"Luck be a Landlord" is a deckbuilding strategy game that comes disguised as a slot machine.

The game has no story apart from a nonsensical backdrop: You have rented an apartment with a slot machine, and you have to use that machine to earn enough money to pay your rent, within a limited number of spins. If you don't have enough money after using all your spins, the game ends. If you do, the landlord raises the rent and the game continues.

What makes the game interesting, are its simple but engaging mechanics. You have an "inventory" of symbols that can appear in the slot machine. The machine shows a grid of 5x5 squares, and every time you spin it, the symbols from your inventory are randomly distributed among these squares until either the grid is full or all symbols have been used. (Note that the symbols are not technically on wheels, so you won't see the same "columns" of symbols repeating.) You then get coins (i. e. money) depending on the symbols that appeared, and are shown 3 new randomly selected new symbols, of which you can put 1 in your inventory.

The symbols have complex interdependencies. For example: By default, a "cat" gives 2 coins and a bottle of milk gives 1 coin. However, if the milk bottle appears in one of the 8 squares adjacent to a cat, the bottle gives 9 coins and gets destroyed (removed from your inventory). If the cat appears adjacent to a witch, the cat gives 4 coins.

Some symbols are not added to the grid, but are permanently pinned next to it. Those are always active. For example, there is a special cat symbol that makes all cats give 1 additional coin. And there is another symbol that treats all cats as wildcards which double the yield of adjacent squares.

There is a huge amount of different symbols, and learning their indepencies is key to succeeding in the game. If you just pick up every symbol that gives coins, you won't have enough interdependencies on your grid and, as the game progresses, won't have enough money to pay the ever-increasing rent. To succeed, you need to build an inventory of symbols that work well together.

Hovering the mouse over a symbol tells you exactly what it does, so you always have the information available that you need. The game does not give you a catalog of all symbols that exist, you'll encounter them over time as you keep playing the game. This means that you'll keep discovering new things which can then help you to plan your strategies better.

You also have the (limited) opportunity to re-roll the selection of new symbols to choose from, and to remove symbols from your inventory.

I found the game pretty enjoyable for the 3 rounds and 100 minutes that it took me to beat the "campaign" and reach endless mode. The content looks like it may stay interesting and varied enough for a few more rounds played with different strategies, but apart from discovering more symbols that I haven't seen before, there's little left to do. I got it on a sale and don't regret the purchase, but I think that the list price is a bit steep for the amount of content and the simplicity of the gameplay.

"Luck be a Landlord" is a deckbuilding strategy game that comes disguised as a slot machine. The game has no story apart from a nonsensical backdrop: You have rented an apartment with a slot machine, and you have to use that machine to earn enough money to pay your rent, within a limited number of spins. If you don't have enough money after using all your spins, the game ends. If you do, the landlord raises the rent and the game continues. What makes the game interesting, are its simple but engaging mechanics. You have an "inventory" of symbols that can appear in the slot machine. The machine shows a grid of 5x5 squares, and every time you spin it, the symbols from your inventory are randomly distributed among these squares until either the grid is full or all symbols have been used. (Note that the symbols are not technically on wheels, so you won't see the same "columns" of symbols repeating.) You then get coins (i. e. money) depending on the symbols that appeared, and are shown 3 new randomly selected new symbols, of which you can put 1 in your inventory. The symbols have complex interdependencies. For example: By default, a "cat" gives 2 coins and a bottle of milk gives 1 coin. However, if the milk bottle appears in one of the 8 squares adjacent to a cat, the bottle gives 9 coins and gets destroyed (removed from your inventory). If the cat appears adjacent to a witch, the cat gives 4 coins. Some symbols are not added to the grid, but are permanently pinned next to it. Those are always active. For example, there is a special cat symbol that makes all cats give 1 additional coin. And there is another symbol that treats all cats as wildcards which double the yield of adjacent squares. There is a huge amount of different symbols, and learning their indepencies is key to succeeding in the game. If you just pick up every symbol that gives coins, you won't have enough interdependencies on your grid and, as the game progresses, won't have enough money to pay the ever-increasing rent. To succeed, you need to build an inventory of symbols that work well together. Hovering the mouse over a symbol tells you exactly what it does, so you always have the information available that you need. The game does not give you a catalog of all symbols that exist, you'll encounter them over time as you keep playing the game. This means that you'll keep discovering new things which can then help you to plan your strategies better. You also have the (limited) opportunity to re-roll the selection of new symbols to choose from, and to remove symbols from your inventory. I found the game pretty enjoyable for the 3 rounds and 100 minutes that it took me to beat the "campaign" and reach endless mode. The content looks like it may stay interesting and varied enough for a few more rounds played with different strategies, but apart from discovering more symbols that I haven't seen before, there's little left to do. I got it on a sale and don't regret the purchase, but I think that the list price is a bit steep for the amount of content and the simplicity of the gameplay.