A Wolf In Slots Clothing: Huff N’ More Puff Debuts At FanDuel Online Casino

If you’ve logged on to FanDuel Casino anytime in the last week or so — assuming you’re in one of the five states where the iCasino operates, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Michigan, West Virginia, or Connecticut — you’ve seen banner ads, pop-ups, and even a countdown clock directing your attention to a new slots game: Huff ‘N More Puff.

This is a hallmark of many online casino sites’ strategy: Roll out a new game, feature it, hype it, let players know it’s “exclusive.” At FanDuel Casino, specifically, Huff N’ More Puff seemed to get the most focused promotion on the site for any new game since World of Wonka debuted last March.

And it worked on me. Hey, hit me over the head with a hammer enough times (while you’re using that hammer to build houses made of straw, sticks, or bricks), and I’ll respond.

Huff N’ More Puff launched on FanDuel Casino on Tuesday, and I immediately took it for a spin (pun, regrettably, intended).

The Light & Wonder game itself is not new — in a press release, FanDuel Casino Product Senior Director Ian O’Reilly said, “The Huff N’ Puff family of slots is one of the most popular slot series on the casino floor.”

But it’s new to the regulated online casino space, and to FanDuel. Could I tell you what makes Huff N’ More Puff different from other Huff N’ Puff varieties? No, I could not. Did I have fun playing the game for about an hour, particularly when I was able to do so during daytime hours, under the guise of it being something I was doing “for work”? Yes, overall I did, although I couldn’t say definitively to what extent that was conditioned on me finishing up a few bucks rather than down a few.

Building the foundation

As you’ve probably deduced by now, the game is themed around the story of the Three Little Pigs. There are three different pig symbols, there’s a Big Bad Wolf that counts as a “wild,” etc.

The basic game play is fairly standard. It’s a 3×5 board, a symbol has to appear in each of the first three columns to possibly win you any money, and those symbols don’t need to touch each other or line up. And in the basic game, if you don’t make it to any of the bonus rounds, you will inevitably grind your bankroll down to a nub. There just aren’t many ways to win big on that grid, and the great majority of your spins will be losses.

Yes, Huff N’ More Puff is one of those slots where it’s all about the bonus rounds. That’s where the serious money is, and that’s where all the excitement is. This is true of many slots I’ve sampled, but I don’t think I’ve ever played one where it’s more true than this.

According to the fine print, the expected return-to-player (RTP) on Huff N’ More Puff is 96.00%. By my highly unscientific estimates, if you never make it to any bonus rounds, the RTP is about 9.6%.

Bonus, baby!

So, playing Huff N’ More Puff is mostly an exercise in rooting for the symbols that will get you to the bonus rounds.

This slot does offer the opportunity to buy directly into a bonus round. Spins are available for as little as 20 cents and as much as $90, and at that minimum 20-cent ante, buying into the bonus costs $9.50. That also comes with an expected return of 96%, meaning, on average, a bonus round when playing for 20 cents will award $9.12.

But for those who prefer the thrill of “earning” bonuses to the shortcut of buying them, here’s what you’re rooting: either six hard-hat symbols anywhere among the 15 squares, or a buzzsaw in three of the five columns.

The bonus rounds, while by no means groundbreaking, are a legitimately exciting dopamine hit.

The six hard hats send you to your more basic bonus. You get six free spins. The squares that featured hard hats get borders made of straw before the spins begin. And now you’re rooting for more hard hats, as every space with a hard hat upgrades — from no border to straw, from straw to stick, or from stick to brick. Get three or more hard hats on a single spin, and you’re rewarded with one more free spin. When the spins are complete, the wolf blows on the squares to remove the borders, and there are prizes underneath, with straw worth minimal amounts (0.5x to 2x the cost of the spin), sticks worth more (2x to 8x), and bricks worth the most (10x to 250x, or a jackpot amount).

Again, there’s nothing here that redefines the slot experience, but the mechanic of gradually upgrading boxes from straw to stick to brick delivers what it’s supposed to. Mostly playing at the 20-cent level (what can I say, I’m a low roller), I frequently squeezed only $4 or $5 out of my free spins. But one time, I had four houses turn to brick, one of which had a Mini Jackpot (worth $4) underneath and one of which had a Minor Jackpot (worth $20), and the whole bonus round added up to a little over $32.

The wheel deal

The more exciting bonus round arrives when you hit three buzzsaws in the standard game, triggering a spin of the jackpot wheel. The wheel features seven possible options (which, the fine print spells out, do not have equal chances of hitting). Four of those are straight-forward jackpot amounts: a Mini worth 20 times your initial spin value, a Minor worth 100x, a Major worth 1000x, and a Grand worth 5000x.

The first time I scored the wheel feature, I got the lamest possible outcome: a Mini jackpot, worth all of $4, with no further gameplay to enjoy. Any of the jackpots qualify as lame from a gameplay standpoint — but, at high-dollar amounts (like, say, turning a $1 spin into $5,000), who cares about gameplay?

The other three spots on the wheel are variations on the free spin bonus game: the Buzz Saw Feature, the Mansion Feature, and the Mega Hat feature. Full disclosure: I have yet to hit the Mansion Feature. I couldn’t tell you how enjoyable it is. Based on reading the rules, it appears you automatically get three brick houses. We like brick houses. But, I haven’t experienced it, so I have no tales and no takes.

As for the others, they’re free spin bonus rounds where you may or may not start off in better standing than you do with your typical six-hard-hats bonus. The Mega Hat covers four, nine, or all 15 squares in straw to start. The Buzz Saw Feature sees those saws plow across the grid to the right, building borders over every square they cross. And from there, it’s into your standard six free spins and you’re just rooting for hard hats.

As noted above, in my limited playing time, I finished slightly ahead, which is bound to impact how I feel about Huff N’ More Puff.

My experience was positive overall, but when it comes to slots, the phrase “different strokes for different folks” undoubtedly applies. Some people like games with crazier graphics and a lot going on at once, making it hard to tell what’s even hitting on a given spin. And some like games with just a handful of simple things to root for and graphics not much fancier than in the arcade games we used to play as kids.

Huff N’ More Puff is in the latter category. The pleasures are simple. For some iCasino players, it isn’t going to blow their house down, so to speak. But it’s popular on casino floors for a reason. And FanDuel Casino is clearly under the impression that if it puts in a marketing effort akin to carefully building with bricks rather than quickly assembling with straw, the game will find its audience.