New Slot Announcement Bonanza by Big Time Gaming

[brianmon]

The thing that no one's been able to adequately explain about Bonanza is if it's been changed, then what aspect of it has been changed, and how? And for what reason?

RTP is the same, 96%, so it's not that.

Feature frequency still appears to be the same old insane 1/460 number, so it's not that.

A couple of months ago someone posted their numbers from long extended periods of play without getting a bonus, and RTP came in at 76%, which is bang on what the base game RTP in Bonanza is known to be. (And if base game RTP is the same, then the RTP allocation for the bonus must be the same as well.)

At that point all we've got is volatility, and they could have messed with either or both of the base game and/or the bonus round, but then we come to the other question, why bother?

I've been reading this thread for years and it seems to me that Bonanza has always been a weird proposition, thanks to that bonkers 1/460 feature frequency and large allocation of RTP to the base game - it's always been capable of weird shit, and it's still doing it today.

I mean, I'm not saying they haven't messed with it, but as per the list above, there's not really much they could have actually messed with!

One reason they might increase the volatility is to (hopefully) get extra deposits.

Low Volatile Bonanza

Deposit £20 and play at 20p, bust out after an hour, maybe a bonus or perhaps no bonus at all.
But you've had an hour's 'entertainment'
'Ah well, better luck tomorrow (or next week or whatever)'


Higher Volotile Bonanza

Deposit £20 and play at 20p, bust out after 15 minutes (which can happen quite regularly these days), No decent wins, no bonus
Only had 15 minutes play...
'Maybe I'll give it another £20'
'Maybe it's saving up for a big win' (yeah I know they don't work like that. But your average punter doesn't)

If you were a slot provider. How would you increase your income and/or decrease your costs

 

[Jono777]

Agree with the above but it is a bit more in depth than that.

Honesty time in that I really can't be bothered to type a lengthy post, however my key point had I done the long post would be that the providers don't worry too much about how to keep the customer happy or get them back 'tomorrow' No - They pray on addiction, vulnerable and those who don't understand the game in full and those who won't or can't say "Enough is Enough"

Provider costs lol, these are miniscule compared to their profits, guarantee BTG made a mint from the Megaways licence alone before we even think about individual slots profits.

 

[pinnit2014]

As Brian mentioned, psychology is a big thing - you lengthen gaps between big wins, you increase the 'chase' feeling - if you think providers don't tweek games to maximise that, then you need your head read.

Ah, but the RTP is achieved regardless:

Given they apparently can chose how many trillion of spins in a simulation...so what?

 

[pinnit2014]

Agree with the above but it is a bit more in depth than that.

Honesty time in that I really can't be bothered to type a lengthy post, however my key point had I done the long post would be that the providers don't worry too much about how to keep the customer happy or get them back 'tomorrow' No - They pray on addiction, vulnerable and those who don't understand the game in full and those who won't or can't say "Enough is Enough"

Provider costs lol, these are miniscule compared to their profits, guarantee BTG made a mint from the Megaways licence alone before we even think about individual slots profits.

Funnily enough the licensing aspect is maybe why they can run with 96% etc and not run lower - licensing is the holy grail of a business: you pass all the risk onto others, get a guaranteed income and have no real development costs

 

[ChopleyIOM]

One reason they might increase the volatility is to (hopefully) get extra deposits.

Low Volatile Bonanza

Deposit £20 and play at 20p, bust out after an hour, maybe a bonus or perhaps no bonus at all.
But you've had an hour's 'entertainment'
'Ah well, better luck tomorrow (or next week or whatever)'


Higher Volotile Bonanza

Deposit £20 and play at 20p, bust out after 15 minutes (which can happen quite regularly these days), No decent wins, no bonus
Only had 15 minutes play...
'Maybe I'll give it another £20'
'Maybe it's saving up for a big win' (yeah I know they don't work like that. But your average punter doesn't)

If you were a slot provider. How would you increase your income and/or decrease your costs

Yes that makes sense, you could absolutely change the volatility profile of a slot to make it more enticing/addictive to players, especially those who are into the 'sunk cost fallacy' space, and I guess you could try and simply take 'all the money' before those players ran away skint. (The NLC bonus buy model, let's get all the money as quickly as we can.)

