Noah’s Ark Pokie Machine
Casino games developer IGT has taken a bit of a gamble themselves with their Noah’s Ark pokie, as basing this type of game around a religious theme could upset a few people. But we won’t flood this review with deep issues like this and instead focus on the game itself, which is a cartoon-style 5 reel pokie that comes with wild substitutions and a free spins game with richer reels in play.
The story of Noah gathering all the animals together in 2 by 2 and sailing off during a great flood will be familiar to most of us and the game has a number of references to the tale, including a picture of the ark sat behind the reels. The skies are still blue, so it’s set either before or after the flood, and the animal symbols that populate much of the game all look very happy to be to be safe as they spin down the wood-effect reels.
Enhancing the theme even more is the fact that animals can appear doubled-up in each symbol position which also has the effect of creating winning lines quite easily and potentially landing ten of a kind combinations for the biggest payouts.
Setting Sail On Noah’s Ark
Bet sizes range from 0.01 to 300.00 per spin, so few people are going to have any complaints about how much they can stake, although a minimum of 0.30 is needed to activate all 30 paylines, with players winning a prize when 3 or more of the same symbol type stop across a line running form the left side.
The usual playing card symbols are featured in Noah’s Ark and although they are colourful enough, they don’t have anything to do with the overall theme and are just there to fill spaces and pay out the lower value wins. Landing 3 examples of the J, Q, or K on a line will be worth a prize of 5x the line bet, with 4 of a kind being worth 15x and a full line of 5 is 100x. The A pays 8, 20 or 200x the line bet and then we move on to the animals that are worth more and have a special double-up feature.
Turtles, camels, elephants, hippos and lions will appear in the base game, either as a single example in a symbol, or as 2 in a single position. These double symbols count as 2 of a kind, meaning that only 2 will be needed on reels 1 and 2 on a line to create a win. It also means that in a perfect scenario, a full line of 5 double symbols can appear and make a 10 of a kind line with wins of 1000 to 2500x the line bet depending on which of God’s creature’s lands in the right places.
Noah’s Ark
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Bonus Features
This is dwarfed by the potential for a prize of 10,000x the line bet that’s won by landing the Ark right across all 5 reels on an active line. This picture of the boat sailing under a rainbow is the game logo and it’s also a wild symbol, so it will be able to act as any other, apart from the dove, if it can then complete a combination or extend a winning line across extra reels for a bigger reward. Any time the wild substitutes for an animal symbol, the value of the win is doubled.
The dove can appear in any positions, either as a single or double symbol and a total of 4 are needed to get a win equal to 2x the triggering bet. If 5 or 6 land at once, on top of this prize, either 5 or 10 free spins will then play out. These spins will see different animals like a crocodile, ostrich, zebra, goat and giraffe on the reels, but they are worth the same as the animals in the base game, so although these spins cost nothing, the odds and winnings remain the same.
It’s not possible to retrigger the free spins and once they have finished, any wins are added up, paid out and players are returned to the base game.
The Verdict
In many ways, this is a nice pokie to play. It looks good, in a simple cartoon fashion, where friendly animals smile from the windows of the Ark and the overall design can’t be faulted. The doubled-up symbols are the real highlights here and they will make it easy to land a few wins, with the potential for much bigger rewards always there if longer lines are spun up.
The free spins round is a bit of a disappointment and clearly IGT have had to cut back on bonuses somewhat to include the doubled symbols, but overall, this is a high-quality pokie.