Belle The Blade Hunter: Slot Overview

‘If you go down in the woods today, you’re sure of a big surprise‘, and that surprise arrives in the form of Belle, a tough-as-nails boss with an assortment of hefty, razor-edged weapons. The slot is Belle The Blade Hunter from Hacksaw partner Bullshark Games, where the named heroine leads players through dangerous woodland in pursuit of cash prizes. The game leans on a couple of mechanics Bullshark Games has played with before, including individual cell multipliers like those in Paper Biker, and roaming wilds, a.k.a. Amazing Miceketeers. Here, though, Belle The Blade Hunter combines them differently, wrapping everything in a visually appealing, storybook-style adventure.

Even if it’s never stated outright, Belle The Blade Hunter gives off the vibe of a refreshed take on Little Red Riding Hood. On the left stands Belle, blades ready, seemingly eager to carve through anything in her way, while on the right looms a huge black wolf, huffing and puffing. The big bad wolf? Hard to say, but it certainly doesn’t look welcoming. Then again, Belle doesn’t either, and despite the exposed midriff and a touch of cleavage, she feels less overtly sexualised than Triple Edged Studios’ Wicked Tales: Dark Red. Pulling back to view the whole scene, the setting is striking, and the dark, ominous yet strangely enchanting backdrop recalled Foxium’s Cossacks the Wild Hunt, with both games offering an inviting place to spin.

Belle The Blade Hunter is a medium-high volatile slot that runs on a 5×4 gaming grid covered in creeping ivy. Players can set stakes from $/€0.10 to $/€100 per spin, and at those bet levels the RTP is 96.31% on the higher return model, or 94.32% on the lower one.

Wins are made by forming 3 to 5 OAK across the game’s 20 paylines. Landing 5 matching 10-A card ranks returns 1 times the bet, while 5 horns, cleavers, axes, bows, or the other bladed weapon symbols pay 2.5x to 10x the bet.

Belle The Blade Hunter: Slot Features

As Belle tracks through the forest, the action is driven by wilds, cell multipliers, two bonus rounds – Wilds Stalk and Savage Slayer, plus feature buys.

Cell Multipliers and Wild Symbol

Cell multipliers affect only wild symbols that land in that position and contribute to a win. They reset on every new base game spin. Whenever a wild lands, it adds or increases the cell multiplier on that cell. When wild symbols jump to new cells, they apply a fresh multiplier to the cells they arrive on. Additive values range from x2 to x100, while multiplicative values range from x2 to x10.

When a wild helps form a win, it applies its cell’s multiplier to that win. If multiple wilds take part in the same win, the multipliers are added together. Wilds substitute for any paying symbols, and pay 15x for landing 5 on a payline. In the base game, the symbol only boosts the cell multiplier if there is at least one win on the grid.

Respins

Respins are available only in the base game. When 3 or more wilds land on a spin, wins are calculated and a respin begins. Cell multipliers increase progressively, and wild symbols are persistent. Wilds move across the grid with each respin, increasing the cell multipliers as they go. If at least one new wild lands during a respin, another respin is granted. Scatters that land on the initial spin or any respin are added to the counter above the reels.

Wild Stalk

Hitting 3 or 4 scatters activates the Wild Stalk bonus, awarding 8 or 10 free spins, respectively. Before spin one, each scatter symbol places a multiplier of x2 to x100 onto a random cell. Cell multipliers increase progressively, and wild symbols are persistent. On every spin, wild symbols move to new positions and increase cell multipliers in those cells. The feature can be extended because landing a scatter awards +1 free spin.

Savage Slayer

Landing 5 scatters grants 12 free Savage Slayer spins. It follows the same rules as Wild Stalk, except at least one wild is guaranteed on the first spin, and wild symbols appear more frequently.

Feature Buy

The feature buy menu includes BonusHunt FeatureSpins for 3x the bet, making each spin 5 times more likely to trigger free spins, or Blade Frenzy FeatureSpins for 50x, which guarantee at least 3 wild symbols land. The Wild Stalk round can be purchased for 100x, while 200x buys the Savage Slayer.

Belle The Blade Hunter: Slot Verdict

Belle The Blade Hunter’s fun factor took a winding, stop-start route. First impressions were strong thanks to the rich fairy-tale atmosphere Bullshark Games created around the reels. The forest feels light and airy with an otherworldly edge, and Belle reads like a modern Little Red Riding Hood who doesn’t need rescuing, because she’d have no trouble carving up wolves with her blades. Once the base game got going, though, the excitement dipped. Cell multipliers are present in that stage (and respins too, albeit infrequently), but they didn’t seem to make a huge impact. That’s not to say they can’t, since an x100 in the right spot could help rebuild a bruised bankroll, but the mechanics really come into their own during the free spins rounds, whether you trigger them naturally or buy them.

Free spins can be a bit of a tease as well, because even though a wild bouncing around the grid can generate plenty of cell multipliers (or boost existing ones), those multipliers only matter when wilds actually take part in wins. So you can end up with loads of multiplier values scattered across the screen, doing absolutely nothing, like a book left half-written. Wilds are excellent at planting values onto cells, but less eager to link up with winning lines. Still, slots always have another side to the coin, and with the right multipliers lining up alongside roaming wilds, Belle could finally catch her target. As usual, the more roaming wilds you can keep in play, the better the odds of something memorable happening, and in Belle The Blade Hunter the biggest moment is 10,000x the bet. In a nod to how powerful the features can be, that top win is possible in both the base game and the bonuses.

Belle The Blade Hunter offers a tempting set of mechanics with the potential to pay out, all set inside an attractive, fairy-tale-like world. It didn’t feel as satisfying as Bullshark Games’ approach in Paper Biker, which made things cleaner by applying cell multipliers to wins without needing wilds as the go-between. Even so, anyone who enjoys roaming wilds, cell multipliers, and nicely illustrated fantasy settings will find all of that, and possibly more, in Belle The Blade Hunter.