Certainly the new games are higher variance with a lot of the RTP tied up in very infrequent occurrences.
My problem is that I don't believe the variance is honest.
I am sure that the theoretical RTP resolved from the paytable and reel strips matches but it would be a huge oversight(one that happened in the past) if it didn't.
No way on this Earth are the feature triggering scatter symbols not weighted and no way are the free spins just independent spins with any result equally possible each spin.
IMO the reason the new slots are high variance slots is all smoke and mirrors designed to disguise the fact that we are being made monkeys of.
The only half decent slot MG have released this year is Lions pride.
Still, all the software is designed in a similar way and they are all playing more and more like each other every passing year.
The same streakiness and vanishing scatter and wild syndrome.
PS
The max winning combinations for a 5 reel slot with 3 symbols per reel in view is 243. (3x3x3x3x3)
Cant agree more.
I've seen too many of those strange anomalies happen during free spins to believe these are random.
About 3 months ago I was playing Spring Break, hit the freespins and got 4 retriggers for a total of 75 freespins.
I swear, the 4 retriggering spins paid 15x bet each, from the remaining 71 spins 65 were dead spins, and the others gave the lowest possible payouts, 2oak, 3oak low paying symbols.
Not one single win with a wild. The wilds were AWOL.
Went to playcheck because I wanted to see and maybe post the results of that freespinround, and found out that it is not possible to see the outcome of freespins in playcheck.

Need more proof that its one predetermend package?
Same thing happened when I played First past the Post once, hit the 3 horses, and my horse won the race, so 25 freespins at x4.
The first 10 spins gave me 3 retriggers and around 100x bet in winnings.
So 90 spins at x4 remaining!
Huge payout? LOL, no, cannot remember exactly, but those 90 spins paid less than 40x bet.
After the last retrigger the game just started to unmatch reel 1 and 2, each and every spin, you must have seen it to believe it, but its true.

At least 70 dead spins in a row, only the last 20 spins I got a few lowpaying 3oak, 4oak.
I've never been so unhappy with a win over 100x bet.
If those were random results, than I'm the Pope.
About your dynamic weighting theory, I love it, it would explain everything.
The insane dry spells in which nothing happens, than all of a sudden its scatters everywhere.
How an event that is supposed to happen once every 130 spins does not happen in over 2000 spins.
And the next day it happens 8 times in 100 spins.
Slots have cycles they go through, no doubt about that.
Avalon for example.
If its eating your balance like candy, not giving any decent linewins, the freespins wont pay either.
But it if it gives the treasure chests and the crowns alot, 3oak, 4oak, 5oak, big chance you'll hit big in the freespins.
Just watch how a tournament evolves, you can clearly see the cycles there.
32RED's daily.
Changes in the top-30 always come together, nothing can happen for many hours and hundreds of people playing who are all getting the same lousy 30-40% return and then within 15-30 minutes there are all of a sudden many changes in the top spots.
Problem is, its next to impossible to prove anything, no matter how far outside of expectation the results sometimes are.
But for myself, I've seen too many strange, one-in-a-million chance things happen, both positive and negative, impossible wins and impossible losses, to still believe its all just random, that there is not some sort of control.