Golden Amulet Slots
99 percent of the time, reviewing a slot machine is a pleasure, with games that developers have clearly crafted with care and that come with fair payouts and fun bonus features. Sometimes, however an online casino slot machine simply doesn’t work and it’s our sad duty to tell potential players to avoid it.
While online slots developer Casino Technology are perfectly capable for releasing high-quality games, they seem to have had a bit of and off-day when making the Golden Amulet video slot, which looks OK but seem to have no real bonuses at all and even worse, comes with an incomplete paytable. In its favour though, it follows an interesting theme and the symbols have all been nicely designed.
Mayan artefacts such as clay cups, jugs, masks and a mysterious golden airplane are seen on the 5 reels of the Golden Amulet video slot from Casino Technology. The ancient Mayan civilisation has long fascinated historians and now seems to be a popular topic for online casino slots to follow, but it gives developers plenty of scope to add exotic symbols.
Heading Back to the Mayan World
We’ll cover the good bits about this slot machine first, and in fairness, anyone looking to just line up winning symbols, without being very interested in knowing in advance what each line will be worth, or wanting any bonus rounds, may find this game suits them perfectly. It’s got a standard 5-reel layout and has 5 paylines running across them with just 2 examples of the same symbol needed across a line to form a winning combination. There are 3 lines running horizontally across the rows of symbols and lines 4 and 5 are the diagonals from left to right.
Free Golden Amulet video slots are provided, and this is a case where we would strongly recommend punters trying it out at no risk before deciding whether or not to play for real cash. The minimum s take is only 0.05 though, so there’s not much risk at these levels, and in practice, it seems to be a fair game that has the decent return to player percentage seen across the rest of the Casino Technology range.
There’s no paytables listing what each symbol is worth, so finding this out can only be done by playing the game, and waiting for the high-value combinations to land could take some time. Lower-paying winning lines are created by the golden jar, a bronze-effect cup and a gold cup, while the best payouts in normal play are seen when the ceremonial head sculpture, rabbit and lion-styled jugs appear. A golden jewel, styled like an airplane is a mysterious object that refers to the legends of Mayans having access to advanced, possible extra-terrestrial technology, and returns some high prizes as well.
Golden Wins from an Amulet
In one corner of this slot game, we see a green button with an ‘i’ that would normally lead to the information about how it all works. In this case however, it shows a single symbol, and only by playing the game can we discover that it’s a scatter icon. This is, of course, the Golden Amulet, and when it lands in any 3, 4, or 5 positions, without needing to be across a payline, spinners receive the top winnings of 0.5, 2.5 or 12.5 times the total stake.
This happens quite frequently, so it’s a decent bonus feature, but there’s no wild symbol, it doesn’t trigger a bonus game such as free spins, and if you want any extra features, like a gamble round, you’re out of luck, as there aren’t any.
Other Mayan-Themed Slot Games
Because the subject matter is so popular, perhaps we should look at similar online casino slot machines that have more features, or even complete game information paytables on them. Mayan Treasures, from Bally, has wild substitutions, free spins rounds and a scatter icon that awards up to 4000x the payline bet.
Another game that we like is Mayan Gold, which comes from Australian developer Ainsworth. This slot machine has features like differently-sized reels across the screen, 100 paylines and multiple wild symbols. During the free games round, you can scoop multiplier wins, along with the chance to retrigger more spins with the Dollar symbol.
Final Thoughts on Golden Amulet
There’s a lot more ancient Aztec and Mayan civilisation-themed slot games available, but we’re sorry to say that Golden Amulet isn’t one of our favourites. It still manages to have a nice design though, with the gold-framed reels sitting against a backdrop of intricately carved stonework, and each symbol is quite detailed.
There’s no mobile-optimised version of the Golden Amulet video slot, so gamblers will have to be playing on a desktop PC or laptop to get the full effect, but if the style appeals, and you are not looking for much in the way of bonuses, then giving the reels of this game a few spins could land some steady and reliable coin awards.
