Slot reviews
[Slot review] Guardians of Ice & Fire — PG Soft
The board's second PG Soft review. A diamond-shaped grid with a different row count per reel that multiplies out exactly to the published 576 ways — a rare chance to check the arithmetic — plus another look at this studio's maximum-RTP disclosure habit.
Overview
Guardians of Ice & Fire is a 6-reel ways slot PG Soft released on 11 January 2021. Published spec: 96.7% RTP, a 50,000× win cap, 576 ways, and a listed Free Spins feature. It is the board's second PG Soft review.
Where the Mahjong Ways 2 review covered this studio's gap — volatility, hit rate and bet range all unpublished — this title gives the published side something to read. The row count is stated separately for each reel, which makes the published 576-ways figure something you can check yourself.
Layout and rules
The studio's spec states six reels along with a row count for each: reels 1 and 6 carry 2 rows, reels 2 and 5 carry 3, and reels 3 and 4 carry 4 — a diamond shape that widens toward the centre. Multiply those six numbers together — 2×3×4×4×3×2 — and the result is 576, matching the published ways figure exactly. A case where the published grid and the published ways count confirm each other, which is uncommon among the PG Soft titles this site has covered.
The one listed feature is Free Spins. The entry condition, spin count and how multipliers apply are not in the public catalogue, so they are not listed here — the in-game rules screen in the demo is the only source with exact values.
This studio's own disclosure note applies again: the RTP PG Soft publishes is its maximum. 96.7% should be read as the highest configuration this game reaches, and a live deployment may sit below it.
Free demo
See the screen you're reading about
The official demo published by PG Soft. It runs on play money only; no real funds are involved.
If the demo does not appear, check your browser's frame-blocking settings.
Reading the numbers
576 ways is far fewer than found on the sequel-scale titles this site has covered (the exact ways count for Mahjong Ways 2 is not in its spec, so a direct comparison is not possible, but the grid shapes themselves differ — a standard 5-reel layout versus this diamond-shaped 6-reel one). The cap is also lower: 50,000× against Mahjong Ways 2's 100,000×, exactly half. A pair that shows reel layout and cap are each designed per title, even within the same ways format.
The diamond grid is arithmetically meaningful too. On a standard fixed-row grid — say, five reels of three rows each — the ways count comes out as one number raised to a power, like 3 to the 5th power giving 243. Here, with a different row count on every reel, the calculation multiplies six distinct numbers instead. Wider in the centre and narrower at the edges also means the density of possible combinations differs by reel position.
One sentence has to stop here, though. A smaller ways count does not mean lower volatility. The ways figure only states how many combination routes exist per spin; how widely results swing is set by the whole paytable. This title's volatility is unpublished, so that judgement cannot be checked.
Presentation
This site's own story text summarises the scene as 'a fire spirit and an ice spirit face each other across a black gap, neither advancing' — a pairing that fits the diamond grid's own centre-widening structure, with two forces meeting in the middle.
This title is still part of PG Soft's current public catalogue (152 titles), so it carries both a demo and cover art. Open the rules screen first when you launch the demo — the free-spin entry condition and multiplier handling live there, not on the spec sheet.
Strengths
- Multiplying the per-reel row counts (2·3·4·4·3·2) lands exactly on the published 576 ways — a rare PG Soft entry you can verify yourself
- The diamond grid demonstrates ways arithmetic moving from 'one number to a power' to 'six distinct numbers multiplied together'
- Still part of the current public catalogue, so both demo and cover art are available
Weak points
- The published 96.7% is a maximum-RTP disclosure; a live deployment may sit below it
- Volatility, hit rate, bet range and paytable are all unpublished — the in-game rules screen is the primary source
- A smaller ways count does not imply lower volatility, and volatility is unpublished here, so that judgement cannot be checked either way
Verdict
A verifiable figure is not common. This title's 576 ways is one of the few you can confirm yourself by multiplying the per-reel row counts, and that verifiability stands in sharp contrast to what remains unpublished — volatility and hit rate. Check what can be checked, and leave what cannot be checked marked unpublished: that is the whole of what this review can do.