Loki’s Riches

Loki’s Riches is a cluster-paying grid slot from the studio that churns out more games than a politician makes empty promises during election season, Pragmatic Play. Mythology is a subject the Prag team knows well and has put to excellent use in the past. This time, they’ve picked one of the most interesting characters in Norse mythology and one that has seen a resurgence thanks in part to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as brought to the screen by actor Tom Hiddleston. Indeed, the Loki in Loki’s Riches looks very much like Marvel’s interpretation, what with the gold-horned helm and deep green and golden get-up. Mechanically, the thing to look out for here is a special expanding feature to go with tumbles, free spins, an ante bet, and a bonus buy.

A soothing symphonic soundtrack helps lay the scene on a glowing, Northern Lights-bathed rocky location, where a large gaming grid has been placed in the middle. Loki hangs out to the right, staff/spear in hand, a mischievous expression on his face, as if ready to reward or deny as the mood strikes. Trigger free spins, and the green etheric lighting is replaced by a red lava-filled scene of flashing lightning and whatnot. The game’s change of mood suits what some perceive as the mercurial nature of the so-called ‘trickster god’.

Loki’s Riches’ gaming area is a 7×7 game board creating wins when at least 5 identical symbols land connected in vertical or horizontally adjacent positions. Players participate by selecting a stake where the options are 20 c to $/€240 per paid symbol drop. A free spins buy is available, too, though not an ante bet this time. Highly volatile, a default theoretical RTP of 96.04% is produced when playing Loki’s Riches ‘normally’ or 96.01% when buying free spins.

The tumble mechanism removes winning symbols from the grid after they have paid out and drops symbols downwards to replace them. This provides another chance to win, and as long as new wins keep appearing, the tumble feature will keep repeating itself. A total of nine regular paying symbols appear on Loki’s Riches’ grid. They include 5 stones with runes carved on them as the low pays, then a round object, a hammer, a ring, and a golden Loki symbol as the high pays. Hitting 5 matching symbol clusters awards 0.1 to 2 times the bet, up to 50 to 10,000 times the bet for a 25+ matching symbol winning cluster. Loki’s Riches does not offer assistance in doing so by dropping wilds, as wilds do not exist in this game.

Loki’s Riches: Slot Features

Loki’s Riches is fairly light on features in general. What it has are tumbles, special expanding symbols, free spins, and a free spins buy.

Special Expanding Symbol

At random in the base game, a random pay symbol may be selected to be the special expanding symbol. When this happens, the chosen symbol does not explode as part of tumbles, and instead, at the end of all tumbles, from the initial spin, it expands into a group of 4 symbols of the same type in 2×2, after which any wins with it are paid. It expands right-down by default, but if the symbol is in the bottom position of the leftmost reel, it expands right-up. If the symbol is on the rightmost reel, anywhere except the bottom position, it expands left-down. If it is on the bottom of the rightmost reel, it expands left-up. When expanding symbols expand into the same spot and overlap, they count as one instance of the symbol.

Free Spins

In the base game, landing 4 or more scatter symbols triggers 10 free spins. Before free spins start, 1 pay symbol is randomly selected to be the special expanding symbol for the full duration of the round. Hitting 4 or more scatter symbols during the feature triggers +10 extra free spins.

Buy Free Spins

The free spins round can be bought from the base game for the cost of 100x the bet. When buying the round, 4 or more scatters randomly hit.

Loki’s Riches: Slot Verdict

Was anyone else expecting more tricks from a slot called Loki’s Riches? Whilst there are no major complaints about what is to be found here, Loki’s Riches did feel a little light on extra features – exacerbated by the fact this is a cluster paying grid slot, which often come drenched in symbol collects, power-ups, charges, meters, modifiers, and so on and so forth. Loki’s Riches is a rather Spartan game, by comparison, relying on the core gaming mechanics plus the special expanding symbol to get the job done.

With 10,000x the bet as its win cap, the job Loki’s Riches can perform isn’t exactly a shabby one from a numerical perspective. It would appear that one of the main goals, if not the main goal, in this slot is to either land a ton of golden Loki symbols, or land enough of them when they’ve been selected to be the special expanding symbol so players end up with 25 or more golden Lokis on the screen at once. Do that, and the top prize is yours. A lot is riding on the one feature’s shoulders, though, meaning the base game might end up becoming a tad emptily repetitive since there are no other features complementing the tumble/cluster combo other than the expanding symbol one.

As such, Loki’s Riches wasn’t Pragmatic Play’s most exciting release, creating the impression it could’ve been better. The presentation is pretty neat, the stats and the features it does have are tough to criticise, but ultimately, Loki’s Riches came across as lacking a little something extra that might have knocked it further out of the park.