Game: Ocean Song
Manufacturer: Gimmie Games
Advantage play potential: Medium
What Makes it Special: Pearls in columns 2, 3, 4 can lead to wilds; left behind wild reels offers instant AP possibility; 5 bet levels per denomination and multiple denominations; bonus round pearls being left behind
Ocean Song is a game by the Aristocrat studio Gimmie Games, which brings Advantage Play potential along but with a lower volatility format common to the studio. It offers a pretty good balance for the game, but not a big opportunity to make money through Advantage Play.
The Advantage Play comes from the persistent state of the pearls on the reels, and the wilds that they can generate.
Understanding the Game
Ocean Song is a 5×4 reel format all-ways-pays (Super Reel Power) game that offers 1024 ways to win. There are five bet levels for each denomination, and all bets give access to the progressives and the chance for pearls, which will ultimately unlock wilds. The game also has a Free Games bonus that offers free spins when triggered.
Landing Wild Reels
Pearls can be collected in reels 2, 3 and 4. Two pearls are needed to be able to trigger a wild reel, and two reels need to have two pearls for the wilds to appear. You could make all three reels wild with the right timing of pearls, which would be the best outcome given the all-ways-pays format as you’re guaranteed a lot of four of a kinds and the possibility of a bunch of five of a kinds.
Once the wilds are triggered, those reels will stay wild for two spins. These spins are your best chances for solid line hits, as the pays on a standard hit are pretty anemic. This is likely do to the all-ways-pays setup as a line hit being paid x1024 could be pretty substantial.
The Free Spins Bonus
If you get the free spins symbol in reels 1, 3 and 5, you’ll trigger 12 free spins on the bonus. This plays just like the regular game, but with double pearls replacing the single pearls, speeding up when you can make wilds appear (you still need two columns). You also have the ability to retrigger to get more spins.
Understanding the Advantage
The pearl collection is where the advantage lies. The more pearls collected, the closer to that wild reels and the chance for spins that pay higher than normal amounts. The more pearls, and the more to the left, the better the chances are.
Remember that many of these games have 15 bet levels – 3 denominations with 5 options per denomination. So it’s worth checking all of the bet options and taking advantage of any that are pretty close to triggering.
In our experience pearls seem to come pretty regularly so the wait will not be long. Conversely, the game’s lower pays overall and frequency of bonus means you shouldn’t chase lower advantage opportunities as often as it won’t recoup what you bet as often as more volatile AP games.
The pearls in the bonus are also persistent state, meaning if you trigger wilds at the end of one bonus, they will carry in to the next bonus. Since you can’t check the state of the bonus when your’e walking up to a machine, this won’t help you in the initial evaluation of a machine, but if you complete a bonus with wilds becoming active, and trigger another one, they’ll be there.
Winning a Progressive
When the wilds have been activated, each of the two spins the wilds are active a pearl from each wild column is sent into the clam. Those pearls are your chances to win the progressive; on any spin where pearls fly up, the progressive feature can be triggered. In it, 15 pearls appear and you pick until you get 3 of the same symbol. Don’t worry about your picking; this is a predetermined bonus, like many in this format (think 88 Fortunes, Dancing Drums, etc.).
Watch and Learn
Check out this video from The Shamus of Slots, who has a bit of everything – three wild reels, a retrigger in the bonus, and more!
Have you had any luck on Ocean Song? Share your perspective in the comments!
