It’s another slightly sparse selection of new slot releases, but let’s separate the good from the bad (and the ugly).
Astro Rumble reminds me of Alien Invaders from last week, lending credence to my theory that slot providers meet up and decide to all release games with the same themes around the same time! Joking aside, Astro Rumble comes from Hacksaw collaborators, Bullshark, and features three types of ‘Pot’ and a ‘Cosmic Boost’ that can potentially supercharge the grid, which is fun.
Multihand Blackjack Pro 2 continues BGaming‘s streak of non-slot games and provides exactly what you’d expect from the title.
Flight Mode from Nolimit City follows on from slots like Outsourced with a colorful, wacky art style, and in true Nolimit style, turns up the macabre humor to 11. The gameplay will take you a while to get to grips with, as is par for the course with NLC.
Gem Trio from Pragmatic Play is a stripped-back 3-reeler made to echo the feel of old-school fruit machines but with a modern, gem-themed twist. Hopefully that description will let you know whether this slot is for you.
Then we have two slots and one fish shooter from TaDa Gaming, and none of these excited me unfortunately.
So that leaves us with The Luxe from Hacksaw. Like I said about Alien Invaders in the last roundup, on a usual week this would be an average title, but this time it’s elevated to Game of the Week!
New Slots
- Astro Rumble – Bullshark Games
- Multihand Blackjack Pro 2 – BGaming
- Flight Mode – Nolimit City
- All-Star Fishing – TaDa Gaming
- Gem Trio – Pragmatic Play
- The Luxe – Hacksaw Gaming
- 3 Witch’s Lamp – TaDa Gaming
- Cash Coin – TaDa Gaming
Game of the Week
At first glance, The Luxe doesn’t look like your usual Hacksaw slot. There’s no dramatic title, or cartoon character standing to the side of the grid – no, what we have in terms of aesthetics is a fairly typical modern casino look laid out in black and gold, plus symbols based on a deck of cards.
In the same vein, the gameplay is more classy than flashy. The Luxe does borrow the Golden Squares feature from another Hacksaw classic, Le Bandit, but here those squares appear randomly.
The general idea in the base game is to land wins on traditional paylines from left to right, and when the Golden Squares do appear, they add multipliers or award jackpots. There is also a clover symbol, but again, it doesn’t behave like the one in Le Bandit; here it collects the values of all Golden Squares to apply the number to your wager.
It can be tough to rack up anything special in the base game, so it does feel like The Luxe is nudging you towards the bonus buys, and surprisingly for a Hacksaw game, we have a High-Roller option included, which reminds one of Nolimit City’s God Mode. Essentially you give yourself a 1 in 10 chance of landing the max win (20,000x) by wagering 2,000x your current bet. Then we have options where you can increase your chance of spinning into the bonus round, or buy into it outright. In the free spins, the Golden Squares are sticky and last for the entirety of the round, finally giving you a shot at some big wins.
The Luxe will be a little subtle for some, but others will enjoy its relaxed, classy charm. On the other hand, I hope the inclusion of the High-Roller option doesn’t signal Hacksaw moving long-term towards ridiculous bonus buys that look good on streams but don’t offer much value to the average player IRL.
