Barb’s Best Bets: Win A King’s Ransom Playing Crowning Glory NJ Online Slot
Did you watch the May 19, 2018, royal wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle on TV or online? If so, did it have you fantasizing about what it would be like to live their life, if only for a day?
That was my experience. But, of course, it was short-lived, and soon, out of necessity, it was back to reality. Dreaming and reliving that dream as a memory is as close as most of us get to being surrounded by opulence and luxury of that magnitude.
Meanwhile, I was in a quandary about what to make the subject of my next Best Bets article. So that got me to thinking maybe there’s a slot game that could offer a reasonable facsimile of the royal life experience. I was skeptical but eager to start looking, and, much to my surprise — lo and behold — I hit pay dirt!
Crowning Glory is a royal-themed slot that truly lives up to its auspicious title.
What makes Crowning Glory a standout
What makes this slot special is not only the royal theme — which is driven home on every spin — but more importantly, the outstanding rate of return. Seeing the reels line up exactly right and the screen light up with the words “Big Win” is definitely within the realm of possibility and all you need to experience your own Crowning Glory moment!
Where to play Crowning Glory NJ online slot
Crowning Glory is optimized for both desktop and mobile play. Users of iPhone and Android devices will especially appreciate the touchscreen buttons that can be moved to either side of the screen.
If you would like to experience Crowning Glory for yourself (and I can’t see why you wouldn’t), these are the NJ gambling websites that offer it: Betfair, Caesars online, Golden Nugget, Mohegan Sun, PartyCasino NJ, Resorts, and PlaySugarHouse.
How Crowning Glory makes you feel like royalty
Crowning Glory is a relatively new video slot released in 2017 by Bet Digital and NextGen Gaming. Like many other online slots, it has five reels, 3 rows, and 20 fixed paylines.
What draws players to this slot is not the simple, but still commonly used 5×3 20-line format or the game’s special features, but the distinctive royal theme. Not only the clever game title, but also the images that appear on the screen even before you start playing, leave no doubt in your mind about the irresistibly exciting world you are about to enter.
While in reality, you are still sitting in front of your computer or smartphone, your mind tells you otherwise. You feel like you have somehow been magically transported to a distant royal kingdom.
The symbols on the reels are over the top versions of exactly what you would expect given this slot’s royal theme — glittery crowns of silver and gold and large and sometimes super size brightly covered gemstones. A lustrous golden border separates the reels and their coveted contents from a background of regal purple.
Will good fortune smile on you and send an abundance of these riches your way? You are about to find out!
Determining your payouts
Winning combinations are formed when 3, 4, or 5 like symbols appear on a payline on consecutive reels from left to right, starting with the reel farthest to the left.
Each symbol pays a certain designated number of coins, depending on whether it appears 3x, 4x, or 5x. The amount of your payout is then determined by multiplying the number of coins you have won by your line bet (total bet per spin divided by 20).
Crowning Glory symbols
Crowning Glory is a simple slot game. So just as there are only 20 paylines, there are not a lot of different symbols that can show up on the reels either, which actually works to your advantage. The more paylines and symbols a game has, the more possibilities there are for a lot of spins where a player comes up empty.
If these dry spells are prolonged and/or the wins interspersed between them are negligible, it can eat away at your bankroll quickly. This is a big concern (or at least should be) when playing some online slots, but not Crowning Glory.
You can play Crowning Glory to your heart’s content without ever worrying about depleting your whole stake.
Regular symbols
A sparkling and very ornate silver crown along with red rubies, green emeralds, and blue sapphires make up the game’s higher paying symbols. The following table shows the number of coins in the winning payout combinations for each of the four symbols.
| Number of Symbols | 3 | 4 | 5 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sapphire | 20 | 50 | 100 |
| Emerald | 20 | 50 | 100 |
| Ruby | 50 | 100 | 250 |
| Silver Crown | 100 | 200 | 500 |
The lower paying symbols in the game are the playing cards 10 through Ace.
Other symbols
The only other symbol in Crowning Glory is the golden crown bonus symbol, which is the game’s scatter symbol. See the Special Features section below to learn more about this symbol and how it works.
Crowning Glory special features
Crowning Glory has a few special features to enhance your enjoyment of the game and give you additional ways to win.
Giant symbols
Any of the game’s regular symbols, instead of occupying its usual amount of space, can randomly appear on any spin as a giant symbol. Any such symbol expands both horizontally and vertically to cover an entire 3×3 grid.
It is important to note, however, that giant symbols don’t always form winning combinations. The symbol must start on the reel farthest to the left.
However, because a giant symbol expands vertically as well as horizontally and also because there may be adjacent similar regular size symbols, some of the wins that the giant symbols generate are quite large.
Bonus features
Crowning Glory also includes two bonus features: the Royal Reels feature and the Free Spins feature.
