How to play
Sticky Respin Stars is a five-reel, three-row slot with 20 lines, drifting past golden planets, comets, star crystals and a silver moon. The five card ranks fill the gaps.
Use the Coin buttons to pick 1, 2, 5, 10 or 20 credits per line. All 20 lines are always active, so a paid spin costs coin × 20. Press Spin; lines pay left to right starting on the first reel. The Pay table button lists every payout at your current coin.
The main button changes name as the round goes on. It reads Respin when stuck stars have earned you a free respin, and Free spin while free spins remain. Neither costs anything, and the coin can’t change until the round is over. A fresh session starts with 1,000 virtual credits, and an empty balance can be topped up with 1,000 more for free.
How the respin chain works
The star wild is the whole story of this machine.
- A paid spin lands one or more star wilds. Each one locks in place and the game hands you a free respin.
- On the respin, the locked stars stay where they were and every other position spins again. Any line wins are paid.
- If at least one new star appears, it locks as well and you get another respin.
- The first respin that brings no new star ends the chain. The locked stars are released and the next spin costs credits again.
Each reel strip has a single star, so any one reel shows a star only about 7% of the time. Across five reels, that means close to three paid spins in ten start a chain. Each respin has a similar chance to keep it going, so most chains last one or two respins. Now and then one runs long, and with four or five locked stars almost every line has a wild in it. The message bar counts them: “3 wilds stuck: free respin!”
Wins are paid on every step of the chain, not just at the end. A star that locks on reel 1 can help three or four respins in a row.
Free spins
Free spins badges pay anywhere on screen, counted once per reel. Three pay 2× the total bet with 8 free spins, four pay 10× with 12, five pay 50× with 16.
During free spins the stars behave differently in one important way: locked stars no longer clear when a respin brings nothing new. They stay on the reels until the last free spin is played. New stars still lock and still give a respin, and those respins don’t use up any of your free spins. Badges that appear during the feature add more spins.
Pay table
Payouts are in coins (multiples of your line bet). A, K, Q, J and 10 are the low symbols.
| Symbol | 3 | 4 | 5 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Star wild | 9 | 45 | 180 |
| Golden planet | 5 | 23 | 90 |
| Comet | 5 | 18 | 54 |
| Star crystal | 4 | 14 | 36 |
| Silver moon | 3 | 9 | 27 |
| A | 2 | 5 | 18 |
| K | 2 | 5 | 14 |
| Q | 1 | 4 | 11 |
| J | 1 | 3 | 9 |
| 10 | 1 | 3 | 7 |
The star substitutes for every symbol except the badge, and a line of stars pays as stars. The values are modest because a locked star gets paid again on every respin it survives.
The return
Chains of different lengths make an exact figure impractical, so the return was measured over 420,000 simulated spins: about 94.5%, with a win on roughly 38% of spins. That is a little lower than several of our other slots. A lot of the return arrives in the rare long chains and in free spins full of locked stars, so expect long quiet stretches between them.
Strategy
Chains can’t be forced. Whether a respin lands a new star is decided by the same random draw as any other spin, and locked stars don’t make new ones more likely.
Some practical points:
- Respins and free spins are part of the round you already paid for, so let them play out.
- With a 94.5% average, the house keeps about 5.5% of everything you stake over time. A coin of 1 (20 credits a spin) gives you roughly 50 paid spins from a fresh 1,000, which is enough to see a few chains and, with luck, a free spins round.
- If you like wilds that move rather than wilds that wait, Walking Wilds gives a respin each time its wild steps one reel to the left.
If you enjoy Sticky Respin Stars, try Stud Hi-Lo or Stud Showdown next.
