Easter Island 2 Slot Demo

Easter Island 2 from Yggdrasil is the sequel to the popular Easter Island slot released back in March 2018. It’s a 4×6 reel slot with 25 lines and can expand to 55 lines (8×8). Our two favourite Moai are on their own vacation on Venice Beach and have brought all the action from the original game and more with them.

Read on for the full review.

SLOT FEATURES	Expanding Wilds, Sticky Wilds, Free Spins, Tiger Spins
RELEASE DATE	24th March 2021
GAME PROVIDER	YGGDRASIL
SLOT TYPE	Video Slot
THEME	Holiday
REELS, ROWS, PAYLINES	6 Reels, 4 Rows, 25 Lines (Main Game) 6 Reels, 8 Rows, 55 Lines (Feature Game)
BET LEVELS	0.25/300
MAXIMUM WIN	2,500x Your Stake
SCATTER SYMBOL	No
WILD SYMBOL	Yes – WILD
BONUS GAME	Respin, Colossal Blocks, Expanding Reels
FREE SPINS	No
RESPINS	Yes
MULTIPLIERS	No
JACKPOT	No
RETURN TO PLAYER	96.00%
VOLATILITY	Medium

It’s necessary to understand what new slot features have been added into the sequel and what has been dropped or altered, in order to understand the benefits of the new game and the reason behind its development.

Yggdrasil, as with most experienced slot developers know, when creating a sequel, the design must maintain the fundamentals of the original as a solid foundation to build upon. Once these are established, the developer then builds extensions and elaborations upon them to create a point of difference from the original.

The new game should be similar enough to the original for recognition and different enough to create intrigue and curiosity.

Features

Core elements brought forward from the original are the Symbol Swap Respin, the Expanding Reels and the colour palette and shape of the symbols. Yggdrasil has also added a 6th reel for higher pays and colossal block symbols for added volatility.

What has been removed is the 0.004p denomination to make the original’s 10p minimum bet, considering it would have been confusing to players and potentially a nightmare to reconcile in the casino accounting system. The original game’s reel expansion occurring in stages has been changed to a complete rise to max reel height.

What has been altered is the paylines. The original had 103 paylines in the expanded reel set, whereas Easter Island 2 only has 55. Although it is odd to reduce the number of lines in the same reel set in the sequel, the reason behind it, undoubtedly, is RTP and/or the max prize was exceeded.

SYMBOL SWAP RESPIN

Hitting a 3 of-a-kind win in the base game triggers a Symbol Swap Respin.

• If the winning symbols were low pay symbols, all the other low pay symbols are replaced with the winning symbol for the respin
• If the winning symbols were high pay symbols, all the other high pay symbols are replaced with the winning symbol for the respin

COLOSSAL BLOCK

Hitting a 4, 5 or 6 of-a-kind win in the base game adds a Colossal Block of 2×2, 3×3 or 4×4 size respectively added to the Symbol Swap Respin.

EXPANDING REELS

A 6 of-a-kind win in the base game in addition to a 4×4 Colossal Block will expand the reel set to 8×6 with 55 paylines for the Symbol Swap Respin.

Playability

The original game set a slick playability standard and Easter Island 2 has certainly met and exceeded it. The two Moai characters build the anticipation well and compliment the game as narrators. The reels are well laid out, the progress icons above the reels are intuitive and brought forward from the original. Even a player new to the Easter Island family will learn the game quickly as the action starts from the very first win.

• WIN HIT 1 in 6.13 spins
• FEATURE HIT 1 in 6.13 spins (Symbol Swap Respins)

The game is very easy to learn and has well placed in-game cues. The Symbol Swap Respin is intuitive as redundant symbols are inhaled by the left Moai and replacements are exhaled by the right. Winning symbols rotate horizontally highlighting the win while non-winning symbols dim out.

Play rate is quite slow however, as all wins trigger a respin of some form. The animatics to remove lower symbols and replace them with higher symbols before playing the Symbol Swap Respin takes quite a bit of time and, during this time, the playthrough function is disabled.

Paytable Review

Easter Island 2’s paytable is an extension of the original. At first glance Easter Island 2’s paytable looks bigger, but its 3-5 of-a-kind paytable is almost identical with a few prizes altered slightly. The 6th reel in turn adds 6 of-a-kind prizes over and above the original, increasing the maximum win from 1,880x to 2,500x.

Symbols are clear and easy to read. Maintaining the original game’s symbol images and colours to earn player recognition. The top award is 40x but with stacked symbols, added colossal wilds and extended reel height, that 40x quickly becomes a lot more.

Player Profile

Without a doubt, Easter Island 2 is intended for a light hearted, less serious or casual player. A fun game with zany characters coupled with a mid-volatility math model makes for lots of quick action in an enjoyable soft environment. The game, however, seems a little confused as the silliness of the theme is greater than the original, while its medium volatility pushes the game into a serious player’s realm, away from its casual play style.

Audio

With Easter Island 2 you’ll find entertaining tunes, lots of bright sounds and good audible cues. It would have been useful to have the flexibility of a ‘character off’ button as these guys can become a little irritating, considering they’re commenting on the game’s every event.

The whistling idle tune is also a little irritating but, perhaps this is an intentional addition to reduce idle time.

The special reelstop sound on the Red Rooster symbol could be improved. Agreed, we should be alerted if it lands consecutively from reel 1, but it sounds regardless of a potential win. It breaks the tempo of the game as it alerts you to a non-winning event and is therefore not all that useful.

The Glory Spin

The maximum win is 2,500x. However, considering the complexity of the math model, it is not known how this event is reached. The developer states in the game rules: “The maximum recorded win is x2,500 and it happened three times in 1,000,000,000 simulated game rounds.”. Assuming the max win is achieved with expanded reels then 6x Roosters paying 40x across 55 lines comes to 2,200x. The max trigger win is 6x Roosters across 25 payline, but this event wins 1,000x. Is it possible a 4 Rooster per reel event in the base game did not occur in 1 billion spins?

Delights and Surprises

• The action begins very early on in the play session and continues throughout play.
• The fundamental similarities to the original.
• The anticipation created by the Colossal Block symbols.

Observations and Negatives

• The audio alert on the Rooster symbol breaks the flow of the game.
• The chattiness of the Moai character, and the lack of an off button.
• A 4×6 game should have more paylines than 25.
• An 8×6 feature game should have more lines than 55.
• The reduction in paylines from the original makes the game feel flatter.
• A ‘Ways’ game would have been more intuitive especially as a point of difference from the original.
• The Symbol Swap Respin does not retrigger if there is a follow up win.
• Wilds only appear as a result of the added Colossal Blocks.
• The horizontally rotating symbols in a win seem borrowed from NextGen’s Pillars of Asgard.

Conclusion

Easter Island 2 is a well developed package and a decent sequel to the original. As the original was good but didn’t set the world on fire, the developer could have taken the game much further by distancing it from the original more while toning the Moai character excitement down somewhat to meet the increase in volatility. An ideal separation would have been to explore a Ways game rather than paylines, considering paylines seem to have been reduced to fit technical or regulatory parameters.

Easter Island 2 gets 74 Spins out of 100 based on the following ratings:

PLAYABILITY	70
ORIGINALITY	100
BUILD QUALITY	90
MARRIAGE	50
IMMERSION	85
RUN FOR MONEY	45
INTEGRITY	85
TOTAL	74