Royal Reels bonus feature
On any given spin, the Royal Reels bonus may be randomly triggered. A wheel with 10 positions appears on the screen, and you can either press SPIN to spin the wheel or wait a couple of seconds and the wheel will spin automatically.
When the wheel comes to a stop, the symbol that is highlighted is transferred to the reels and placed in all five positions on a payline.
Then the reels stop and the player gets paid the rate for five of a kind for that symbol!
During a recent trial run, betting $6 per spin in demo play, less than 30 minutes after I started playing, I activated the Royal Reels bonus. When I spun the wheel, the symbol that came up was the Silver Crown, the highest paying symbol possible.
The payout for five of them on a payline is 500 coins, which in this case amounted to $150. Not bad for a bet of only $6!
Free Spins bonus feature
In the last section, I mentioned the Gold Crown scatter symbol. You will recognize this symbol instantly by its gold, rather than silver, color and by the word Bonus written on it. The Gold Crown symbol appears on reels 1, 3, and 5 only.
However, in this game, one Gold Crown won’t do anything for you. You need at least three of them to appear anywhere on the reels to activate the Free Spins bonus round.
If exactly three Gold Crown symbols show up, you win 12 free spins. But if more than three Gold Crown symbols land on the reels, even better.
An extra free spin is awarded for each additional visible Gold Crown bonus symbol. By the way, this bonus can be retriggered. So the free spins can last a long time and your winnings can really mount up.
Crowning Glory bet size and RTP
The bet range for this game is not as wide as for some slots, but should be sufficient to accommodate most players.
The minimum coin size is 1 cent and the maximum coin size is $1. However, all 20 lines must be played, thereby making the minimum bet per spin 20 cents and the maximum bet per spin $20. Players select their bet from the choices available by pressing the up or down arrows on the screen.
Crowning Glory is a low volatility slot with a superior RTP of 96.4 percent. This combination is great news for all players, but especially for small players with a limited budget for online gambling.
You can enjoy the game worry free, knowing that you not only have an excellent chance of winning, but even when it’s not your lucky day, any negative impact on your total bankroll will be minimal.
A slot game can be simple and still be spectacular
Bet Digital, the maker of this slot game, is a company whose slots, by today’s standards, tend to be relatively simple and — as should be clear by now — Crowning Glory is no exception. There are just enough special features to keep the game interesting without overloading you with a lot of fancy extras.
What Crowning Glory is not
There is no flashy design to wow you and no progressive jackpot with the potential to be life changing either. In addition, if you like your slots to be loaded with extra features such as stacked and expanding wilds, multipliers, and pick ‘em bonuses, be forewarned that this game doesn’t offer any of those goodies. In fact, there is no wild symbol at all!
Another thing that is notably missing in this game is action and adventure. There is no storyline, so the only thing that keeps you from getting bored and motivates you to continue playing even when nothing much is happening is getting winning combinations.
When you win — which in this game is likely to be often — the win speaks for itself without a lot of fanfare. When the win is substantial, the words “Big Win” will appear on the screen in big letters, followed by the amount.
However, the symbols don’t become animated, nor is there any exciting celebratory soundtrack to accompany your win.
Why simple is in some ways better
In other words, Crowning Glory won’t be every slot player’s cup of tea.
However, what Crowning Glory lacks in suspense and excitement is more than made up for in lower volatility and frequent payouts, some of which can be sizable. In other words, Crowning Glory excels in precisely the criteria that any slot player watching his or her budget should look for to be able to stay in the game for the long haul.
Keep in mind, too, that extra bells and whistles aren’t free. They add to the slot manufacturer’s cost and, more often than not, the effect trickles down to the player.
Many slots that go above and beyond to entertain you charge you for the experience by lowering the win rate. Even a few percentage points difference in a slot’s return to player (RTP) can make a big difference in the bottom line of someone who plays frequently.
Also, some slots are so sophisticated in design, with so many different games within games and other things going on, many slot players become confused. Slots needn’t be overcomplicated to be enjoyable. In fact, being overly complicated makes them less fun, not more fun, for many players.
The bottom line: Crowning Glory is Barb’s Best Bet, but is it yours?
Based on everything I have told you here, you will have to decide if this is the right game for you.
Crowning Glory is a Barb’s Best Bet partly because it’s enjoyable to play and taps into a theme that is both timely and relatable. However, in this case, it’s relatable as something we probably only fantasize about rather than experience first-hand.
There is nothing threatening or sinister looking in any aspect of this game, which makes it the perfect choice for anyone who simply wants to relax and unwind. Although the soundtrack is rather blah and the game could probably also benefit from the addition of a wild symbol and some enhanced visual effects, the existing symbols are exquisite.
But above all, this game meets my criteria for a Best Bet because its rate of return to the player is among the best for NJ online slot players.