I've been saying for years that this is the problem with the multi-provider 'shopfront' online casino model, whereby you're not being presented with a single curated experience, as used to happen with Microgaming and the Viper Client casino, so they don't want to 'kill you off' as it were with one big hit, but want you to keep coming back, over time, and lose your money that way. And honestly I was fine with that, I knew what the deal was, I knew I was playing random games with a house edge and I'd lose eventually, but also that Microgaming had a vested interest in keeping me coming back to casinos powered by their software. (Which is also the 3Dice model of course, my eyes are wide open with this, and I'm fine with it, I like to have a gamble, I'm OK with the 'cost' aspect of it, but I expect to be entertained in the process.)

If Bonanza has been changed behind the scenes into a more volatile game with absolutely no indication of that change being given to players then it's a total dick move and morally indefensible, but as long as it still makes RTP in the end, BTG have done nothing 'wrong', at least from a legal perspective, it's not written down anywhere that you can't change the play profile of a game and not tell anyone about it. (3Dice occasionally do this with their own slots, such as Gemini and Berrini's Fortune, but they always make you click through a pop-up window and an explanation of the changes made the first time you play the slot after the change has been made.)

I've said all along that, for example, snorky may well have enough data to reasonably conclude that Bonanza has had its parameters tweaked, I simply don't have enough experience with the game to pass judgement on that aspect of things, but if it's still making RTP, then we can argue about the morals of it all day long, but BTG get off on the technicality of having done nothing 'wrong'.

 

[goatwack]

Yes that makes sense, you could absolutely change the volatility profile of a slot to make it more enticing/addictive to players, especially those who are into the 'sunk cost fallacy' space, and I guess you could try and simply take 'all the money' before those players ran away skint. (The NLC bonus buy model, let's get all the money as quickly as we can.)

I've been saying for years that this is the problem with the multi-provider 'shopfront' online casino model, whereby you're not being presented with a single curated experience, as used to happen with Microgaming and the Viper Client casino, so they don't want to 'kill you off' as it were with one big hit, but want you to keep coming back, over time, and lose your money that way. And honestly I was fine with that, I knew what the deal was, I knew I was playing random games with a house edge and I'd lose eventually, but also that Microgaming had a vested interest in keeping me coming back to casinos powered by their software. (Which is also the 3Dice model of course, my eyes are wide open with this, and I'm fine with it, I like to have a gamble, I'm OK with the 'cost' aspect of it, but I expect to be entertained in the process.)

If Bonanza has been changed behind the scenes into a more volatile game with absolutely no indication of that change being given to players then it's a total dick move and morally indefensible, but as long as it still makes RTP in the end, BTG have done nothing 'wrong', at least from a legal perspective, it's not written down anywhere that you can't change the play profile of a game and not tell anyone about it. (3Dice occasionally do this with their own slots, such as Gemini and Berrini's Fortune, but they always make you click through a pop-up window and an explanation of the changes made the first time you play the slot after the change has been made.)

I've said all along that, for example, snorky may well have enough data to reasonably conclude that Bonanza has had its parameters tweaked, I simply don't have enough experience with the game to pass judgement on that aspect of things, but if it's still making RTP, then we can argue about the morals of it all day long, but BTG get off on the technicality of having done nothing 'wrong'.

......and thus fall into the 'I believe the game has changed' category, as manifested in the thread Snorky created, indicating the gameplay and volatility changed from years of daily play

 

[pinnit2014]

I'll save you the bother of debate:

It has changed

But the RTP is, apparently, the same.

So, it's not the destination, but how you get there

 

[goatwack]

That's what I tell the missus all the time!

?

 

[pinnit2014]

The driver varies week to week?

