Book of Yuletide

Book of Yuletide: Slot Overview

There's something almost cute about the way so many software providers continue to observe Christmas time, year in and year out, dropping an endless procession of seasonally related slots. Today, we've got developer Quickspin in a gift-giving mood. Not for the first time, either. See Spinions Xmas Party for a cutesy, 'lite' celebration of the season with characters that look like the Minions and a bag of Cheetos spawned a batch of love children. Book of Yuletide, by contrast, manages to be a little bit naughty and a little bit nice while packing significantly higher-strung gameplay, features, as well as winning potential.

Two things first. Yes, Book of Yuletide is an expanding special symbols in free spins type game, and yes, it is a Christmas clone of Quickspin's exciting contribution to the 'book of' genre, Book of Duat, released around 2 years prior. As far as getting players in the mood for Xmas, Book of Yuletide does a great job, in large part because the music selection is bang on. The base game mischievously plods along to Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy from the Nutcracker Suite, then O Come All Ye Faithful jams while big win count-ups occur, and a swinging Vagas-y, Jingle Bells track accompanies free spins. It's joyfully upbeat yet doesn't get department store generic thanks to things like mischievous elf symbols and a Santa who looks like he's getting an inordinate amount of joy adding kids' names to the naughty list. In short, Book of Yuletide is an Xmas slot, but one with more balance to it than just all-out schmaltz.

Beneath the outer layer, Book of Yuletide's math model is highly volatile and spits out a return to player value of 96.27%, and 2 less generous models are available, as well. The bet range is 20 c to $/€100, and players have access to three bonus buy options of exponentially rising costs and possibly potency. Despite a stack of innovative charms, Book of Yuletide is played on a regular grid setup consisting of 5 reels, 3 rows of symbols, and 10 fixed paylines.

Book of Yuletide sticks to the high payout value these sorts of games are famous for, as hitting a 5 OAK winning line made up of medium elves (there are three types) pays 75 to 200 times the bet, while a line of 5 Santas is worth 500x the bet. Low pay 10-A card ranks aren't as exciting but award 10 to 15 times the bet for a 5 symbol win.

Book of Yuletide: Slot Features

A carrot-nosed decoration thing is Book of Yuletide's wild symbol. It lands on all reels, substitutes for any pay symbols and pays out up to 2,500x the bet when 5 wilds make a winning line. In addition, wilds are the free spins scatter symbol. Landing 3, 4, or 5 wild/scatters triggers the bonus game, awarding 4 free spins plus 3, 6, or 12 picks, respectively. An expanding symbol and a multiplier of x1 is also awarded.

Pick and Click

The Pick and Click takes place before free spins begin. A total of 20 gift boxes appear on the screen, and players pick them one by one until their lot of picks have been used. Revealed awards from a gift can be +2, +3, +5, +10 free spins, +1 expanding symbols, +2 expanding symbols, +3 expanding symbols, +1x multiplier, +2x multiplier, or +5x multiplier.

Free Spins

After normal evaluations occur in free spins, each expanding symbol has its own evaluation one by one. These symbols expand to cover each reel they are on and pay all lines from any position. Wilds are not used when this happens. Hitting 3, 4, or 5 wild/scatters awards +2 free spins plus 1, 2, or 4 picks, respectively.

Buy Feature

From the base game, players may buy the free spins feature. There are 3 choices. Paying 150x, 500x, or 1,600x the bet triggers free spins with 3, 4, or 5 wild symbols, respectively. The 3 wild trigger RTP is 96.5%, the 4 wild trigger RTP is 96.71%, and the 5 wild trigger RTP is 96.91%.

Book of Yuletide: Slot Verdict

If you're going to clone an older slot and make it a Christmas one, you might as well do it in style. Or if not, then at least copy a decent game. Both of these things Quickspin has done, really. On the style front, Book of Yuletide might not be as irreverent as Lucksome's Saint Nicked or iSoftBet's Raging Reindeer, but the fact it gets into the spirit while managing not to drip cheesy/generic Xmas cheer from every single pore is appreciated. Well, there's a thematic edge here, to a degree. If you gave Book of Yuletide a big hug with a pointy object in your pocket, piercing its outer layer, then along with eggnog and Kinderpunsch, it wouldn't be surprising if one or two surprising ingredients oozed out, as well.

Book of Yuletide's gameplay is also part traditional, part not, for a 'book of' game. The base game will feel familiar to practically anyone who has played a 'book' slot, where aiming to hit big 5 OAK wins is the order of the day. That and scouting for scatters, which, when at least 3 hit open Book of Yuletide right up. Or they can do, partly depending on what sort of rewards are revealed during the Pick and Click phase of the bonus round. As you might imagine, winning extra free spins tended to be the most common reward, followed by additional expanding symbols, while multipliers were the rarest extra of the lot. With all that in mind, bonus buys were tempting, but they are somewhat on the expensive side. The 4 or 5 scatter options were at least.

What is likely to make buying bonus rounds even more tempting is the fact Book of Yuletide's winning potential is 32,760x the bet, putting it in the higher potential 'book' bracket, up there with a slot like Book of Shadows. Everything adds up to a satisfyingly fruity mince pie of a slot for players looking to get into the Christmas spirit with excitingly unorthodox 'book of' style of gaming thrown in the mix.