Sphinx Slot – Free Demo

One pick per qualifying line

Sphinx keeps its whole feature set in one place: a screen of five sarcophagi, one pick per qualifying payline, and a Sphinx statue hidden somewhere in them. With so many studios anticipated to launch a whole pile of games, there's a genuine danger of the market growing saturated unless somebody reimagines the pyramids-and-pharaohs recipe and push the limits onward, and additional Book of Ra imitations simply won't suffice anymore. One round I captured triggered on two paylines, handed over two picks and paid 6,600.00 at a total bet of 270.00.

So here it is. IGT's Egyptian slot launched without much fanfare, it arrives with a tomb-raiding theme similar to The Mummy, and at first look there's nothing that truly stands out as especially inventive. My run waited 129 spins for the first bonus. In fact, apart from the pick bonus it seems as a rather rudimentary nine-line game. Of the 175 spins that paid me anything, 121 came back under the 270.00 stake.

There are no significant surprises in terms of features. Across 460 spins the feature never retriggered once it was under way. But a few items are worth noting nonetheless, and central to the game is the Sphinx Bonus, a pick round rather than free spins. The captured round shows how short it can be, opening with two picks remaining and nothing else on offer. It is where you'll discover nearly all of its potential, and there's no bonus buy option, so you'll have to await for it to drop naturally. Mine arrived three times, on spins 129, 168 and 227.

Sphinx is a 5 reel slot with 3 rows and 9 fixed paylines, and with a minimum stake of 0.09 credits per spin, it's welcoming enough to low rollers. I played it much higher, at 270.00 a spin against a coin value of 30.00.

Nefertiti, the scarab and the Pharaoh mask

Symbols on the reels comprise pyramids, a blue fan, a cartouche, palm trees and a Bar symbol as the lower end. There are also the premium symbols - the crook and flail, the Anubis statue and the Nefertiti bust. The Nefertiti bust is the most lucrative regular symbol, handing you 2,500 coins times the coin value for five of a kind. The largest win without a bonus attached was 4,050.00 on spin 211, fifteen times the stake. The Pharaoh mask is the wild and substitutes all symbols bar the Bonus symbol. The Bonus symbol therefore has to arrive on its own to open the pick round. Five of them pay 10,000 coins - the highest line pay in the game - and the scarab scatter pays in any position, multiplied by total bet: 50x for five, 20x for four and 2x for three. At my 270.00 stake, five scarabs would have been worth 13,500.00.

Inside the Egyptian Burial Chamber

There is only one method of gaining entry to the bonus. The gaps between my three were 39 spins and then 59. That is by awaiting for it to drop "organically", and if 3 or more bonus symbols land on an active payline you will win one pick in the Egyptian Burial Chamber per qualifying payline, up to a maximum of 5 picks.

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The aim in the bonus is to open the five sarcophagi. Opening all five needs the full set of picks, and that in turn needs the bonus symbols to qualify on five paylines at once. Each uniquely contains a mystery award of 5, 20, 100 or 250 times the coin value of the triggering spin - or a Sphinx statue. In the captured round one sarcophagus printed 600.00, which is the 20 award at a coin value of 30.00.

Now, should you manage to reveal the Sphinx statue, the Sphinx Chamber opens. In that same captured round the chamber paid 6,000.00, the 200 award at the same 30.00 coin value. There you select one of five statues for 100, 200, 250, 1000 or 2500 times the coin value of the triggering spin, and your selection does not alter the outcome. The two picks together made a total bonus win of 6,600.00, and the balance went from 95,320.00 to 101,920.00. Bonus wins are added to the payline wins. On spin 168 that meant 40,500.00 from the bonus and 324.00 from the reels on the one spin.

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Our Minty Verdict: Three bonuses in 460 spins paid 50,220 credits between them, 45% of everything the run returned, and the session still closed at 88.9% of what went in. A two-of-six volatility rating sitting beside a feature that holds most of the money is an odd pairing, and 460 spins is nowhere near enough to say how often the Sphinx Chamber opens behind it.

460 spins at a coin value of 30

In fact, Sphinx is a rather plain and uncomplicated slot with no significant surprises or odd, intricate features, and it all comes down to landing bonus symbols on as many paylines as possible in order to gain picks and reach the Sphinx Chamber. Over the run I wagered 124,200.00 and won 110,430.00, finishing on 86,230.00 from a start of 100,000.00. There is no buy option. But the bonus is powerful enough when it lands - across 460 spins at 270 credits a go it triggered three times and paid 50,220 credits between them, 45% of my total return. The spin 168 round alone took the balance from 78,400.00 to 118,954.00. The best of them was worth 150 times the stake. The other two paid 9.0 and 27.0 times it.

It's a low variance slot. The balance never dropped under 78,346.00 and peaked at 119,089.00 on spin 247. My session returned 88.9%, with 175 paying spins out of 460 and a longest dry stretch of just 17.