Iron Man Slots

Gameplay

The Iron Man slot game is a 5-reel, 3-row video slot game with 25 pay lines. The game boasts an unlimited free spins bonus game and an innovative in-game prize boost feature. All winning combinations pay from left to right and only when they occur on active pay lines, except for the Scatter combinations, which pay regardless of where they appear on the screen. The game also participates in the Marvel Multi-Level Mystery Progressive Jackpot, which is explained below.

Playtech positioned a control ribbon across the top of the screen for the casino to leverage its other games but this is also where the in-game options menu (denoted by the Wrench icon) can be found. The sound can be toggled on or off and brave players can load up to four games at one time.

Thirteen numbered buttons run down the left side of the playing area and twelve numbered buttons run down the right side of the playing area. Clicking on any of these buttons activates all the pay lines up to the corresponding button number and deactivates all the higher numbered pay lines. Colored lines matching the buttons' own colors are used to designate which pay lines are awarding prizes during game play.

The game's remaining controls run across the bottom of the screen below the playing reels. From left to right they control the coin value, pay tables interface, auto play, active pay lines, bet per line, maximum bet, and individual game spins.

• Coin Value Control

  Clicking on this brings up an expanding menu with 6 coin value options. The game defaults to the lowest option of 0.01. Highest value is 1.00 although this can be configured for any currency and any variety of denominations.

  Just below the coin value control is the Info button. Clicking on Info brings up the 5-page pay table interface, but the interface itself has a button that brings down an overlay showing all the pay line charts. This screen is designed to operate similarly to Tony Stark's virtual interactive 3-D hologram displays as seen in the movie.

• The Auto Start widget

  This uses two special buttons, minus ( - ) and plus ( + ), to set how many spins the game plays continuously before you interrupt the auto play, run out of money, or leave the game. Hold either button down to scroll from 0 to 99 or downward.

• The Lines control

  This is just a clickable button. You must click on it 25 times to cycle through all the pay line settings to return to where you start.

• The Bet Per Line control

  This is also just a clickable button. It scrolls through the options numbering from 1 to 10 but represents its value in terms of multiples of the coin value.

• The Total Bet window

  This is positioned just above the Max Bet button. Total Bet is the product of Bet Per Line times Coin Value.

• Clicking on Max Bet

  This control sets Active Pay Lines and Bet Per Line to their maximum values and initiates 1 spin. Coin value remains wherever it was. If Coin Value is set to the maximum, however, then Max Bet represents a very substantial bet such as 250 Dollars, Pounds, or Euros.

• The Win display

  This button is positioned just above the Spin button and it reports the sum of all prizes paid on the last game or 0 if no prize was won.

• The Spin button

  This initiates a single game but also doubles as a Stop button. There is a slight delay after you click on Spin before it becomes a Stop button.

Iron Man Slots Pay Table

There are twelve symbols in the game, of which two are Wild symbols and one is a Scatter symbol.

Both the Iron Man symbols are Wild and they pay 5,000 times bet per line for 5 of a kind, 350 times bet per line for 4 of a kind, 70 times bet per line for 3 of a kind, and 10 times bet per line for 2 of a kind. The Wild symbols are stacked on reels 2, 3, and 4 and they can become Expanding Wilds if they can help with pay lines across all three rows. The Expanding Wilds display in-tile animations of Iron Man soaring up into the sky and play an ambient sound representing his thrusters from the movie's sound effects.

The dual Wild symbols also introduce a unique Mixed Pay Feature where if at least one of each symbol contributes to a winning combination they add 8 times bet per line to the prize for 2 Mixed Wilds, 30 times bet per line for 3 Mixed Wilds, 150 times bet per line for 4 Mixed Wilds, and 750 times bet per line for 5 Mixed Wilds. Mixed combinations must begin on reel 1.

The Iron Man game logo is the Scatter symbol. All Scatter prizes pay a multiple of the Total Bet, from 1 times total bet for 2 of a kind to 100 times total bet for 5 of a kind. When 3 or more Scatter symbols appear the Missile Attack Bonus game is triggered. See below for details.

Tony Stark's portrait is the game's high value symbol, although he only pays 500 times bet per line for 5 of a kind.

The Jericho Missile and Tony's electronic Briefcase are the next highest value symbols, with both paying a maximum of 200 times bet per line for 5 of a kind.

The remaining symbols are the usual low value "A", "K", "Q", "J", "10", and "9" symbols found in many slot games. Their 5 of a kind prizes range from 150 times bet per line down to 75 times bet per line.

Iron Man Slots Missile Attack Bonus Game

The Missile Attack Bonus Game begins when 3 or more Scatter symbols appear anywhere on the reels. The feature begins with an animation showing Iron Man flying toward New York City and an F-22 Fighter Jet moving in ahead of him. The fighter launches 12 missiles. This is vaguely reminiscent of the scene in the "Avengers" movie where Iron Man intercepts a nuclear missile fired from a fighter jet.

The bonus game consists of two rounds. In the first round you click on each of the missiles in turn, revealing a prize. There are three types of prizes: cash amounts, free spins, and a multiplier.

There are nine cash prizes and it is possible to collect all of them. There are three free spin prizes and it is possible to collect of them, too.

However, the pick round ends when you have clicked on at least one free spin prize and the multiplier.

The second round consists of all the free spins you won in the first round. All prizes are multiplied per the pick you made. It is possible to retrigger free spins indefinitely although the game remains at the same multiplier level determined in the first round.

Marvel Mystery Multi-level Progressive Jackpot

All Marvel superhero slot games are linked to the Marvel Mystery Multi-Level progressive jackpot game. However, you must be playing for free money in order to play this game.

The bonus game is awarded at random and may be triggered after any spin completes. Although you can enter the bonus having made the lowest possible bet and won nothing on your last spin, the more you bet the better your chances of triggering the jackpot bonus.

There are four jackpots:

• Power Jackpot
• Extra Power Jackpot
• Super Power Jackpot
• Ultimate Power Jackpot

Their prizes are accordingly larger in size corresponding to the names of the jackpots.

You are taken to a screen displaying 20 mystery symbols. Your objective is to click on the symbols, revealing the names of jackpots, until you uncover three names for any one jackpot.

You are guaranteed to win one of the jackpots even if you don't click on any of the mystery symbols because a timer will eventually wind down and reveal a jackpot prize for you. Clicking on the symbols gives you a shot at the highest jackpot. There is no way to know in advance which jackpot you will win either way.

Conclusion

When it was introduced the Iron Man slots game was very innovative and it still offers a unique gaming experience in both the Mixed Wilds feature and the Missile Attack Bonus game. If the maximum prizes for the various symbols strike you as being rather low, think about it. The theoretical return to player for this game is 94.89%, which is about the mid-range for a modern slot game. To provide for so many different ways to win the game has to temper its maximum prizes so you should win more often in this game.

The animations are all cartoonish but this game came out in 2009 and there are at least two more Iron Man slots in the series. For its time this game was very stylish and colorful. The introductory film alone almost makes you want to watch the movie all over again.

If you are a fan of the Iron Man movie soundtrack you'll be disappointed with this game's sound options. The only way to hear music is to visit the pay table and its music is a kind of techno theme that does not do justice to the movie. It would have been nice to hear Robert Downey, Jr.'s voice once in a while, or have J.A.R.V.I.S. make some vacuous comment about how you are doing well, could do better, and shold watch out for missiles.

Still, when all is said and done the game is fun to play and you feel well rewarded when the Wilds begin expanding and the missiles begin to fly. Although cartoonish the game's illustrations are close enough to the movie's depictions of Stark, Iron Man, the Jericho, and Tony's brief case that you come away with a sense of how cool the game must have seemed within the first year after Iron Man had forever changed the way superhero movies will be perceived.

You may not win enough money to become the next Tony Stark but you'll keep spinning the reels for a chance to win one of those four jackpots and you won't complain about the Missile Attack Bonus game.