Gates of Olympus POP is a Pragmatic Play slot that takes the studio’s most famous Greek god, shrinks him down, gives him a friendlier smile and plants him on a 3×5 grid built for phone screens. If you have ever wondered how many more versions of Gates of Olympus the market could absorb, Pragmatic Play clearly decided the answer was “at least one more”. Zeus has already had a sequel, a Super Scatter edition, a Christmas outing and a dice spinoff. Now he has a pocket edition.
Gates of Olympus POP Slot Game Details
Gates of Olympus POP Overview
Compared to previous Gates of Olympus releases, where Zeus took on a stern appearance, this new release has a much friendlier, happier tone. The backdrop keeps the familiar clouds, columns and flames, but everything is brighter and rounder. On a desktop, the game sits in a narrow portrait window with a lot of background showing on either side, which tells you exactly what device it was designed for. On a smartphone, it fills the screen and feels right at home.
So what has actually changed underneath the new coat of paint? Quite a lot, as it turns out. The grid drops from 6×5 to 3×5. Wins need 5 or more matching symbols anywhere in view rather than 8. Volatility drops from high to low. And the top prize jumps from 5,000x in the original version to 25,000x here, thanks to a new jackpot symbol. It is a smaller game that somehow pays more at the very top end, which is an odd combination worth unpacking.
Theme and Design
The game design of Gates of Olympus POP has the typical Greek mythology appearance. The symbols are the usual gems, rings, hourglasses and crowns, redrawn in a chunkier style that reads clearly on a small screen. The soundtrack is the same sort of orchestral adventure score the series always uses, and it does the job without being memorable. Nobody will call this a visual step forward, but it is tidy and easy to follow.
RTP and Volatility
Pragmatic Play lists the RTP at 96.54% on its official game page. Some game rule sheets floating around show a higher 97.05% setting, and it is normal for Pragmatic Play titles to ship in several RTP versions, so the number you get depends on the casino you play at. Check the paytable inside the game before you commit real money. Volatility is low, roughly 2 out of 5 on Pragmatic Play’s own scale, which is a big shift from the high volatility model of the first version.
Bet Sizes
Stakes run from 0.10 to 250 in most currencies, which in rand terms usually means a couple of rand per spin at the bottom end. Exact limits depend on the operator. There is no bonus buy and no ante bet option, which will disappoint anyone used to paying 25x for a straight ticket to free spins in the initial version.
Features
The feature list will look familiar to anyone who has played a Gates game before, with one new addition that changes the maths considerably.
Pays Anywhere Wins
There are no paylines. Land 5 or more matching symbols anywhere on the 15 positions and you win. There are 6 paying symbols in total: gold, purple and red gems, plus rings, hourglasses and crowns. Land 9 or more of a kind and payouts range from 2x to 50x your stake depending on the symbol. There is no wild symbol. That was true of the first as well, and with low volatility and only 6 symbols in play, its absence is not felt much.
Tumble Feature
Every winning combination is removed from the grid, and new symbols drop in to fill the gaps. Tumbles keep going as long as new wins keep forming, all on the same stake. This is the mechanic the whole series is built on and it works exactly as you would expect here.
Multiplier Symbols
Multiplier orbs can land on any spin in both the base game and free spins, carrying values from 2x all the way up to 1,000x. That top value is double the 500x cap in the classic Gates of Olympus. Multipliers stay on screen for the full tumble sequence, and when the tumbling stops, all visible multiplier values are added together and applied to the total win from that sequence. The 1,000x orb exists, but as with every Gates game, the small values are the ones you will actually see most of the time.
Free Spins
Landing 3 or more scatter symbols triggers 15 free spins. During the feature, any multiplier that lands on a winning spin or tumble gets added to a running total, and that total is applied at the end of each tumbling sequence for the rest of the bonus. The multiplier never resets during the feature, which is where the big wins in this series traditionally come from. Landing 2 or more scatters during free spins adds 5 extra spins.
POP Jackpot Symbols
This is the new bit. POP symbols can appear on any reel during base play or free spins. According to Pragmatic Play, landing 2 POP symbols awards the Spark jackpot worth 500x your stake, while landing 3 awards the Burst jackpot worth 25,000x. Some rule sheets describe this slightly differently, as combinations of 3 scatters that include 1, 2 or 3 POP symbols paying 50x, 500x or 25,000x.
Either way, three POP symbols on screen at once is the target, and it is the only route to the game’s maximum win. This is where the game borrows from Pragmatic Play’s Super Scatter titles like Sugar Rush Super Scatter and Starlight Princess Super Scatter, where a rare symbol combination pays a fixed jackpot rather than relying on multipliers stacking up.
Max Win
25,000x your stake, paid via the Burst jackpot. On a R2 spin, that is R50,000. On a R20 spin, it is R500,000. Do not plan your retirement around it. Three POP symbols landing together is a rare event in a low volatility game, and the maths only works because the rest of the time the game is dishing out small, frequent wins.
Gates of Olympus POP Pros and Cons
Pros
Cons
Verdict
Did the world need another Gates of Olympus? Probably not, and Pragmatic Play knows it. What the studio has done here is fairly clever, though. Instead of another high-volatility retread with a different god on the throne, it has taken the series in the opposite direction: a smaller grid, lower variance, a phone-first layout, and a fixed jackpot bolted on top to give the marketing team a headline number. The result comes across less like a sequel and more like a casual spinoff aimed at people who found the first a bit brutal on the bankroll.
In play, it is pleasant. Wins come often, tumbles chain reasonably well with only 6 symbols in the mix, and the multipliers show up with enough regularity to keep things interesting. The free spins round behaves like the original, with the total multiplier building as the feature goes on, and this is still the part of the game that produces the satisfying moments. The POP jackpot is a different story. It is the reason the max win is so high, but you will spend most of your time not seeing it, and the base game without it is essentially a gentler, smaller Gates of Olympus with a higher multiplier ceiling.
For South African players who do most of their spinning on a phone, and that is most of us, this is one of the more sensible ways to play a Gates game. It loads light, fits the screen and does not chew through a prepaid bundle. It will not replace the original for anyone who likes the high variance swings, and if you rolled your eyes at the words “Gates of Olympus” in the first sentence of this review, nothing here will change your mind. But as an easygoing entry point into one of the most played slot series in the country, it does what it sets out to do.
Frequently Asked Questions
Gates of Olympus POP Free Demo Game
Play the free Gates of Olympus POP demo slot game here:
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