Jaguar Strike

Jaguar Strike: Slot Overview

Within the wider medical dictionary is the term thalassophobia, which describes a 'persistent and intense fear of deep bodies of water such as the sea' (Wikipedia). This is a bit of imaginative wandering here, but after playing Jaguar Strike, you get the impression someone at Stakelogic really digs Push Gaming's hit Razor Shark yet gets 'the fear' while playing it. That would be one explanation why Jaguar Strike was made, which is an Aztec themed slot built around the key features of Razor Shark such as Mystery Symbol Stacks, a Drop and Reveal system, unlimited free spins, plus a Jaguar Strike Coin extra.

After playtesting several slots from Stakelogic that are clear copies of other studios' work, the surrealism has worn off, to be replaced by a strange curiosity over what they will do next. For now, it's Jaguar Strike, a 5x4 video slot offering 20 fixed bet ways to win. If you don't read the rules, then at first, the comparisons with Razor Shark aren't immediately apparent due to a jungle setting full of carved stones, prowling jaguars, ruins, and foliage. It's attractive, though the goodwill starts to sour once you hit spin and the familiar gameplay starts to dawn on you.

Jaguar Strike is a game available on any device where bets come in two different levels. The first is regular stakes, where choices range from 20 p/c to $/€20 per spin. The other option is Super Strike, which when activated, doubles the bet to allow more scatter symbols onto the reels. Either way you choose to play, the default RTP remains the same at 95.63%, while volatility is high in both modes.

Eight regular symbols line the paytable, separated into four J-A royals and four premium character symbols. The values of the four high pays range from 5 to 50 times the stake when a winning combination of five land across the reels. There are no wilds used in Jaguar Strike, but several more symbols are tied into the features.

Jaguar Strike: Slot Features

In Jaguar Strike, the features include stacks of Mystery Symbols which trigger respins when they land, and unlimited free spins, that only end when no Mystery Symbols remain on the game board.

Mystery Symbols land in stacks of four on the reels, triggering the Drop and Reveal Respins feature when they do. Mystery Symbols nudge down one position on every respin, and all transform to reveal either matching pay symbols or Jaguar Strike Symbols. If Mystery Symbols turn into Jaguar Strike Symbols, the Jaguar Strike Coin feature is triggered.

With the Jaguar Strike Coin feature, each applicable position spins to reveal either scatter symbols or special coin symbols awarding bet multipliers of 1-10x, 25-200x, or 250-1,000x for the bronze, silver, or gold coins.

When 3 or more scatter symbols land, the free spins bonus round is awarded. At the start of the round, the 2nd and 4th reels are filled with Mystery Symbols, then the Drop and Reveal Feature starts. With every free spin, the win multiplier increases by +1, and new Mystery Symbols may land on the grid at any time. There is no set number of free spins. Instead, the feature continues to roll as long as there are Mystery Symbols in view. If the Jaguar Strike Coin feature activates and reveals a scatter symbol, all Mystery Symbols are moved up one position.

Jaguar Strike: Slot Verdict

Jaguar Strike is another puzzling release from Stakelogic. After their versions of Avatar UX's CherryPop and Yggdrasil's Valley of the Gods, they've now ripped off Push Gaming's Razor Shark. They might have moved the action away from the bubbling undersea location of the original game and plonked it in the middle of a Central American jungle, but the scene shift is by no means enough to disguise what are the same core features found in Push Gaming's classic.

It begs the question, why Stakelogic is doing this. They're a team that has proven creative in the past, so it's not like they are some barren studio struggling to come up with their own ideas. Or are they? It's almost bordering on spiteful now as if someone from a rival studio has ticked them off in some way, and now they're seeking recourse - some might call it payback or revenge. This is pure speculation, of course, but this is the vibes they're giving off. Talk about burning bridges and alienating people. Avatar UX made a stand over the CherryPop debacle, will Push Gaming as well, or let this one slide?

On a gaming side of things, free spins with their interplay of progressive win multiplier, Mystery Stacks, and Coins is still a great combination. Scoring a seemingly endless line of Mystery Stacks, with a steadily increasing win multiplier while hitting Jaguar Coins is a stroke of slots wizardry. Too bad it's all been done before. It's one thing to wow audiences with a brand-new idea, but this feels like it was crafted in the hopes of making a few quick bucks.

When the game is firing, you almost forget that you're playing a cheap copy of a system someone else thought up. Also, if someone hasn't played Razor Shark, they would never recognise it anyway. For gamblers in the know, though, will they shun Jaguar Strike out of loyalty or possibly ethical concerns, or is it all a storm in a teacup since many think the industry is rife with knockoffs anyway? Either way, the persistent copy & paste situation at Stakelogic at the moment is getting a bit uncomfortable.