese market. We came into this with high hopes. With the special features being as they are, we hoped it would be similar to Black Knight 2 by WMS, and we were pleasantly surprised to find that it did end up playing quite like it, earning a lot of points in our book for that. Then again, it does seem that the developers were keen to make sure this game succeeded.

You don’t need to look much further than the graphics, which seem to have gotten a slight facelift compared to what Quickspin usually puts out. The female warrior’s animations are fantastic and smooth, though sadly the rest of the reels don’t have much in animations to accentuate them. Regardless, the whole thing looks fabulous and the feel of playing the slot is amazing.

And while part of that is no doubt the great graphics, we also can’t deny that the gameplay is damn fun. Sakura Fortune rolls Scatters and Wilds into a stacked symbol that can be snapped up onto the reels fully when a special feature pops up or one of the re-spins nudges it back up into place. With only free spins and re-spins being around as bonuses, you would think the game would get boring after a while, but it’s still fun trying to hear the sweet sound of a sword being unsheathed, knowing it is time for another round of bonuses.

You’ll quickly find that both of the special features can be a volatile affair to pursue. Quickspin’s newest release seems inclined to follow the philosophy of big win or miniscule win, with very little in between. When luck was on our side, we were hauling home awesome scores that sat from 50x to 70x our stake. Meanwhile, sometimes re-spins would give us next to nothing at all, and one time we went 7 free spins with just a single win that didn’t even amount to a 10x win! Outside of bonuses, the wins are small and scarce, so you better hope one of those free spins brings home the bacon.

With the theme being the oriental culture of Japan, it’s no surprise to find that the symbols also reflect this. You have several intricately detailed coins that are the smallest wins on the paytable, a pair of statues and some Japanese men and women who are supposed to be evil emperors that Sakura, our sword-wielding Wild is supposed to fight against. We would have liked to see some animations on the human characters at least, but none appeared, sadly.

When two full stacked Wilds appear next to one another, they activate two re-spins. If additional full stacked Wilds appear, they add on an additional re-spin, but at that point, if you get three Wilds, you’re guaranteed to activate the free spins. The Wilds also stick during the re-spins, so you could potentially be lucky enough to have five full stacked Wilds up at once.

With three or more Wild Scatters up, you also activate the free spins. While it officially is supposed to trigger between 5 to 10 extra turns, it also awarded 7 for us, with one or two additional popping up when a full stacked Wild appears on the reels. Much like during the re-spins, the Wilds stay in the same position until the bonus is over.