Pragmatic Play, a software developer, maintains a very strict release schedule because it has found that if enough ideas are thrown against a wall, eventually some of them will stick. Contrarily, many mediocre concepts fall to the ground, where they rot and baffle their creator with questions about their origin. Moonshot, a slot machine developed by Pragmatic Play, is one of the company’s outliers. To determine whether or not you enjoy it, you may need to suspend disbelief and explore a setting that has never previously appeared in an online slot. Some people might find all this oddness endearing. Let’s see where we stand on this issue.
Let’s get one thing out of the way first: Moonshot has nothing at all to do with rocketry, astronaut selection, centrifuge training, or launching human beings into space atop one of the most terrifying machines ever conceived of by the human mind. Instead, Moonshot seems to be based on a cultural (slavic?) festival or celebration, replete with individuals wearing bizarre masks and sipping cups of… tea? A thorough game sheet would have been helpful in making sense of the situation. Unfortunately, no more information was available at the time of writing, so it will be up to the participants to use their own imaginations to try to figure out what is going on.
The betting range for Moonshot is 20 pence per spin up to £/€100, and there is also the opportunity to buy a bonus. It’s a risky game, but the one with the highest return to player rate (RTP) is the one you desire. With 5 reels and 4 rows to work with, players have 1,024 options to increase their chances of winning.
When identical symbols appear on the first, second, and third reels (or the first, second, and third for the top premium mask symbol), a win is triggered. When made with the 10-A card ranks, a full 5 OAK win is worth 1 to 1.5 times the wager; when produced with the higher-value cup of tea, gourd, blueberries, plums, cherries, and mask symbols, a full 5 OAK win is worth 1.5 to 4 times the stake. The wild symbol can help out here by replacing any of the normal symbols. Except for the first reel, all the others feature Wilds.
Slot Functions: Aim for the Moon
Okay, so far, huh? Perhaps the unique characteristics of Moonshot can rescue anything from the chaos. In this case, there are Golden Mask icons, free games, and a bonus purchase to discuss.
To Wear a Mask of Gold
The Golden Mask appears on reels two through five and acts as a substitute for any symbol save the jackpot mask. Multipliers may be found in Golden Masks as well; the greater the number of masks depicted on Golden Mask symbols, the greater the multiplier. If one mask appears, the multiplier is x1; if two masks show, it’s x2; and if three masks appear, it’s x3. All premiums combination wins are multiplied by the bonus amount.
No Risk Turns
Free games of 10, 15, or 20 are awarded when 3–5 coin bags appear anywhere on the reels. All masks and Golden Masks are gathered during free games. When 40 of them are amassed, a new level is unlocked:
In the first level, Golden Masks drop with random x1, x2, or x3 multipliers.
On Level 2, Golden Masks have a two- or threefold chance of dropping as multipliers. You’ll get an extra 3 spins after reaching this level.
At the third level, golden masks have a multiplier of 3. You’ll get an extra 3 spins after reaching this level.
All remaining retriggers and free spins are locked at Level 3 once you achieve it. Free games of 5, 10, 15, or 20 are awarded for seeing 2, 3, 4, or 5 scatter symbols. Finally, the RTP is 96.5%, and free spins may be purchased for 80 times the initial wager.
Judgment in the Time Slot
What is this Moonshot thing all about, then? One possible takeaway from the game is that the tea these characters are guzzling down isn’t your typical Earl Grey or morning blend, but rather something with a hallucinogenic twist. In which, upon taking a sip, one experiences something like to an inner moon-shot, taking them far beyond the world of tranquility. We may be completely wrong, and we probably are, but if we had to guess, that’s the best we could do to describe what the heck is going on in Moonshot.
Collecting masks, Golden Masks, and multipliers during free spins to advance levels makes the gameplay much simpler to grasp. So, that’s pretty much all. If you’re not into the novel concept, you won’t find anything to be excited about. It’s difficult to squeeze out more words to adequately evaluate the Moonshot experience. The game features a maximum win of 5,000 times the wager, which is great and all, but so do a ton of other Pragmatic Play slots, so whatever.
At Pragmatic Play, we want to keep the factory floor humming. It’s true that doing so necessitates some creative problem solving to keep the whole thing running smoothly. Moonshot is not one of Pragmatic Play’s better games, but not every slot machine has to be based on ancient Egypt, the Leprechaun, or fruit. It’s hard to think of many reasons to endorse Moonshot beyond the fact that it could be of interest to gamers who truly can’t say no to unique subject matter.