Siberian Storm is one of those older IGT pokies I keep coming back to, even when shinier options are right there. It’s not trying to dazzle you with bells and whistles. What hooked me? The reel setup.
Instead of your standard rectangular grid, the reels form this diamond shape: 3-4-5-4-3 positions from left to right. Sounds weird on paper. Looks even weirder the first time you see it. But that odd geometry? It creates 720 ways to win, and here’s the kicker—they pay both directions.
First time I played Siberian Storm with actual money at a casino, I’ll admit, the layout threw me off. Years of staring at 5×3 grids had trained my brain to hunt for paylines that simply don’t exist here. Took me a good few spins before I stopped looking for them and started watching adjacent reels from either edge. Once that clicked, everything made sense. The whole game hinges on that unusual shape.
Theme-wise, you’re getting white tigers, frozen landscapes, and gem-studded symbols—classic mid-2000s IGT aesthetic. If you want to get a feel for how the MultiWay Xtra system works before risking your own cash, the Siberian Storm demo is available free on WinPockets with play money.
How to Play Siberian Storm
There are no paylines to select. None. The game runs on a fixed 50-credit bet structure, and what you’re actually adjusting is the coin value to change your total stake. Set your coin value, hit spin, and all 720 ways are live.
After the reels settle, the game scans for matching symbols on adjacent reels. It checks left to right starting from reel 1, then also checks right to left from reel 5. That second direction is what sets it apart from most standard ways pokies.
Two symbols deserve your attention beyond the regular paytable:
- Siberian Storm logo Wild: fills in for regular symbols to complete wins.
- Tiger’s Eye bonus symbol: your ticket to free spins.
The bonus trigger is where I had to really pay attention. You don’t just need a certain number of Tiger’s Eyes scattered anywhere. You need one on each of the 5 reels. I’ll get into why that matters in the bonus section, but it explains a lot about how the base game feels.
Gameplay & Winning Combinations
The diamond layout is everything. Multiply the positions per reel (3 × 4 × 5 × 4 × 3) and you get those 720 possible symbol paths across the screen. A win forms when a symbol lands on at least 3 consecutive reels, starting from either the leftmost or rightmost reel.
The two-way rule is what IGT branded MultiWay Xtra. In practice? A line of tigers on reels 3-4-5 counts just as much as one on reels 1-2-3. Made the base game feel busier than the symbol frequency would suggest, because more combinations are active at any given moment.
The shape affects how you read the reels, too. The middle reel has the most positions (5), while the outer reels have the fewest (3). So reels 1 and 5 act as gatekeepers. If a symbol doesn’t land on an edge reel, it can’t start a win in that direction—doesn’t matter how many times it appears in the centre. Once I wrapped my head around that, I stopped getting excited by strong middle reels with empty edges.
Compared to a fixed-payline game, it takes a few spins to read the screen properly. After that? Pretty intuitive. The win animations do a solid job highlighting which paths paid.
Symbols
The paytable splits into themed premiums and jewel-style lowers. Premiums are the tiger imagery—white tiger leading the pack, followed by the orange Siberian tiger and ornate tiger-themed pieces. Lower tier uses coloured gemstones cut to match the frozen, jewelled aesthetic.
Payout values scale with your coin value. Because the game uses that fixed 50-credit structure, I’d recommend checking the in-game paytable at your chosen stake rather than relying on a fixed figure someone quoted online.
The two special symbols matter more than any single paying icon:
- Siberian Storm logo (Wild): replaces standard paying symbols. With 720 ways paying in both directions, one Wild on a middle reel can sit inside several winning paths at once. That made it more valuable than it looks at first glance.
- Tiger’s Eye (bonus symbol): doesn’t form ordinary wins. Its only job? Trigger free spins when one lands on each reel.
I found myself watching the Tiger’s Eyes more than the premium tigers. Once you understand the all-five-reels requirement, every Tiger’s Eye on reels 1 through 4 builds this quiet anticipation for reel 5.
Bonus Features
MultiWay Xtra
This isn’t a triggered bonus, but it defines the entire game, so it gets its own heading.
- Trigger: always active.
- Mechanic: wins count from left to right and from right to left across 720 ways on the 3-4-5-4-3 layout.