 

[johnnymcc1966]

First 17 spin bonus in ages

 

[hogexd]

They may be still operating at max rtp (although I would love to see genuine proof) but they have changed how the rtp is achieved. The game became virtually impossible to bonus and virtually all the big base hits have been removed.

The game became an absolute joke since Evolution took over, along with their other original games like DHV. As so many of their recent releases completely flopped, they had to cash in somewhere and they chose to hit Bonanza. They are fizzling out anyway. One trick ponies and once the audience has worked out how the trick is done, they stop paying your wages.

Funnily enough I got my first ever base game diamonds all the way on the EVO version of the game a few days back

 

[The Viking]

Funnily enough I got my first ever base game diamonds all the way on the EVO version of the game a few days back

All mind games i really dont think it matters what version or from what server you are playing from
for me it pays the same as it did 3-4 years ago.
just go back to page 3-400 3-4 years ago same stuff still talking about how crap it but still play it
i play some spins on Bonanza in nearly every session, i also still play Raging Rhino where avalible in nearly every session
even there the bonuses are worse you get feature garanty there in 9 out of 10 features but like Bonanza you know
its possible to hit big and thats why we play it.

 

[hogexd]

All mind games i really dont think it matters what version or from what server you are playing from
for me it pays the same as it did 3-4 years ago.
just go back to page 3-400 3-4 years ago same stuff still talking about how crap it but still play it
i play some spins on Bonanza in nearly every session, i also still play Raging Rhino where avalible in nearly every session
even there the bonuses are worse you get feature garanty there in 9 out of 10 features but like Bonanza you know
its possible to hit big and thats why we play it.

I’d rather play the Bonanza 2.0, better known as Extra Chilli since there you can actually just buy the bonus and hit big instead of spinning 1000 times for a 30x bonus.

Alas, I still play bonanza from time to time, but there are so many better options from BTG, it’s usually last on my list nowadays

 

[hogexd]

According to this info sheet that they presumably got from BTG or Evolution, the max win is 26,000x

Has it ever actually been achieved?

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

That’s like asking if Barrow have ever won the premier league.

 

[goatwack]

They've won the Northern Premier League in 2010. So by that reckoning, if the BTG rep answered that question, then Barrow were Premier League champions once

 

[snorky510238]

According to this info sheet that they presumably got from BTG or Evolution, the max win is 26,000x

Has it ever actually been achieved?

No but it’s only been out 6 years……oh, hang on, well, come to think of it.

 

[goatwack]

*walks on podium*

Just because no player here, out of the hundreds of regular players, and those that play it religiously, often as their only game, hasn't hit the '26,000x' and shown it here, doesn't mean it hasn't happened. For all we know it's happened countless times across the internet. We're not the Messiah you know, just a very naughty boy

*stacks it off the podium*

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

There is no max win as it’s got that much potential.

I mean come on do you ever see max wins on Pragmatics, Netents, Hacksaw or NLC??

I wonder if the former disgraced BTG office junior (rumour was, his name was Rick Nobinson BTW) who was punting out faked screen shots had time to knock up a 28,000x’er before the head honcho’s realised what that sneaky employee was doing and fired his/her ass??

Hopefully one of their fanboy streamers can premiere maybe even a vid of it??

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

Hopefully Rick erm I mean Nick could be in the chat on that stream to talk us through when it happened and what casino it was at??

 

[goatwack]

The win potential is capped at 26000x eh

So I take it the Unlimited Multiplier isn't actually unlimited then, those sneaky bastards

 

[Kroffe]

Gold dust retrigger pays 26000x, im sure the game can reach that number in other ways aswell but i have only had it from the GD retrigger.

 

[snorky510238]

I wonder how many times the x26,000 was hit during the billions of trial spins? I think I know the answer to be honest.

 

[Kroffe]

I wonder how many times the x26,000 was hit during the billions of trial spins? I think I know the answer to be honest.

