Description
There are five reels, three rows and 11 set-in-stone Paylines in Thunderkick’s Native American-themed Turning Totems Slot, set against a desert landscape backdrop with an indigenous American boy standing at the side of the poles. You’ll also see large rock formations, a bison skull and settlements of wigwams, and some flowering cacti, as crickets chirrup in the background.
Each of the reels is a Totem pole divided in three, independently spinning sections. There’s a monkey-like character atop each pole, while birds soar past overhead.
How to play
As usual with Thunderkick’s offerings, play from 10p to £100 each go, across all mobile and desktop devices.
You’ll find just five winning symbols in the base game, and these are masks in various colours, including pink, yellow, red, green and blue. (Unfortunately, there are also four ‘no win’ icons in brown.)
The pink icon is the most lucrative at 1,204x overall stake for bagging 15 of them, followed by the orange, red, green and blue ones.
The good news is that Paylines can be created in both directions – i.e. left to right as well as vice versa.
Symbols land at random across the Totems, and it’s possible to land more than a single symbol on any of the poles at any point. Winning combos must include a minimum of six similar symbols anywhere on the poles. (Theoretically, you could land the same icon 15 times for the biggest available payout.)
Where you get the same icon at least five times over all poles, these remain in place while the others get replaced. Each time you land further ‘winning’ symbols, the respins carry on until no more appear.
Turning Totems Slot special features
Special symbols
A ‘sleeping Totem’ serves as the Wild here. When active, it replaces all other icons to help form a winning combo. The sleeping Wild behaves like a normal symbol if the Thunder Reels are inactive.
The Thunder Snake symbol is another one to look out for since it converts whatever reel it’s on into a ‘Thunder Reel’. This ‘awakens’ sleeping Wilds, grants you a respin and could lead to tidy winnings.
When ‘sleeping’ the Wild pays out 10x for five in a row, otherwise it’s 25x when ‘awake’.
Bonus features
Free spins round
This round kicks off as the Native American lad runs up a slope towards a fresh set of Totems, with a string of multipliers in front of them. It launches when at least three Thunder Reels are active, and awards five free whirls. The Thunder Reels stay active as long as the feature is going on, so you benefit from having locked Wilds on a minimum of three reels.
What’s more, each time you get a bonus symbol, you enjoy a couple of extra freebies; there’s a maximum of 30. Equally, the multiplier goes up through 1x, 2x and 3x to 5x with each respin, increasing the potential for some great wins.
To add to the drama, the weather changes in this round to include rainstorm and lightning flashes.
The bonus finishes with another perk, the ‘Winfinity’ feature, in which the round continues until you have a win.
Return to Player (RTP)
Turning Totems Slot features a standard RTP or Return to Player of 96.1%, in keeping with similar slots from this operator. It has a medium-to-high variance while the hit rate is nearly one in three or 30.8%.
Verdict
This 2016 launch is another good-looking and splendidly entertaining slot from Thunderkick, and as ever the bonus features have been designed with great creativity and a refreshingly original concept.
The animation is slick and the artwork typically amazing, while the whole thing also rolls along at a decent pace. Give it a whirl today, playing in free demo mode initially.
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