Thunderstruck is a Microgaming slot game released in 2004, based on Thor and Norse mythology.

It’s one of the earliest online slots and a huge hit that brought Microgaming in the spotlight.

Perhaps even more importantly, it led to the creation of a title that had even more success, the aptly named Thunderstruck II sequel, which was released in 2010.

Thunderstruck introduction, including RTP and variance

Thunderstruck has a theoretical payout of 96.10%, and this is why the slot was so popular in its time, as land-based slot machines featured much lower theoretical payouts, and most of the time it wasn’t even known what the RTP for a specific slot was.

Thunderstruck is one of the first slots to offer a fair game with a small house edge. The variance is medium to high, and this game plays no differently than other classic slots it used as a template.

Gameplay and Pay Table

Thunderstruck is a 3×5 slot game with only 9 paylines, but most of the time you won’t care about a shortage of paylines because the way this game is set up is that when it pays, it pays well.

When you do land a win in Thunderstruck, it will be a significant one.

There are six low-paying card symbols, but they don’t pay that bad, decent wins can be formed by them if you get enough of the same symbol, though you’ll get next to nothing for three-of-a-kind.

There are five medium-paying symbols, and two of them have the added benefit of issuing a small win already for a pair. Scatter is a paying symbol, and so is a Wild, which is by far the best-paying symbol in the game and it also doubles all wins.

You win a whopping 10,000 coins for five Thor Wilds on a winning payline, while the next best-paying symbol pays 750 coins.

All the symbols have lovely artwork that’s cartoonish but doesn’t look bad even today.

Thunderstruck bonus feature: free spins with a 3 x multiplier

When you land three or more Scatters, you’ll trigger the free spins feature which will award 15 free spins in all cases.

During the feature, all wins will be tripled. The free spins can be re-triggered if you land three or more Scatters during the feature.

You usually win around 30x your bet during the free spins feature, though the number can be much more significant, perhaps 100x – 200 x or more.

In any case, these 15 free spins will usually produce some nice cash.

CasinoWizard’s verdict: 4 out of 5 stars

Thunderstruck deserves its place in history, and it’s a slot that’s still very playable today as classic slot players still choose this one because of its simplicity, good payout and the free spins game with a 3x win multiplier on all wins.

Many players still rank this game among their all-time favourites, so if you haven’t played it yet, do give it a try. Look beyond the outdated graphics and rigid gameplay, and you’ll see how great this slot is.

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