Advantage Slots

With Buffalo Link and Lightning Buffalo Link, at least there is a must-hit point of 1,800. Check out the photo below to get a better understanding of it:

Look at the small rectangular box right above the top of the fifth reel. For this game, that number can’t exceed 1,800. As you spin, you’ll have a chance to land buffalo heads, which happens frequently (around two or so on average per spin). Each buffalo head bumps up the counter by one on the way to 1,800, and you’ll also have a chance to trigger a random bonus at any point.

If the number is 1,340 or higher, it’s technically an advantage play. And again, some pros will take it even lower (into the low 1,200s). So while that example above wouldn’t be a play at 719, this one below would:

At 1,423, however, you can still easily lose a lot.

How much? Well, suppose you collect 1.5 buffalo heads per spin on the way to 1,800, which would be a little below average. If you take the must-hit point (1,800) and subtract 1,423, you get 377. Then do some quick math (377/1.5), and you’ll get 251. You’ll notice it’s a $5 bet, so it could sometimes cost you around $1,250 to trigger the must-hit on this board. And then not only can it be feast or famine in the lead-up to the bonus, but the bonus itself can sometimes pay you zero.

With Buffalo Link and Lightning Buffalo Link, you can’t check each denom and bet without putting your voucher in. But wait a second. Once you put your voucher in and check a different bet, it automatically spins and costs you money.

What do you do? Well, you can put in a voucher of $0.99 or lower and click through each bet to see if you can find a 1,340 or higher. The game will ask you the following:

Want to cash out your $0.79, press buffalo, or return to the game? Cashing out is just cashing out. Hitting “press buffalo” will give you a fractional chance of getting one spin. So if it’s a $1 bet and you “press buffalo” with a $0.79 voucher, you should have a 79% chance to get one spin. But for our purposes, we want to hit “return to game.”

That will usually let us check the various bets on every denom without risking anything. I say “usually,” because sometimes the game glitches and doesn’t even let us do that, making a tedious process all the more frustrating.

Personally, I don’t check Buffalo Link and Lightning Buffalo Link anymore and only play if I happen to see someone spinning at a number above 1,340. Even then, I’m not excited to play at any number.

There are two bonuses for these games.

Landing three or more gold coins gives you free games with multipliers, and getting two or more coins within that bonus retriggers and grants you additional games. This bonus can pay you literally $0 or hundreds and hundreds of times your bet, with plenty of options in between.

Like with Buffalo Diamond and Buffalo Diamond Extreme, you’re looking for as many sunsets as possible and weighty symbols like buffalo and eagles, among others.

The other bonus is achieved by hitting eight or more numbered buffalo. The buffaloes have various amounts of money imprinted on them, with most being just 1x or 2x your bet. So if you’re betting $5, you’ll see a lot of $5 and $10 buffalo in this bonus. This bonus never pays $0 like the coin bonus sometimes can, but it’s also often underwhelming. Of course, every blue moon, you’ll hit some 200x or 300x buffalo.

Filling the screen with numbered buffaloes gives you the grand (usually over $20,000). You’ll often be just one or two buffalo away from doing that. So close!

You can also have bonuses within bonuses. If you’re in the coin bonus, you can trigger the buffalo bonus and even the number you’re chasing in the right corner of the screen, which gives you an additional coin or buffalo bonus at random. That’s really how you can make money on this game: hitting a bunch of lucky bonuses as you chase that number approaching 1,800.

Once you trigger the must-hit bonus, which again can happen at any point, that number resets to 100 and the play is, mercifully, over. If you can’t tell, I’m not a fan of these fringy buffalo games, even if they’re advantage plays and should be included.

I have four videos for these games: