The Mummy Slots

Gameplay of The Mummy Slots

The game starts with a splash screen featuring actors from the movies. It provides no real introduction to actual game play. This is just filler material to keep you occupied while the software finishes loading.

The Mummy is a 5-reel, 3-row video slot game with 25 configurable pay lines and featuring an incidental soundtrack that is fully orchestrated from synthesized music. It does not resemble any significant themes from the movie soundtracks.

There are three bonus games, which are described below.

You should see a utility bar at the top of the screen. You have the option of switching to a Two Game View or a Four Game View. As you would expect, clicking on these controls adds more games to your playing screen. There is also an audio bar that turns the game sounds on or off. Finally, the Wrench brings up all sorts of game options such as History (only available to real money players), Options (which opens up three menus with lots of choices), and Help (a chat service for the casino). Some installations of the game may look a little different.

Except for the Special Features bar, described below, all the gambling game controls are located in a row at the bottom of the screen.

• The square Info button brings up the 8-page pay table that explains all the symbols and the game rules.
• The Lines display is just there for information. It tells you there are 25 active pay lines.
• Line Bet is what some games call "Bet Per Line"; or "Coin Value". You use the plus and minus keys to change this setting.
• The Total Bet window multiplies your Line Bet by the active pay lines (25).
• The Win window displays how much the last spin paid you.
• The Auto Play button brings up a choice of 10, 25, 50, or 99 spins.

The big red Spin button does what it says but it also becomes a Stop button after a brief waiting period. You can stop the reels from spinning but you're just ending the animated spinning of the reels. You cannot catch the special symbols in winning combinations.

At the very bottom of the screen is another ribbon with an information window showing you what your current balance is, a button for the Cashier, a button to switch modes if you are only playing with practice money, and a link to the Gambling Commission on some installations. There is also a clock in the far right corner.

Game Rules

Unlike older slot games you cannot adjust the number of pay lines. You are playing 25 pay lines, so remember that when you set your bet amount per line.

All winning combinations pay from left to right, except for the Scatter bonus.

The Scatter bonus pays 4, 20, or 150 times your total bet for 3, 4, or 5 symbols respectively.

The Mummy Slots Pay Table

Here is how the game awards prizes for winning combinations. The game tiles become animated when they form part of a winning combination, and the pay line is highlighted in color to help you identify where the prize money is coming from when you win multiple prizes.

• The Mummy Logo is the Scatter symbol.
• The Mummy (character) is the game's Wild symbol. It only appears on reels 2, 3, and 4 and it substitutes for all other symbols except the Scatter and the special bonus game triggers.
• Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser) is the game's highest value symbol. He pays 5 times your Line Bet for 2 adjacent tiles, 250 times your Line Bet for 3 adjacent tiles, 1000 times Line Bet for 4, and 10,000 times Line Bet for 5.
• Evelyn Carnahan (Rachel Weiss) pays 3 times Line Bet for 2 adjacent tiles, 100 times Line Bet for 3 adjacent tiles, 500 times Line Bet for 4 tiles, and 2,000 times Line Bet for 5 tiles.
• Imhotep (Arnold Vosloo) and Anck-Su-Namun (Patricia Velasquez) pay 2 times Line Bet for 2 adjacent tiles, 50 times Line Bet for 3 adjacent tiles, 200 times Line Bet for 4, and 500 times Line Bet for 5 of a kind.
• The Scorpion King (Dwayne Johnson) is worth 25 times Line Bet for 3 of a kind, 100 times bet per for 4 of a kind, and 250 times Line Bet for 5 of a kind.
• The Golden Scorpion Bracelet and the Book of the Dead are both worth 15 times Line Bet for 3 of a kind, 40 times Line Bet for 4 of a kind, and 75 times Line Bet for 5 of a kind.
• Rick's Revolvers, the Blue Scarab, and the Canopic Jars are all worth 5 times Line Bet for 3 of a kind, 20 times Line Bet for 4 of a kind, and 50 times Line Bet for 5 of a kind.

There are additional special symbols that appear at random.

The Lost City Adventure Bonus

After every spin there is a chance you'll be awarded this bonus game. The playing area is replaced by a screen depicting a room in an ancient tomb with 6 chests. You click on each chest until the word "Collect" appears. You are awarded cash prizes for each non-Collect table.

At the end of the round the Book of the Dead will appear if you have not collected all eight special feature symbols. The book awards you one of the symbols, which sets a special rule in the game for you. You can collect six of the eight special features in a sidebar. The symbols are:

You can only have one special feature active at a time but as you collect them you can change which feature is active by clicking on them in-between spins.

The Mummy Special Bonus Games

The final two features are special symbols that are added to the reels:

The Free Spins balloon becomes a permanent addition to the reels and when it appears on reels 1, 3, and 5 it activates a free spins game. You win 5 free games and 1 Super Spin. During the 5 free spins you collect Wild symbols on a special ribbon. You can collect up to 9 Wild symbols. When the Super Spin begins your accumulated Wild symbols are distributed to reels 2, 3, and 4. You can still win Scatter prizes even if they are covered by these special Wilds.

The Mummy Hunt bonus, when it appears on reels 1 and 5, triggers the last bonus game. You pass through a tunnel until you come to two entrances. Choose one, right or left. You will either arrive at a dead end, thus ending the bonus game, or you'll find a mummy. You kill the mummy for cash and continue. You can kill up to 10 mummies per bonus round.

Conclusion

If all this sounds like a lot of work that is because it is. The game is one of those multi-level slot games that is designed to keep you playing for hours on end. You have to earn your way to the final bonus. Of course, once you unlock the final bonus you can win it again and again, as well as the free spins bonus game.

You also get to keep the special features until you stop playing the game. That means you can switch back and forth between the various ways to win prizes.

Selecting any given special feature does not affect whether you win another round of the Lost City Adventure bonus game. That is completely random. And, of course, once you have collected all 8 special features the Lost City Adventure just becomes a random Pick Bonus, which is not bad. Pocket the cash and get back to the game, right?

Playtech has a reputation for designing imaginative games and the fact they based this game off of two movies means they had a lot of material to work with. In fact, despite the game's complexity it is a little disappointing that they did not use more images or clips from the movies. For example, why did they not use Ardeth Bay (the Magi who helps Rick and Evy in the movies, played by Oded Fehr)? Another bonus game featuring him would have been cool.

But it's a very full game as it is. Most people who loved the movies should enjoy playing the game. The Lost City Adventure builds up your anticipation and may even make you a little impatient as you have to earn all 8 special features before you can get down to the serious business of killing mummies. But at least you can toggle through all the different bonus and multiplier options, which makes the game easily customized for anyone who wants to design their own slot machine game without actually designing a slot machine game.

If you get bored and leave the game you may have second thoughts because you'll have to earn all those special features again the next time you play. And that is perhaps the danger of the game. You may become so involved in earning new features you lose track of the time. It's probably a good thing they included a clock on the bottom ribbon. You would not want to find yourself playing all night long before you have to go to work the next day.