Slots Like Fishin’ Frenzy: The Original Still Out-Pays Every Sequel
Fishin’ Frenzy invented the UK’s favourite slot genre, the fisherman who reels in cash values, and a decade on, its family of sequels still tops operator homepages. If you’re after slots like Fishin’ Frenzy, here’s every official catch compared: Megaways, Fortune Spins, Even Bigger Catch and the rest, with verified RTPs, max wins and release dates.
Where to Play Fishin’ Frenzy Slots
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Reviewed by Brian TaylorPublished: August 2026
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On this page: The family at a glance · Every game reviewed · Full family tree · The original · RTP & the maths · History · Beyond slots · Biggest wins · Which game? · FAQs · Series vs series
Every Fishin’ Frenzy sequel and its RTP at a glance
Every game below is an official Blueprint Gaming release (the originals come from Reel Time Gaming’s retail catalogue, which Blueprint licenses online). Release dates and figures are read from published game data, and notice the pattern: the family’s max wins exploded from 2022 onwards while the RTPs quietly slipped under the original’s.
| Game | Year | RTP | Volatility | Max win | Standout feature |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fishin’ Frenzy Megaways | 2019 | 95.00% | Med-high | Not published | The classic catch on up to 15,625 ways |
| Fortune Spins | 2022 | 96.13% | Med-high | 5,000x | Three stacked reel sets fishing at once |
| The Big Catch Megaways | 2022 | 95.00% | Med-high | 50,000x | Fish values that grow between spins |
| Reel Time Fortune Play | 2022 | 94.93-95.51% | Med-high | 50,000x | Buy-a-feature homage to the retail original |
| Even Bigger Catch | 2023 | 95.00% | Med-high | 50,000x | Boat upgrades and giant fish |
| The Big Splash | 2023 | 95.00% | Med-high | 4,000x | Splash wilds soak whole reels |
| The Big Christmas Catch | 2023 | 95.00% | Med-high | 2,500x | The catch, in tinsel, a seasonal fixture |
| Even Bigger Fish | 2024 | 95.00% | High | 10,000x | The family at its most volatile |
| The Golden Catch Megaways | 2024 | 95.51% | Med-high | 50,000x | Golden fish upgrades on the Megaways engine |
Figures from published game data, checked 3 July 2026. Jackpot King editions of several titles add the progressive tiers and are covered under Beyond the reels.
A decade of casting: the family from the 2014 original to 2024’s golden era.
Every Fishin’ Frenzy game, reviewed
Ordered by how directly each game descends from the original’s formula, catch the fisherman, collect the fish.
1. Fishin’ Frenzy Megaways
The 2019 sequel that turned a retail classic into an online phenomenon. Blueprint licensed Big Time Gaming’s engine and stretched the 10-line original across up to 15,625 ways, keeping the one thing that mattered untouched: in the free spins, the fisherman still hauls in every cash-value fish on screen. For a huge share of UK players this, not the original, is what “Fishin’ Frenzy” means.
Megaways: the fisherman working a six-reel tide.
2. Fishin’ Frenzy Fortune Spins
The value pick of the modern family. Fortune Spins runs three stacked reel sets simultaneously and sells an optional Fortune Spins mode where wilds and fish rain across all of them, and at 96.13% it’s the only sequel that out-pays the 2014 original. Quietly the connoisseur’s choice, exactly as Pick ’n’ Mix is for the Rainbow Riches crowd.
Fortune Spins: three boats fishing the same water.
3. Fishin’ Frenzy: The Big Catch Megaways
March 2022’s entry added the idea the family has milked ever since: fish that grow. Collect symbols during the bonus and the cash values on the fish inflate between spins, building toward a 50,000x ceiling, a full hundred times what the original could ever pay. The moment the franchise stopped being gentle.
The Big Catch Megaways: fish values fattening mid-bonus.
4. Fishin’ Frenzy: Reel Time Fortune Play
The name is the tell: “Reel Time” tips its cap to Reel Time Gaming, the retail studio that built the 2014 original. This 2022 release wraps the classic catch in a Fortune Play buy-in (pay 50x, start at the feature) and carries the family’s joint-biggest 50,000x ceiling with a stake-dependent 94.93-95.51% RTP. For betting-shop veterans, it’s the most faithful online homage.
5. Fishin’ Frenzy: Even Bigger Catch
February 2023, and the arms race continued: boat upgrades. Collecting during the bonus doesn’t just fatten the fish here; it upgrades your vessel through tiers that multiply everything the fisherman lands. Same 95% base maths as most of the modern wave, but the upgrade ladder gives sessions a shape the flat originals never had.
