Gonzo's Treasure Hunt, A New Live Game

What Is Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt?

The conquistador Gonzo is one of the best known and most loved slot game characters ever.  He first burst on to the scene more than ten years ago in NetEnt’s perenially popular game Gonzo’s Quest. This iconic game was one of the first to introduce the Avalanche feature (after each win, the winning symbols explode, other symbols drop down to fill the gaps and new symbols fill the space up to the top of the screen) and combine it with an increasing multiplier.

Avalanche and increasing multiplier is now so prevalent that it forms the basis of the bonus round in the majority of Megaways slots.  It came as no surprise, then, that the long awaited sequel to Gonzo’s Quest manifested as Gonzo’s Quest Megaways; you’d be hard put to it to think of a game whose unique gimmick is better suited to the Megaways treatment!

Gonzo’s Quest Megaways was released in July 2020 but not by NetEnt; it’s actually a Red Tiger game and at some sites it is hooked up to the Red Tiger Daily Drops jackpot system, to make it even more exciting.  This is possible because of the deal that was agreed back in September 2019 for NetEnt to acquire Red Tiger.

In September 2020 another such deal was agreed, this time for NetEnt itself to be taken over by Evolution Gaming – and that is what has opened the door for the latest instalment in the Gonzo series.  Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt Live is a live Evolution gameshow (other examples of the genre include Dream Catcher and Mega Ball) hosted by a live dealer and by Gonzo himself!

How To Play Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt

The mechanism at the heart of Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt is a wall of 70 blocks (7 columns x 10 rows). The blocks are marked with 6 different symbols from the slot game, but you don’t get to see which symbols are where at the start; in fact, the whole point of the game is to guess where they are!

The first thing you need to do is to decide which chip size to use; this can be 10p, 50p, £1 or there on up.  Bear in mind that if you want to bet on multiple symbols and/or make multiple picks (and most players do) your total stake will end up being considerably higher than that.

The next thing you need to decide is which symbols you want to bet on and how many chips to add to each.  The Bet On All button places one chip on each symbol for a total of 6 chips. There’s also a Repeat button which lets you place exactly the same chips as you did in the previous round.

• Brown – pays x1 – 27 blocks
• Orange – pays x2 – 20 blocks
• Purple – pays x4 – 12 blocks
• Green – pays x8 – 7 blocks
• Blue – pays x20 – 3 blocks
• Red – pays x65 – 1 block

Each symbol has its own RTP; the best (96.56%) is green and the worst (96.35%) is purple.

After that you need to choose how many picks you want to make; this can be anything from one (the default) to 20.  The chips you’ve placed are multiplied by the number of picks you choose to make up your total stake.

The game starts with a fresh wall of blocks spiralling up into place, and you’ll have around 20 seconds to make your picks by placing handprints on the wall.  If you don’t complete them in time, they will be made randomly for you.

Gonzo then triggers the next stage by turning the key.  The first thing that happens is the Prize Drop.  Two horizontal reels spin at the top; the upper one has numbers and multipliers on it and the lower one blocks and spaces.  When the reels stop, any numbers that are above spaces fall down and stop randomly on one of the blocks in the column below, to be added to its payout multiplier, and any multiplier that is above a space is then applied.  There’s also a re-drop symbol that can retrigger the Prize Drop.

The symbols are then revealed, starting with the lowest paying ones.  For each of your picks, if you’ve placed chips on the symbol that’s revealed you will receive those chips back plus chips x multiplier.  For example, let’s say you have 2 x 50p chips on green.  One of your picks is revealed to be green, which has a base multiplier of x8 and in addition, it’s a block that has been modified during Prize Drop with a +10.  You’ll receive your chips back – £1 – plus 18 x £1, so £19 altogether for that pick.

Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt Live is a beautiful looking game that really pays homage to the original slot, and there’s plenty of entertainment to be had trying out different strategies for which colours you bet on and the number of picks you choose.  Another winner from Evolution!

Where To Play Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt

Gonzo’s Treasure Hunt Online can be played at any bingo or slot site with an Evolution Gaming live casino.   Here are some we know have it.