Gung Pow
January 2015 saw the launch of another Asian-themed video slot by Microgaming to add to their collection. Gung Pow was released in time for the forthcoming Chinese New Year and is styled accordingly. Bringing you the fun of the festivities with plenty of colourful fireworks you will certainly enjoy this video slot if you like Dragon Dance, Lucky Twins or Serenity to name just a few other slots in the genre.
Gung Pow by Microgaming is a 5-reel video slot that offers 243 winning combinations. It is one of their more back to basic games that does not have too many features. You will still find the fairly standard free spins bonus round based on landing at least 3 scatter symbols and also a wild substitution symbol to help boost winnings. There is also the ability with a win to gamble by selecting coloured cards with the chance of doubling your cash prize. The remainder of the game is a standard matching of symbols within the pay lines. Gung Pow offers a top jackpot prize of £90,000.
How to play the Gung Pow Video Slot
When the Gung Pow video slot loads you will see a predominately red coloured game screen. The backdrop is red with the outlines of Chinese symbols in the corners and background of the reels are the same colour. The text, outlining frame and buttons are all in a yellow gold colour and along with the vibrant symbols stands out against the red. It is a typical looking Asian themed game.
Gung Pow incorporates standard card-valued symbols from A-9. There are then 4 different types of fireworks that are used as symbols, a lantern and the Gung Pow logo as the Wild symbol. The wild can take the place of all symbols, except from the scatter symbol. The scatter symbol is a Chinese coin which is used to trigger the free spins bonus round.
Before starting your play on the Gung Pow video slot you need to set your cost per spin. We always recommend that this is set at a level you are comfortable with. Set the coin size at 1p, 2p 5p, 10p, 20p, 25p, 50p or £1 witht he ‘Bet’ button. Then, decide how many of those coins you wish to play, from 1 up to 10. The game is then set to a 25x multiplier so, for example, a 1p coin at 1 coin per spin would be 1x1x25 giving a cost per spin of 25p. You can set the cost per spin from as little as 25p up to a maximum of £250.
To start playing Gung Pow online slot, just select the rectangular red button in the bottom-right of the game screen. You can use the ‘Auto Play’ button to spin the reels automatically. This allows you to manually set from 5 up to 100 or use the preset buttons for 10, 25, 50 or 100 spins. There is no bet max button on this video slot.
The game is a nice video slot to play as the presentation is good and the symbol animations are well done. The Wild symbol will appear quite often and helps to boost your cash win. The wild symbol only appears on reels 2 and 4. You can actually win a cash prize by matching just 2 symbols for two of the fireworks and also two scatter symbols. Although the scatter symbol rewards you by landing 2 symbols you will require 3, 4 or 5 to activate the free spins feature.
Once you activate the bonus round with at least 3 scatters, the game feels like it jumps into life. The colour scheme changes and you have an animated night time scene with fireworks bursting in the background. The base game plinking sounds are replaced with some dramatic music and this all adds up to emphasising you are now in the bonus feature. This is where you can achieve the top jackpot prize of £90,000.
You will be awarded 15 free spins with all wins during the bonus round being tripled. You can also re-trigger the 15 free spins by landing 3 scatter symbols during this feature. This is where the bigger wins will come in compared to the base game and can help see your balance jump up quite dramatically. Once your free spins are complete you will be returned to the base game.
After you win in the base game or in the free spins bonus round you have the choice to gamble. An extra button will appear over the Spin button giving you the option to try for a chance to double your cash win. This is a simple case of choosing a coloured playing card. You can choose red or black. Guess correctly and you will double your win. Guess wrong and you lose your win. Be aware that if you play the Gung Pow slot in the quick spin mode the gamble feature does not appear.
Gung Pow Video Slot Tips
You can review the paytable via the ‘View Pays’ button under the leftmost reel. This will show you the payouts for each combination of prize symbols. Move through three information screens to learn more about the game and it’s features. To get first-hand experience of the game, you can play it riak-free in demo mode at one of our recommended online casinos. You can switch to real cash play at any time. You can play Gung Pow slot for free at Mr Green Casino.
Is Gung Pow the right video slot for you?
The Gung Pow Slot has a theoretical RTP (return to player) of 96.19% giving a house edge of up to 3.81%. This is a fairly standard RTP for Microgaming slots which tend to be in the range of 96-97%. We tested the game over 100 spins at a £1 cost per spin and found the game enjoyable to play. We never had a dry spell of more than 6 spins without a win which was very good compared some other slots we have reviewed. Maybe we were just lucky but it made for a good gameplay experience.
The wins we received in the base game could at times be quite low but then every now and again a decent sized prize would land. It was definitely the free spins bonus round that brought in the cash and it is this that you should be looking for when playing the game. Although we took the ‘gamble’ option a few times we felt it may have been best to keep hold of any decent sized cash win. The Gung Pow slot is classed as a medium variance machine so bear this in mind when looking to meet the wagering requirements of a free casino bonus by playing this particular slot.
