Asgardian Fire

Asgardian Fire: Slot Overview

Welcome to Asgard, home of the Norse Gods, ruled by Odin, the All-Father, he who traded an eye to drink at Mímir's well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, another mythology slot set in the home of some gods again, no big deal. Right? Well, it kind of is a big deal if Games Global partner Neon Valley Studios has anything to say about it. For Asgardian Fire, the studio has pulled out its best slide rulers and paint brushes, then set to work making a cracker of a Norse mythology game. Spoiler alert, the team has borrowed one or two ideas from one of its competitors, which will soon become apparent. But if you're willing to overlook that, then there is a fine example of Norse mythology-themed gaming to be sampled in Asgardian Fire.

First things first, Asgardian Fire's graphical standard is quite exceptional. Players are drawn into an awe-inspiring world where the base game, with its rocky landscape beneath the aurora borealis, is pretty enough but trigger free spins, and play moves to an even more celestial realm, full of thick golden glowing clouds and what could be Odin's residence behind the active gaming panel, visible when symbols are rolling. This is powerful subject matter, and Neon Valley Studios has brought plenty of power to bear for Asgardian Fire.

Now's when things get thornier because Asgardian Fire uses a reel setup taken straight from ELK Studios' 'Gold' range of slots. Each base game spin starts with 6 reels and 4 rows of symbols, with 4,096 ways to win. When winning combinations hit, the symbols are removed by the Rolling Reels feature, and replaced by symbols from above, then an extra row is added to the grid. The reels can expand up to 8 rows high at the most, where 262,144 ways to win become active. In the base game, when no more wins appear, the grid resets to its resting 6x4 size. In Asgardian Fire, this expansion system is known as Escalating Ways.

Asgardian Fire's math model has garnered a 'very high' rating in terms of volatility and is available in four RTP models, 96% being the highest. It takes bets of 20 p/c to $/€50 and spits out a win, theoretically at a hit rate of 26.29% on the highest RTP model. Should a win be 6 symbols in length, it'll pay 0.4x the bet when made up of J-A card ranks, 1x to 1.2x the bet for the wolf, axes, hammer, or ravens symbols, before rising to 2.2x-5x the bet for the 4 top value character symbols. Also, appearing on reels on all but the leftmost reel is Asgardian Fire's wild symbol, substituting for all symbols except scatters.

Asgardian Fire: Slot Features

Along with Rolling Reels and Escalating Ways, Asgardian Fire has Jumbo Blocks, a Wild Fill Feature, Second Chance, free spins with Elevator, persistent wilds, a feature buy, plus the Upsizer.

Jumbo Blocks

Any symbol except scatters or wilds can land as a Jumbo Block. Jumbo Blocks may appear during Rolling Reels in sizes of 2x2, 3x3, or 4x4. They can appear on reels 2 to 6.

Wild Fill Feature

When Jumbo Blocks land, if there are empty spaces beneath them, these empty spaces are filled with wild symbols.

Scatter and Second Chance

Each scatter that lands activates the Second Chance feature, which triggers after all wins are complete. Up to 12 symbols in a diamond-shaped area around each scatter explode, making way for symbols to cascade in. Wilds, Jumbo Blocks, or other scatters do not explode.

Free Spins

Landing 3 scatter symbols awards 6 free spins, plus 3 extra free spins for each additional scatter in view. Free spins can be retriggered, and before they begin, the Upsizer feature displays the cost of buying extra free spins. The options may be 9, 12, 15, or 25. The Upsizer is not available from the feature buy. Now, free spins start with the Elevator set to 4 rows. After each winning spin, the Elevator moves up 1 row to a maximum of 8 rows high. The Elevator locks in the minimum number of rows and ways to win for the remainder of the feature. Also, in free spins, when all wins are complete, any wilds left on the grid drop to the bottom of the reels. Wilds persist until they are part of a win.

Feature Buy

From the bonus buy menu, players may buy 6, 9, 12, 15, or 25 free spins for the cost of 70x, 100x, 125x, 140x, or 300x the bet, respectively.

Asgardian Fire: Slot Verdict

With Asgardian Fire, Neon Valley Studios has designed the Norse slot equivalent of a banquet overflowing with roast boars, mead, and walnut bread. The team has lavished Asgardian Fire with eye-popping graphics and head-banging tunes. Screenshots don't really do the game justice because the excellent animations, the dynamic reel, the zooming in and out only get a chance to sparkle when in motion. For fans of Norse-themed slots, this one is a must-try. You'd be forgiven for thinking the studio was based way up in the Arctic regions of Scandinavia (rather than Las Vegas), its workers poring over dusty, ancient books, dissecting Sagas, studying up on local lore in preparation for Asgardian Fire's development. That or they really liked the movie Thor: Ragnarok because Asgardian Fire's punchy visuals coupled with a rock-influenced soundtrack awakened memories of that bit in the film after Odin reminds Thor he's the God of Thunder, not the God of Hammers, then goes on a rampage to the sounds of Led Zeppelin's Immigrant Song.

If so, then movies aren't Asgardian Fire's only influence because its core mechanics are very close, if not exactly the same as those found in numerous 'Gold' slots from ELK Studios – and by extension Blueprint Gaming's slot Viking Fury. Visually too, there were echoes of Relax Gaming's slot Volatile Vikings, and for some reason, Rise of the Mountain King came to mind. Maybe it's all the celestial-ness going on. What we're trying to say is Asgardian Fire isn't the most original Norse-themed slot players are likely to bump into.

However, if you're willing to ignore the elephant in the room, then there is a cracking game here for Norse mythology fans to experience. On the front end, Neon Valley Studios has made great use of the subject matter, and Asgardian Fire packs a mighty audio-visual wallop. At 5,000x the bet, its max win while decent could've walloped harder, but if that figure and the clear imitation aren't a bother, Asgardian Fire is worth getting the hammer a-swinging for.