Rise Of Maya

The Maya civilization, developed in the area that today comprises southeastern Mexico. The first Maya cities, developed around 750 BC, and by 500 BC these cities possessed monumental architecture, including large temples with elaborate stucco façades. Hieroglyphic writing was being used in the Maya region by the 3rd century BC. In addition, their Culture developed to a high level of Writing system in pre-Columbian era, as well as for its Architecture/ Mathematics/ calendar/Art and Astronomical System.

It interests me a lot, the following fact. The word Maya is pronounced and sounds exactly the same. In the ancient Eastern world, the word 'Magus' comes from ancient Persian, Μaguš meaning "capable of performing rituals". In Greek, the word Maya, means Magic! Such an oddly coincidence.

Rise of Maya, is an interesting video slot from NetEnt which captures the mysterious but at the same time remarkable Mayan culture. The action is revealed, upon 5 Reels/10 Paylines inside the Temple of Night known today as 'El Diablo'. The design and enriched sound is at a high level, creating an attractive exploration. Τhe slot offers, a 'Bonus Bet' option, for a second chance for Scatter symbols/Wilds/Expanding Wilds/Potential above 5.000x bet.

Ιn overall is a well crafted NetEnt slot with attractive gameplay! The only thing he lacks are the multipliers.

Rise Of Maya is one of the latest games from NetEnt, playing with 10 paylines and with a $0.10 starting bet, reminding me of PlaynGo and Thunderkick games, which also plays with the same minimum bets. I have always liked and prefer this minimum bet size per spin, because of the extended play time it can give, and without requiring a bigger starting balance to play the game. However, I would have liked this game even more if it plays with 15, 20, or more paylines, but that’s okay with me.

Win values of the top symbols are very good – both the Wild and top regular symbol pays a nice 500x the total bet for getting 5 of them – whilst the other symbols have lesser but still good win values. However, there aren’t any win multiplier anywhere, but the Wild symbol can expand into a partial or a full Wild Reel (only when landing on a Hot Reel during the free spins), thereby slightly increasing the chances for more winning combinations, but these are not really good alternatives, if I may say so. Moreover, the Scatters are non-paying, serving only to trigger the free spins feature game, so this sucks a bit.

Once again, a Bonus Bet feature is included in this game, doubling the bet size when activated, and serving to give a Second Chance to trigger the free spins feature game whenever two Scatter symbols appear on the reels. Honestly speaking, paying twice the cost per spin just to get the second chances in getting the third scatter symbol is a bit too much because the third scatter simply won’t come often either, so it’s more of wasted money with each unsuccessful spin.

I gave this Rise Of Maya several separate plays, just to get a better feel of the game. At times, it would play as horribly as the game ‘Temple Of Nudges’, also by NetEnt, but on a few occasions, the game play was quite interesting and enjoyable, as I have found out so far. Nonetheless, I couldn’t get any good wins of above 100x my staked amount, I couldn’t get any retriggers during the free spins play, and the limited possibilities of getting the full Wild Reels became more apparent. Yes, it may be possible to get 4, or perhaps all 5, of the Wild Reels during the free spins play, but I could only get 2 of them at any one time, hence, no good wins ever came to me.

Will I play Rise Of Maya again on another day? In its present form, no, I wouldn’t want to. If with more paylines and with better chances of getting the full Wild Reels, then yes, I would want to play this game more.