Slingo Daily Challenge: P-p-p-p-power!

Slingo Daily Challenge is a new game at Slingo. It’s a really neat expansion on the classic Slingo game! (Read the guide on Slingo Classic to learn about the coins, Jokers, Cherub, and Devil.)

 

This is a solo game so you’re not trying to beat anyone else. You have 5 minutes to take your spins and match the numbers! I really love that I don’t have to wait for everyone else to finish each turn. *^_^*

 

And if you couldn’t guess by the name, each day you’ll get a new challenge score to beat. (Thus the “Daily Challenge” part.) Beat it and you’ll earn 150,000 Slingo coins! If you can’t beat it you’ll get 10,000 coins and a chance to try again.

 

But what really makes this a fabulous game is the addition of powerups!

 

Oooooh! Fun!!

 

Powerups are a common feature in their downloadable games, but this is the first time they’ve been included on a browser-played Slingo game. I like it. ^_^

 

Each day you get between one and nine powerups. (So far I’ve only seen between 2-6, but I don’t play every single day.) Currently there are ten different powerups and an 11th will be released later this month.

 

So right now there are a total of 3,628,800 powerup combinations. It would take you 103,680 years to play a different one each day!

 

In other words, you’re not likely to get bored with this one. ^_^

 

I have no idea how many total powerups they plan on releasing, but here’s what’s out so far. (The Instant Slingos powerup is new TODAY!)

 

Most of these are pretty self explanatory, but here’s more info on a few of the trickier ones.

 

Bounce Slingos

As you know, normally Slingos can only be made when you cover five in a row, column, or diagonal. Getting the Bounce Slingos powerup adds two new patterns to the board!

The first one is very simple.

It’s smiling at me!

That’s a Slingo! That shape activates four new Slingos on the board. You can also look at it this way, if it helps.

Um.. Thanks?

For some reason I have a harder time remembering the second pattern, but it works like this:

Check!

It may look simple, but this this pattern adds sixteen Slingos to the board! If you drew them all out it’d look something like this.

o_O Well, that’s… colorful.

If you’re not into planning your Slingos out, just place your Jokers wherever you want and don’t worry about it. ^_^

 

Devil Protection

This is one of my favorite powerups, mainly because I HATE that darn Devil. >_< But there’s another great reason to have the Cherub save your behind. Sometimes zie’ll double your score!

Woohooo!!

Whenever you look at the daily scores and wonder how in the heck people got that high, this is the answer. The Cherub saved their behind multiple times, and generously doubled their score in the process!

Keep in mind that Devil Protection doesn’t mean that you’ll get your score doubled every time a Cherub saves you. But it does mean that you won’t lose any points at all to that darn Devil!

 

Power Shot

This one is awesome. ^_^ When the icon pops up, you can match any number in the column above it. But when you click the number you’re really getting five spots at once! It looks like this:

 Nice!

Very handy!

 

Slingo Vision

This is another of my faves too. (Is there a powerup I dislike? Probably not.)

Slingo Vision automatically highlights available moves, which makes the games SUPER fast. ^_^ I love it.

Slingo Vision, activate!

 

Tips & Tricks

The value of Slingos increases when you have them in succession.

• 1st Slingo = 1000 points
• 2nd Slingo = 1500 points
• 3rd Slingo = 2000 points
• 4th Slingo = 2500 points
• 5th Slingo = 3000 points
• 6th Slingo = I hope you get the idea by now.

When you click SPIN it starts over, so try to plan your Slingos out and get as many as you can in one turn!

Since the game changes every day, that’s really the only tip I’ve figured out so far! *^_^*

 

Final Rating

I really enjoy the variety in the Slingo Daily Challenge, and I look forward to seeing future powerups! The challenge score is also pretty neat, but it’s frustrating when the only way you can get it is to have the Cherub save your behind AND double your score. I’m not usually that lucky. :(

Other than that little bit, it’s a fantastic game! ^_^ I rate it 4.5 stars out of 5. What would you rate it? Do you have a favorite powerup? Least favorite?

