Theme and Storyline
Gladiator Jackpot is a movie themed slot which follows the plot of the classic Ridley Scott movie Gladiator.
Unfortunately, getting the trademark didn’t give them the rights to Russell Crowe’s likeness, so the main character does not appear anywhere in the game.
One additional strangeness about this slot is the fact that the word "colosseum" is spelled throughout as "coliseum", a medieval alternative spelling that hasn’t been widely used for six hundred years.
There are plenty of Rome themed slots that feel closer in tone to the movie than this one. If you want a slot that captures the feel of that film, play one of them.
Graphics, Sounds and Animations
Despite having movie studio approval the final product is a bit rickety. Adjusting screen size away from the scale the designers built it results in ugly pixelation.
The choice of character photos are uninspiring and the animations simple involve swapping in a new picture and zooming in and out.
There is no backing music. A massive oversight given the influence the original Hans Zimmer soundtrack had. Even a faded imitation would have been better than the generic win and spin sounds the makers selected.
Overall, the design of this slot is enormously disappointing for fans of either slot machines, or the movie Gladiator.
Gameplay
The base game is a basic five reel slot with three rows. The game has twenty-five win lines, which are adjustable.
There is no gamble feature. Though it has two bonus games, these do not do much for the pacing or excitement of a game that seems to have been worked on with very limited effort.
Wilds, Bonuses and Free Spins
The Wild symbol substitutes for all symbols except the Scatter symbol.
Three or more Wild symbols landing on one spin trigger the Gladiator Jackpot Bonus. This allows the player a spin on special reels. There are nine spots on a grid, each spot gets one of three Helmet symbols in either Gold, Silver, or Bronze. The metal corresponds to a particular multiplier. The player wins the total value of all nine Helmets. If all nine are Gold Helmets, then the player wins the progressive jackpot (unless the bonus was triggered during a free spin).
Three or more Scatter symbols trigger the Coliseum Bonus. This is a Free Spin bonus, with a picking game to randomise the number of free spins, the multiplier for those spins, and reels with additional scatter and wild symbols.
Bet Sizes, RTP and Variance
The return to player of this game is 94.09%. This is much too low. We use a yardstick for average of roughly 96%, and coming in two percentage points is a black mark which no slot is good enough to overcome. That sound you hear is our recommendation being thrown to the lions.
The volatility of this game is medium. That would make it a poor match for our preferred slot machine strategies even if the RTP weren’t painfully low.
Conclusion
After one recovers from the shock of a licensed slot machine game without Russell Crowe, Hans Zimmer, or tigers, one can be shocked all over again by how lazy the design of this slot is.
The user interface is ugly, the soundtrack is not very immersive, and the RTP is insanely low.
There isn’t a single redeeming feature to this tired and lazy slot. Two thumbs down.
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