Slingo Boom Bingo Sites

Slingo Boom, or boom bingo as it is also called, is an exotic variant of 75 ball bingo that is only available to play at sites powered by Gaming Realms.  Other versions of Slingo (the ones that are more akin to a slot machine than to bingo) are more widely available.

1. Who are Gaming Realms
2. Origins of Slingo
3. What is Slingo Boom
4. How to play Slingo Boom
5. Is it any good?

Who are Gaming Realms?

Gaming Realms plc is based in London and has a board of directors that reads like a Who’s Who of the online gaming world, bringing a wealth of experience from other operators including Sky Bingo, Foxy Bingo, Betfair and bwin.party.

The company provides a gaming platform and licensing via their subsidiary Bear Group including a suite of original games (including games with a skill element such as Magic Mine and Baking Bonanza as well as multiple variants of Slingo) from Slingo Originals (who used to be a subsidiary but now appear to be separate).  A third US/Canada based subsidiary, Blastworks, specialises in social gaming and produces free-to-play Slingo games for the App Store (Apple only, not Android).

Gaming Realms have also licenced the Slingo IP to other providers including Instant Win Gaming who make the Big Money Slingo game (basically a scratchcard).

Gaming Realms are very mobile focused, with 80% of their audience playing on mobile devices.

Origins of Slingo

Slingo was invented in 1996 by Sal Falciglia Sr (a businessman from New Jersey) and was first launched on AOL.

Slingo is so called because it is a cross between bingo and a slot machine.  Players have to complete lines and coveralls on a board that resembles a bingo card, by marking off numbers as they are spun on a set of slot machine reels.  This turned out really to resonate with players and Slingo theming has cropped up everywhere from lottery scratchcards to gaming machines in bricks and mortar casinos.

Real money online versions of Slingo first came on the scene in 2015 after Gaming Realms bought the rights. and the multiplayer version, Slingo Boom, was launched in May 2016.

What is Slingo Boom?

In single player versions of Slingo, the player receives a set number of spins with which to try and complete the board and is then given the opportunity to buy extra spins. Basically, it’s a slot machine with vastly extended gameplay.

In Slingo Boom, players compete against each other to win a prize pot (sometimes fixed, sometimes determined by player stakes) and this shared liquidity means that it is essentially a type of bingo rather than a slot machine. Instead of there being a fixed number of spins, the game continues until someone wins.

How to play Slingo Boom

• In Slingo Boom, the board looks like a 75 ball bingo card (the kind where the centre square is not free) 
• The game is played in what looks like a bingo room complete with chat
• As in regular 75 ball bingo the first column only contains numbers from 1-15, the second column only contains numbers from 16-30 and so forth.
• Each player has one card only (which gives everyone an equal chance of winning) and these are priced from 25p – £1.
• The numbers and symbols come up – 5 at a time – on a set of reels immediately below the board.
• The cards are all different but the numbers and symbols that come up after spinning the reels are the same for all the players.
• The numbers that can appear on the reels are those that can appear in the column directly above, e g reel 1 contains numbers 1-15 only.
• The three symbols that can appear are the Joker, the Super Joker and the Devil.
• The Joker marks off one number in the column above it and the Super Joker marks off one number anywhere on the board.  Slingo Boom is unlike the single player versions in that players do not have any control over where the Joker and Super Joker are used; the number to be marked off is randomly selected and auto-daubed so will rarely be the best choice strategically.
• The Devil is a blocking symbol which appears on reel 3 only.
• Single player versions of Slingo also have a free Spins symbol but this does not feature in Slingo Boom.
• A “Slingo” is a horizontal, vertical or diagonal line with all 5 numbers marked off.
• Game types are coverall, pattern or 1-2-Slingo (prizes for 1 Slingo, 2 Slingos and coverall, split as in 90 ball bingo).
• When a prize is won, the name of the player pops up in the same awy it would in a bingo game – unless you are the winner, in which case the message is BOOM! (hence the name) 
• As in single player versions of Slingo the reels spin from left to right and the numbers are not normally shown being marked off until the spin is complete (after all the reels have stopped). Nevertheless, a check is made after each individual reel stops (rather than after the spin as a whole) to see whether someone has won and if they have, the game pauses mid-spin to award the prize, only resuming to show the rest of the spin if the win was on a Slingo rather than on the coverall.
• This means that if two players complete a Slingo on the same spin, they will only split the prize if both complete from the same reel; if they complete from different reels the player who completes from the reel that is further to the left will win.
• One fundamental difference between Slingo Boom and regular 75 ball bingo is that numbers are NOT removed from the reels after being called, so the same number can come up multiple times in one game.  This means that although a game of Slingo Boom does play quite a bit more quickly than a game of 75 ball bingo, it isn’t the 5 times faster one might expect.
• When Slingo Boom was originally released there were no extra spins, but this functionality was added in a later version in Spring 2017.  Players who are close to completing the board may be offered the opportunity to buy (often quite expensive) extra spins to try and finish; if they succeed they win the full house prize. Essentially this adds a slot machine feature game to the bingo game (it works like a slot, because the player is now competing against the house and not other players) 

Is it any good?

So is it any good? Well, it depends what you want from a bingo game.  It’s certainly a bit different from regular 75 ball bingo and has quite a lot more going on visually.  With only one board per player, it’s fair for everyone.  It also has chat.

On the minus side, with only Slingo Boom on offer there’s not as much variety as at a regular bingo site.  Nor are there any really big prizes.

If what you’re after is mostly slots with a bit of bingo to add a sense of community, these sites could be right up your street with their mixture of well known classics and exclusive titles.