Cleopatra & Cleopatra II
WHY THIS SLOT: Big payouts for a relatively small bet. Both line hits and the bonus feature can pay extremely well. On Cleopatra II, the bonus round multipliers can result in massive wins ($10K or more). The audio track on this slot is charming, and the game play is fast.
HOW WE BET: We bet 20 lines or 15 lines at the maximum denomination. We always look for the 10¢ denom game because the pay outs can equal the $1 denom version for a fraction of the bet. A $400 win on a $2 bet makes us very happy.
CAVEATS: Nothing specifically for Cleopatra or Cleopatra II. However, the same cautions for “regular” slots apply to high-limit slots as well.
Wolf Run
WHY THIS SLOT: Large payouts on line hits, which happen often. The base game isn’t particularly interesting, but it’s no worse than Dragon Link.
HOW WE BET: We play max bet if our budget allows for it. We will only play as long as it takes to get a large line hit. The $150 line hit in the image took one spin to get.
CAVEATS: If you usually play for the bonus, large line hits are easy to miss. In one particularly bad example, I won more than $300 on a Wolf Run line hit, but since the sound wasn’t working on the machine, it didn’t register as a big win. I ended up gambling most of it away because I simply wasn’t aware it had happened.
Diamond Queen
WHY THIS SLOT: If you get the Mystic Bonus, the payouts can be massive even though it’s only three spins. There are two bonus features on Diamond Queen; the better one in my opinion is the stacked wilds bonus (shown in the screenshot).
HOW WE BET: We only play this game in the high-limits room, so our bets are typically $20 per spin or more if our budget allows for it. This game is more volatile than Cleopatra, so if we don’t get the bonus within a few spins, we’ll walk away and try again later. The handpay shown in the image required $190 (about nine spins, so we were within one spin of walking away).
CAVEATS: More volatile than Cleopatra. The game play is fast, but not particularly interesting.
About High-Limits
Playing the slots in the high-limits room can forever alter your perception of what’s possible from a slot machine. But it comes at a price.
If you want to win a handpay, the high-limits room is probably where it will happen. Expect bets starting at $9 per spin, higher at “true” high-limits rooms. Large bets typically require a bankroll of $1,000 or more. While we’ve won a $2,000 handpay with $60, we’ve also lost hundreds in five minutes.
Also be aware that some slots ONLY give you the bonus on the maximum bet. The most well-known of these is Pinball. I was playing $25 denom Pinball in the high-limits room and got the pinball symbol, but didn’t get the bonus because I was only betting one credit to save money—$300 down the drain. The $10 version was sitting 15′ away. Lesson learned.
CAVEATS: It’s extremely easy to lose a large amount of money quickly in the high-limits room. Please do not gamble money that you need for essential expenses. Slot are not a way to make money.