- Effect: more symbol combinations can pay on any spin than in a standard left-to-right ways game.
What I appreciate is that the feature isn’t cosmetic. It genuinely changes how you read every single spin, and it carries straight into the free spins round.
Free Spins
- Trigger: 1 Tiger’s Eye symbol on each of the 5 reels.
- Initial award: 8 free spins.
- Retriggers: landing the same combination during the round adds more free spins, up to a total of 240.
- Effect: the round keeps the 720-ways, two-direction system at no extra cost.
The trigger condition is what shapes the pokie most. Needing a symbol on every reel makes the bonus feel like a set you’re completing, not just a Scatter count. I don’t know of another IGT game from that era with quite the same tension—4 Tiger’s Eyes can land and still count for absolutely nothing.
The round itself? Simple. There’s no multiplier ladder or collection meter. Its appeal is that the retrigger ceiling is very high, so a good round can keep extending. If you prefer layered bonus mechanics, it’ll probably feel plain. I liked it because it stays true to the base game instead of adding a separate system.
RTP & Volatility
Siberian Storm’s RTP is most commonly listed at 96%. IGT games are often supplied to operators in more than one configuration, and lower settings like 94.26% are also reported for this title. Which version you play depends on the casino, so check the game’s help screen at your chosen site.
Whatever the figure, RTP is a theoretical long-term return across a very large number of spins. Doesn’t predict what happens in a single session.
Volatility is generally classed as medium. That means returns are spread between smaller base-game wins and larger bonus results without leaning heavily towards either. This profile suits the design. Two-way wins across 720 paths give the base game regular activity, while the free spins—with their high retrigger cap—carry the larger potential swings.
Maximum Win
The maximum win is widely listed at 1,000x your stake (50,000 coins on the 50-credit structure). That’s modest next to modern pokies advertising ceilings in the tens of thousands. It fits a game built around ways coverage and extended free spins rather than stacked multipliers.
The ceiling would realistically come from premium tiger combinations filling multiple ways, helped by Wilds, during a long, retriggered free spins round. It’s a cap, not a target. Most sessions will look nothing like it.
Theme, Graphics & Sound
The setting is a frozen Siberian landscape—reels framed in icy blues and whites. The tigers are the clear focus. The white tiger in particular is rendered with more detail than most pokies of its age.
What I appreciate is how the theme ties into the mechanics. The Tiger’s Eye bonus symbol isn’t some generic Scatter. Building a row of watching eyes across all 5 reels fits the “hunting” feel of the game, and it makes the trigger memorable.
Graphically? It shows its age. The animations are functional rather than elaborate, and the interface is clearly from a pre-2015 design era. The sound is a light, wintry backing track with crisp win effects. I didn’t find it annoying on longer sessions, but it won’t stand out either. If you want cinematic presentation, this isn’t it. If you prefer a clean, readable screen, it holds up well.
Play Siberian Storm on Mobile
IGT has converted Siberian Storm to HTML5, so it runs in mobile browsers at casinos that carry it—no separate download. The diamond layout scales reasonably well on phones. Landscape orientation gives the 5-position middle reel more room and makes it easier to spot Tiger’s Eyes on the edge reels. The free spins round and MultiWay Xtra system work the same as on desktop, and the WinPockets demo is a good way to check how the layout looks on your screen.
Our Verdict
I think Siberian Storm is still a well-designed pokie, mainly because its single big idea is a good one. The 3-4-5-4-3 layout with two-way MultiWay Xtra wins changes how you read the reels. The all-five-reels Tiger’s Eye trigger gives the free spins a distinctive build-up that many newer games lack.
Where it’s less convincing? Depth and scale. The free spins don’t add multipliers or new mechanics. The 1,000x maximum win is modest by current standards, and the presentation looks dated next to recent releases. Players used to Bonus Buys, cascading reels, and huge headline ceilings will probably find it too restrained.
I’d point the free demo towards players who like medium-volatility games and a clear, readable structure, and anyone curious about how two-way ways pokies work. If you want constant feature activity or a very high ceiling, IGT’s newer catalogue or modern high-volatility releases will suit you better.
