Crystal Quest: Arcane Tower: Slot Overview

Flame-haired adventurer Gemma returns in the second entry of Thunderkick’s Crystal Quest series. This time she heads deeper into the jungle to a place known as the Arcane Tower in search of riches. Anyone expecting a big shake-up may come away disappointed, as the follow-up doesn’t bring many fresh surprises. Thunderkick seems to have largely reworked Deep Jungle visually and not much more. The core numbers are almost identical, one feature has been replaced, and overall Arcane Tower plays extremely similarly.

Doubts can creep in as soon as the splash screen appears, since it looks almost the same as the original and again teases free spins alongside an unlimited multiplier. After that, the main game screen reveals a very familiar Thunderkick layout: a 6×4 grid with 4,096 ways to win – once more, exactly as before (a proven format that works well, to be fair). Visually, it doesn’t immediately scream “tower”; the frame is filled with old trees, candles, and books. But when symbols fall in each spin or are cleared by the Avalanche feature, a tower becomes visible in the background. Theme-wise, Arcane Tower is quite different from Deep Jungle, which is helpful considering how much else stays the same.

Arcane Tower supports stakes from 10 p/c to $/€100 per spin, and its math model delivers near-identical performance to the previous game, although most values (except potential) have been nudged up slightly. Here, RTP rises from 96.14% to 96.17%, while Gemma remains as highly volatile as ever—arguably a touch more on paper, though not enough to feel like a major change.

Winning ways trigger when three or more matching symbols connect left to right starting from the first reel. The exception is the sorcerer symbol, which pays from just two of a kind. He’s the top payer at 20x the bet for five a kind, followed by the knight henchman, then three mid-tier crystals in red, green, and blue. Rounding out the paytable are five lower-value gems in pink, orange, yellow, green, and blue. The pale blue circular gem tile is the wild, appearing anywhere to replace all symbols except the scatter. It also gains an extra useful trait during the bonus, explained next.

Crystal Quest: Arcane Tower: Slot Features

Thunderkick didn’t hold back on the feature count, packing Arcane Tower with five in total. Avalanches and multipliers run throughout, supported by Linked Reels, free spins, and a Wild Explosion feature.

Any symbols involved in winning ways are cleared by the Avalanche feature and replaced as new symbols drop in from above. Avalanches keep chaining as long as fresh wins continue within the same spin sequence. Alongside this, a win multiplier is permanently in effect. It begins at x1 and steps up by one each time the Avalanche feature activates.

A random add-on is Linked Reels, where up to 6 neighbouring reels can link together on the initial spin. When this happens, each Linked Reel becomes an exact duplicate of the others. This feature cannot trigger during an Avalanche chain.

The slightly awkward-looking treasure chest symbol is the scatter – landing 3 awards 12 free spins. In the bonus, any two scatters visible grant 3 extra free spins, while each scatter beyond two adds 2 spins apiece, with no cap on the total that can be collected.

Free spins introduce two advantages not found in the base game. First, the win multiplier does not reset between spins, allowing it to grow without limitation. Second, a Wild Explosion feature is active. If no winning combinations land, all wild symbols on the reels explode, removing symbols in both a vertical and horizontal line. This then sets off the Avalanche mechanic.

Crystal Quest: Arcane Tower: Slot Verdict

As its own release, Crystal Quest: Arcane Tower is another polished, very playable Thunderkick slot. It features the studio’s bold, cartoon-like style, backed by smooth animation and punchy, satisfying sound effects as symbols land and wins burst away. The feature set is also strong, especially when the mechanics combine and build into an exciting peak. Put simply, most players should have a good time if they load up Crystal Quest: Arcane Tower.

However, as the next step in the Crystal Quest series, it can feel like running in place with a heavy dose of déjà vu. Beyond small tweaks to the stats, it’s essentially Crystal Quest: Deep Jungle again—just relocated to a tower setting. The visuals have been updated to fit the new backdrop, but the gameplay is largely unchanged. The ways system, grid configuration, and most features return, with the key change being the swap of Mystery Symbols for Linked Reels. It’s hard not to suspect future entries may follow the same formula: a new wrapper, a feature exchange, and a different title.

Even so, Crystal Quest: Arcane Tower is undeniably a solid game: colourful graphics, lively animation, and a slightly offbeat theme. Gemma arrives with plenty of entertaining extras, and the potential remains strong—wins up to 15,000 times the bet can happen. Still, it raises the question of whether a series makes sense if each instalment is this close to the last. Would it have been better to focus effort on one truly standout release instead of several good-but-similar ones? Then again, Thunderkick could always surprise everyone with the next Gemma game, taking the series somewhere completely unexpected and proving the doubts wrong.