 

Similar Games

If you like Slingo Daily Challenge, well, you should probably hang around Slingo and play some more of their games! XD But if you want to branch out, try some of these!

• Frantic Fish at Gamesville – Play each day for a shot at $25!
• Lottso Express! at Pogo – This combines bingo and scratchcards. Win!
• Olympics at Playtopia – If you love complicated slots, Olympics is PERFECT for you. ^_^

Frantic Fish – Definitely fishy.

Frantic Fish has many die-hard fans, and if you want to be one of them you’d better head over to Gamesville! This game is a cross between bingo and slots, and if you couldn’t guess by the name, it has a beachy theme. ^_^

 

Aloha!

 

In each game you have 4 minutes and 20 “spins” to score as many points as you can. On each spin you’ll get five fish with numbers one them, and one bonus item. All of these things appear at the top of the board,

 

The first five fish are directly above columns of numbered shells. Each shell randomly contains a number between 1 and 75, and the fish are numbered in that range too. However!  The numbered fish can only be matched to shells in the column directly below them!

 

Dangit. :(

 

To “match” a fish to a shell, just click on the fish and drag it to the shell. Keep matching fish each round and try to make as many bingo lines as you can. A bingo line is five fish-covered shells in a row, column, or diagonally. Each bingo line is worth 1,000 points!

 

Fish-o!

 

That takes care of the first five fish. The sixth spot is a random bonus, and you’ll get one of three things.

 

Item	Purpose
Random # Fish	It’s like a regular fish, except you can place it on ANY shell with that number!
Wild Fish	Place it on ANY shell for an instant match!
Coin	+1000 points to your score. Woohoo!

 

Pretty cool, huh? Unfortunately, the randomly numbered fish doesn’t always have a match on the board. Sadness. :(

 

But the Wild Fish is awesome! I love it. ^_^

 

Frantic Fish also has an awesome feature called “Auto Daub.” With auto daub on, the first 5 fish will automatically find their matches on each spin! You’ll need to take care of any bonus fish yourself, but with auto daub you have less to worry about. Woohooo!

 

Scoring & Rewards

Scoring is really simple. You get 200 points for every matched fish and both coins and bingo lines are worth 1,000 points. See? Easy. ^_^

 

The rewards are a little more complicated. Here are the current payouts.

 

1 Gold Coin	5 GVs
1 Bingo Line	10 GVs
Be in the Top 5 when the game ends	250 GVs & 5 entries
Be the #1 player when the game ends	250 GVs & 20 entries

 

Basically, you REALLY want to be one of the Top 5 players when the game ends! The entries are for a daily $25 drawing. This particular drawing is unique to Frantic Fish, and you cannot earn entries through other games! Really! You can’t buy entries with GVs either.

 

It’s pretty tough to get into the Top 5, so you’d better bring your A game and bribe lady luck.

 

Tips & Tricks

First things first. Turn auto daub ON! This will save you a lot of frustration down the road.

Secondly, keep an eye on your board and plan where you would place a Wild Fish. You want to make as many bingo lines as possible, so look for lines that are the closest to being finished. For example, a line with 3-4 fish already in it. ^_^

If the game has barely begun and you have few (or no) fish on the board, well, you have three options.

1. Start using the diagonals to build an X across the board. This distributes the fish and opens possibilities for more bingos.
2. Look for shells with duplicate numbers and cover one (or more) of them with a Wild Fish. Why? Well imagine that you have two #12 shells on the board. If you’re lucky you *might* get a bonus #12 fish that you can place anywhere, but it’s unlikely that you’ll get two bonus #12 fishies.
3. Close your eyes and pick randomly. Don’t look at me like that! Random can be fun. ^_^

Frantic Fish can turn upside down within seconds. I’ve had games where I was in the Top 5 for 10+ rounds and then stalled out at the end, and I’ve had one game where I joined on round 8 and somehow managed to make it into the Top 5. o_O

But most of the time I end up with a moderately covered board and no Top 5 title to make me happy.

