Soldier of Rome: Introduction

Barcrest seems to have a habit of making things more complicated than they need to be. Soldier of Rome looked like such a tangled setup that we nearly passed on it and went straight to the next title. A quick look at the paytable didn’t exactly help our enthusiasm either, but we stuck with it…

Soldier of Rome is a 7-reel slot with 50 paylines in the base game that can increase to 100 paylines. It uses 4 Money Burst Reels with 1 row each, alongside 3 Mighty Reels featuring 5 standard rows plus 5 additional rows that can be opened up as you play. It runs on all devices with stakes from €1 to €500, and includes a Big Bet feature with fixed options of €20, €30, and €50 bets. All of this sits on top of a fairly unusual engine that takes a few spins—and a bit of time in the help section—to fully grasp.

As you’d expect, it leans hard into a Roman warrior theme, with a flaming reel set (which is actually a nice touch) and a roman soldier posted on the far left, looking a bit silly. The reel-spin audio will be instantly familiar if you’ve played Bruce Lee or Zeus before.

Soldier of Rome includes 2 paytables: one for the standard game and another for the big bets game. The only real change is that all wins are multiplied by 2 when playing big bets. Low-paying symbols are the usual card-suit icons, while the higher-value set includes chariots, coins, eagles, Caesar, and the top symbol, a Roman lady paying 5x for a combination of 5.

The Wild symbol is three positions tall and expands to cover the entire reel if it lands fully visible in the base game. In Free Spins and in Big Bet games, Wilds may appear partially in view and will still expand to fill the whole reel.

Soldier of Rome: Features

Landing matching symbols across all 4 Money Burst Reels triggers the Lightning Spins feature. While Lightning Spins are active, multiple symbols that match the 4 Money Burst Reel symbols are added onto the Mighty Reels.

• The Mighty Reels remain active throughout this bonus feature.
• The Lightning Spins run automatically.

Using the Big Bet option lets you select €20, €30 or €50 per spin. Raising the stake adds extra benefits in the following way:

• 5 x €20 big bet spins with wild symbols partially in view will activate top reels and expand to fill the whole reel (up to 100 paylines).
• 5 x €30 big bet spins with all 20 big bet advantages plus all low value symbols removed.
• 5 x €50 big bet spins with all 20 & 30 big bet advantages plus Mighty Reels 100 paylines always active.

3 scatter symbols activate the free spins feature, awarding 10 initial free spins, and each extra scatter adds another 5 free spins (the maximum number of free spins that can be awarded is 25). Free spins can be triggered again with 3 or more scatters. During Free Spins, landing a Wild partially in view will open the Mighty Reels.

Soldier of Rome: Conclusion

Soldier of Rome is yet another disappointing release from Scientific Games. It plays slowly (although you can at least skip the sluggish win count-ups), pays poorly, and feels awkwardly put together—especially when wilds expand even when they don’t help create a win (so why bother?). Beyond the weak mechanics, it’s so unattractive it could make onions cry. There isn’t much more to add—we’re out of words.

As for RTP: when the total stake is below €2, the expected RTP is a rough 93.7%. With a total stake of €2 or more, RTP rises to 95.8%, which still isn’t great. The RTP in the Big Bet Game is 97.8%, so big bets are clearly the main point of this slot.