Even Bigger Catch: calm seas before the boat upgrades begin.
6. Fishin’ Frenzy: The Big Splash
May 2023’s twist swaps greed for chaos: splash wilds that soak neighbouring positions, turning single hits into flooded reels. Its 4,000x cap is modest against the 50,000x monsters either side of it, which honestly makes it the friendlier session, more frequent drama, smaller heart attacks.
The Big Splash: one wild away from a soaked screen.
7. Fishin’ Frenzy: The Big Christmas Catch
Every December, UK lobbies fill with tinsel, and Blueprint’s pelican puts on a Santa hat. The Christmas editions (there are several, this the best known) are genuine games rather than reskins, 2,500x cap, the full catch mechanic, but their real function is seasonal comfort food. A stocking-filler slot in the most literal sense.
8. Fishin’ Frenzy: Even Bigger Fish
October 2024’s release is the family with its safety catch off, the volatility rating climbs to High, the fish climb to 10,000x, and the free games trail above the reels keeps escalating multipliers in play. If a decade of gentle fishing left you wanting the deep sea, this is the deep sea.
Even Bigger Fish: the free-games trail running above a full grid.
9. Fishin’ Frenzy: The Golden Catch Megaways
July 2024 closed the loop: golden fish on the Megaways engine, upgrading through metals toward that now-standard 50,000x ceiling, at a healthier-than-usual 95.51%. It’s the current state of the art, everything the family has learned since 2014 in one boat.
Close cousins outside the family
The imitation is the compliment: Pragmatic Play’s Big Bass Bonanza dynasty is a direct descendant of this formula and now outnumbers it; Blueprint’s own Big Catch Bass Fishing fishes the same waters with a different rod, a genuinely separate franchise from the Big Catch line below, despite the shared name; and Games Global’s Fishin’ Pots of Gold splices the fisherman onto the 9 Pots of Gold engine. None of them existed before this family proved Britain would rather catch its winnings than spin them.
The complete family tree
Beyond the nine reviewed, the catalogue sprawls across seasonal editions, jackpot builds and retail-style variants. The wider haul:
| Game | In one line |
|---|---|
| Fishin’ Frenzy Jackpot King | The original wired into Blueprint’s progressive network |
| Megaways Jackpot King / Big Catch JK / Even Bigger Catch JK / Christmas JK | Jackpot King editions of the main titles |
| Lure ’Em In | Recent entry built around lure-selection bonuses |
| Prize Lines | Retail-style prize ladder variant |
| The Big Catch (non-Megaways) | The growing-fish idea on classic reels |
| The Big Catch 2 / 3 | Rapid Fire Jackpots sequels to the above |
| Even Bigger Fish 2 / 3 Megaways | 2025 continuations of the high-volatility line |
| Bubble Bonanza | Bubble-pop spin on the catch mechanic |
| All Stars | Greatest-hits build mixing family features |
| Power 4 Slots | Four Fishin’ Frenzy grids running at once |
| Full House / Win Stepper / Rapid Fire editions | Arcade-style and stepper variants closer to the retail floor |
Titles rotate through UK lobbies constantly, checked 3 July 2026. If a lobby search shows a Fishin’ Frenzy name not listed here, it’s almost certainly a Jackpot King or Rapid Fire edition of one of the above.
The original Fishin’ Frenzy: quick facts
Ten paylines, one pelican, and the most influential feature in modern British slots.
| Fishin’ Frenzy Slot Info | |
|---|---|
| Provider: | Reel Time Gaming, licensed online by Blueprint Gaming |
| First released: | September 2014 (retail heritage before that) |
| Layout: | 5 reels × 3 rows, 10 fixed paylines |
| RTP: | 96.12%, still the family’s benchmark |
| Volatility: | Medium |
| Stakes: | From 10p a spin |
| Main feature: | Free spins where the fisherman collects all fish cash values |
| Max win: | Around 500x in practice, modest, and nobody cared |
✓ Facts checked 3 July 2026
The family DNA: catch of the day, explained
One mechanic built this dynasty, and it fits in a sentence: fish carry money, and the fisherman collects it.
The fish
Throughout the game, fish symbols land carrying visible cash values, small fry worth a stake or two, rarer monsters worth hundreds of times more. In the base game they’re decoration. The genius is that you can always see what you would have won, which is exactly the itch the bonus scratches.