Carp!

 

Final Ranting Rating

Many Gamesvillians LOVE Frantic Fish, but uh, I’m not one of them. *^_^* It kind of surprised me, because Slingo Classic is one of my favorite games, and Frantic Fish is a lot like it. I don’t want to delve into a full-out rant, but… well…. 

Get comfy.

Okay, here’s my BIG problem with Frantic Fish: If I play with auto daub on, I only have to worry about the bonus fish. This means I have 10 seconds to place one fish, and most of the time I either get a number I can’t use or a coin. I have nothing to do! Even 10 seconds feels like a loooooooong time if you’re just sitting there waiting for the timer to run out, and it’s not uncommon to sit there for 4+ rounds in a row with absolutely nothing going on.

On the other hand, with auto daub off, I have 10 seconds to scan and place 5-6 fish. No matter how hard I try, I can never do it fast enough. Since I automatically scan from the left to the right, this means I frequently miss out on the bonus fish. It’s extremely frustrating to realize you missed a fish. >_<

The reason there’s so much down time in Frantic Fish compared to Slingo Classic, is because it’s working with a larger pool. In Frantic Fish, every shell picks a number between 1 and 75. With Slingo Classic the columns divide the numbers into groups of 15, and nothing repeats.  (Column A ranges from #1-15. Column B ranges from #16-30, and so on.)

What this means is that you have vastly different odds of actually spinning something that you can use. Let’s focus on just the first column. With Frantic Fish, you have a 7% chance of spinning a match on the first spin. (5 out of 75.)

Slingo Classic has bonus pieces that you can pick up in the spins so the numbers are a little different, but for the first column you have a 32% chance of spinning a match on the first spin. (6 out of 19. Don’t ask, but it’s right.)

Slingo Classic doesn’t have auto daub, but it’s easier to find matches because I’m working with a smaller pool of numbers per row. It’s a quick pace but I never have trouble keeping up with it. Conversely, in Frantic Fish I often sit around and wonder if auto daub is working because nothing is happening. Seriously!

Also, the rewards are pretty shoddy. Unless you’re in the Top 5 you probably won’t get many GVs. (I usually picked up 30-50 GVs per game.) Oh, and good luck on getting in the Top 5, because you’re competing against everyone playing Frantic Fish at that moment. They take all of the players in all of the rooms and arrange the high scores through that.

Gamesville does this with most of their games, but Frantic Fish is the only one where getting in the Top 5 really matters. Remember, in order to get entries into the Frantic Fish $25 daily drawing, you must get into the Top 5 at least once! There’s no other way to get entries.

A game that has me yo-yoing between boredom and frustration is not a winner for me. I love the crew at Gamesville, but Frantic Fish is a stinker in my book. :(

2 stars out of 5.

Are you one of the rabid fans? Tell me why you like (or dislike) Frantic Fish! What would you have rated it? ^_^

 

Similar Games

If you like Frantic Fish, be sure to try some of these games too!

• Slingo Classic at Slingo – An exciting cross between bingo and slots! But you already knew that.
• Lottso Express at Pogo – Here we cross bingo with scratchcards! It’s really fun. ^_^
• Bingo Bash at Winster – Work together with your teammates to complete bingo patterns!

Spigo Scratch Cards - Exactly what it sounds like.

I love scratch cards. ^_^ They are AWESOME! Thus far, Spigo is the only site I’ve found with daily scratch cards. (Slingo used to have one, but it’s been gone a long while. Sad. ~_~)

Each day you’ll get 6 new scratch cards, and you can earn several more as you go along.  Here’s how they work!

 

Quick Scratch

Each day you get three Quick Scratch cards.

Big money!

Use the coin to scratch off all of the spaces. If you find 3 matching images, you win a prize!

Ooh! Ooh! I won…. nothing. :(

Possible prizes are 50-1000 Spigos, $20, $50, $100, or the current Jackpot. The Jackpot has a max prize of $200!