Well there is one sure-fire way to get it that i know of (other than getting a gold dust retrigger)

 

[pinnit2014]

I wonder how many times the x26,000 was hit during the billions of trial spins? I think I know the answer to be honest.

I hit it twice in a day because, you know, it's random*

*only such a thing as losing randomness, not winning randomness

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

Maybe that’s the casinos cap rather than the actual game itself.

We all know the max win from the feature is closer to 280x than 28k

 

[aceking123]

Your being generous)

 

[snorky510238]

What’s the difference between Batman and BTG?

Batman has been known to have a day without Robin.

 

[Jono777]

Your being generous)

Very!

 

[slotmaster]

Hope to represent Ontario Canada and be in this thread again soon and piss you all off with Bonanza wins when videoslots goes live and assuming the game will be available,lol

 

[snorky510238]

Hope to represent Ontario Canada and be in this thread again soon and piss you all off with Bonanza wins when videoslots goes live and assuming the game will be available,lol

It’s a wonderful thing, hope.

 

[cncas2123]

First decent bonus in a while.

 

[cncas2123]

A few spins later..... I think Bonanza is broke.

 

[gonzo fonso]

some nice hits,where was you playing at ?

 

[cncas2123]

some nice hits,where was you playing at ?

Virgin Bet.

 

[Jono777]

Virgin Bet.

Weak ass joke time, tired, bored, you know the usual shit...in fact posting still knowing its beyond a boredom post, anything to occupy 60 seconds

Bet most of the people on this thread wish they were Bonanza virgins

Anywayyyyy - Nice hits Cncas

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

Yes I’m thinking of having surgery to re-become a bonanza virgin.

It’s a complicated procedure apparently. Undoing 6 years of torture, countless brains, mental health issues, false hopes and dawns, broken mouses, keyboards and monitors, mental breakdowns, psychological issues, physical and mental scarring, family neglect, relationship issues all in the hope of a fucking bonus that ultimately delivers fuck all.

 

[cncas2123]

The good run continues.

 

[Schind]

I have some interesting (in my opinion) figures based on my play over the past four weeks.
This has nothing to do with long term RTP which I have no issues with on 99% of games but the 'hot and cold' runs you get when playing a game regularly. Again, in my opinion, this shouldn't happen if everything is as random and independent as it's supposed to be.

These figures only cover 30,000 spins over 22 days but something happened on Saturday that made me think. A week and a bit ago I mentioned on here how the base game and bonuses had suddenly gone to pot after being very generous to me previously. Well, it was crap all week but then changed again on Saturday so I had a look at my figures for bonus frequency.

Week 1 (from 24th Dec) - 8924 spins, bonus every 343 spins, average bonus pay out 67.1x
Week 2 (from 31st Dec) - 5297 spins, bonus every 353 spins, average pay out 65.5%
Week 3 (from 7th Jan) - 9436 spins, bonus every 589 spins, average pay out 96x
Week 4 (from 14th Jan) - 4152 spins, bonus every 318 spins, average pay out 112x but bear in mind this is only three days so far and I had a 597x in there. I expect the pay out will go down over the next few days.

Apart from a couple of days on Bet365 that have the MGS version and during which there was no notable difference in play, all the rest were the NextGen version so why would week 3 be completely different from the other weeks? And it was exactly one week. It wasn't down to not having a bonus for thousands of spins, on the contrary, the frequency was very regular, just further apart. The longest I had to wait in that period was 1214 spins. I had a 1449 spin wait in week one but still averaged lower as I was often getting bonuses less than 100 spins apart. During week three I only once went below 300 spins.
Strangely, as the amount of spins required to get the bonus went up, the bonus payout went up as well. How does it know?
Also, in week 3, my weekly RTP was down in the mid 80's%, it was at 110% since November before that so it wasn't just the bonus frequency. I wasn't expecting it to stay at 110% but I thought the decline would be more gradual

I know it's only a small sample and I'd have to play at this level for months to see if these weekly peaks and troughs are regular occurrences but it was so stark that it made me think. If you're just dipping in and out of a game every few days you probably won't notice it, although I have to say I've felt the same thing on loads of other games by Blueprint, Red Tiger etc. but not kept records or played them enough to check if it's all in my head or not.