The fisherman
Three or more scatters award free spins (ten in the original). During them, whenever the fisherman lands, he reels in every fish value on screen at once. Multiple fishermen, multiple collections. Every sequel since is a riff on this loop, growing fish, upgrading boats, golden variants, but the 2014 formula is already complete: bait, wait, haul.
What the sequels added
Megaways multiplied the ways; Big Catch made the fish grow; Even Bigger Catch upgraded the boat; Fortune Spins tripled the reels; the 2024 wave added escalating trails and metal-tier fish. Different rods, same river.
The moment that built a genre: fisherman on the reels, values on the fish.
The maths: the 96.12% nobody has beaten
Here’s the family’s uncomfortable secret, laid out in its own comparison table above: the 2014 original remains its best-paying mainline game. Every headline sequel since Fortune Spins trades roughly a full percentage point of RTP for bigger max wins, 50,000x ceilings funded by 95.00% floors. That’s not a scandal, it’s a pricing decision, but it means the “old” game is objectively the value pick and the new ones are volatility products.
Expected average cost per 100 spins on the original, at stake × spins × (100% − 96.12%):
| Stake | 100 spins staked | Expected average cost (3.88%) |
|---|---|---|
| 10p | £10 | £0.39 |
| £1 | £100 | £3.88 |
| £5 | £500 | £19.40 |
✓ Calculated from the published 96.12% RTP, checked 3 July 2026
Long-run averages only, the fisherman does not know you’re due. Budget first, cast second, and keep our responsible gambling guide in the tackle box.
History and legacy
Fishin’ Frenzy came up through Germany’s Merkur arcades and Britain’s betting shops, a Reel Time Gaming cabinet before it was a website. When Blueprint carried it online in September 2014, it brought something the polished Scandinavian slots of that era lacked: the unglamorous, legible fun of watching cash values swim past and wanting the man in the hat to arrive. No tumbling reels, no fanfare. Ten lines and a promise.
A decade later that promise has built one of the two or three most valuable slot brands in the country. It survived the Megaways craze by joining it, seeded an entire genre of imitators, and still ranks among the UK’s most-searched games, a 2014 release outdrawing titles born last month.
Why this franchise still matters
Because it owns a mechanic the way Rainbow Riches owns a rainbow. “Fishing slot” is now a shelf category in every UK lobby, and this family sits at the head of it as the original article, the one whose sequels get automatic homepage placement, whose Christmas edition is an annual ritual, and whose biggest rival (Big Bass Bonanza) is transparently its child. Genres age well; individual games don’t. Fishin’ Frenzy became the genre.
Beyond the reels: bookies, jackpots and a very busy pelican
The betting-shop empire
Before and alongside its online life, Fishin’ Frenzy has been a fixture of UK betting-shop terminals and arcade cabinets, for many players the game is a Ladbrokes lunchtime before it’s a website. The retail versions run their own configurations (typically tighter than 96.12%), which makes the online original the best-paying way to play its own game.
Jackpot King
Several family members ship in Jackpot King editions, Blueprint’s three-tier progressive network, whose Regal pot pools across every Jackpot King game at every operator and has paid seven-figure sums. The trade-off mirrors Age of the Gods: a slice of RTP buys tickets to a shared pot far bigger than any single game could fund.
Power 4 and the arcade formats
Power 4 Slots runs four Fishin’ Frenzy grids simultaneously for the multi-machine arcade feel, and the Win Stepper and Rapid Fire editions steer the brand back toward its cabinet roots. The pelican, it turns out, will perch anywhere.
What players say
Affection for this family is generational, threads regularly describe it as the game a parent played in the shop and the poster plays on the sofa. The praise centres on legibility (you always know what you’re fishing for) and the original’s honest RTP. The criticism is equally settled: the base game is dull by design, sequels are accused of being the same game in new weather, and sharper posters have noticed the RTP slide across the modern wave, the exact pattern our comparison table shows. The community’s standing advice matches ours: play the original for value, the 2022+ wave for ceilings.
The biggest Fishin’ Frenzy wins
The family’s ceiling has grown a hundredfold in a decade. The 2014 original tops out around 500x, £500 on a £1 stake. The modern flagships (Big Catch Megaways, Even Bigger Catch, Reel Time Fortune Play, Golden Catch) all advertise 50,000x: fifty thousand pounds from the same £1 spin, if the boat upgrades and the monster fish align. Add the Jackpot King editions and the theoretical top prize stops being a multiplier at all and becomes whatever the Regal pot has climbed to that week.
This real Even Bigger Fish session shows the modern engine at work:
Third-party player recording, embedded for illustration. Their catch, not typical, not ours.
