Gonzo’s Quest has a conquistador in the main role, one of the conquerors that went to South America in search of fame and fortune. Gonzo is a character that we see placed on the left side on the screen, the reels being on the right. The game is not just based on conquistadors, but also around the civilizations of South America that aren’t around anymore. I’m talking about Mayans in this case, whose scary-looking idols are displayed as symbols. You’re not going to get anything exciting from the layout of Gonzo’s Quest, 5 reels & 20 lines being offered, which is something that is considered quite common. The system relies on Avalanches which can bring you multipliers, but there are also wilds and free spins. We know that the big rewards mentioned in Gonzo’s Quest will deliver up to $12,500 normally, but that it can also be increased to $187,500 in certain situations.
The interface looks just a little bit different from the standard one, but it works the same way. You will cover all 20 lines with your bets, and your decisions will only influence what the line bets will be worth. You have 1 to 5 coins to use per line, so 20 to 100 coins total. The value of the coins being up to $0.50, the betting range for Gonzo’s Quest is between $0.20 and $100. Theme & Design The Mayans seem to be the civilization of choice, in this case, Gonzo being shown next to a temple of theirs. The reels are filled with symbols which have this Mayan connection, being shown as square slabs of stone with various images sculpted on them, in intricate designs. We have a Question Mark for the wild, a Sun Idol for the scatter, plus another seven symbols that have masks, wild animals, birds and humans represented on them. They’re mostly creepy-looking symbols, not attractive at all. While I did enjoy the design, the theme choice is far from unique. Still, they did provide a unique look for the game, which is something that help makes it stand out a bit. It’s not one of the better-looking titles from this company, but it’s perfectly playable as it is.
Probably the most important feature of Gonzo’s Quest is the one they call Avalanche. You’re going to find something similar at other developers, usually with some trademarked term for the name. If you’ve heard about Rolling Reels, Exploding Reels, or other similar names, they’re doing the same thing as the Avalanche. It’s simply going to remove all symbols that are part of winning combinations, and then the Avalanche will bring new ones to take the now-empty spots. The initial winning combo pays the regular amount, but the new symbols that come in will have increased rewards, depending on how many times the Avalanche has brought in new symbols that spin. You get rewards multiplied by 2x, 3x, and eventually by 5x. The multipliers are much higher for the free spins, since they combine with others there. They’re using the name Free Fall for the free spins. It’s the Sun Idol symbol that is going to bring these to you, whenever three of them are on a bet line, arranged to form a combination (so, it’s not a scatter symbol, obviously). The reward in that case will be a round of 10 free falls. The free falls have a multiplier of 3x, which is combined with the one of the Avalanche. The first round will pay at 3x now, while the next ones will pay at 6x, 9x and 15x. This is the way to get the biggest possible prizes of the game, during the free falls and taking advantage of the Avalanche feature at the same time. The least interesting feature of this game is the wild symbol, can be used as a replacement for any other symbol, even for the Free Fall icon, since it’s not a scatter. Don’t expect any rewards to come directly through the wild, that’s not its role here.
The base game jackpot is going to give you at most 2,500x, so up to $12,500 cash. There are several ways through which this amount can be improved, using the Avalanche and the Free Falls. In the base game, the Avalanche can bring that reward up to $62,500 with the right multipliers applied to it. During Free Falls, and with the Avalanche contributing, it could even go up to $187,500 (15x the original payout). 96.10% is the average RTP in the case of Gonzo’s Quest. It’s an OK number for the slot machine industry as a whole, but it’s on the low side for Net Ent, which can even go above 97% with their better games.
Gonzo’s Quest tries to make a different type of Mayan-themed game, and it succeeds for the most part. I’ve enjoyed their features and the huge multipliers, as they’re quite exciting to trigger.