The Count: Slot Overview
Count von Count (also known more simply as the Count) is a purple-skinned puppet vampire who has been teaching children how to count things since he first appeared on the TV show ‘Sesame Street’ in 1972. He also bears one or two resemblances to the leading bloodsucker found in developer Hacksaw Gaming‘s online slot The Count. This includes the fact that they’re both vampires with links to numerals. Opportunities for counting stuff in The Count occur, for instance, when Expanded Bloody Wilds and Bat Wilds stack multiplier values, available in all phases, including the base game and its three bonus rounds.
At the risk of sounding superficial, if we’re judging on looks, it might be said The Count is a blood relative of slots in Hacksaw Gaming’s portfolio like Pray For Three and SixSixSix. All three games use a predominantly black and white colour palette (though more colours seep into the bonus rounds), deal with paranormal subject matter, and do so in a cartoonish kind of way. The actual Count character bobs up and down on one side of the screen, while his headless skeleton compadre bobs on the opposite side. It’s all very Hacksaw Gaming where charming characters front a charming slot, and we haven’t even got to the gameplay yet.
The Count is played on a 5×5 grid, with 19 paylines evaluating winning combinations of 3 to 5-of-a-kind. The bet range is $/€0.10 to $/€75 per game round, while the theoretical RTP is 96.36% at the most, with three lesser return models also available. The math model is medium-highly volatile, rated by the studio at 4 out of 5.
J to A card ranks are The Count’s low pays, all awarding 1x the bet when 5 of them land in a winning combination. Players collect 2x to 5x their stake when landing 5 matching hammers and stakes, headstones, coffins, skulls, or spiders. All wild types, Bats and Bloody, substitute for all paying symbols and are worth 5x for a 5 OAK hit.
The Count: Slot Features
The Count’s features consist of Expanded Bloody Wilds, Wild Bats, three bonus rounds titled Bat to the Bone, Rest in Pieces, and the hidden Count on Blood, plus feature buys.
Expanded Bloody Wild
When a Blood symbol hits, it expands into a Bloody Wild if the expanded symbol is part of a win once expanded. When a Bloody Wild expands, it can be just wild, or it may reveal a multiplier of x2 to x500. When part of a win, the multiplier applies to the value, and when more than one Bloody Wild multiplier is in a win, their values are combined.
Wild Bat Symbols
When a Wild Bat lands, it has an additive multiplier of x2 to x500. When a Wild Bat is part of a win, the value of the win is combined with the multiplier, and if more than one Wild Bat multiplier is part of the same win, the values are added together first before being applied. When an Epic Wild Bat lands, it also has a multiplier of x2 to x500, and it spreads its value to all Expanded Bloody Wilds and other Wild Bats on the reels.
Bat to the Bone Bonus Game
Hit 3 FS scatters in the base game to be rewarded with 10 free spins in the Bat to the Bone feature. On top of the base game mechanics, there is an increased chance of landing Wild Bat symbols. In all three bonus rounds, hitting 2 or 3 scatters awards a further +2 or +4 spins, respectively.
Rest in Pieces Bonus Game
Hitting 4 FS scatters in the base game awards 10 Rest in Pieces free spins. As well as the base game mechanics, a progressive Symbol Counter appears outside the grid with 5 sections linked to each of the 5 low pay symbols. Each time that low pay symbol makes a win, one section is filled on the corresponding Symbol Counter. When all 5 sections are filled, on the next free spin, all corresponding low pay symbols are replaced by Wild Bats for the rest of the feature.
Count on Blood Hidden Epic Bonus
10 Count on Blood Hidden Epic Bonus spins are granted when 5 FS scatters land in the base game. It keeps the mechanics of Rest in Pieces while increasing the chance of landing Epic Wild bat symbols. Five Wild Bats are guaranteed on each spin.
Feature Buys
The Count’s feature buy has BonusHunt FeatureSpins at 3x the bet to make each spin 5 times more likely to trigger a bonus, and Fangtasia FeatureSpins for 50x to guarantee at least 3 Wild Bats land and a high chance of other special symbols. Bat to the Bone and Rest in Pieces cost 100x and 300x the bet, respectively, to buy.
The Count: Slot Verdict
If you asked Gen AI to make an online slot in the style of Hacksaw Gaming, there is a chance it might produce something like The Count. Not because The Count is a generic, soulless, empty piece of faux art made by emotionless code without a heart that beats blood, but because the game is just so classically Hacksaw Gaming in just about every single way. It’s no secret the studio adores spreading mechanics, like it just can’t seem to get enough of them, pulling the mechanic out on a very regular basis. Sure, some players might be over them by now, but at the same time, the team has a real talent for squeezing every last drop of use out of them, altering what they can do, or adding side features to enhance them.
At their base functionality, Expanding Bloody Wilds do very little to nothing that Hacksaw fans won’t have seen before. Hit a Bloody symbol, and watch a waterfall of blood cascade down to their position, making the expanded symbol wild, similar to Fighter Pit, for example, except here, possible multiplier values can be as high as x500, which is big. Expanding Bloody Wilds are also combinable with Wild Bats, and are able to be further boosted if you’re lucky enough to hit an Epic Wild Bat, which also possesses a shareable multiplier value up to x500. With so much potential multiplicative havoc, it’s no wonder The Count’s 12,500x win cap is technically achievable at any stage.
Haters and players with exacting standards are likely to have a field day eviscerating The Count due to the rollout, once again, of a spreading component. Fair enough. But on a positive note, if Hacksaw Gaming slots were somehow miraculously transformed into food items, The Count would be, let’s say, an IKEA hotdog. It’s nothing astonishing, it’s certainly not gourmet, but it’s reliable, hits the spot, and might just have you coming back for more.
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