Burning Desire Slot – Free Demo

A 2009 build still running on 243 ways

I have no clue what took so long, and it was on 2 February 2009 that Games Global put Burning Desire out. That date makes it one of the older titles still sitting in the studio's catalogue. It is a five reel slot constructed on the studio's 243 ways engine. The studio kept building on that same 243 ways engine in later titles such as Wild Scarabs and Wild Orient.

Numerous players still hold Games Global in high esteem, although it has lagged behind as of late. I played 280 spins of it at 2.50 a spin. There's no doubt about that fact. News of slots from the supplier tugs my attention; however, upon first catching a sight of Burning Desire, any expectation of a stunning Games Global slot was all but vanished, but can you truly assess a slot by its cover? There are no paylines to pick and no bet lines to set here; the only thing you move is the credits figure. Let's see.

Burning Desire is a five by three reel, 243 ways online slot. That 243 is simply what three rows across five reels produces when every position on every reel counts. It pays from reel 1 to the right, and identical symbols have to land adjacent on a pay way. A gap on any reel ends the way there, so matching symbols on reels 1, 2 and 4 pay nothing. Only the largest win on each way counts, and scatter wins are added on top of the standard ones. Only one scatter combination is paid per spin as well, and it is the highest one available.

The logo wilds, the coin scatters

Symbols on the reels comprise the Burning Desire logo and a gold coin. The logo is the wild and the coin is the scatter. The wild cannot stand in for the coin, so the free spins trigger has to arrive on its own. The coin pays from anywhere without requiring adjacent reels, and it pays on the entire bet rather than on a way. Three of them are enough to start the feature, wherever on the grid they land.

The paytable is plain and straight to the point. Scatter pays are the exception, since those are worked out against the total bet. It shows payouts relative to the current bet size, refreshing accordingly when raising or lowering your stake — well, nearly, because the stake is a credits figure multiplied by a fixed bet multiplier of 25, and the panel's own example is 0.10 x 25 = 2.50 per spin. That 2.50 is the stake I played every spin of the session at.

Wilds only on reels 2 and 4

Playing a pivotal role in this slot, wild symbols appear only on reels 2 and 4 and substitute for everything except the scatter. Reels 1, 3 and 5 stay clean, so every way still has to open with a real symbol on reel 1. They create no combination of their own. A wild on reel 2 and another on reel 4 can bridge a match through the middle of the grid.

Fifteen free spins with every win tripled

Three or more Scatter symbols launch the free spins game with 15 free spins, and every win during the round is tripled. The award screen states the 15 up front, and a side panel spells out that all wins are multiplied 3x during the round. The round can be retriggered and the additional spins are added to the spins remaining. One free spins frame shows a five-of-a-kind way win landing with the 3x multiplier active.

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The round operates at the last bet placed in the game. The winnings are collected automatically, and I witnessed the feature twice in 280 spins, on spin 57 and again on spin 218, 161 spins later. The first paid 45.00 on a 2.50 stake, 18 times the stake, and the second 97.50, or 39 times the stake; neither retriggered. The first round moved the balance from 944.00 to 987.00, the second from 1,542.75 to 1,637.75. Between them the two rounds constituted 12% of everything I won. That came to 142.50 in feature money.

The Minty Take: Two rounds of free spins in 280 spins paid 142.50 between them, 12% of the 1,213.50 I won, and the run still closed at a 173.4% return because one base game spin on 98 came back with 269 times the stake.

A bare slot that pays anyway

This is a bare slot that relies on a single feature. Beyond the wild on reels 2 and 4, the free spins are the only thing the game does. It is difficult to view it as a representation of the company's recent accomplishments, and I'm struggling to grasp what must have passed through the minds of the staff working at Games Global to put out a game this plain. There are no imaginative or inventive ideas to be found whatsoever. The 3x multiplier inside the free spins is the only departure from the base rules. That makes the game come across as generic, flat, and dull at best.

The payouts, though, are not the catastrophe the reels imply: over 280 spins I wagered 700.00 and won 1,213.50, a session return of 173.4%, with the balance rising from 1,000.00 to 1,513.50. The high point was 1,683.25 on spin 98 and the low was 944.00. The base game does most of the work. 78 spins paid, 43 of those less than the stake, and the best spin of the run arrived outside the feature on spin 98 for 672.50, 269 times the stake. Spin 59 paid 102.50 and spin 152 paid 82.50, the two largest base game wins after it. The free spins game is the smaller half of the story. Both rounds together paid less than that one base game spin on 98. The longest I sat without a win at all was 12 spins.