Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion Slot Machine

‘Another Huff N’ Puff game,’ I hear you cry. With good reason, too. Light & Wonder certainly churns them out at a ferocious rate. The Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion slot machine is one of the newer variants of the hit franchise, but does it add much to the stable?

I don’t think it is an exaggeration to say that Light & Wonder has decided to see Huff N’ Puff as their Buffalo. Rivals Aristocrat have a surefire winning formula with Buffalo, knowing that any game that carries the branding, characters, and personality will be played on familiarity alone.

And I don’t begrudge Light & Wonder that. In fact, it’s just natural and sensible. It’s their Sonic the Hedgehog to Aristocrat’s Super Mario, their Spider-Man to Aristocrat’s Superman.

However, while Buffalo is an unquestionably massive success story, there can be little doubt that there is sometimes a lot of prospecting done with the title. Aristocrat will often release a Buffalo game, find it has not been taken to, and it quietly disappears. Understandable, of course. Buffalo fatigue is a thing.

Have we reached a point of Huff N’ Puff fatigue yet, though? After the base trilogy of Huff N Puff, Huff N’ More Puff, and Huff N’ Even More Puff, we are now seeing the formula stretched and played with, and that offers few guarantees.

So, let’s have a closer look at the Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion slot machine and try to figure out if it’s a true sequel or if it’s just leeching off the good name of its hit predecessors. 

For all intents and purposes, Money Mansion was the first Huff N’ Puff title to hit the land based casino floor after Huff N’ Even More Puff. That means it was the first one to attempt a new mechanic rather than just evolve the previous ones.

You can see that immediately, too, from the minute you sit down. For a start, there is no wheel. That means that there is no buzzsaw bonus either. That was certainly a bold decision given its popularity.

What there is, instead, is a giant mansion covered in jackpot amounts. The higher they go in the mansion, the higher the amounts are.

The other big change is that there are pigs peaking over the top of every reel. Occasionally, they show themselves to a fuller extent, but rarely when you actually want them to. More on that later.

Aside from that, it is unmistakably Huff N’ More Puff fare. The symbols are familiar, the sounds are the same, and the characters are all as bright and bold as ever. If you were somehow unaware, the game is based on the Three Little Pigs, by the way.

In general, the Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion slot machine got the balance just about right, I think, between trying something new and maintaining its familiarity, and I have zero issues with that part of it. Other parts of it… Well, I have plenty of issues with them. But not that part. That part deserves credit.

The comforting familiarity extends to the gameplay, too. The buzzsaws have been swapped for property deeds, but that is the only real change. I am not even sure the maths model has really changed much either, because the deeds bonus is just as hard to get as the buzzsaws were.

The hard hats are still there, obviously, and your task is still to get six of them to trigger the hard hat bonus. That is the Huff N’ Puff trademark hold and spin-like feature, where hats upgrade houses from straw to wood and wood to gold (mansions).

In Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion, you theoretically get help in triggering that hard hat bonus from the pigs that are posted behind each reel. Occasionally, they will pop up wearing a hard hat, and those hats count in addition to any you land on screen.

That sounds great in theory, I know, but it’s actually quite maddening because it so seldom seems to help you. If you get two pigs popping up, you land three hats. If you get four pigs to pop up, you land one hat. Once, I even got five pigs to pop up and then didn’t land a single additional hat on the spin. I assumed it was just an unlucky day, but I can’t say that subsequent attempts have done anything to dissuade me from my initial conclusion that all Light & Wonder did was invent a new way to annoy you.

At a glance:

• Layout: 5 x 3
• Denominations: Multiple
• Minimum Bet: $0.75 on a 1c denomination
• Theme: Three Little Pigs
• Return to Player (RTP): Approximately 90 - 95% but dependent upon casino and local regulations
• Volatility: High

I mentioned before that the Huff N' Puff Money Mansion slot machine had appeared to change its bonus mechanic from a wheel to something new, and that I liked that about the game.

Essentially, in Money Mansion, you need three Deeds symbols rather than buzzsaws. When you get them, various segments on the large mansion above the reels start to flash and ding, slowing down until you eventually win one.

I have to say that more often than not, that seems to be a credit amount. That, I must admit, I found really disappointing. After all, the most annoying thing about the classic Huff N’ Puff games was finally triggering the wheel and being fobbed off with a Mini Jackpot rather than getting an actual game.

Thankfully, there are a few other symbols on the mansion too that you can light up: a paint brush (touch-up feature), a hammer (home improvement feature), and a gold door (mansion's feature). The one I seem to get the most out of the three is the paintbrush.

In the Touch Up Feature, paint brushes stroke up and down the reels, leaving straw houses in their wake. Sometimes many, usually few. You then go straight into a hat's bonus. Sound familiar?

If you get the hammer, the home improvement feature is similarly underwhelming. You get an extra row, and the hammer adds a few houses to the screen, usually straw ones. Then you go into the hats feature.

Obviously, the one you want of the three is the mansion feature, which is the gold door. That just triggers a standard mansion's feature, where every hat you land is gold immediately, without having to upgrade through straw and wood. The payouts on that can be huge, as always.

However, you soon realise that they didn’t actually change the bonus mechanic at all with Money Mansion; they just gave it a facelift. A wheel with three features and cash amounts was just replaced by flashing windows on a house (with three very similar features and more cash amounts).

Therefore, if you are anything like me, you quickly realise that the one thing you were most excited about with Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion hadn’t actually happened at all.

If you’re playing slots at an actual casino, do yourself a favour and join the player rewards program. Then make it a habit to use your card every single time you play. It doesn’t matter whether you’re dropping serious money or just playing a few spins for fun. The key is making sure your play is being tracked, because that’s how the casino starts handing out perks.

Before you jump into Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion, take two seconds to slide your card into the machine. Once you do, you’re automatically earning points as you play. And those points can turn into some pretty nice extras, like free play, meal discounts, drink credits, show comps, or even a free room for the night.

Also, here’s a tip people overlook all the time: treat your cocktail waitress well. A little friendliness goes a long way, and tipping $3 to $5 per drink can seriously improve your chances of getting service. Not every casino still runs free drink service, but many do offer complimentary drinks for players on the floor. If they’ve got it, you might as well take advantage.

I dislike being negative about slots. Honestly, I do. For better or worse, developers are trying to make something cool. And, I suppose, there are some things to like about the Huff N’ Puff Money Mansion slot machine. The problem is, I don’t think it adds anything that the predecessors don’t already do much better.

It all just feels a little bit lazy, really. Perhaps I am being unkind there, and it was just an honest failure, but it plays like Light & Wonder tried to coast a bit off their fantastic work previously with Huff N’ Puff.

They gave a great game a snazzy little facelift and hoped the player would laud new style over copy and paste substance. I don’t think too many fell for it.

Hopefully, though, it was a mistake that Light & Wonder at least realised. They have done better with subsequent titles such as Huff N’ Puff High Rise (a game I don’t really like, but at least they did genuinely add something new into it) and Huff N’ Puff We’ve Had Enuff (which is excellent).

And Money Mansion is not a bad game. It’s okay. It’s decent. Many would say it’s even pretty good. It’s just nothing new.