Planet of The Apes

What do you do when you can’t decide what slot to make? Just make two and weld them together in a slightly awkward manner! We joke, of course, but that’s how Planet of the Apes felt for us.

Conceptually, the idea is sound. Since both movies follow the ape general Caesar, using both in the same game makes sense. But NetEnt essentially drew a line down the middle and made two separate releases. The only real connection are a few special features that trigger on both sides.

Planet of The Apes Slot Review

Planet of the Apes is played on two five-reel boards, each one three symbols high. Both have twenty fixed paylines that do not interact with each other. And since paylines are fixed, you cannot turn some of them on or off to lower your total stake.

Wins are granted when you collect three or more identical symbols in adjacent positions, starting with the leftmost reel. Said wins must follow one of twenty fixed paylines, and must remain on ‘their side’.

If you like special features, this slot will be like three Christmases put together! There’s a whole lot of bonuses for players to enjoy. The Dual feature, Rise and Dawn bonuses, stacked Wilds and Rise and Dawn free spins. And no, none of these are duplicates! Each and every last one is completely unique and separate from its counterpart.

Theme & Symbols

If you’ve seen the movies, you’ll know exactly what’s going on with this game. And if not, it can be summed up very easily. Hyper intelligent monkeys built their own civilization and are trying to make humanity disappear. Only one species can win, and we’re going to make sure it’s not the apes!

The background image depicts a painting of the ape leader Caesar. You also see some scenes from each movie on their respective ‘sides’. Splitting the two reels by color isn’t an elegant solution, but it gets the job done. It makes the distinction between the two clear. One is bright and sunny, and the other cast in shadow.

Symbols are a mixture of movie characters and playing card royals. Each one has a passive and an ‘active’ state. In their active state, icons will play a brief animation to highlight a winning combination.

How to Play Planet of The Apes

This NetEnt release is played on two 5×3 boards with 20 fixed paylines on each. What annoys us most is the absence of any meaningful interaction between the two playing fields. While the Dual and Stacked Wild special features try to bridge the gap, it’s not nearly enough. These bonuses are only sometimes active. So for the vast majority of your time with Planet of the Apes, the two reels are completely separate.

Now, we don’t know about you, but this arrangement felt awful to us. It felt like trying to watch two football matches at once, but not being able to focus on either. NetEnt should have split this slot into two separate games, or added more interaction between the two reels. The way things are right now is just awkward to deal with.

The awkwardness continues when it comes to paylines too. There are two 20 payline systems, each one responsible for a separate side of the slot. The developers were smart, and only charge you a minimum of €0.20 per spin. We can’t imagine it would have gone over well if you had to play €0.40 to play. The maximum stake is worth €200 for each spin. Perfect to combine with the promised 3000x jackpot!

Planet of The Apes Bonus Features

There’s a lot of special features to talk about, so let’s not waste any time!

• Dual Bonus

This special feature activates randomly. One icon is randomly chosen on both sides and becomes sticky. Re-spins are played so long as new chosen symbols keep appearing on the playing field. The bonus ends when no new icons have landed on the reels.

• Rise Bonus

This bonus is randomly triggered. It grants a cash prize for each human or ape symbol present on the Rise side of the screen.

• Dawn Bonus

This special feature is activated randomly. It transforms all human and ape icons into a single symbol. The transformation only occurs for icons on the Dawn side of the board.

• Stacked Wilds

This bonus activates when a reel is fully stacked with Wilds on the Rise side of the screen. The accompanying reel will be filled with Wilds on the Dawn side, as well, increasing your odds of winning.

• Rise Free Spins

Three or more Scatters grant ten free spins. During this special feature, all Wilds are collected and stored. On the final free spin, they are all released and placed on the playing field.

• Dawn Free Spins

Three or more Scatters award fifteen free spins. During this bonus, there are three collectable symbols players can pick up. These are multipliers, extra Wilds and extra Free Spins. Each collect icon increases the matching meter by one. Once a meter is filled, the attached special feature becomes activated.

Payouts

Despite its flaws, the payouts for game are absolutely fantastic. Despite having a low-medium variance, this release can net you up to 3000x your total stake! The RTP for Planet of the Apes is 96.33%, which is slightly above the current industry average.