Pirots X: Slot Overview

Aarrrgharkkk! Sorry—just attempting to bridge the gap between a pirate’s yell and a parrot’s squawk using the alphabet. That’s because we’re heading out with ELK Studios for the team’s online slot, Pirots X. The original Pirots game blended pirates and parrots (hence the name) and had 4 adorable birds racing around the reels, gathering winning symbols thanks to the smart CollectR mechanic. It was genuinely distinctive, then came the dinosaur-flavoured Pirots 2, followed by the Western-styled Pirots 3. Pirots X, however, takes a different route by ditching the CollectR mechanic—bold, considering how central it was to the earlier titles. So, does the change work?

Across both the base game and the bonus, players and the four birds are placed in a rugged ravine where a river runs toward the sea, surrounded by dense greenery and scattered treasure chests. The cast still looks like pirates, so—purely guessing—it feels like they’re either about to bury treasure or they’ve tracked down a map’s destination and are ready to dig up the stash. For players’ benefit, let’s hope they’re in the business of uncovering riches rather than hiding them underground.

Choose a wager from 20 c to $/€100 per drop and hit play to send symbols falling into a 5×5 gaming area, which can expand to 7×7 through certain features. Rather than watching the Pirots roam the reels collecting pay symbols, Pirots X opts for a more traditional cluster pays setup. It’s also highly volatile and runs with an RTP of 94% whether you’re spinning normally or taking a shot via X-iter feature buys.

On the low end, Pirots X uses 4 gem symbols in blue, green, purple, and red—matching the birds—while the premium symbols are the blue, green, purple, and red birds themselves. A 5-symbol cluster pays 0.1 to 1 times the bet, while clusters of 16+ return 4x to 50x. Low value, high value, and regular wilds appear in 1×1, 2×2 Super, 3×3 Mega, and 4×4 Epic sizes. Any empty spaces beneath oversized symbols are filled with 1×1 symbols of the same kind.

Pirots X: Slot Features

Breaking away from earlier Pirots entries that leaned on the CollectR mechanic to generate wins, Pirots X is built as a cluster pays title. Groups of 5 or more matching symbols connected vertically or horizontally create winning clusters. Those winning symbols are removed, and a wild symbol is placed into one of the empty spots before the remaining symbols drop to fill the gaps. Cascades keep going until no further win appears. Additional Pirots features include bombs, feature chests, big symbol drops, wild symbols, the bonus game, the super bonus game, and X-iter buys.

The Pirots

Rather than being on the grid for the whole session, the Pirots now sit at the top of the reels. When a nest symbol appears (either by a drop or via a feature release), a random bird swoops down and lands on it. From that nest, Pirots can collect symbols that match the bird’s colour after wins are evaluated. Each collected symbol increases the global multiplier by +1 for lows, +2 for highs, and this multiplier applies to all wins. Birds can’t collect feature symbols or wilds, and they leave the grid once they’ve collected at least one symbol or if a bomb scares them off. If a bonus is triggered on the same drop, birds complete their collection before the bonus begins. Birds return to the top of the grid at the start of the next drop if they’re crushed by a crushing big symbol, burned by an exploding bomb, or if they fail to collect any symbols.

Features

The Pirots at the top of the reels may randomly trigger features – bomb, feature release, and big drop. The bomb feature drops a bomb onto the reels; it detonates and removes all nearby symbols except feature symbols, then causes a redrop. The explosion can also expand the grid up to a maximum of 7×7. Charlie the parakeet may randomly set off the bomb feature at the end of a game round.

Feature release can trigger randomly at the start of a drop or free drop when a bird opening a chest. It replaces a number of 1×1 symbols with random feature symbols. Feature symbols and birds aren’t affected. A feature release may add wilds, bombs, nests, scatter or super scatter symbols. During free spins, free drop symbols may also be placed.

The big drop drops a large symbol in the same colour as the bird that triggered it, crushing 1×1 symbols as it falls through the grid. Symbols of the same type and feature symbols are not affected. Big symbols count as the number of positions they cover.

Wild Symbols

The wild symbol substitutes for any standard paying symbol to complete or enhance winning clusters. If a wild connects to multiple winning clusters, it will split and award 1 wild symbol for each cluster. When multiple wilds appear in the same winning cluster, they merge into a multiplier wild whose value equals the number of wilds that contributed. Winning clusters are multiplied by all connected multiplier wilds, along with the global multiplier.

Bonus

• Regular Bonus Game – Landing 3 bonus scatter symbols triggers the bonus game. The global multiplier carries over between drops during the bonus. Hitting free drops symbols awards additional free spins.
• Super Bonus – The super bonus starts when 2 bonus scatters and 1 super bonus scatter land. This mode plays on the maximum grid size. Every free spin in the super bonus begins with a guaranteed feature chest.

X-iter

Pirots X’s X-iter feature buy menu includes: Bonus Hunt – more than triple the odds of triggering a bonus game for 3x the bet per spin, Big Symbol – guarantees a big symbol on a 6×6 grid for 5x the bet, Feature Release – purchases a round on the maximum grid size with a guaranteed feature release of 3 to 5 symbols and a guaranteed super bonus if a bonus is triggered for 25x the bet, Bonus Game – 100x the bet, and Super Bonus Game – 500x the bet.

Pirots X: Slot Verdict

To start with, Pirots X is a strong cluster pays slot. ELK Studios has already shown they know how to build them—Propaganda being one example—and they’ve delivered another capable entry here. The Pirots theme sits alongside cluster wins with a rapid mix of features that suit the game’s rhythm, and there’s a hefty 10,000x the bet max win to chase. There are no max win coins or similar gimmicks either—just the main mechanics that can, potentially (or not), reach the top prize. With multipliers stacking in two ways—wild multipliers supported by the global multiplier—you can see, at least in theory, how the biggest result could land. Overall, both on paper and in play, Pirots X is a polished cluster slot with plenty of tricks to keep things entertaining.

Still, removing the CollectR mechanic means Pirots X delivers a more familiar experience than the other Pirots games. There are echoes of that idea, such as birds landing in nests and munching symbols to build the global multiplier, so the connection is there. The birds themselves are another clear tie-in. But if ELK Studios had swapped in different characters and renamed the game, would players immediately recognise it as part of the Pirots line? Possibly—though it’s open to debate.

Either way, they made the call, and it’s hard to fault a studio for stepping away from a proven formula to try something new. There’s a real mix of ELK concepts at work, and it’s fun spotting similarities—big symbols reminiscent of the Gold games, or the wild multiplier combining seen in Propaganda. Ultimately, Pirots X comes across as a well-built cluster slot with a robust feature set, capable of layering modifiers from several directions to create exciting, chain-reaction sequences.