When you are playing a slot game you need as much help as you can get to produce winning combinations. Wild symbols definitely help you do that and they come in many different forms, all of which are really helpful for the player.

A wild is the symbol in the game that can substitute for others, this really helps you get winning combinations you wouldn’t have had without their assistance. It’s rare that the wild substitutes for all the other symbols in the game. They don’t substitute for scatter symbols or bonus symbols because by doing so they would be helping you trigger bonus games.

Despite that though you’re always going to be looking out for the wild symbol in the game. In the ‘Wild Gambler Artic Adventure’ the wild symbol is the wild polar bear, and when this sticks, you’re in for a nice payout. The problem with wild symbols is that you’re forever looking out for them to appear on the reels and give you that chance of getting a winning combination out of nowhere. Wouldn’t it be easier if they just appeared and then stayed there?  Well that’s what a Sticky Wild is.

The arrival of wild symbols was a big part of the development of slot games in the past few decades. The next step for game developers was to decide just how they could make the wild symbol even more useful. As well as the introduction of the sticky wild there has been the introduction of expanding wilds and shifting wilds.

So just how does a sticky wild help you? The basic idea is that they are a common wild behaving as wilds do, but once they arrive on the reels, they stay there for the next spin of the reels or perhaps even longer. It’s a little bit like when you used to press the hold button except this has far more qualities.

Usually the sticky wilds are found in the bonus game that a slot has. This is the case in the NetEnt game ‘Dead or Alive’.  The sticky wild comes into play during the free spins bonus round. This means you can end up in a situation where not only have you got some spins that you don’t have to pay for but a sticky wild too just waiting to give you more winning combinations.

Sticky Wilds also appear in the bonus game seen in NetEnt’s ‘South Park’. The sticky wild plays an important role here as when the Stan bonus game begins there’s a sticky wild in the centre position on the middle reel. It only stays there for a couple of spins though but other sticky wilds can also appear. The significance here is that for the free spins to continue you need there to be a sticky wild on the reels.

Sometimes though sticky wilds come at a cost. You can choose to have a symbol stay in its position for the next reel but to do so will need an additional contribution from the player. It could be worth it and you’ll get a big win but your luck might not be in and no winning combinations appear. This can be seen in the BetSoft game ‘Mamma Mia’.

As you can see a sticky wild is definitely something you want to see as part of the game you are playing. It really can get you some great wins and help that account balance of yours grow.