Gold Hit: Dragon Bonanza Slot by Playtech

The reels are built like the tower the dragon is wrapped around. Five columns climb in uneven steps, four symbols tall on the two left reels and rising to eight on the far right, a lopsided stack of stone blocks with a snarling red dragon and its orange wings coiled over the top, the whole thing perched on a heaped mound of gold coins and loose gems. That shape gives 4,608 ways, three or more matching symbols on consecutive reels from the left. Dragon loot fills the grid: green eggs, a jewelled chalice, a ruby crown, a curved white tooth and the dragon's own head, sitting above gold-trimmed royals.

Coins are what you actually chase. Three kinds drop and lock in place for at least three spins, and each fresh coin landing on a reel refreshes that hold. Cash Prize Coins carry a set value. Mystery Prize Coins pay one of four fixed jackpots, Mini, Minor, Major and Mega, the Mega topping the ladder at 500x total bet, and none of them climb. The Multiplier Coins are the ones to hope for. Each carries an x2, x3, x4 or x5 and multiplies every prize locked on its own reel, in the base game and the free games alike, so a single x5 dropping onto a crowded column swings the entire payout. Fill a whole reel with coins and you collect everything sitting on it at once.

Here's where that tower geometry bites. Packing the eight-high reel on the right takes far more coins than the four-high ones on the left, so the fattest columns are the hardest to finish.

Three, four or five Bonus symbols award 10, 12 or 15 free games. The coins stay stuck for the whole round now, and completing a reel spins a wheel that multiplies every prize on it by up to x10. Nothing pays as you go. Everything on the board is collected in one hit when the spins run out. There's no fixed-price buy for any of it. What you get instead is Double Chance of Bonus, an optional ante that lifts your stake by 40% for better odds at the round and more coins landing on the reels.