Funky Time Game Review

When Evolution Gaming launched Funky Time in the spring of 2023, they declared it the “biggest live game show since Crazy Time”. On the face of it, Funky Time may not look much different from Crazy Time, Dream Catcher, or Monopoly, as it features a similar wheel of fortune design. However, underneath the skin, Funky Time presents you with dynamic multipliers and a new DigiWheel mechanic, coupled with disco beats to bop your head to while playing.

There’s more to explore, though. We’ve spent some time going through the game, test-driving it, if you will. After much thought and consideration, we concur with Evolution Gaming. There’s plenty to get excited about with this game, so let’s dive into it with our Funky Time live game review.

Theme and Design

At heart, Funky Time may have the same basic concept as its sister titles, but this live dealer release does do some things differently. For starters, as its name suggests, the DigiWheel is entirely digital. What this means is that instead of having fixed multipliers attached to its structure, the wheel has dynamic multipliers chosen at random and superimposed onto its segments.

Even though much of the gameplay hangs on its digital mechanics, Funky Time is still very much a live dealer game. This means that there is a physical wheel (with digital elements) spun by a very real live casino host. Of course, this being a live dealer release, there’s plenty of excitement and atmosphere built both by the host and the catchy tunes in the background. How does the gameplay, though?

Specs and Gameplay

Funky Time looks similar to Evolution’s other fortune wheel releases in that there is a giant segmented wheel. There are sixty-four segments, consisting of twenty-eight “Number One” segments, twenty-four letter wedges, and twelve bonus round spots.

As with all money wheel games, you’re looking to slap down a wager and hope that the pointer stops in one of the segments favorable to your bet. You’ll have just twenty seconds to wager in each betting window, and quick bet options make it simple to wager speedily on successive bets. Wagers include Number One, Letters (which spell Funk, Play, and Time), and bonus sections. The latter includes Bar, Stayin’ Alive, Disco, and VIP Disco.

The wagering range can vary depending on where you play. For the most part, crypto casinos agree that a minimum stake of $0.10 (the equivalent in cryptos) is acceptable. However, some versions of the game support maximum stakes of $5,000, and others double that. It really depends on the site you’re signed up to.

Once bets are placed, the betting window closes, and the game commences. The wheel is spun in different directions sequentially. So, while the first spin may be clockwise, the second will go anti-clockwise, and so on. While spinning, the game will add dynamic multipliers to random segments. These stretch from 2x up to 50x, and any landing on your segment (with a winning bet) will multiply your winnings.

If you successfully win on Number One segments, you can win 1:1 plus any multipliers granted. Payouts rise to 25:1 for lettered segments, with, again, any relevant multipliers being paid out. The RTP rates associated with Number One and Letter bets are set to 95.99% and 95.49%, respectively, with probabilities of 43.75% and 37.5% to be expected.

To discover the prizes for the bonus sections, we need to look at those bonuses more closely, which we will do in the next section.

Bonus Features

You can bet on the bonus sections in the game. If the pointer stops on one of these, and you have a live bet on that segment, you’ll trigger the corresponding bonus round. Without an active bet, you can only watch as a passenger as the bonus round is played. This is no doubt done to try and convince you to wager on bonuses the next time around. The RTP rate of landing bonuses varies depending on each bonus. Bar, Stayin’ Alive, Disco, and VIP Disco bonuses have RTP rates of 95.98%, 95.49%, 95.51%, and 95.38%, with probabilities of 9.37%, 3.12%, 4.68%, and 1.56%, respectively.

Next, let’s look at what each bonus round has to offer.

Bar Bonus

The round begins with a robot tending bar. You can choose from one of three “mocktail” glasses. The robotic bartender will fill each of the blue, purple, and yellow glasses resulting in multipliers of 2x up to 20x appearing. A slot machine then spins, showcasing another multiplier which will be added at random to one of the glasses. If that’s your glass, you’ll get that, too. Once the glasses are full, the bonus ends.

Stayin’ Alive Bonus

This round is, of course, named after the famous Bee Gee song featured in Saturday Night Fever. There are three ladders here, colored green, orange and purple. You must pick a ladder, with each ladder having twenty levels, and your objective is to climb as high as possible with your four lives. This is done by drawing bingo-style balls.

A black ball costs you a life. A green, orange, or pink ball sees you climb one or two steps on the ladder. Once all four black balls have been selected, the bonus ends. The ladders have increasing multipliers on them, so the higher you climb on Funky Time, the more you’ll win.

Disco Bonus

Onto the Disco Bonus now, and this round features a dance floor of multipliers. The dance floor features thirty-seven spots. Mr Funky will begin dancing on the floor, and every square his feet touch offers you a multiplier. These can be accumulated until Mr Funky falls off the dance floor and your prizes are paid out. He is moved by the presenter, who spins a wheel with four directions on it.

VIP Disco Bonus

The VIP Disco Bonus is similar to the Disco Bonus, although it has sixty-three squares, giving Mr Funky plenty of room to maneuver without falling off the dance floor. This can result in more impressive wins being paid out.

GOSU Verdict

As you can see, Funky Time relies a lot more on RNGs (random number generators) and digital gameplay than some of the other wheel-based live game show titles from Evolution Gaming, with the exception, perhaps, of Monopoly Live. However, this is part of its charm and allure.

In our opinion, Funky Time is all about those bonus rounds. While it is true that you can win decent prizes (when multipliers come into play) in the base game, the bonus rounds can take things to another level, where prizes can reach $500,000 or the equivalent in cryptocurrencies. Funky Time is new, it is fun, and it is unquestionably an atmospheric, night feverish, and, yes, funky way to play live dealer games at crypto casinos.

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