A chart showing how my average was bumbling along quite happily at the 350 spin range before abruptly going up to 400. The last three days have seen it dip back down again.

Sorry for the long post. I'm not a tin-foil hatter, honestly, just a realist who likes to know how things work!

 

[PMKFRUITPRO]

What I want to know is how do you get a bonus frequency like that in the first place??

Running so well there.

 

[Schind]

What I want to know is how do you get a bonus frequency like that in the first place??

Running so well there.

Ha ha. I dunno. I've read on here it's supposed to be one in 460. Not my experience although I've only been keeping figures for a little while. Been playing the game infrequently for years, can't remember it being as generous as this in the past to be honest.

As an aside, my record since November is four spins between bonuses. I've also had a 9 and an 11 and none worse than 1449. happy days!

**edit**
As an afterthought I am a low roller. Most spins on here are at the 20p to 60p mark and none more than £2. I haven't collected figures based on stake. Wish I had now.

 

[brianmon]

Unusually, there wasn't a single dead spin.

510x

 

[brianmon]

Has anyone had this before?
It wouldn't even let me spin my last 20p

 

[snorky510238]

It’s because you hit that x500 above, Bri.
Anyone who dares hit the max-cap win is removed from being able to play until the win is authenticated, as during the billions of trial spins, it didn’t happen once!

To be serious though, no, I never experienced that. I wish I had to be fair, would have saved a fortune.

 

[goatwack]

You'd think with six years' worth of 'updates' the game would run smoother than a greased-up monkey on ice, and yet it's still a glitchy crock of shite.

Who knew?

 

[cncas2123]

Has anyone had this before?
It wouldn't even let me spin my last 20p

Think it has happened to me a couple of times when I hit my loss limits. Not sure if thats what is happening with you but definitely looks what happened with me.

 

[dunover]

Has anyone had this before?
It wouldn't even let me spin my last 20p

Yep - but not since I played it at Rizk a couple of years back, and it happened on 60p a few times. You have EXACTLY the balance for 1 last spin to the penny, but the black box appears saying insufficient funds or whatever. As I haven't seen it for a while I thought maybe an update had got rid of the error. IIRC you reload the game, toggle the stake up and down again to the correct amount and it lets you spin it off.

 

[dunover]

I have some interesting (in my opinion) figures based on my play over the past four weeks.
This has nothing to do with long term RTP which I have no issues with on 99% of games but the 'hot and cold' runs you get when playing a game regularly. Again, in my opinion, this shouldn't happen if everything is as random and independent as it's supposed to be.

These figures only cover 30,000 spins over 22 days but something happened on Saturday that made me think. A week and a bit ago I mentioned on here how the base game and bonuses had suddenly gone to pot after being very generous to me previously. Well, it was crap all week but then changed again on Saturday so I had a look at my figures for bonus frequency.

Week 1 (from 24th Dec) - 8924 spins, bonus every 343 spins, average bonus pay out 67.1x
Week 2 (from 31st Dec) - 5297 spins, bonus every 353 spins, average pay out 65.5%
Week 3 (from 7th Jan) - 9436 spins, bonus every 589 spins, average pay out 96x
Week 4 (from 14th Jan) - 4152 spins, bonus every 318 spins, average pay out 112x but bear in mind this is only three days so far and I had a 597x in there. I expect the pay out will go down over the next few days.

