Black River Gold Online Slot Machine – Free Play & Review

The slot is part of the Gold series, and we’re following its main character (Kane) as he’s trying to get rich in North America, while digging for oil. It’s a game that takes advantage of the beauty that the region’s mountains have, and incorporates certain Wild West elements as well. There is a Sheriff, a small revolver, a badge, pendants, whiskey, diamonds and the standard mix of playing cards/Royals.

Developer

ELK Studios doesn’t really do games with few features, they always seem to provide as much content as possible to their players. On the other hand, their features do seem to repeat themselves at times, so there is a mix of original and common content that you get. This particular game is one of their more original releases though.

How To Play It

The betting system doesn’t change in the slots that ELK releases. It’s the same one that we find here, with bets using 100 coins and worth anywhere from $0.20 to $100 total. A coin denomination between $0.002 and $1 will be selected automatically.

Starting you off with 6×4 reels and 4096 ways to win, Black River Gold has the ability to give the game area a significant boost, and you could end up forming combinations through as many as 262,144 ways to win. While you don’t have to do much, just click on Spin once you’ve selected your bet, understanding everything that is going on might take a couple of minutes, especially with the Revolver feature.

Special Features

As wins are formed, the cascading reels bring around not just new symbols, but add new rows and ways to win as well. You can get up to 262,144 ways eventually, once you expand the area to 6×8 reels. They reset once the cascades are over and you start the new spin.

One of the noteworthy features of Black River Gold would be the presence of big symbols, sized anywhere from 2×2 to 4×4, so there is potential for a lot of matching symbols being added at the same time.

Some of the big symbols will land in positions where there are empty positions underneath, as a result of cascading reels. When that happens, the symbol is transformed into a Revolver cylinder, and it will load its positions with symbols that are found underneath it. Get all six spots filled, and you turn the revolver into a big wild.

Compass symbols are also potentially available, and when one shows up, it will transform symbols into wilds. The direction to which the compass is pointing will decide which symbols get this treatment. Once a Compass hits the bottom of the game area, it is transformed into an additional wild.

Up to 25 free drops are triggered with the help of scatters, anywhere from 3 to 6 required to get inside this feature. In this mode, you don’t reset the game area between spins, so you can get and keep the maximum number of ways to win. If any wilds appear, they stick around until they are part of at least one win, so they’re guaranteed to pay.

Maximum Payouts

Though a game with fairly high volatility, I didn’t find Black River Gold to be as rewarding as other slots. It can offer 262,144 ways to win, but there is a cap on its top jackpot, at 5,000x. It doesn’t sound great, but it’s understandable, as the game still manages to keep a healthy RTP of 96.10%.

Summary

Black River Gold is a good slot machine for the Gold series, a release with high volatility, but also with exciting new features and adequate RTP. I would’ve loved a bigger top jackpot for it though.