Five Awesome Ice Hockey Online Casino Slots for Fans
With the NHL suspended and much of the country under lockdown, Sabres fans have time to kill. If betting’s in your wheelhouse, these ice hockey-themed online slots might be just the ticket.
Ice Hockey by Playtech
Ok, it’s not the most original title in the world, but Ice Hockey (created by developer Playtech) is one of the most popular ice hockey slots you’ll find at an online casino. It’s a 5 reel game that has 15 paylines, and an unusual choice mechanic. When you start the game you get to pick which two teams oppose one another, with the associated symbols for the first team paying left to right, but paying in the opposite direction for the second. The puck symbol is especially valuable and can act as a multiplier for one of the teams. National flags are handy too, and may yield free spins.
Break Away by Microgaming
Microgaming’s take on ice hockey is the 5 reel, 3 row video slot Break Away. A nice feature, and one that Microgaming pioneered, is the 243 ways to win mechanic which maximizes the opportunity to get a good result. There are both stacked and smashing wilds (these involve hockey players slamming into reels for guaranteed wins). Get 3-5 scatters and you’ll get a special bonus of up to 25 free spins. There are some interesting features with this ice hockey slot that go beyond run of the mill ideas, with payouts being of the small but frequent variety.
Canadian Expats Enjoy NHL Online Slots
Of course, ice hockey doesn’t just mean a lot to fans from New York. The NHL crosses the border and is huge in the Great White North, with 7 teams of the 31 hailing from Canada. In fact, the league was Canadian to begin with, starting with a quartet of Canadian teams way back in 1917. And ice hockey is considered Canada’s national sport, whilst it faces stiffer competition in the US from other major leagues. Canada also takes a more relaxed view when it comes to online slots and mobile casinos, making ice hockey slots particularly appealing to players from north of the border who may also be living in the Big Apple.
In fact, the same year the Buffalo Sabres were founded the Vancouver Canucks joined the NHL, and today Canadian online casinos offer plenty of great sports slots, including not only ice hockey slots from the NHL but NFL, NBA, soccer, and more.
Canadian casino players can enjoy an unbiased review of top Canadian games to find out what else is available in the world of online gambling to help stave off boredom during this odd period of isolation.
New York’s just across the border from Canada, and there are plenty of Canadian ice hockey fans who love watching the Sabres meet teams from Canada (or who have become adoptive fans of the Sabres). Vancouver expats in particular can enjoy the great ice hockey slots in this review when they’re at an online casino, and watching the Sabres and Canucks go at it when they’re in the stands.
Hockey League by Pragmatic Play
This ice hockey slot features 5 reels and 20 paylines, and wager sizes can vary significantly, so whether you’re playing for bottle tops or high stakes it might be up your street. With an arena backdrop, the slot has wilds in the form of the trophy and hockey puck symbols, the latter of which also acts as a scatter. Triggering the MVP feature brings on free spins, which can be re-triggered if you’re lucky. This is a more straightforward ice hockey slot, better suited to those who prefer to keep things simple.
Hockey Hero by Push Gaming
There are 40 paylines in this 5 reel online slot, which makes use of ice hockey symbols alongside A, K, Q, and J. There are also hockey players that can fill entire reels, and a similarly sized Stanley Cup trophy which functions as a wild. Get a player to fill a reel and he’ll stay in place as the reels are spun again. If he (or any part of him) appears on another reel then this is repeated. Hockey nets act as scatters and trigger free spins if you get 3 of them.
Hockey Hero by Real Time Gaming
That’s not a typo, there are indeed two ice hockey slot games with identical names, by different developers. This slot is by Real Time Gaming (RTG) and has 5 reels and 25 paylines. There are free spins triggered by multiple scattered penalty boxes and wilds (hockey players). One key aspect is that minor and major progressive jackpots are attached, so if you like your mobile slots to have the biggest of juicy carrots, this might be the one for you.
Buffalo Slots
Once this lockdown has ended and sports resumes, you’ll be able to either keep with the online casino slots or delve into the world of sports betting as well. But that might take some time. As a little bonus for Sabres fans in particular, and online slots players generally, here are a few buffalo-themed slots games to help tide you over.
Buffalo Blitz features the eponymous megafauna and was created by software developer Playtech. This video slot is a little unusual, having 6 reels and a huge 4096 ways to win. The buffalo, as you might expect, is a key symbol and gives you a 300x win if you get six adjacent to one another. There are also scatters, and getting a trio of these triggers 100 free spins (this can, in turn, trigger another set of free spins, and so on).
Microgaming’s White Buffalo gives our favorite beast a wintry feel in this 5×3 video slot. Set in a serene and chilly forest, the online slot has a number of different animal symbols, with the buffalo skull being a scatter, and buffalo silhouette a wild. Triggered at random, there’s a free spin feature that turns each animal symbol into a buffalo, increasing the chance of a sizeable prize.
Blueprint Gaming’s Buffalo Rising MegaWays features 6 reels, 5 rows, and a mind-boggling 117,649 ways to win. This online slot is set in a scenic canyon, with symbols a mix of wild beasts and A to 9. There’s a multiplier to your wins if you land multiple buffalo symbols on adjacent reels. An unusual type of symbol is the mystery, with every landscape turning into something else (they can turn into wilds but not scatters). Diamonds are the scatter symbol and if you get a quartet or more free spins are triggered (you can choose more free spins without a multiplier or fewer free spins with a multiplier of either 5x or 10x). Overall, it’s an interesting and well-presented mobile slot game.
There’s no official timeline on when the NHL will resume the regular season, or even jump ahead to the Stanley Cup playoffs. Hopefully, in the meantime these slot suggestions will help give you some distraction and light relief from the situation.