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23 July 2024 
North Guardians Slot Review 2024
Dust off your best Viking attire, Pragmatic Play is preparing us for battle in their latest release, North Guardians!
Valhalla calls in North Guardians, as Vikings get ready to battle in the midst of a blizzard across the reels. With Shields, Axes and Viking Warriors taking to the reels, we must prepare ourselves for the ultimate Clash.
Pragmatic Play are rather prone to a release that capatalises on the Vikings of old, but in their defence it is a popular genre in more than just slots.
Will it be enough though? Pragmatic Play are an infamous provider but it does feel like some of their titles are rushed…Will North Guardians and its popular aesthetic be enough turn skeptics into believers?
Let’s find out together in this North Guardians Slot Review.
North Guardians Betting and Symbols
Like most Pragmatic Play titles, North Guardians has a wide variety of betting options for players to choose from. For those who prefer a lower stake, the minimum bet available here is £/€0.50 per spin. For those who prefer a higher stake, the maximum bet available is £/€100 per spin, with plenty of other options in between the two. The minimum bet is slightly higher than we’re used to seeing in a Pragmatic title, which may not sit right with players who prefer to play on much lower stakes than this.
In terms of symbols, the highest paying regular symbol in North Guardians is the Male Viking, followed by the Female Viking, the Gold Coin, Horn, Shield and Axe. Low paying symbols fall to Red, Light Green, Blue, Purple and Dark Green tiles.
Wild symbols substitute for all symbols except Scatters.
North Guardians Base Game and Features
North Guardians is a 5 reel slot with 50 fixed paylines. In order to form a winning combination, you will need to connect 3 or more of the same symbols types from left to right, starting from the left-most reel.
The base game in North Guardians may not look anything special, but Pragmatic Play has included a Wild Patterns Wheel to bring the base game to life and more importantly deliver some much needed excitement. More on this below.
Wild Patterns Wheel
Before we can dive straight into the Wild Patterns Wheel, you will notice underneath the symbol positions are two halves of a Marking Rectangle. During each base game spin, the two halves will move around the reels. If they come together and form a full Marking Rectangle, the Wild Patterns Wheel will trigger.
The Wild Patterns Wheel is home to a selection of Wild patterns along with Level Up slices. Landing on a Wild pattern will transfer the corresponding pattern onto the grid. If you land on the Level Up slice, you will be awarded an additional Wheel spin with bigger and better Wild patterns.
The Wild Patterns Wheel has 5 Levels available, these are follows.
- Level 1 – Has 9 Wild patterns available, with a maximum of 3 Wilds and a Level Up slice.
- Level 2 – Has 10 Wild patterns available, with a maximum of 6 Wilds and a Level Up slice.
- Level 3 – Has 11 Wild patterns available, with a maximum of 10 Wilds and a Level Up slice.
- Level 4 – Has 11 Wild patterns available, with a a maximum of 15 Wilds and a Level Up slice.
- Level 5 – Has 12 Wild patterns available, with a maximum of 25 Wilds which will fill the entire reel set.
North Guardians Free Spins
Landing 3, 4 or 5 Scatters in any position on the reels, triggers the Free Spins round, awarding 5 Free Spins and a payout of 2x, 10x and 100x your current bet respectively.
During the Free Spins round, the Wild Patterns Wheel is triggered for every free spin. The Wheel will start off on Level 1 and any level up that occurs will increase the level until the end of the Free Spins round, up to Level 5.
Each time a Level Up occurs, additional Free Spins are awarded.
- Going from Level 1 to Level 2, awards +3 Free Spins.
- Going from Level 2 to Level 3, awards +2 Free Spins.
- Going from Level 3 to Level 4, awards +2 Free Spins.
- Going from Level 4 to Level 5, awards +1 Free Spin.
If the maximum win capacity of 5,000x is reached, the Free Spins round immediately ends and all remaining Free Spins are forfeited.
North Guardians Bonus Buy
For those outside the UK, you may benefit from a Bonus Buy option.
The Free Spins round can be purchased for a generous 100x your current bet.
The RTP when purcachasing Free Spins drops slightly from 96.38% to 96.29%.
North Guardians: Our Verdict
It’s a little difficult for us to get overly excited about reviewing another new release from Pragmatic Play, given the fact that they like to pump out their releases in quick succession and with little care at times, but North Guardians surprised us and in a good way.
The disappointment came with the theme, although a brilliant choice, its one we’ve seen time and time again, and one that Pragmatic Play has only recently touched upon in Gates of Valhalla. The graphics and design are spot on though, which shows that Pragmatic Play took the time to really nurture this one rather than throwing it out the door not looking its best.
Gameplay is a little tricky to focus on, especially when you’re constantly glued to the two halves of the Marking Rectangle, making it really difficult to enjoy what’s on offer here. The Wild Patterns Wheel is a really nice touch even though we’ve seen something similar before, and works well in both the base game and Free Spins round. It’s fair to say that the action lies in the Free Spins round rather than the base game, with the Wild Patterns Wheel triggering with each free spin.
North Guardians isn’t looking too shabby on the statistics side of things either, with an above average RTP of 96.38% and a very typical Pragmatic Play 5,000x maximum win capacity.
All in all, North Guardians may have a really common theme and a slightly disappointing maximum win capacity, but there is certainly some action to be had here.
Welcome Bonus
