Valley of the Gods Slot Review - Blockers, Respins and Online Casinos in Canada

Valley of the Gods is a slot with one idea, done well: every win earns a respin and breaks a block, so a lucky start can snowball into a fully open grid with extra lives and a growing multiplier. It is high volatility with a 96.20% RTP and no free spins or bonus buy, which makes it slower and streakier than modern releases. Play it if you enjoy chains that build; skip it if you want a classic bonus round.

Searching for Valley of the Gods online casinos usually means you already know the look: a 5x5 grid of Egyptian gods and hieroglyphics, with much of it hidden behind scarab blocks. Yggdrasil released the game in August 2017, and it still plays differently from most slots on our list. There are no free spins. Instead, each win triggers a respin and breaks blocks, opening more ways to win as the chain continues.

This review explains how the grid grows from 45 to 3,125 ways, how extra lives and the win multiplier keep a chain alive, what the published 96.20% RTP and high volatility mean for your budget, and where Canadians can play it legally. Like every slot, it is entertainment with a house edge, and no pattern of play changes that.

How the blocked grid works: from 45 to 3,125 ways

The reels form a 5x5 grid of 25 positions, but at the start 12 of them are covered by blockers. That leaves 13 open positions and 45 ways to win. Wins pay for 3 or more matching symbols on adjacent reels starting from the leftmost reel, counted across every open position, as on any ways slot.

The arithmetic explains the jump. Ways are the number of open positions on each reel multiplied together. With nothing blocked, five reels of five positions give 5 x 5 x 5 x 5 x 5 = 3,125 ways. With 13 open positions giving 45 ways, the only split that works is reels of 1, 1, 3, 3 and 5 positions in some order, which is why the starting grid feels so narrow.

	Starting grid	All blockers destroyed
Open positions	13 of 25	25 of 25
Ways to win	45	3,125
Win multiplier	none	x2
Extra lives	0	1

Every blocker you break widens a reel, and every wider reel multiplies the ways on the others. The last few blockers therefore add far more ways than the first few.

Respins and scarabs: how one win keeps the reels moving

The whole game turns on the respin. Here is the order of events after a paid spin:

1. If the spin wins, it pays and you get a free respin.
2. Each winning symbol releases a scarab, and each scarab breaks one of the 12 blockers.
3. The respin plays on the wider grid. If it wins, it pays, releases more scarabs and awards another respin.
4. The chain continues while wins continue. A losing respin ends it, unless you have an extra life to spend.

A win made of many symbols is therefore worth more than its payout. A five-symbol win releases five scarabs and opens five positions, while a three-symbol win opens three. Early in a chain, that difference decides whether the next respin has a realistic chance of winning at all.

A chain, followed step by step

Picture a paid spin that wins with three matching symbols. Three scarabs break three blocks, leaving 9. The respin, now on a slightly wider grid, wins with four symbols and breaks four more, leaving 5. A third respin wins with five symbols and the last blocks fall: the grid is fully open, you hold one extra life and the multiplier sits at x2. If the next respin loses, the life is spent and the chain carries on; if it wins, it pays at x2 across 3,125 ways. The example is an illustration of the rules, not a typical spin, and the payouts depend on the symbols involved.

From a 45-way start, a chain needs several wins in a row before the grid opens up, and a losing respin without a life ends it. The game's high volatility comes from that shape: long quiet stretches, then occasional chains that clear the grid and run on.

Extra lives and the win multiplier

Clearing all 12 blockers is the moment the game changes gear. It awards two things at once:

• One extra life. If a later respin loses, the life is spent and you get another respin instead of the chain ending. Every 5 red scarabs collected add another life.
• A x2 win multiplier. It applies to the respins that follow. Every 5 blue scarabs collected raise it by 1, to x3, x4 and so on.

Together they turn a cleared grid from a one-off into a potential run: 3,125 ways, a rising multiplier and a cushion against a losing respin. This is where the game's large results come from. It is also rare, because a chain has to win enough times on a narrow grid to break all 12 blocks before it can start.

