The Hidden Temple

There are games in the online slots industry that stand out for really breaking the mold in terms of what the gameplay is like, and The Hidden Temple slot, available at Push Gaming casinos, is a perfect example of this. It's a classic slot with anime-style graphics and a video that's playing overhead at all times that shows what's going on with the story. We'll get more into this below, but it's a much different game than anything we can remember having seen.

Format, Layout and Controls

This is a three-reel game, it has three rows of symbols, and there are five paylines. It has the typical classic slot layout in this sense. However, betting is a bit odd. From the menu, you can choose to bet between $0.10 and $50 per spin, but there are only eight different options, so there can be some pretty big jumps between available bet sizes. We definitely would have preferred a few more options here, especially at the lower and middle levels.

The controls are also a bit different, and they're more involved than what you'd normally find in any kind of slot. You'll press over on the right-hand side to insert a large, gold coin into the game. This gives you 50 "credits" to play with based on your actual bet size that you choose in the menu. From there, you'll hit the red button on the left, which will prepare the reels for spinning, and you'll press the large, black, shiny button under that to make the reels spin.

From there, you actually have to stop each of the reels individually using the three glowing blue buttons underneath. If you hit a win, you'll have to hit the smaller, black, shiny button on the right-hand side to collect and add them to your total. Hitting it again will move the in-game credits to your balance. Overall, this is rather tedious, and we're not sure what they were going for here.

Assist Time Mode

If you get to the assist time mode, you'll have different numbers show up on the reels. You'll need to stop the reels in the right order, and this gives you an opportunity to win bigger payouts on average. A failure to do so will hurt your chances of winning, so you'll actually have to pay attention here.

Big Bonus Mode

Winning with either of the seven symbols will give you a go at the Big Bonus mode. You'll get two or three power-ups depending on which of the sevens you triggered the feature with, and you'll be able to spend the power-ups during these spins. You'll get a chance for extra wins along these lines.

This can also lead to the regular bonus mode, and that gives you seven spins where you always get at least one prize from the melon symbols.

Regular Payouts

During the regular play mode, you'll see the story unfold on the video screen above the reels. The more wins you get, the more things will happen in the story. You can get 2x for one or two of the cherry symbols on a payline, and it doubles to 4x for three of a kind. Three of the bells is worth 6x, and three of the melons gets you 9x. You can also be awarded 12 for three of a kind of The Hidden Temple symbols. The payout is 15x for three of the red or blue lucky sevens, each of which activates the Big Bonus mode. You can also score three of the reply symbols for an instant free spin.

Overview

Sometimes a slot producer will take a big risk. Sometimes this risk pays off big, and sometimes it's a flop. Unfortunately for Push Gaming, The Hidden Temple slot feels more like a big risk was taken that turned into a flop. We can sort of see where they were going with this in terms of having interactive gameplay with stopping individual reels, especially with the Assist Time mode where it actually affects your chances of winning.

However, it comes across as incredibly tedious in practice, and we can't imagine many players will want to stick around pressing four or five buttons per spin. It's really a shame because the theme of the game, the idea of the characters playing out a story on the video screen and the multiple atypical bonus features are all great attributes.