Chances are, you saw the name Orient Express, and probably thought about murder about a second later.
But whilst Agatha Christie might have made Murder on the Orient Express popular, the actual train itself was famous way before the books ever showed up.
It was considered one of the first luxury travel methods, in a world where horse and carts were the most popular options.
Yggdrasil Gaming will be bringing you that touch of class and affluence to your screen come November 30th 2017, but will it be enough to draw us in?
What we know about the Orient Express slot
The Orient Express train has had many routes in it’s lifetime, but Yggdrasil game studios have picked the most famous destination for it’s games.
After all, what would a train slot be if it didn’t travel?
As such Yggdrasil are bringing back a concept they love; you’ll travel from Paris, to Venice, to Bucharest and then Istanbul on your gaming journey.
What do you mean ‘bringing back’?
Maybe you don’t follow every single slot release like we do, and fair enough. You have a life, us not so much.
But this isn’t Yggdrasil’s first foray in the world of slots within slots.
Their Seasons game was the first to test out this way of playing, where the seasons would randomly change, each bringing with them different bonus game features.
They’ve ramped up this notion a thousand fold in their Jungle Books slot, where you could get 45 different bonus game combinations over 5 jungle realms.
What will make this Yggdrasil slot different?
That is an excellent question.
If Seasons randomises the fun, and Jungle Books takes bonus game steroids, then Orient Express tames the action for a much classier affair.
Namely because whilst you have little control over what you get in the other two games, here it looks like Yggdrasil gaming are going to change the rules once again.
Unlock cities are you travel on the Orient Express
Each city has their own special feature and free spin bonus round.
After triggering any Orient Express free spins, you’ll then get to travel to the next city. Reach the end of your travels and you’ll be free to choose any destination of your choice:
- Paris: has walking wilds like in Jack and the Beanstalk game
- Venice: has random 2x to 5x multipliers on wins
- Belgrade: 1 to 3 reels can turn wild randomly
- Istanbul: 2 to 12 symbols can turn wild at any time
All in all, each feature brings with it its own great winning opportunities.
Is Orient Express mobile slot worth playing?
When we review the slot game on 30th of November we’ll let you know, but for now, let’s just say that it has piqued our interest.
That’s not to say that we can’t see some big problems ahead, especially if past experience has taught us anything.
How long will it take to unlock all the bonus features?
That’s the big bug bear.
Games like Thunderstruck 2 from Microgaming do it best; sure you unlock different free spin rounds, but the best wins can be won fairly early on in the game.
Slots like IGT’s Nordic Heroes, however, can be a drag, as the only good wins come if you manage to unlock enough of the game… 1,000 spins from now.
Finding that perfect balance could be tricky.
What if unlocking slot features isn’t fun?
This is the other side of the coin – this Orient Express mobile phone game has 4 cities to unlock.
If we are reading the specs right, you only need one free spin bonus round to unlock the next city.
So four free spin rounds will unlock all the cities allowing you to change between any of them whenever you want?
Or, more likely, once you’ve unlocked the cities, every free spin round will let you change destination, but you are stuck there till the next free spins?
Personally, we prefer option 2
Mostly because it increases the stakes in the game. If you have to choose wisely, and then know you have to play it out, it increases the thrill of that decision making.
Otherwise you’ll just be skipping from city to city, like a hobo traveller, never really settling in the game.
This is all our suspicions of course – Yggdrasil may yet come up with a third better option, or prove us wrong altogether.
Thankfully the numbers look interesting
If there is one thing we can count on with the game studio Yggdrasil is that they know why slot players play: for the hope of catching that big win.
This Orient Express video slot doesn’t look like their most volatile machine; that’s probably reserved to games like Vikings Go Berzerk, but the wins looks good.
You can get as much as 115,000 at the max bet of 5 a spin, giving you a huge 23,000 times your bet win.
That’s massive and, if nothing else, good enough for us to want to take a couple of spins come November 30th.