RTP, volatility, stakes and the euro max win

Yggdrasil publishes an RTP of 96.20% for Valley of the Gods and rates it high volatility. Over a very large number of spins, that means about C$96.20 back for every C$100 staked. Casinos can run lower RTP versions of many games, so check the figure in the game's rules where you play.

• Stakes: 25 coins per spin, with coin values from 0.004 to 4.0 in the demo, which gives C$0.10 to C$100 a spin.
• Max win: Yggdrasil publishes it only as a euro amount, EUR 580,000, and gives no multiple of the stake, so we do not convert it.
• Bonus buy: none. The rules list no buy feature.

High volatility and no free spins round make bankroll planning important. A stake of around 0.5% to 1% of your session budget gives the game room for long dry spells. A C$0.50 spin on a C$100 budget allows 200 spins before the money runs out with no wins at all, which is the scenario to plan for. See RTP and volatility for how the labels work.

Valley of the Gods demo: what play money can teach you

The demo on this page is Yggdrasil's own build running in Canadian dollars. It uses the same rules and maths as the real-money version, so it is the cheapest way to see how rarely a chain clears all 12 blocks and how much a cleared grid with a multiplier can pay when it does.

Watch for two things in a demo session. First, how many paid spins pass between chains of three or more respins. Second, the size of results once lives and the multiplier are in play compared with the short chains. The gap between those two is the volatility you would be paying for with real money.

A short demo run will not match the long-term RTP; a session can sit well above or below it. Use the demo to judge whether the rhythm suits you, not to forecast results.

Valley of the Gods online casinos in Canada

Valley of the Gods is a Yggdrasil title, so you will find it at casinos that carry the studio's games. Whether a given site is legal for you depends on your province. In Ontario, look for an AGCO-registered site on iGaming Ontario's list and check its lobby for the game; in Alberta, an operator registered with AGLC, required since 13 July 2026. In the other provinces, a provincially run site is the authorised option, and offshore-licensed casinos operate outside that framework.

Points to check before playing for real:

• the RTP shown in the game's rules at that site;
• the stake range, since the casino sets its own limits;
• deposit limits, cool-off and self-exclusion tools in your account.

Players must be at least 19, except in Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec, where the minimum is 18. Our playing in Canada page covers the provincial rules.

How it compares with Temple Tumble and the Egyptian slots on our list

The closest game on our list in spirit is Relax Gaming's Temple Tumble, which also covers the grid with blocks you destroy by winning. The Egyptian theme links it to Play'n GO's two Book-style slots, which play very differently.

Game	Grid and ways	Main feature	Published RTP
Valley of the Gods	5x5, 45 to 3,125 ways	Respins, 12 blockers, lives and multiplier	96.20%
Temple Tumble	6x6, up to 46,656 ways	3-24 stone blocks; clear them all for 6 free spins	96.25%
Book of Dead	5x3, 10 lines	Free spins with one expanding symbol	96.21%
Legacy of Dead	5x3, 10 lines	Free spins with up to 9 expanding symbols	96.58%

Temple Tumble turns its cleared grid into a free spins round; Valley of the Gods keeps it in the respin chain. If you like the block-breaking idea but want a conventional bonus at the end of it, Temple Tumble is the better fit. If you prefer a slot where every winning spin pushes towards something, this one does it more directly. More games are in our slot catalog.

Valley of the Gods specification

Source: yggdrasilgaming.com and the game's in-game rules, checked 22 October 2026. A dash means the provider does not publish the figure.

What works and what does not

How the feature works

Valley of the Gods has no free spins. Every winning spin pays and awards a respin, and each winning symbol releases a scarab that breaks one of the 12 blockers covering the 5x5 grid, raising the ways from 45 towards 3,125. Clearing all blockers gives one extra life, which saves the chain from a losing respin, and a x2 win multiplier for later respins. Every 5 red scarabs add a life; every 5 blue scarabs add +1 to the multiplier.

Symbols and pays