The Vikings

Vikings were known for being some of the biggest explorers of the northern Atlantic region, and they were also known for the war and chaos they brought with them. While they were a warrior culture in a lot of ways, they were also known for giving rights to women that they didn't have in many other parts of the world at this time like being able to divorce their husbands. That's important to keep in mind when you see the scantily-clad female vikings on the reels of The Vikings slot by Endorphina.

Format and Layout

Endorphina prefers to use slot formats that are pretty standard instead of going way off in some atypical direction. Their logic here is that they want to impress players with good gameplay and quality of their experience instead of some kind of flashy new format they haven't seen before. Along these lines, The Vikings has five reels, three rows and 20 paylines. This is a good starting foundation that's solid and proven in the industry, and they use this foundation to build a good gaming experience for their players with this title.

Gameplay is a little different when you hit a winning combination than most other video slots, and it's a bit of a throwback to classic slot machines. If you hit a win, you're given the option to collect or to turn around and re-wager that win on another spin. There's really no benefit or extra feature for risking that win, and the only real difference is that your bet size chances for that spin. Nevertheless, it can be a fun feature, especially if you want to try to parlay your smaller wins into bigger payouts.

High Symbols

There are basically three tiers of symbols in this game. The wild symbol shows up on all reels, but it doesn't have its own payout. Five of the wild will give you the same 1,000x win that you can earn from five of the male viking character, and that's a reasonable top jackpot. The male Viking also pays for just two of a kind, and he's the only character in the game to do so.

The horse is the next-highest payout, and five of a kind will get you a 500x win. You can also earn 200x for four of the viking or 150x for four of the horse.

Mid-Level Symbols

Two symbols are considered mid-level in this game, and the fact that many Endorphina slots use three levels of symbols instead of just two gives them more "layers" of payouts that help the overall gameplay experience.

Two different women vikings are available in the middle level of symbols. One is facing to the side, and the other is facing towards the player, and though they both have similar features, one is wearing a necklace and a larger coat while the other is not. This could reflect the fact that there were two main classes of female relations in Viking culture. In any event, both of them pay 400x for five of a kind, 100x for four of a kind and 20x for three of a kind.

Low-End Symbols

Finally we have the five low-end symbols. Two different shield symbols earn 200x for five, 50x for four and 10x for three. The A, K and Q symbols also show up on the reels for a 100x payout when you score five of a kind. It's cool to see that even the lowest symbols in the game can give you a three-figure win, and even though they did include letter-based symbols for the lowest payouts, it really works in this game and doesn't come across as lazy development.

Bonus Feature

The skull wearing a helmet is a bonus scatter symbol in this game. Three or more give you a set of 12 free spins. These free spins are a bit more valuable than normal spins because the wild symbol shows up as stacked. This means you'll get plenty of chances for multi-line wins and combination payouts that you wouldn't have gotten otherwise. If you line up a few of these stacked wilds, then you're in for some major wins as well.