All I’ve ever won are Spigos, but those are good to have too. ^_^

 

Zodiac Signs

In Zodiac Signs you pick one of your friends to “play” with. They don’t participate, but if you win anything you’ll share it with them.

Who should I pick today?

And no, you can’t opt to play this by yourself. Even if you haven’t made any friends yet, Spigo is still on the list. :)

Fishies!!

Scratch off all of the circles. You want to see your astrological sign AND your friend’s. That’s where you get the big tokens. ^_^ Top prize is $100 that goes to each of you!

 

Diamond Hunt

Diamond Hunt is really 3 scratchcards in one, if you ask me.

Umm… what?

You’ll eventually scratch all of the squares, so you can’t mess anything up. ^_^ In Mine 1 you want to find 3 matching jewels.

Blast. No luck!

With Mine 2 you only need to find 2 matching jewels.

Yay!!! I won something!!

In the last section you have a statue of a bird with one jewel as an eye. You want to find the other matching jewel!

Curses. No luck again!

The prizes are all Spigos, so don’t feel terrible if you strike out with all 3 parts. Just move on to the next card. ^_^

 

Bingo Scratch

This is one of my favorites!

Bingo!

In Bingo Scratch you have 4 different Bingo cards at the bottom. You scratch off the numbers at the top, and they’ll automatically scratch off on the cards. If any of your cards match a set pattern (listed in the top right corner) you win Spigos!!

Yay!! I winz!!!

I like the rainbow of Bingo balls. ^_^

 

Jackpot Scratch

This one is very different from the other cards. For starters, you don’t automatically get any Jackpot Scratch cards each day.

So how do you get them? Well, the first time you get a jackpot spin on any of the regular games (Diamonds, Treasure Hunter, Jigsaw Puzzle, etc) you’ll get a Jackpot Scratch card. You can get one Jackpot Scratch card per game, per day!

Now, how do you play this one?

Umm.. No clue.

As you can see, there are 14 numbers on the left, and several prizes all around it. If you take a moment to count you’ll see that there are a total of 12 prizes listed and 3 “Blanks.” Have you figured it out yet? ^_^

Still clueless.

As you scratch off the numbers, you’ll reveal prizes. Each prize you reveal is then removed from the prize pool. Whatever is left at the end is your prize!

Wait.. Did I just win 10,000 Spigos?!

See? One item left, and it’s 10,000 Spigos. ^_^ There are three cash jackpots too. Not bad!

As far as I can tell, the Jackpot Scratch cards don’t expire. All of the other cards are gone after a day, but these? They stick around. You could amass a huge pile of them if you wanted to!

 

Super Jackpot

The Super Jackpot isn’t a scratch card, but it’s Spigo’s main attraction. It’s a massive jackpot spread across ALL of the Spigo sites. There are two ways it can be won.

1. A random draw triggered by a number generator. The generator will pick one ticket as the winner. The rest of the tickets are “used up” and everyone starts back at zero.
2. The Super Jackpot slot machine. Each day you can use 3 of your tickets for three chances at the slot machine. If you win the Super Jackpot everyone will get to keep their tickets.

In case you’ve forgotten, you buy tickets with Spigos. ^_^ Now, here’s how to buy tickets.

There are two paths. Path 1: Click on the green SUPER JACKPOT button in the upper right corner on Spigo.

Thar she blows!

Path 2: Click on the “tickets” link in the left sidebar.

That’s a lotta tickets. o_O

Whichever route you pick, you’ll end up at the “Buy Tickets” screen. If you don’t have any tickets yet, go ahead and buy some! From there, click on the Super Jackpot link in the bottom right corner.

This is overly complicated.

Huzzah!!! You found the Super Jackpot machine!

Dear Santa, I WANT TO WIN!!!!

Pull the lever three times to see if you win! Even if you don’t win the big prize, you still might win Spigo merchandise or Spigos.

