History of Fruit Machines
Here at Slotfruit we have a special affection for genuine pub-style fruit machines: Most of us moved onto online slots by playing on these games first, and many people still feel that the gameplay, visuals and sound on land-based machines can’t be beaten. Check out slot sites featuring good, old fashioned fruit machine slots.
When you think about it, that’s hardly surprising as decades of experience has gone into making cabinet-style slot machines an experience that players will want to enjoy again and again, so the large manufacturers like Barcrest and Bally know exactly how to get a player’s heart racing.
The First Slot Games
The first slots were made in the US around 100 years ago, and featured three basic spinning reels with a single win line, displaying a variety of symbols that usually gave an indication of what you’d win if you got lucky. Then, in around 1910, came gambling prohibition in the US, and that meant that the only spinning reel games allowed were those that paid out something other than cash – and in most cases that meant food.
The games were frequently found on top of grocery counters, and were rapidly sponsored by chewing gum manufacturers, who realised that gum was a great prize to offer lucky players as it was easy to store and didn’t perish. Their influence led to the fruit symbols being adopted: Three fruit symbols on a winning line told you what flavour of gum you’d won, whilst the all-important bar symbol represented a generic stick of gum, meaning you could have any flavour you wanted.
US Gambling Prohibition
As the ban was lifted the games became increasingly sophisticated, and once they appeared in Vegas casinos their popularity grew exponentially. With so much money to be made from the games, the top designers were tasked with making them as entertaining as possible to play and some classic formats were developed with games like IGT’s Cleopatra and Rainbow Riches pulling in the punters in their millions. In fact, both of these games – like many other classic pub slots – have made the transition from land-based format to online format with nothing altered at all, and they remain hugely popular.
Hardcore slot players love these games and in terms of gameplay their formats still seem to be unbeatable, so if you’re serious about online slots then you’ll need to give fruit machines a try.
Where can you find online fruit machine slots?
Notable pub fruit slots on the web include any from Ladbrokes’ range, all of which feature retro cabinets for extra authenticity; the Mega Joker games from NetEnt (taken from the Scandinavian slots of the same name), the aforementioned games from IGT and the Retro Reels series from Microgaming, which replicate the eponymous land games found in casino floors throughout Vegas, featuring individually-priced re-spins that’ll have you re-thinking everything you ever learned about slot strategy.
Pub fruit machine features
The main features that distinguish a true pub fruit game from an online slot game, though, are the hold and nudge features: You won’t generally find these on internet-developed slots, but they add a huge amount of potential outcome to any game and consequently present a huge strategic challenge all of their own, that once you’ve encountered a few times you’ll want to master.
On top of these, there are some other key characteristics to watch out: Firstly, keep an eye out for board game-style feature play: Activating one of these will take you to a separate playing environment, and you’ll work your way round a circular path – often by throwing dice – that awards various different outcomes such as monetary rewards or additional throws depending on where you land. Secondly, watch out for skill stop features: These will let you hit a stop button to select one of a number of rapidly flashing options, and if you’re sharp you can stop the feature on the best possible outcome.
Genuine or not?
The main thing to remember when seeking out genuine fruit machines, is that you shouldn’t be fooled into thinking that a game is the real thing just because it has fruit symbols on the reels – as that needn’t be the case: These amazing machines are all about game play, not cosmetics, so take some time to seek the genuine article out from our list of sites offering fruit machines and you’ll be amply rewarded.
