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Every series has a starting point. For Pragmatic Play’s most successful franchise, it was this: a five-reel fishing slot with 10 paylines, a bearded fisherman for a wild, and a free spins round built around collecting money values from fish symbols. Big Bass Bonanza launched in December 2020 and quietly became one of the defining slot games of the decade, spawning enough sequels to fill a tackle shop!
The formula it established (high volatility, scatter-triggered bonus, progressive retrigger multipliers) has been reworked, remixed, and reimagined more than a dozen times since. But if you haven’t played the original Big Bass series game yet, this is where it all started.
The bearded fisherman is the wild. He doesn’t appear during standard play at all; his entire role is reserved for the free spins feature, where he lands on all five reels. During the bonus, he substitutes for every symbol except the scatter, but his primary function is collecting. Every time a fisherman wild lands, he scoops the cash values from all fish money symbols visible on the reels at that moment. Those values are then banked and paid out at the end of the round.
The scatter is the game’s trigger symbol, a circular emblem showing a bass fish breaking the surface. It appears on all five reels. Land three or more to activate the free spins feature. Three scatters awards 10 spins, four awards 15, and five awards 20. There’s no scatter pay system here; the scatter’s only function is triggering the bonus round.
This is where Big Bass Bonanza earns its reputation. During free spins, fish symbols on the reels all carry randomly assigned money values (ranging from 2x to 2,000x your total bet). Each time a fisherman wild lands, he collects every visible money value and adds it to a running total.
The tension builds through the retrigger system: every fourth fisherman wild collected triggers 10 additional free spins and upgrades the multiplier applied to collected money values. The first retrigger sets it at 2x, the second at 3x, and the third at 10x. A fourth retrigger cannot be triggered after the third. If you reach the 10x multiplier stage, the values collected in those spins are multiplied tenfold before being added to your total.
There’s also a random event that can occur when only one fisherman wild is on screen at the end of a spin. Fish money symbols can appear in random positions to give the wild something to collect.
The fish paying symbols visible during standard play all become money symbols during the free spins feature. At every spin, each fish takes a random cash value from a range of 2x, 5x, 10x, 15x, 20x, 25x, 50x, or 2,000x the total bet. These values are only collected when a fisherman wild is present. Without a fisherman on screen, the values sit on the reels uncleared.
Big Bass Bonanza uses a standard 5x3 layout with 10 fixed paylines. All symbols pay left to right on adjacent reels starting from the leftmost reel. Bet sizes run from £0.10 to £250 per spin. Adjust your stake using the +/- controls at the bottom of the screen. The game also features autoplay with configurable loss limits and a turbo mode for faster spins.
With high volatility and a single bonus feature, standard play can go long stretches without significant returns. The game is designed around the free spins round as the primary reward event; standard play exists largely to build toward that trigger. Pragmatic Play offers alternative RTP configurations of this game; the standard version runs at 96.71%, but some operators use lower settings. Check the in-game rules screen to confirm which version is active on your chosen platform.
Symbol values below are shown at a £1.00 total bet (10p per line).
| Symbol | 5 of a Kind | 4 of a Kind | 3 of a Kind | 2 of a Kind |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fishing Float (top) | £200.00 | £20.00 | £5.00 | £0.50 |
| Fishing Rod & Reel | £100.00 | £15.00 | £3.00 | — |
| Dragonfly | £50.00 | £10.00 | £2.00 | — |
| Tackle Box | £50.00 | £10.00 | £2.00 | — |
| Bass Fish | £20.00 | £5.00 | £1.00 | — |
| A | £10.00 | £2.50 | £0.50 | — |
| K | £10.00 | £2.50 | £0.50 | — |
| Q | £10.00 | £2.50 | £0.50 | — |
| J | £10.00 | £2.50 | £0.50 | — |
| 10 | £10.00 | £2.50 | £0.50 | — |
The fisherman (wild) and scatter symbols do not have standard pay values. The fisherman only appears in free spins, and the scatter's role is triggering the bonus.
Big Bass Bonanza is the slot that made a franchise. Strip away the nostalgia and what's left is a clean, high-volatility fishing game with one bonus feature and an RTP of 96.71%. It doesn't try to be more than that. The presentation is bright and relaxed, the free spins retrigger system gives the bonus genuine escalation, and the 2,100x max win sits at the conservative end compared to later series entries. Our review session matched the game's reputation pretty accurately: unhurried standard play, a decent run of scatter suspense, and a bonus round that delivered steadily without fireworks. Ultimate Slots Rating: 7/10
Load it up and the first thing that registers is how straightforward it looks. Five reels, bright orange symbol backgrounds, a clear underwater backdrop. There’s nothing demanding your attention, no intro animation, no exploding effects on every spin. Compared to more recent Pragmatic Play output, this feels noticeably understated. Whether that reads as refreshingly clean or slightly dated probably depends on what you’ve been playing lately.
Standard play is patient by design. The 10 paylines keep regular hit frequency modest, and wins between features tend to be small. What keeps things moving is scatter watching. Land one bass on the reels and your eyes go to every other reel waiting for the second. Land two and the game’s low-key energy sharpens into something more focused. It’s a simple trick, but it works. The anticipation of a third scatter landing does more for the pacing than any number of standard-play animations would.
When the bonus triggers, the tone shifts cleanly. The fisherman appears across all reels, and you’re now watching for fish values rather than standard wins. Early in the feature, rounds can feel underwhelming, a fisherman or two per spin, collecting modest values, the total building slowly. But the 4-wild retrigger structure is what this game is built around. Each retrigger adds 10 more spins and steps up the multiplier. That third retrigger, lifting the collected values to 10x, is the moment the game justifies the wait. A bonus round that reaches that stage with good fish values is a memorable one. Many rounds don’t get there. That’s high volatility doing its job.
Worth mentioning for context: this is the starting point of a long series that has evolved significantly. Big Bass Bonanza 1000 shares the same core retrigger DNA but cranks the potential up to 10,000x and layers in a Bonus Buy and Ante Bet.
Big Bass Splash takes the fisherman wild collecting format and adds pre-bonus modifiers including extra fish, extra wilds, or an elevated starting multiplier level. The Hold & Spinner variants move away from the retrigger format entirely, replacing it with a coin-collecting respin feature on a 3×5 grid. Big Bass Bonanza Megaways expands to up to 117,649 ways to win with a cascading win system.
Each iteration addresses a perceived limitation of the original, whether that’s the 2,100x cap, the single bonus format, or the lack of pre-feature variety. The original holds its own as the template; later entries are better by most measurable metrics.
If you want a calm, focused fishing slot where the bonus does the heavy lifting, this is still a solid choice for a free play session. If you’re coming from a later series entry and expecting modifiers or higher potential, the original will feel stripped back. Both reactions are valid.
The grid is aesthetic and puts the Fishin’ Frenzy series to shame (in our opinion!)
The loading screen shows you to look out for re-triggers and multipliers in this version.
A small sample win is shown, we won $5 from a $1 bet in demo mode.
The game info screen shows the paytable and rules.
