Alien Invaders

Alien Invaders (Pragmatic Play) Review

Pragmatic Play is a skilled game provider with hundreds of titles in its library and is known to have a slot for every theme and a solution for every scenario. By closing 2029, the year when there is a slim chance for the asteroid Apophis to hit Earth, the hypotheses of its origin become wilder. Alien Invaders is an upcoming slot that draws a possible reality in which a comics race claims our beloved planet!

It seems that the theme excites more than one provider, and Pragmatic Play is the second for 2025 with such a game. In March, Urgent Games released a title with an identical name - Alien Invaders, but with much simpler mechanics and bonus features. It’s crafted in a more generic, retro way to probably entice fans of 70s/80s video games.

Alien Invaders by Pragmatic Play is a more sophisticated slot machine with cartoonish artwork and fun animations. It is packed with 5 vertical reels, and 3 to 5 symbols will drop on each one on every spin. The bottom row is marked, and it’s the only active zone of the grid at the beginning. The game offers a Tumble Feature, meaning that more than one payout can be collected every round.

Symbols participating in winning combinations disappear and tumbles continue until there are no more wins in view. Alien Invaders is packed with wilds with multipliers, powerful scatters, and symbols paying in weird ways. It also has Ante Bet and Bonus Buy, as well as technical features, like Autoplay, Quickspin, Turbo Spin, and many others.

Alien Invaders Slot - Game Screen

Alien Invaders pays when 3 or more symbols of the same kind touch the marked row. When that happens, the reels on which the winning symbols are will also become active. All instances of the winning symbols on these reels count for creating payout combinations and then disappear, causing tumbles.

Four alien creatures are the High Pays, awarding 1x, 0.50x, and 0.25x the bet for each symbol in the winning combination. The card royalties and the number 10 depicted with eyeballs are the Low Pays, awarding 0.10x and 0.05x the bet per symbol. The slot features a wild symbol as well that substitutes for all High Pays and Low Pays, and awards 0.05x, 0.10x, and 0.15x for 1, 2, or 3 in the marked row.

The scatter symbols bring no cash, but they have explosive powers. Once a scatter reaches the bottom row, it will be added to a counter in the lower left corner of your screen and will explode, destroying all symbols immediately adjacent vertically, horizontally, and diagonally. These explosions are considered winning combinations and the participating symbols pay.

The Alien Invaders RTP ranges and it can be 96.50%, 95.48%, or 94.51%, with levels of volatility described as high. The Hit Frequency rate is very high as well - 34.48% or 1 in 2.90 spins on average. Bets start at €0.20 and go up to €240 per spin, or even €300 with Ante Bet on. The Alien Invaders max win is capped at 5,000x the bet.

Alien Invaders Features

Alien Invaders offers much more than creatively crafted payout mechanics and scatters causing explosions. The fact that the provider has added boosting and buying features speaks loud enough. It’s crucial to consider the base game features when deciding how to approach the game, so take your time exploring the next paragraphs.

Wild Symbol & Multiplier

Wilds appear on the 3rd reel in the base game and on reels 2, 3, and 4 in free spins. In order to become active and substitute the wild symbol must first touch the bottom, marked row of the grid. Each wild symbol has a multiplier, which is randomly selected from a set - x1, x2, x3, x5, x10, or x25.

Win Multiplier Feature

Each Alien Invaders spin starts with a win multiplier of x1 and when 10 symbols explode during tumbles, it grows by +1. The multipliers of active wild symbols are also added to its current value. The win multiplier is applied to all wins from tumbles and resets back to x1 at the end of the sequence.

Free Spins

Three collected scatters during a spin activate the Free Spins bonus and award 7 rounds and additional 3 for every collected scatter beyond the 3rd one. The bonus starts with 3 symbols dropping on each reel, and the number may randomly increase by +1 up to 5 on every spin. Once increased the size of these reels remains persistent.

Free Spins is also played with a persistent total win multiplier and a special set of reels with higher chances for payouts. Each scatter that reaches the bottom, marked row, adds an extra free spin to the remaining balance. And for dessert, during the bonus, wild symbols carry a multiplier of x1, x2, x3, x5, x10, x25, x50, or x100.

Alien Invaders Slot – Free Spins Gameplay Screen

Buy Free Spins

Free Spins can be truly quite lucrative, but according to the provider’s memo, the triggering frequency is rather low - 1 in 206.71 spins on average. If you are eager to activate the minigame, you can use one of two special features. The bonus bet will increase your bet by 25%, but will double the chance of triggering the bonus.

Buy Free Spins is another option, and it offers two items for purchase. You can either spend 65x the bet to get a random number of scatters or 400x and get the Super Free Spins feature. During the boosted bonus, the win multiplier value starts from x50, and remember, it’s persistent and does not reset!

Theme & Graphics

Alien Invaders is not the first game utilizing the Space Adventure theme crafted by Pragmatic Play, and in fact, I'll present a few alternatives in this review’s verdict. However, the game is fun and light-hearted despite the “ferocious” aliens and all the scatter asteroids. The Reactoonz vibe feels alive on the reels, although lightened.

It’s needless to say that the graphics, designs, and animations are of the finest quality. The audio is also fun and full of cute sounds and hits. Alien Invaders fits perfectly on any screen due to HTML5 optimization. It would be a good choice for smartphones, tablets, and laptops. It’s just that the provider has reached its usual high grade.

Pros And Cons Of Alien Invaders Slot

Our Verdict

Space adventures have always attracted fans of video games and online slots. Pragmatic Play has a proven background in this territory by releasing spectacles like Gravity Bonanza and Wildman Super Bonanza. Both feature Cluster Pays payout systems, while Star Bounty pays in 4,096 ways to win.

Alien Invaders stands apart and offers a complex mechanic, but of a different kind. I can't be certain that this is a true innovation, and I'm not particularly convinced of its efficiency. One thing I can't deny: the slow-burn effect of active row and reels is quite thrilling and creates a brand-new type of suspense.

The Win Multiplier and Wild Multipliers are essential for the big wins in Alien Invaders, but luckily, they are not too rare. The persistence of reel sizes and Win Multiplier in Free Spins is also a key, which makes the more expensive Bonus Buy option a feature to consider. The max win is decent, but claiming it looks like a long shot with a probability of 1 in over 87.7 million spins.

The lack of similar slots makes the comparison a difficult task, so I’ll leave this to you. The Alien Invaders free demo is available at the beginning of this review. Make sure to consider a betting strategy due to the game’s high levels of volatility. Overall, Pragmatic Play has tried to escape the mediocrity of releasing similar slots with different themes. This one looks like a bullseye, but only time will tell!