Belle The Blade Hunter

Belle The Blade Hunter: Slot Overview

'If you go down in the woods today, you're sure of a big surprise', and that surprise is big, bad boss lady Belle and her arsenal of big, sharp weapons. The slot is Belle The Blade Hunter from Hacksaw partner Bullshark Games, which sees the titular heroine guide players through perilous woods in search of monetary rewards. The game makes use of a couple of features Bullshark Games has tinkered with in the past, such as individual cell multipliers as seen in Paper Biker, and roaming wilds, aka Amazing Miceketeers. However, Belle The Blade Hunter pulls them together in a new way, and delivers the package in an ocularly pleasing storybook-like adventure.

Whilst not mentioned anywhere, Belle The Blade Hunter looks like an updated version of the classic fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood. To the left, we have Belle, blades in hand, itching to slash her way through, well, anything that crosses her path, while to the right is a big, black, huffin' and a puffin' wolf. A big bad wolf? Not sure, but it doesn't look especially friendly. Then again, neither does Belle, and despite bearing tummy and a bit of cleavage, she's arguably not as sexualised as Triple Edged Studios' Wicked Tales: Dark Red. When zooming out to take in the full picture, the rest of the scene is quite a sight, and the dark, foreboding, yet also mystically beguiling background brought to mind Foxium's Cossacks the Wild Hunt, both slots providing an attractive location to play.

Belle The Blade Hunter is a medium-high volatile slot played on a 5x4 gaming grid draped in creeping ivy. Players are able to choose a stake of $/€0.10 to $/€100 per spin, and when betting this way, the RTP is 96.31% on the higher return model, or 94.32% on the lower one.

Winning combinations of 3 to 5 OAK may be formed across the game's 20 paylines. Hitting 5 matching 10-A card ranks awards 1 times the bet, or landing 5 horns, cleavers, axes, bows, or the other sharp-bladed weapon pays 2.5x to 10x the bet.

Belle The Blade Hunter: Slot Features

Wandering through the woods accompanying Belle on her hunt are wilds, cell multipliers, two bonus rounds - Wilds Stalk and Savage Slayer, and feature buys.

Cell Multipliers and Wild Symbol

Cell multipliers apply only to wild symbols that land in the cell and are part of a win. They reset with each new base game spin. Each time a wild lands, it adds or increases the cell multiplier on that cell. When wild symbols jump to new cells, they apply a new multiplier to the cells they land on. Additive values range from x2 to x100, while multiplicative values range from x2 to x10.

When a wild is part of a win, it applies its cell's multiplier to that win. If more than one wild is part of the same win, multipliers are added together. Wilds replace any paying symbols, and are worth 15x for landing 5 along a payline. In the base game, the symbol increases the cell multiplier only if there is at least one win on the grid.

Respins

Respins can only be triggered in the base game. When 3 or more wilds land on a spin, wins are evaluated, and a respin is triggered. Cell multipliers increase progressively, and wild symbols are persistent. Wilds move across the grid on each respin, increasing the cell multipliers. When at least one new wild lands on a respin, another respin is awarded. Scatters landing on the initial spin or any respin are added to the counter above the reels.

Wild Stalk

Landing 3 or 4 scatters triggers the Wild Stalk bonus, which awards 8 or 10 free spins, respectively. Before the first spin, every scatter symbol adds a multiplier of x2 to x100 to a random cell. Cell multipliers increase progressively, and wild symbols are persistent. With each spin, wild symbols move to new locations and increase cell multipliers there. The round may be extended when hitting a scatter as it grants +1 free spin.

Savage Slayer

Landing 5 scatters awards 12 free Savage Slayer spins. The mechanics are the same as Wild Stalk, except that at least one wild is guaranteed on the first spin, and wild symbols appear more frequently.

Feature Buy

The feature buy section offers BonusHunt FeatureSpins at 3x the bet to make each spin 5 times more likely to trigger free spins, or Blade Frenzy FeatureSpins at 50x, which guarantee to land at least 3 wild symbols. The Wild Stalk round may be bought for 100x or 200x buys the Savage Slayer.

Belle The Blade Hunter: Slot Verdict

Belle The Blade Hunter's enjoyment levels followed a twisty, turny, up-and-down path. The opening reaction was promising due to the lush, fairy tale setting Bullshark Games had designed to play the game in. The forest has a pleasant, airy, otherworldly quality, and Belle came across as a modern Little Red Riding Hood, one that doesn't need a woodcutter to save the day, since she'd have no problem slicing wolves up with her blades. Then the base game began, and it wasn't super exciting. Cell multipliers are available in that phase (as are respins, if rare), yet they didn't seem to accomplish much. Not saying they can't, though, an x100, for example, in the right place might replenish a battered balance, but their full power is reserved for the free spins rounds when bought or triggered the natural way.

Free spins could be a tease, too, because while a wild symbol bouncing around the grid can create a lot of cell multipliers (or increase them), multipliers only apply when wilds are part of winning combinations. Meaning, it's possible to have a bunch of multiplier values littering the screen, sitting there doing nothing, like an unfinished novel. Wilds are very good at adding values to cells, but shyer when it comes to actually connecting them with wins. But, there is always a flipside to these things in slots, and with the right multipliers, connecting with roaming wilds, there is a chance, Belle might just snare her prey. As is usually the case, the more roaming wilds you can get on the screen, the better the chance of something special occurring, and in Belle The Blade Hunter, the biggest special is 10,000x the bet. And, in testament to the features' potency, this can be achieved in the base and bonus games.

Belle The Blade Hunter possesses a set of mechanics that can tantalise and potentially reward in an attractive, fairy tale-like environment. Its system wasn't as satisfying as the one Bullshark Games used in Paper Biker, however, which simplified things by applying cell multipliers to winning combinations without the need for a wild middleman. Still, players drawn to roaming wilds, cell multipliers, and well-drawn fantasy settings, can find all that and maybe more in Belle The Blade Hunter.