A short list of special symbols and one wild is about as simple as the Money Cart format ever gets, and that simplicity is the point when you’re looking at the game that introduced it. Relax Gaming’s original Money Train reached casino lobbies in summer 2019 running a 96.20% RTP and a 20,000x cap, mechanics that every one of its five sequels has since built on rather than replaced. It’s still listed in the lobby at Relax Gaming casinos today, sitting alongside the games it inspired rather than being pushed out by them, and its numbers are worth knowing on their own terms before comparing them to anything newer in the Money Train series.
Key facts
| Detail | Money Train |
|---|---|
| Provider | Relax Gaming |
| Release | Summer 2019 |
| Grid / paylines | 5×4, 40 fixed paylines |
| RTP | 96.20% (98.00% with bonus buy) |
| Volatility | High |
| Hit frequency | 18.73% |
| Max win | 20,000x |
| Bet range | From around 0.10–0.20 up to 25–50, depending on the casino |
| Bonus buy | 80x stake |
| Theme | Wild west |
How the base game works
Money Train runs on a 5×4 grid with 40 fixed paylines, and the base game itself is deliberately plain: every regular symbol lands in stacks, so a single reel can be several matching symbols deep, and the wild — a pair of crossed guns — substitutes for them to complete extra lines. There’s no separate respin mechanic bolted onto the base game the way later entries add one; three bonus scatters landing on reels 1, 3 and 5 send you straight into the Money Cart instead.
The paytable is short by modern standards, which makes it easy to read at a glance: regular symbols pay through the stacks, the wild fills gaps in a line, and everything of any real size happens once the scatters line up and the bonus takes over. There’s no separate multiplier or upgrade mechanic sitting on top of the base game here — what you see on the paytable screen is what the base game pays, full stop.
The Money Cart bonus in Money Train
Three scatters open the Money Cart with 20 positions on the board and three respins on the clock; landing a new special symbol resets the respin counter back to three, so the round keeps going as long as the reels keep producing something new.
The cart fills with a mix of cash-value Bonus symbols and the special symbols that do the real work:
| Symbol | What it does | Persistent version |
|---|---|---|
| Bonus | Carries a cash value of 1–10x the stake | — |
| Payer | Adds its value to every symbol currently visible in the cart | Persistent Payer |
| Collector | Collects the value of every symbol currently in the cart | Persistent Collector |
| Widener | Opens an extra reel on the board | — |
| Tumbleweed | Lands empty and pays nothing, but doesn’t reset the respin count | — |
Persistent Payers and Collectors are the symbols worth watching for: once one locks in, it stays on the board for every remaining respin in that round, adding to or collecting from whatever lands afterwards, so a cart running two or three persistent symbols together is where the real total builds. Our glossary of Money Cart symbols covers how Payer, Collector and Widener behave across every game in the series, since the same names carry different values and limits from one title to the next.
Bonus buy
Money Train can be bought straight into for 80x the stake, skipping the base game and going directly to the Money Cart. Buying the feature spends 80 times your stake in one click, which is a lot faster than reaching the bonus through ordinary play — the natural trigger rate sits at around once every 298 spins — and that speed is exactly why the bonus-buy RTP comes out higher, at 98.00% against the base game’s 96.20%: paying the feature’s price outright removes the base game’s variance, and it does so at a cost, not a discount. Whether that trade suits you is a matter of preference, not a stake worth chasing — see our full breakdown of every buy price in the series for how it compares with the rest.
Max win and volatility
The ceiling here is 20,000x the stake, and reaching anywhere near it needs several persistent Payers and Collectors compounding across an extended run of respins — a combination high volatility makes rare rather than routine. Hit frequency sits at 18.73%, and with only a handful of special symbols doing the heavy lifting, the maximum multiplier sits a long way from a typical bonus outcome. That 20,000x figure describes the maths model’s ceiling, not a realistic session target: reaching it is rare enough that no amount of ordinary play makes it something to expect. Our max win guide puts that figure alongside the rest of the series, and our RTP guide covers the other half of that trade-off.
Money Train vs the rest of the series
Money Train’s special-symbol list — Payer, Collector, Widener and Tumbleweed — is the shortest anywhere in the six-game line-up, and every sequel since has added to it rather than trimmed it back. Money Train 2, released the following year, kept that same Payer-and-Collector pair but built an expanding 7×4 grid around them and introduced a Golden Bonus paying up to 200x, which is most of the reason its cap reaches 50,000x against this game’s 20,000x. Money Train Origins Dream Drop took a different route again nearly four years later: the same wild-west setting this game established, but wired into a Dream Drop jackpot network instead of a bigger flat cap, so its own Money Cart tops out lower, at 10,000x, with the jackpots sitting on top of that rather than replacing it. Our series comparison sets out that trade-off, and every other pairing across the line-up, in full — useful reading if you’re deciding between the original and a newer entry rather than assuming newer automatically means better.
Verdict
Money Train earns a 7/10 from me: the Money Cart formula it introduced is still sound, but playing it right after any of the sequels makes the three-symbol bonus feel thin, and a 20,000x ceiling looks slight next to what the same studio built later on the same base. It’s still a fair way to learn the mechanics the whole series shares, and worth returning to for that reason rather than for the size of the number on the paytable. Seven years on, it’s still listed in casino lobbies rather than retired just because it’s been outgrown.
Play Money Train demo
The demo runs on exactly the same maths model as the real-money game, with play money instead of a deposit, so it’s the honest way to see how many respins it actually takes to build a decent cart before staking anything. Try the free Money Train demo and watch the respin counter reset a few times before deciding whether the pace suits you.
FAQ
When was Money Train released?
Money Train launched in summer 2019. Published dates differ slightly by a few weeks either side of that, which is why “summer 2019” is the safest way to describe it rather than a single day.
What is Money Train’s RTP?
96.20% in the base game, rising to 98.00% if you buy the bonus feature outright. Both are long-run theoretical figures, not a promise for any one session.
What is the maximum win in Money Train?
20,000x the stake, reached only when persistent Payers and Collectors stack up across an extended run of respins in the Money Cart — a high-volatility outcome, not a typical one.
How much does the bonus buy cost?
80x your stake buys direct entry into the Money Cart, skipping the base game.
Can I play Money Train for free?
Yes — the demo version uses play money on the same maths model as the real-money game, with no registration needed at most sites that offer it.
Does Money Train have a wild symbol?
Yes, a pair of crossed guns that substitutes for regular symbols in the base game and helps complete extra lines across the 40 fixed paylines.
What does “persistent” mean in Money Train?
Once a Payer or Collector locks in as persistent, it stays on the board for every remaining respin in that Money Cart round, so its effect keeps applying to whatever lands afterwards. See the Money Cart glossary for how persistence works across the other five games.
Can I play Money Train on mobile?
There’s nothing specific to confirm about device compatibility beyond the game itself running in a browser, so the safest check is the demo — if it loads and runs smoothly on your phone, real-money play at a licensed casino will behave the same way.
Where to play Money Train slots — the series is listed at 1win and VAVADA. Try the demo first. Availability of Relax Gaming titles depends on your country and the casino’s licence.
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