The best Fishin’ Frenzy game for value versus ceiling
| If you want… | Play | Why |
|---|---|---|
| The best value | The original | 96.12%, still unbeaten in the family |
| The modern classic | Megaways | The catch on 15,625 ways |
| Better maths on a new engine | Fortune Spins | 96.13% and triple reels |
| The 50,000x dream | Big Catch Megaways or Golden Catch | Growing fish, giant ceilings |
| Maximum volatility | Even Bigger Fish | The family’s only High rating |
| A progressive jackpot | Any Jackpot King edition | The Regal pot pools across the network |
| December | The Big Christmas Catch | You know exactly what you’re getting |
Theme and mechanic contrasts outside Fishin’ Frenzy
Big Catch Bass Fishing is the only fishing-theme comparison in this table, but its Pick a Fish feature differs from Fishin’ Frenzy’s collector wild. Kingdoms Rise and Money Train are mechanic contrasts: persistent game tokens and a cash-collect cart respectively, with no claim that their themes are close.
| Series | Choose them if… | Choose Fishin’ Frenzy if… |
|---|---|---|
| Kingdoms Rise (Playtech) | Playtech’s Game Tokens earned through play sounds more like your kind of session | You’d rather have medium volatility, built around Free spins where the fisherman collects all fish cash values |
| Big Catch Bass Fishing (Blueprint Gaming) | You’re drawn to Blueprint Gaming’s approach: Pick a Fish | A medium-volatility session centred on Free spins where the fisherman collects all fish cash values suits you better |
| Money Train (Relax Gaming) | You’re drawn to Relax Gaming’s approach: The Money Cart | Reel Time Gaming’s Free spins where the fisherman collects all fish cash values is closer to what you’re after |
Choose Fishin’ Frenzy for the straightforward fisherman-collects-fish free-spins loop; choose Big Catch for an interactive pick, Kingdoms Rise for token progression or Money Train for a much more volatile collector feature.
Our verdict on the original
SlotsLike score: 8/10. The genre-founder that still out-pays its own children.
| Features: | 7/10: one perfect mechanic, nothing else, and nothing else needed |
| Win potential: | 6/10: the ~500x ceiling is the price of the honest maths |
| Design: | 7/10: plain, legible, ages like a pub sign |
| Playability: | 10/10: ten lines, 10p, instantly understood by anyone |
Play the original if you value RTP over fireworks, it remains the family’s best deal. Pick a sequel if you want the ceilings: the 2022-24 wave charges about a point of RTP for multipliers the pelican could never have dreamed of.
Fishin’ Frenzy FAQs
How many Fishin’ Frenzy games are there?
Around thirty official titles including seasonal editions and Jackpot King builds. This page reviews the nine that matter most, with the rest catalogued in the family tree above.
What is the RTP of the original Fishin’ Frenzy?
96.12%, which, unusually, is still the highest of any mainline game in the family. Most modern sequels run 95.00-95.51%.
Which Fishin’ Frenzy has the biggest max win?
Four titles share the 50,000x ceiling: The Big Catch Megaways, Even Bigger Catch, Reel Time Fortune Play and The Golden Catch Megaways. The original manages roughly 500x.
Who actually makes Fishin’ Frenzy?
The games originate with Reel Time Gaming, a retail studio in the Merkur/Gauselmann group, and Blueprint Gaming licenses and distributes them online, which is why the family is a fixture in both betting shops and web lobbies.
Is Big Bass Bonanza part of the Fishin’ Frenzy family?
No, it’s Pragmatic Play’s take on the genre this family invented. Same fisherman-collects-fish idea, different developer, no shared games or jackpots. Our full head-to-head comparison weighs both up directly.
What is Fishin’ Frenzy Jackpot King?
An edition of the original connected to Blueprint’s Jackpot King progressive network, where a three-tier pot (topped by the Regal jackpot) pools across many games and operators.
Can I still play Fishin’ Frenzy in betting shops?
Yes, it remains a staple on UK retail terminals, though machine configurations typically pay less than the online original’s 96.12%.
Are Fishin’ Frenzy slots fair?
Yes. Blueprint Gaming is licensed by the UK Gambling Commission and its games use independently tested RNGs with published RTPs.
Related research
Related research: Map the supplier lineage in Blueprint Gaming families, compare mechanic definitions in Features, or continue with Big Bass Bonanza and Big Catch Bass Fishing.
Sources & Verification
Primary sources checked 9 July 2026: Blueprint Gaming’s own corporate site; and the UK Gambling Commission’s public register (Blueprint Gaming Limited, account 6516).