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football star

Football Star Slot Review

5/5 star-full-icon star-full-icon star-full-icon star-full-icon star-full-icon
Written By Thomas Williams

In a way, it is surprising that we don’t see more slots based on football. After all, the Beautiful Game remains the world’s most popular sport. So we were excited when we saw that Microgaming had produced their Football Star game, and added to the small selection of soccer slots that you can find in online casinos.

So did Microgaming put a real shift in and produce a winning performance that was truly different class? You’ll need to read this Football Star slot review to find out!

Slot Information

rating-icon Rating
5
slots-rtp-icon RTP
96.45%
slots-rtp-icon House Edge
3.55%
software-icon Software Providers
no download - instant play, mobile
auto-spins-icon Autospin Feature
Yes
max-bet-icon Min. Bet
5
created-at-icon Launch Date
1/01/2014
slots-scatters-icon Scatters
Yes
max-bet-icon Max. Bet
50
max-coins-icon Max. Coins
10
slots-gamble-icon Gamble Feature
No
payline-icon No. of Paylines
243
grid-horizontal-icon No. of Reels
5
bonus-rounds-icon Bonus Rounds
No
free-spins-icon Free Spins
Yes
software-icon Software Types
slots-wild-icon Wilds
Yes
slots-multipliers-icon Multipliers
No
slot-review-icon Slot Type
Video Slot
Football Star Slot Review screenshot

Key Details

The Football Star slot game is played on a grid with 5 reels, 3 rows and 243 paylines. The usual minimum bet for UK players is 50p and the maximum is £250, though this may vary slightly depending upon which online casino to use. The game uses Flash technology and can be played on a range of mobile devices with no compromise in quality.

The game was released by Microgaming in May 2014, just ahead of that year’s World Cup tournament in Brazil. You can win prizes when symbols line up adjacently on the reels as this game does not have a conventional payline structure. This is useful in the Rolling Reels feature that we’ll discuss later in this review. There is an autoplay feature that is triggered when you hold the spin button, as well as a fast play button that can speed matters up for you.

Football Star Slot RTP

The Football Star slot RTP is 96.29%. This is a pretty typical figure for a slot of this variety, and it’s also pretty standard for a slot from Microgaming. Ant And Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway, for example, has an RTP of 96.35%, while Gopher Gold’s RTP stands at 96.79% and Lara Croft Temples and Tombs has an RTP of 96.05%.

The game has medium variance, so your chances of frequent smaller wins should be roughly about the same as your chances of spinning in the really big prizes. You may have to show some patience when waiting for the feature, but it is likely to deliver big wins when it occurs.

Different Class Graphics and Plenty of Football Stars

As you might expect from a slot from Microgaming, the Football Star slot looks very classy. It’s graphics are rendered in a sophisticated cartoon style that is much more like a graphic novel than an episode of The Simpsons in terms of style. The reels are framed in front of a simple soccer stadium backdrop, with the colours being fresh and vibrant. The pitch is a gorgeous deep green colour and there are plenty of primary shades of red, gold and pale blue on the reels.

The sound effects are pretty subtle. When a win spins in, you are treated to a little trumpet fanfare and you also hear the roar of the crowd as though you had just scored a goal. We were pleased with the music and sound effects in the game as they were unobtrusive. When they did appear, though, they added to the immersive nature of the game without ever grating on our ears. This slot certainly has a subtlety when it comes to sound that not many other games share.

Watch out for the Top Players

As you might expect, the symbols on the reels all relate to football in some way. The higher value symbols are football players. The most valuable of the high-value player symbols is the guy wearing red and green. This looks suspiciously like a Portugal kit, which would make sense given the character’s passing resemblance to Cristiano Ronaldo. There are 4 other players there too, including a goalkeeper. The other symbols apart from the players are a referee, a stadium, a replica shirt and a pair of football boots.

The game’s logo is the wild symbol, and this will appear stacked on the third, fourth and fifth reel. It can substitute for all other symbols to create winning combinations for you. The game’s scatter is the flying football. We’ll see how this symbol and the wild can bring you big wins via the games’ features in the next section of this Football Star Slot review.

Striking Wilds, Rolling Reels and Fun Free Spins

There are 3 features for you to enjoy in the football star slot machine. They range from a modified wild symbol to a full free spins feature. We’ll take a closer look at them for you here now.

Striking Wild

This feature can occur at random in the base game. When it occurs, it turns one of the middle 3 reels entirely wild. If no win occurs on that spin, the wild symbols will remain locked in place until a win does occur.

Rolling Reels

You have probably see this feature used in other slots that you have played, such as classics like Gonzo’s Quest. The symbols in any win will disappear and are replaced by new symbols. This process will continue indefinitely until no new wins appear. You can benefit from very long streaks, if you’re lucky, that will bring big prizes. This feature can become very exciting if you manage to get on to a lengthy winning streak, with plenty of action occurring on the screen.

Free Spins

The football scatter symbol is what you need to watch for when it comes to the free spins feature in the Football Star slot. If 3, 4 or 5 of the ball symbols appear anywhere on the reels you will trigger the free spins. For 3 symbols, you get 15 spins, for 4 symbols it’s 20 spins and for 5 spins it’s 25.

The Rolling Reels feature also applies during these spins, so you can soon see the wins mounting up once the bonus spins kick in. As well as Rolling Reels, there is also a prize multiplier in operation. You can see a scale above the reels that tells you the size of the multiplier. Each consecutive win boosts the multiplier, so, again the potential for some really lucrative wins is massive. Sadly, though you cannot retrigger the free spins during the feature, so make sure you use the spins you get wisely.

These 3 features add up together to really boost the appeal of this game. While they are not the most involved features we have ever seen, and there is not much real interaction from the player required during them, they are still good fun. When the Rolling Reels are triggered it can be very exciting indeed to watch the wins mount up.

Slot Verdict: Solid Soccer Fun

We’ll end this Football Star slot review on a largely positive note, by saying that we really enjoyed the game’s bonus features. The graphics and sound effects are also a lot of fun. The game has a fresh feel to it that’s helped by its clean design and vibrant colours. The features offer plenty of opportunity to win big prizes, with the Rolling Reels an especially appealing aspect of the game. We recommend you give this game a go, especially if you are a fan of the Beautiful Game.

If you enjoy sports-themed slots, then Bicicleta from Yggdrasil should be right up your street.

Football Star Slot FAQs

⚽At which casinos can I play Football Star slot? chevron-down-icon
The best way to find casinos that feature Football Star is to check out this website’s list of Microgaming casinos. We have a full list of which casinos feature games from this developer’s catalogue. New casinos are springing up all the time at the moment, so make sure you check back on the page as often as possible. You can also check out which Microgaming casinos offer the best bonuses and all-round service.
❓What is the ‘paytable achievements feature’ that is found in the Football Star slot machine? chevron-down-icon
This feature of the game allows you to keep track of all the wins that you have recorded while playing the slot. It highlights symbol combinations that brought you victory, as well as highlighting your achievements permanently on the payout table, even after you have exited the game. Regular game wins are logged as achievements, while wild symbol substitute wins are not. This is another nice little touch that adds something extra to this game.
🎰How many stacked wilds are there in the Football Star slot? chevron-down-icon
The number of wild symbols that can appear stacked in the game varies from reel to reel. Reel 3 has a total of 18 wild symbols on it, while reel 4 has 25 and reel 5 has just 3. It is worth knowing this so that you can accurately shape your strategy when the feature is triggered. Those sticky wilds are well worth looking out for as they can boost your chances of winning.