Apart from a couple of days on Bet365 that have the MGS version and during which there was no notable difference in play, all the rest were the NextGen version so why would week 3 be completely different from the other weeks? And it was exactly one week. It wasn't down to not having a bonus for thousands of spins, on the contrary, the frequency was very regular, just further apart. The longest I had to wait in that period was 1214 spins. I had a 1449 spin wait in week one but still averaged lower as I was often getting bonuses less than 100 spins apart. During week three I only once went below 300 spins.
Strangely, as the amount of spins required to get the bonus went up, the bonus payout went up as well. How does it know?
Also, in week 3, my weekly RTP was down in the mid 80's%, it was at 110% since November before that so it wasn't just the bonus frequency. I wasn't expecting it to stay at 110% but I thought the decline would be more gradual

I know it's only a small sample and I'd have to play at this level for months to see if these weekly peaks and troughs are regular occurrences but it was so stark that it made me think. If you're just dipping in and out of a game every few days you probably won't notice it, although I have to say I've felt the same thing on loads of other games by Blueprint, Red Tiger etc. but not kept records or played them enough to check if it's all in my head or not.

A chart showing how my average was bumbling along quite happily at the 350 spin range before abruptly going up to 400. The last three days have seen it dip back down again.

Sorry for the long post. I'm not a tin-foil hatter, honestly, just a realist who likes to know how things work!

LOL...that reads pretty much exactly how I see the game. It is, as you say, a crashingly small sample size but I have seen it numerous times, a couple of sessions without a single bonus so over 1k spins, then it comes in 3 or 4 times in 500-odd spins and when it does come in frequently, the returns are shit. You have quite a decent bonus frequency overall, judging by the 4 weeks averaged, must be playing the Dazza affiliate RTP version. In fact, you must be playing the Dazza affiliate RTP version with bullshit icing on top, as you managed 597x which is just pure fantasy for me in the last year. After a couple of good seasons with runs like you describe in your 110% line, I am getting twatted so far this year, it's been awful in every way; bonus fequency and returns both.

 

[brianmon]

Yep - but not since I played it at Rizk a couple of years back, and it happened on 60p a few times. You have EXACTLY the balance for 1 last spin to the penny, but the black box appears saying insufficient funds or whatever. As I haven't seen it for a while I thought maybe an update had got rid of the error. IIRC you reload the game, toggle the stake up and down again to the correct amount and it lets you spin it off.

The difference is that the 'black box' doesn't appear. It just repeats that sequence

 

[Schind]

LOL...that reads pretty much exactly how I see the game. It is, as you say, a crashingly small sample size but I have seen it numerous times, a couple of sessions without a single bonus so over 1k spins, then it comes in 3 or 4 times in 500-odd spins and when it does come in frequently, the returns are shit. You have quite a decent bonus frequency overall, judging by the 4 weeks averaged, must be playing the Dazza affiliate RTP version. In fact, you must be playing the Dazza affiliate RTP version with bullshit icing on top, as you managed 597x which is just pure fantasy for me in the last year. After a couple of good seasons with runs like you describe in your 110% line, I am getting twatted so far this year, it's been awful in every way; bonus fequency and returns both.

This week I was back down to an average of 375 spins per bonus. Where did this 460 figure come from? I started reading this thread from the beginning to try and find out, gave up after about 8 pages but it is funny reading the same gripes then as now.
Problem is, the base game has gone to pot. If I'm allegedly getting the bonus more frequently than average then I shouldn't be on 83% RTP over the last two weeks. But then again it's weird how the bonus stays at around 20% of the spins taken to get it. As my spin average went up for a week, so did the bonus winnings, as it went down again so did the winnings. There's no direct correlation per bonus but there is on a weekly basis over 20 or so bonuses. That's the only 'suspicious' thing I've noticed. I'm fully prepared to admit it may be just a coincidence.

I'm still gonna keep records but, as of today, I'm not gonna do 1000+ spins a day. Just a few here and there.
So, after 36000 spins my biggest bonus was that 597x, biggest base win was 450x. Had 89 bonuses averaging 396.42 spins apart, average bonus win 77.38x
My overall personal RTP, which includes about 6 or 7 thousand spins before I started counting properly is 97.94%
And the only site where it was consistently awful was Paddy Power!