When the current Super Jackpot is over $50,000, well.. Spigos aren’t a great consolation prize. *^_^*

 

Final Rating

I love scratch cards. ^_^ Wait.. I already said that? Well it’s true, dangit! I wish more sites had them!!

For the sheer joy and uniqueness of them, I rate the daily games at Spigo 4 stars out of 5. What would you rate them? Do you have a favorite scratch card?

 

Similar Games

Well whaddya know? I can’t list any similar games because NO ONE ELSE HAS SCRATCH CARDS!! Untapped market here, people! Get to it!

The best I can offer you are links to games of chance. Good luck! ^_^

• Lottso Express at Pogo – Fine fine, I was wrong. This mixes Bingo and scratchcards!
• Mixed Matrix Slingo at Slingo – Here we mix Bingo and slots!
• Quick-Draw Poker at Gamesville – And this mixes Poker with… Poker. Fun though!

Mixed Matrix Slingo – There is no spoon.

If you’ve played Slingo Classic and thought it was too easy, well I have a game for you! Mixed Matrix Slingo takes the board and shuffles everything up. When you spin for numbers it can be anywhere on the board!

Both games are available (of course) at Slingo! But if you haven’t played either game, well let’s start at the beginning. ^_^

Mixed Matrix Slingo is a cross between Bingo and slots. In each game you get a board with 25 numbers on it, and you have 20 spins to match all of the numbers on your board.

  Purple!

On each spin you’ll get a total of five numbers and/or special pieces. (I’ll get to the special pieces in a moment.) And if you didn’t catch what I said earlier, the numbers can be anywhere on the board. You have a few seconds to find them, so you’d better be quick!

The first 16 spins are free, but the last four cost points.

• Spin 17 – 500 points
• Spin 18 – 1000 points
• Spin 19 – 1500 points
• Spin 20 – 2000 points

You can see why it’s best to finish your card as soon as possible. ^_^

For each number you match you’ll earn 400 points. Whenever you cover five numbers in a row, column, or diagonally, that’s a Slingo and it’s worth 2000 points!

Little bit of math here. ^_^ Covering every number on your card is worth a total of 34,000 points! (10,000 points for the numbers and 24,000 points for all of the Slingos.)

When you fill your card you get a Full Card [FC] bonus.

Full card! Woohoo!

The earlier you fill your card, the bigger the bonus! You won’t fill your card every hand, so enjoy whatever bonus you pick up. ^_^

When the game is over your score converts into Slingos. In the above picture I gained 48,000 Slingos. Sweet!

HOWEVER! To play Mixed Matrix Slingo you must pony up at least 10,000 Slingo coins at the start of each game. This goes into a group pool and the number one player gets all of it!

Earning back 10,000 coins isn’t a problem with this game. If you want to really gamble, check out the 25k, 50k, or 100k rooms! 

 

Special Pieces

Sometimes you’ll get more than just numbers on a spin. If you’re lucky you might get a gold coin or two. ^_^

Shiny!

These beauties are worth 2,000 points each! Woohoo!! They’re a wonderful boost to your score, and it’s always great to start a game with three gold coins. ^_^ But when I’m near the end and need just 2-3 numbers to fill my card, well.. then I’m not quite as happy to see coins.

Another great item (and it’s always great) is the free spin!

Weeee!!!

Free spin tokens appear at random and they’re “saved” for the later rounds. You can have up to four, and they’re listed under the spin number. In the picture below I was on spin 16 out of 20 and had 2 free spins!

 Two more, please!

As soon as you get to round 17 you’ll have an option to pay or use your free spin. ALWAYS pay before you use free spins!

If I have two free spins I’ll most likely need to pay for two spins, unless I get a full card. Now follow my math here. ^_^ If I use my free spins on 17-18, then I’ll have to pay 3,500 points for spins 19-20. On the other hand, if I pay for spins 17-18, then it’s only 1,500 points. It might not seem like a big deal, but remember, you’re competing against other players. 2,000 points can make a huge difference!

