Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways

Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways: Slot Overview

Microgaming collaborators Triple Edge Studios gear up for some deep-sea diving in the undersea adventure Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways. The game picks up where Ancient Fortunes: Zeus left off around two years previous. Aside from a new Ancient Greek deity, the main difference is Triple Edge has used Big Time Gaming's popular engine Megaways to run the show – their first time to do so. Rolling Reels remain, which is pretty much standard for this slot style, while Triple Edge has also slapped a few jackpots on there as well as the game's key draw.

With 4 jackpots on display, the screen is a tad cluttered but not distractingly so. On the left-hand side of the reels, we find prize levels of various values depending on the stake level. Most of the screen is taken up by a 6-reel Megaways grid, plus a 4-position horisontal reel on top. A different number of symbols land on each spin, from 2 to 7 per reel, producing up to 117,649 ways to win. It's a colourful game, symbols are rich in a bluey aqua colour, and while the reels spin, Poseidon's kingdom can be glimpsed off in the background.

There is no mention of whether bet size affects the chance of scoring one of the jackpots, where players can choose stakes from 40 p/c to $/€40 per spin. Mathematically the game came across pretty awkwardly during testing. Not so much hit rate, which at 33.10% meant a win every 3 spins or so. However, symbol values are low, so combined with medium volatility, zero reel modifiers, and sparsely occurring main features means base game boredom can set in after a time. Stats aren't bad though, offering high potential gaming and an RTP of 95.98%.

Various beasts make up the lower value symbols, including clams, crabs, dolphins, bulls, horses, and octopi. They look pretty good actually, Triple Edge has captured a neat Minoan/Ancient Greek look with them. The 4 higher paying symbols consist of three gems, and a golden mask, presumably of Poseidon worth 2 to 50 times the stake for 6 of a kind. All symbols need at least 3 of a kind to payout, except the golden face premium, which pays on 2 or more.

Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways: Slot Features

Jackpots might be the headliner, but greater wins may be collected during free spins with the help of a progressive win multiplier. Other than these two features, Rolling Reels is the other device padding out the base or bonus games.

Rolling Reels are a standard Megaways reaction feature that removes winning symbols from the grid when they hit. New symbols tumble down into the gaps, possibly leading to repeat wins. Rolling Reels only stop when no new winning combo hits.

Appearing only on the extra top reel are the trident wild symbols. For one, they replace pay symbols to complete winning combinations. Secondly, when wild symbols appear, whether they are part of a win or not, they are collected in a chest at the bottom left corner. When Rolling Reels complete, there is a chance the Jackpot Pick Game is triggered. The more wilds collected, the higher the chance of triggering.

In the Jackpot Pick Game, 12 tokens are shown facedown. Players select tokens until they have revealed 3 of a kind, then the corresponding prize is awarded. The 4 jackpots are the Mini, Minor, Major, and Mega, worth 15x, 50x, 100x, or 5,000x, respectively.

Landing on any reel is the 'G', 'O', 'L', 'D' scatter symbols. Having all 4 in view awards 12 free spins, while each additional scatter symbol on the reels adds +5 additional free spins. Free spins use a win multiplier starting at x1 and increment by 1 after every Rolling Reels roll. In the bonus round, scatter symbols appear only on the extra top reel and 3 or 4 in view award 5 or 10 extra free spins.

Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways: Slot Verdict

While an improvement over Zeus: Ancient Fortunes, Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways relies exclusively on well used, tried and true features. There's nothing the game does that is wrong as such, there just isn't much about it to get the blood stirring or the imagination firing. The theme treatment is quite good though, and Triple Edge has done a nice job of capturing the spirit of the underwater Greek god in his realm, yet intrigue quickly wanes when the grind sets in.

One of the issues is symbol values are lower than usual, so it's not uncommon to have a run of consecutive rolls, including six symbol combos and end up with an oddly disappointing payout. Hit frequency is alright, but since there are no modifiers during the base game, there are loads of these penny wins and little else going on. Triple Edge has even refrained from including some sort of 'Hyper' feature to add a dash of innovation – some players might even end up wishing the studio had after ploughing through several hundred feature-free base game spins. It ends up being pretty vanilla Megaways gaming from a purely technical standpoint.

The two headline features can deliver when luck is running hot, however. There's the instant 5,000x from the Mega Jackpot, of course, and free spins are thrilling as a Megaways progressive multiplier can be. Outside the Jackpot, wins as high as 10,000x the stake are possible when rolls and multipliers come together in tremendous quantities during free spins.

Still, Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways doesn't offer many convincing reasons to pick it over the mountain of other Megaways games out there. Unless you're really after an additional jackpot feature, or prefer a less volatile math model than normal, then Poseidon Ancient Fortunes Megaways doesn't offer a stack of attractions.