The Gameplay Experience: Testing the Mechanics
Nothing about the base game has changed since 2005, and that's the point. To get paid, you need to land three or more low-value card symbols adjacent from the left, or as few as two of the Egyptian-themed premium symbols, across up to nine adjustable paylines. There's no cascade, no cluster and no wild beyond the Book symbol itself.
We played 400 spins on desktop at a $1 stake across all nine paylines, in manual mode (not autoplay). This made it easier for us to track how often the free spins actually triggered rather than let the game blur past us.
Novomatic's own Book of Ra Deluxe, released three years later, added a 2x multiplier to free spins that the original never received, and the difference showed in our side-by-side testing: every expanding-symbol hit here felt smaller by comparison. Book of Dead by Play'n GO borrows the same expanding-symbol format almost exactly, but its base game paid out more often between free spins triggers than Book of Ra's did.