German game design team Merkur has gone East for inspiration for their latest slot, Wishing Tree, which draws on classical Chinese themes and imagery. An elegant, low-variance slot with five reels, four lines, and a surrounding wild feature, Wishing Tree achieves an elite, artistic approach to gaming.
Theme
The Chinese New Year tradition of a Wishing Tree is the central design theme of this slot. Historically, people observing this tradition would burn joss sticks, write their wishes down on a strip of paper which they would tie to a piece of fruit (usually an orange or kumquat). Then, throw both fruit and printed wish up into the tree’s branches, hoping that it would remain there and make the wish come true. Gaming symbols in the Wishing Tree slot come from this tradition and include lanterns, kumquats, joss sticks and the large drums upon which they sit, the playing cards valued ace through jack (resplendent in the style of Chinese calligraphy), and the Wishing Tree itself. The soundtrack and background are both spare – sound only accompanies play when the reels are in motion and during wins, while the red background features a skyline filled with temple-styled rooftops.
Betting Options, Functions and Features
Wishing Tree offers a variety of ways to vary bet size. Paylines can be adjusted from a minimum of five to a maximum of 20 (though it’s always recommended to play with all paylines activated). The bet per line can go from a low of .01 to a maximum 2 times the betting currency, for an overall bet range .05-40 times the betting currency per spin. There is also an auto-spin feature that can be set from five to 100 spins.
When auto-spin is inactive, players meet with an interesting opportunity after each win. There are two separate mini-games at which winnings from the reels can be gambled. One, a card-based game where the player guesses whether the next card drawn will be red or black, is simple double-or-nothing play. The other is a ladder game, where the win total can be increased or decreased depending on where the counter comes to a stop. In both cases, if the mini-game play is successful, the player can play again at higher stakes, and continue in this way without limit. It’s also possible in both mini-games to pocket half of one’s winnings from the reels while risking the other half.
The signature feature of Wishing Tree, however, is the surrounding wild symbol – when it appears on the reels, it expands in size so that every symbol bordering it becomes wild as well. With 20 paylines going both right-to-left and left-to-right, this almost always leads to very big wins.
Our Take
Wishing Tree is a simple, elegant game that seems to respect its source material in the Chinese tradition. Though it may lack some of the pizzazz of flashier slots, play is smooth, the mini-games keep things interesting, and the beautiful design makes this game a pleasure to return to again and again.
Slot data and features
- 5Reels
- 20Pay lines
- $4,000.00Max cash jackpot
- 96.06-96.08Payout Percent
- YesWild Symbol
- NoMultiplier
- $0.05 - $40Betting Range
- 0.01 - 2.0Coin bet range
- 1Coins per line
- NoProgressive
- 2000Max coins jackpot
- 20Max coins
- NoScatter Symbol
- NoFree spins available
- NoBonus Game
- NoBuy feature
- Asian , Chinese Game theme