Vegas Rush

Vegas Rush: Slot Overview

It had been a little quiet on the Megaclusters front for a while at the time of writing. Creative Aussie powerhouse Big Time Gaming's mitosis-like feature had lain dormant for a while, gathering its strength, or dust, in preparation for its next outing. Quiet, it is no more, as Big Time Gaming has dropped the machine in the middle of one of the rowdiest places on earth, Sin City. Yup, Las Vegas is where we're going this time, y'all in a slot titled Vegas Rush, alongside a cluster of various features.

If you can't make it to Vegas in real life, then is the next best thing pretending you are there? If it is then helping fuel the illusion, Big Time Gaming has created Vegas Rush as if players were present in a busy gaming room surrounded by physical gambling machines. There are no people, though, so you'll have to stretch your imagination to populate the scene with punters all smashing the play button on their chosen machine in the hopes a few extra coins will spew forth. It's an approach Big Time Gaming used not long ago in Vegas Megaways, which was a rebranding or, better, an un-branding of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire Megaways. Vegas Megaways forms a bedrock for Vegas Rush, which then layers on gameplay taken more or less straight from another slot.

Roll up and pick a bet where Vegas Rush furnishes players with options as low as 20 p/c per spin or as high as $/€20. As often is the case with BTG, volatility is high, so it's maybe not the best choice for a casual pretend you're in Vegas type experience, though few would be arguing about the 96.44%-96.45% return to player. A cluster paying slot, Vegas Rush action is held on a 5x5 grid which gets bigger and kind of smaller at the same time when winning clusters start hitting.

A winning cluster is created when at least 5 matching symbols are adjacent to each other anywhere on the grid. Next, winning symbols are removed, and each one is replaced with 4 smaller symbols. Winning smaller symbols are simply removed and replaced like a regular reaction mechanic. At its maximum size, it is possible to have up to 100 symbols on the grid. The pay symbols themselves are classic gambling icons such as casino chips, dice, BARs, four-leaf clovers, horseshoes, cherries and diamonds. Landing a 25+ size winning cluster will award a payout worth 30 to 50 times the bet. Wilds of varying sizes may be added to the board, as we will see next. No matter the size, wilds are able to replace any regular pay symbol for the purposes of a win evaluation.

Vegas Rush: Slot Features

The reaction mechanic in Vegas Rush is directly linked to the Megatrail with its 12 types of bonuses, including free spins should you make it to the seventh rung of the trail. Or, players can just buy them from the bonus buy menu.

Megatrail Bonuses

Consecutive reaction wins progress players along the Megatrail Bonuses ladder, triggering the following modifiers:

• Wilds – up to 10 wilds are added at random to the grid.
• Multiplier Wilds – wilds with up to x5 multipliers are added to the grid.
• Symbol Explosions – all instances of the displayed symbol remove all symbols in its row or column.
• Symbol Subdivide – all big instances of the displayed symbol turn into 4 smaller ones of the same type.
• Symbol to Wild – every instance of the displayed symbol turns wild.
• Mega Wild – a grid of 4 wilds is placed on the grid. Two grids in free spins.
• Win Multiplier – a multiplier of up to x10 is generated for the spin but is not applied to the Bonus Prize.
• Explosions – up to 3 explosions in a certain shape remove symbols from the grid.
• Symbol Duplication – five big instances of the displayed symbol are added in a row or column.
• 50:50 – all symbols in the top, bottom, left, or right of the grid are removed.
• Max Megaclusters – all big symbols are placed by 4 smaller ones.

The top rung of the trail, rung 12, possesses a cash prize of up to 1,000x the bet in the base game.

Free Spins

Hitting the seventh ring of the Megatrail in the base game awards 6 free spins. For free spins, an enhanced version of the Megatrail is used where the rung 12 top prize is up to 2,000x the bet. Hitting rung 6 awards 3 extra free spins, and it is theoretically possible to score up to 99 free spins in total.

Bonus Buy

The last point is players are able to buy free spins rather than climb the trail in the base game for the cost of 60 times the bet.

Vegas Rush: Slot Verdict

Vegas Rush is a bit of an odd one in some ways. It's like Big Time Gaming has basically taken the gameplay from Millionaire Rush, ripped out the Millionaire parts and replaced them with artwork from Vegas Megaways. Job done, boom, another Megaclusters slot for the masses. No major critiques as such, but it feels like a frighteningly short cutted approach for a studio famed for taking time to pour its considerable creativity into a brand new unique venture. On the contrary, nothing about Vegas Rush feels particularly fresh at all. Not saying that every new slot release has to feel like a warm pair of freshly cleaned underwear straight from the drier. Just saying it's an unusual spot to be in when reviewing a Big Time Gaming machine. But, like Vegas Megaways, it does make sense if this is simply a repackaged version of Millionaire Rush for a different market.

Déjà vu aside, there's plenty to recommend about Vegas Rush. Its predecessor was a playable slot, and this one's no different. The Megaclusters-powered grid looks great dressed up in all those neon versions of classic slot symbols, and a bit of pretending you're at the casino can be fun, too. No need to dress up or find a parking space either. The Megatrail proved successful last time, and it has got a ton of great modifiers it can shovel onto the reels to help chug the action along. In the base game, Vegas Rush is capable of chugging all the way to 33,050x the bet, potentially chugging on up to 47,200x the stake in free spins.

There is a chance that haters are going to pour scorn over Vegas Rush due to its lack of major creativity. It is basically spawned straight from a hook-up of the two previously mentioned games with little to nothing new to boast, after all. But, it's still a fun game, so if a bit of Megaclusters in a faux Vegas setting sounds pretty nang, here you go.