Pharaoh’s Secrets Slots

Pharaoh's-SecretsAn Egyptian themed slot, Pharaoh’s Secrets is a game that Playtech created. The Egyptian theme is extremely well covered by developers from all major companies, and this is one of those titles that gives you pyramids, scarabs and so on. The design is cute in its own sort of way, with symbols being well detailed and in good resolution, but it’s nothing that you haven’t seen a dozen times before if you’ve playing the slots for any length of time.

All the secrets that this pharaoh might have are spread across five reels, with 20 paylines allowing for its symbols to form up and offer prizes of up to $100,000. You get various wild symbols, free spins, multipliers and scatters along the way, with the XtraWin being the one that is slightly unusual and rare.

Features of Pharaoh’s Secrets

The features are the ones that feel a bit more interesting, in this otherwise completely forgettable slot machine. The XtraWin feature is one of the reasons, along with the wild symbol, a scatter, free spins and multipliers.

If you’re willing to spend an extra 50% with your bets, the XtraWin feature can be activated. All it does is it adds an expanding wild in the game, which replaces the regular wild. The expanding wild is available during free spins even if XtraWin is not activated, so this feature is only offered during the base game. While I’m sure that expanded wilds will be much more profitable than regular wilds, it’s probably not going to bring an additional 50%, to warrant that kind of extra wager.

The Pharaoh is the wild symbol, which will appear only on the middle three reels. Capable of substituting for other symbols, the Pharaoh wild can turn into an expanded wild on the same three reels, if the XtraWin feature is activated. It is not the kind of wild that also gives out prizes. During the free spins the wild is more profitable, but more on that below.

Pharaoh's-Secrets-xtrawin

The scattered Pyramid symbol is a good way to make some extra money, its prizes going up to 100x the triggering bet, if you have up to five symbols of this type on the reels.

Pharaoh’s Secrets Bonus

The bonus game gets triggered when 3+ scattered Pyramids appear in the game. The bonus game that comes next asks you to pick one of three gold coins. You win free games from them, but the exact amount depends on your pick. You can get up to 100 free spins from this feature. The wild symbol is both expanded at all times and capable of doubling the prizes formed with its contribution.

Pharaoh's-Secrets-bonus

Betting options and jackpots

There are three components to any bet that you place in this game. The paylines are first, the number of coins is second, the denomination of a coin is third. First, you can select up to 20 bet lines to place wagers on. Second, you pick 1 to 10 coins to use for each individual payline. Third, you pick the denomination, the range being $0.01 to $2. The result is a total bet of up to $400, made out of 200 coins of $2 each.

The jackpot’s offer is 5,000 times what the line bet was, meaning up to 50,000 coins, or $100,000. Keep in mind the x2 multiplier of the free spins, it might help you out with that top jackpot if you’re very lucky.

Design and symbols

The Egyptian theme is mostly visible in the half of the symbols that are themed and in the surrounding graphics. The playing cards are stock photos of different colors, while the reels are all black and doing nothing to make the game more inviting. Overall, I’d say it’s a missed opportunity on Playtech’s part, their chance to make a great Egyptian slot turning into yet another average title with pyramids. It’s a shame, as some of those symbols actually show promise.

Symbols: Pharaoh (wild), Pyramid (scatter, 100x spin’s total bet), Pyramid Interior (5,000x), Eye of Ra (1,000x), Goddess Isis (750x), Scarab (500x), Ace (200x), King (200x), Queen (150x), Jack (150x), Ten (100x) & Nine (100x).

Is It Worth Playing?

It’s one of a few dozen Egyptian themed slots, and it doesn’t seem to stand out in a major way. The XtraWin feature is the only one that would be different, but I’m not sure it’s worth playing because of that alone.

You will find Pharaoh’s Secrets at any online casino which chooses to use software from Playtech, playable either for free or for real money.