Original Release: Netent, 2010
One of Netent’s more enduring properties, Jack Hammer documents the adventures of a private dick with snoring problems as he spins his way through obese mobsters and the diabolical Dr. Farnsworth
Jack Hammer (NetEnt, 2010)
Review by: C. M0use
First released around 2010, Jack Hammer has been enduringly popular (though seemingly more so its sequel than this first one). Aside from kind of a cool pulp comic look to it, I think the main attraction was the then-new “sticky wins” system that creates both a positive return on a pretty high number of spins and a constant sense of a big hit being within reach.
This one has numerous paylines across the board, some of which are only three spaces in length. When you hit a payline with the right symbols, it “sticks” and you continue getting free spins so long as that same symbol (or a Wild) pops up in at least one of the other spaces. The ultimate goal here is to fill the entire board with the same symbol, which gives you the game’s biggest payoffs.
Jack Hammer has a reported RTP of just a sliver under 97%, and is classified as “low volatility.” After playing with it for a while I think that’s mostly fair, though there have been arguments online about it for years now. It is possible to hit fairly long stretches of dead spins, but it’s also far from unusual to get a bunch of “sticky wins” in short order and these are pretty much always in excess of your wager amount. I think the perception of it being “volatile” comes from the fact that fractional wins (just a portion of your wager back) are rare to nonexistent here. Hitting five of the appropriate symbols across the board also grants 10 to 30 free spins, which can build multipliers that make the screen-filling wins much bigger.
The bet range that can be set by the casino is from 25 cents to $250 USD per spin, I think this one is usually catered to the lower rollers when it appears though. A screen full of Jack Hammers is the max win and nets you 1000x your wager, but with multipliers on during free spins I believe that can go up even more. So it doesn’t have big mondo jackpots that will change your life in one hit, but does seem pretty well-suited to grinding reward credits or what have you.
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