The next special piece is the Joker. Whenever it appears you can mark any number in the column above it! If you get three or more Jokers, you get an extra bonus!

Hi, guys!

Jokers are awesome. ^_^

• 3 Jokers = 1,000 point bonus
• 4 Jokers = 2,500 point bonus
• 5 Jokers = 10,000 point bonus!

Getting five Jokers is extremely rare! If you’re lucky enough to get it, CELEBRATE! ^_^ Send me a message and I’ll celebrate with ya!

In addition to the regular Jokers, every now and then the rare green Super Joker appears.

Hey! Where’s my pot of gold?

The Super Joker can be placed anywhere on the board! He’s flexible!

IMPORTANT: Look before you place the Super Joker! See how the numbers beside him are grayed out? That’s because you have to place the Super Joker first. If you aren’t careful you’ll mark a number that you would have gotten anyway. (Ex: Marking an 18 when you already spun an 18.) It’s a waste of the Super Joker and it’s REALLY frustrating. ~_~

Moving on!

So far these are all good things, but the devil is in the details.

Or in the reels.

That was a terrible segue, but I couldn’t resist. ^_^

Every now and then the Darn Devil will appear with a burst of flames on the reels. He’s truly, truly evil, and takes half of your points. (Bribes and begging don’t work. He’ll still take your points.)

He might show up at the beginning of a game, when you barely have anything to lose. He might show up at the end and shove you from first place into last. (It happens!) You might not see him for many games, or you might see him several times in one game. He’s random, and it sucks when he strikes. Sometimes people in chat will say “DD” which means they got hit. An appropriate response is, “ss” which means, “So sorry!” Or if you don’t care, don’t say anything. ^_^

Luckily, we have one defender against the Darn Devil: the Cherub.

 YAY!!! *Boogies*

If fate smiles upon you, the Cherub will swoop down, fan away the flames of Hades, and you’ll get to keep your points. ^_^ He seems to rescue me about 25% of the time. I guess he’s stuck in traffic for the other 75%.

In chat someone might say “csmb” which means “Cherub saved my behind.” You could say “grats” or “wtg” or glare jealously at your screen. (I pick the latter.)

 

Handy Things

Player rankings change after every spin. To see how you compare to others, hit the “Scores” tab at the top. Instant list of current rankings!

 Hmmm.. Did you wait until you were #1 to get this pic?

And yes, I did wait for a game where I was #1. ^_^

You may notice the “News” tab right next to the “Scores.” Whenever anyone gets 4 Jokers, 5 Jokers, or gets a Full Card [FC], it’s posted in the news.

I’m sensing a pattern here.

Oh shush. *^_^*

 

Tips & Tricks

1. Each spin you have only a few seconds to see if you have any matches. I usually start clicking while my eyes search the grid. There’s no penalty for misclicks!

When you move your cursor over the squares they’ll either light up or stay white.

I like fireflies!

If the squares light up that means you have at least one match on the board! It might not be the square your cursor is on, so keep searching!

2. Place the Jokers FIRST. It’s very common for the Joker to be the only match you can make, and you’ll waste a lot of time searching for the numbers on the other reels.

3. Know your blind spots! For some reason my eyes skim right over the numbers directly above the reels. Whenever I can’t find a match (but I know it’s there) I make sure to check the bottom line.

 

Final Rating

I like Mixed Matrix Slingo, but I kinda like Slingo Classic more. The extra challenge just makes my head hurt. *Sheepish grin*

Mixed Matrix Slingo is still a great game, it just doesn’t rock my world. 4 out of 5 stars.

What would you rate it? Do you have any tips to share?

 

Similar Games

If you like slots or bingo, check out some of these games!

• Lottso Express at Pogo – This is a cross between bingo and scratchcards. Odd, but it works!
• Bingo Zone at Gamesville – Try your luck at winning small cash prizes! Dozens of winners each day!
• Flaming Crates at FreeSlots – Simple slots game, but entertaining!