Yokai

Yokai Slot Review: BGaming's Sticky-Wild Take on Japanese Folklore

Yokai is a 5x3 video slot from BGaming that leans on samurai imagery and supernatural spirits, built around a sticky-wild mechanic layered with a growing multiplier. It ships with a generous 97% RTP, sits in the medium-to-high volatility band, and tops out at an 8,000x maximum win, all running across 20 fixed paylines. Hit frequency is stated at around 1 in 3.82 spins, so wins land at a reasonably steady clip for a game of this volatility.

The base game centres on Wild symbols that can appear on the middle three reels, each carrying a value of +2, +3, +5 or +10. Rather than multiplying wins directly, these values add together into a Moon Multiplier displayed above the reels, which is then applied to whatever total win lands on that spin. It's a neat way of giving ordinary line hits a bit more weight, though because the multiplier resets after every base-game spin that doesn't produce a Wild combination, the pacing outside the bonus can feel fairly even-keeled while you wait for the free spins to arrive.

Three scatters landing on reels 1, 3 and 5 trigger the free spins round. Instead of a fixed number of spins, the game cuts through nine moons, each revealing one, two or three spins, so the starting total varies from round to round. Once inside the feature, the Wilds become sticky and the Moon Multiplier stops resetting between spins, letting it climb throughout the round. Two scatters during the feature can also retrigger extra spins, giving the multiplier even more room to build before the round ends.

An ante bet is available for players who want to double their chances of triggering the free spins for an extra 0.5x on the stake, and the bonus can also be bought outright for 100x the base bet if you'd rather skip straight to the action. Between the strong RTP and the respectable 8,000x ceiling, the maths behind Yokai holds up well against plenty of modern releases, even if the sticky-wild-plus-persistent-multiplier format is one that regular slot players will recognise from elsewhere in the genre.

Where Yokai earns its keep is in execution rather than originality - the theme is handled with a decent amount of atmosphere, and the growing multiplier gives the free spins genuine tension. It's a solid pick for players who enjoy a slower-building bonus round with real upside. The free demo at johnessyslots is worth a spin before deciding whether to play Yokai for real money.