Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins Megaways: Slot Overview

Outside of John Rambo, not many people can truly pull off a bandana. There’s something undeniably macho about tying a strip of cloth around your head, cinching it tight at the back, and giving the biceps a quick flex while you’re at it. The hero of Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins Megaways from UK developer Storm Gaming actually wears one pretty well. It helps that he’s a muscular, Sinbad-esque adventurer in traditional Arabian attire, complete with a curved blade. Once we’d played it and dug into the stats, though, the charismatic Arto turned out to be one of the strongest points in a slot that doesn’t have a whole lot else to shout about.

Theme-wise, it’s a little muddled, because Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins clearly wants to evoke Aladdin, but stops short of outright admitting it. You get the Persian-style clothing, the backdrop, the characters, and nods to genie lamps, yet the lead is a guy named Arto. Still, the game has a touch of appeal: it’s colourful and cheerful, with a cartoony presentation and that slightly retro vibe that often comes through in Storm Gaming’s Megaways titles. The studio definitely has a recognisable look, but if their style hasn’t won you over before, this probably won’t be the one that changes your mind.

According to the game sheet, Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins runs on all devices and takes bets from 10 p/c to $/€10 per spin. It’s worth being cautious with your stake choice when stepping into Arto’s world. The reason is the RTP: smaller bets return 94.81%, and it slips even lower to 94.52% at higher stakes. There’s no clarification on what the game considers “low” or “high” bets, though it’s hard to see the point when both figures are weak. Volatility is listed as 3.5/5, meaning it can be fairly temperamental, and the stated hit frequency is 35.71%.

The action plays out on a 6-reel + 1 bonus reel Megaways setup, delivering up to 117,649 ways to win on any spin. Wins are formed by landing matching symbols from the leftmost reel across adjacent reels. There are ten standard pay symbols: the low-value group is made up of J-A card ranks, paying 0.4 to 0.8x the bet for six of a kind. Higher-paying icons include monkeys, coin containers, ladies, Arto, and the game logo, where six of a kind returns 1.2 to 20 times your stake. One final symbol to note is the wild, which substitutes for all regular pay symbols.

Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins Megaways: Slot Features

The feature set includes reactions, mystery symbols, a pick-me bonus, and free spins, with the latter using a progressive win multiplier and a slightly odd prize-wheel-style selection to launch the bonus.

Reactions

With the reaction mechanic, every winning combination is cleared from the grid and replaced by new symbols dropping in from above. Reactions keep chaining until no further wins are created.

Mystery Symbols

These may appear on any spin as two crossed swords. When they do, all mystery symbols currently visible transform into the same regular pay symbol for the win check.

Pick Me

Hitting 3 or more genie lamps on the screen activates this feature. Players pick a lamp to collect an xbet cash prize. The more genie lamps showing, the bigger the multiplier becomes.

Free Spins

Lading 3 scatters awards 7 free spins, plus an additional 3 spins for any extra scatter in view. Before the free spins begin, a wheel spins to grant 1 of 7 free spin types – Ways to Spin, Reel of Persia, Reels of Silk, Reels of Gold, Pots of Gold, Genies in Lamps, or Royal Revolt. Strangely, they seem to function identically; the only explanation provided is that each one ‘gives different average wins.’

During free spins, a progressive win multiplier starts at x1 and increases by +1 after each win. The multiplier does not reset between spins, and the bonus can be extended by +6 or +12 additional free spins if 3 or 4 scatters land on the top horizontal reel. Finally, players can also land Arto Spins, which are simply standard free spins awarded at random without needing scatter symbols.

Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins Megaways: Slot Verdict

Once the below-par RTP delivered its metaphorical slap, there wasn’t much motivation left to keep spinning Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins. The idea is fine, the presentation is serviceable (and we’ve seen worse), and the features do their job. But the returns feel unnecessarily stingy. Sure, you could argue that 94.81% isn’t far off where some ELK slots land these days, and that’s a fair point to a degree. Still, there’s a mental barrier between 94.XX and anything 95+—and ELK typically offers far more distinctive, inventive gameplay than what’s on display here. Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins came across like a Tinder date who fudged their age—credit where it’s due, though: Storm Gaming is completely transparent about the number. The real question is why settle when there are loads of Aladdin-style slots available, plus a huge selection of Megaways games that feel like better picks than this. Anyway, rant paused… for now.

Beyond that, it didn’t improve much. Storm Gaming’s Megaways releases are very much an acquired taste: you either click with the visuals or you don’t. In Payday Megaways, the studio leaned into a retro VGA-like look, carried it into Megaways Mob, and continued it to some extent in Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins. At this point it’s clearly Storm Gaming’s signature, and it’s good they’re building a distinct identity, but it doesn’t have the same charm as slots from, for example, Peter & Sons.

As for the seven free spins bonus rounds, it wasn’t obvious what truly separates one from another, and we weren’t exactly excited by the idea of triggering all of them just to compare outcomes. In any case, Arto does include a standard unlimited win multiplier, which can propel players to prizes of up to 10,650 times their stake, for anyone still tempted to give it a go.

Overall, noticing the weak return-to-player early on coloured everything else Arto & The 7 Deadly Spins had going for it. Even if the RTP were excellent, the game would still be average at best. That said, players who enjoy Storm Gaming’s semi-90s aesthetic and copy/paste Megaways approach might still be persuaded, while everyone else may find this trip a bit queasy.