Gold Rush Slot – Free Demo

Habanero sends you down a mine shaft

Gold Rush is an online slot by Habanero. Its one feature round is a set of free games, opened by the dynamite scatter. They are a crew working the traditional end of the marketplace, and Gold Rush is an uncomplicated game which travels to a locale far more recognisable than outer space – an operating gold mine. The odd moments sit inside those free games, where mine collapses drop a single symbol across the reels. A journey down a mine shaft seems conventional enough. I ran 450 spins at 3.50 a spin to see what was down there. But rest assured, Habanero has managed to stuff a couple of peculiar moments into Gold Rush.

No RTP is printed anywhere in Gold Rush

Shifting behind the scenes, Gold Rush arrives with much the same set of statistics as an older release would, which signifies no published RTP value at all and a fairly modest volatile math model, rated 2 of 5. There is no cap stated on what a single run of free games can total, either. The layout is dated. Only the highest win counts on each line, and wins on separate lines are added together. The action happens on a game panel composed of 5 reels and 3 rows, and players collect coins when identical symbols land left to right from the left-hand side, across 25 paylines, all of them played.

From the mine door down to the lantern

The symbols are a mining roster. Every one of them pays left to right from the leftmost reel, apart from the dynamite. It is headed by the mine door, then the miner and the bandit, then the donkey, mine cart, barrel and dog, and finally the gold pan, pickaxe and lantern, and the pay table displays cash values at a bet level that cannot be converted into stake multiples. Line wins are multiplied by the bet per line. 2 kinds of special symbol turn up at assorted moments, too, to help you win. These are the gold nugget wild and the dynamite scatter.

A collapse drops 3 to 15 of one symbol

Naturally, there are only a few things happening here, but a couple of them are worth the wait, so buckle in. The list runs to the free games, the mine collapses and the two special symbols. I'll burrow through them.

Mine collapses are set off inside the free games, at random in each one. No hit rate is stated for them, so a free game can pass without one. In the last one they are assured. So a run of free games always ends with at least one collapse. Every mine collapse features a distinct random symbol. Neither the choice of symbol nor the number that fall is weighted in any way the rules describe. 3 to 15 of that symbol will drop and land anywhere on the spinning reels, like a mystery symbol scheme, and all symbols including the gold nugget can drop in a mine collapse. Since the nugget substitutes for everything but the dynamite, a collapse of wilds can complete lines all over the grid. The dynamite is the one exception.

The gold nugget and the dynamite

The gold nugget is the wild, and it substitutes for everything except the dynamite. A paying line still needs at least one symbol in it that is not a wild. It pays on its own: 500 for five, 100 for four, 50 for three. The dynamite is the scatter. It is also what opens the free games. It pays anywhere – 125 for five, 62.50 for four, 25 for three – with those wins added to line wins and multiplied by total bet.

Three dynamite anywhere opens the free games

Landing 3, 4, or 5 dynamite anywhere grants 10, 12, or 15 free games, and they are played at the lines and bet of the activating spin. The trigger scatters pay their own win on the same spin, added to whatever the lines produce. The feature cannot be retriggered. So the count handed to you at the start is the count you play out. The dynamite does not surface during it.

Minty’s Closing Thought: Three bonus rounds across 450 spins gave the session back 66.6% of everything wagered, and the mine collapses are the reason any of it was fun to sit through.

A jackpot clock the pay table never mentions

On the whole, Gold Rush was a simple enough Habanero game to play, light on features and quick to absorb, and there's a pleasant rhythm to the proceedings and nothing sinister to report. Three bonus rounds turned up across the 450 spins. However, it didn't make quite as favourable an impression as it might have. The session returned 1,048.95 against 1,575.00 wagered. Since aside from the absent RTP, Gold Rush's features operate without a hitch, there's only the maths to fault really.

So then, the chief problem is that the game tells you nothing about itself: no RTP is displayed anywhere, no volatility rating, no max win. Nor is there a bet range or a coin table, which is why the cash pay table stays cash. The Jackpot Race timer ticking away on the game screen is unexplained in the pay table – no qualifying bet, no prize, no draw mechanic. It sits above the reels as an operator layer rather than documented game mechanics. This is just a remark. Who knows, other players might be all over a mystery jackpot clock, or not even spot it.

Three bonuses in 450 spins

It's simpler to look past this aspect of Gold Rush when the mine collapses, the free games and all the rest of it are going your way. The balance started at 2,000.00. Over 450 spins at 3.50 a spin, that occurred three times. The first came from three dynamite and 10 free games. A first bonus on spin 21 paid 19.6x the stake and placed the balance at its 2,043.40 peak, then nothing at all for 347 spins, then two more in the space of twelve, worth 8.2x and 26.0x. The balance never came back to that peak, and bottomed out at 1,455.45. It would be pleasant to get some statistics to hang on that, the way Nolimit City has been forthcoming with in recent games – for instance, how often three dynamite are meant to land. The second of the three arrived on spin 368 and paid 28.70. Or how many mine collapses one feature can contain beyond the assured one would be intriguing. The third followed twelve spins later and paid 91.00, with a further 9.80 from the base game on the same spin. Just musing out loud here. The largest single spin was 108.50 on spin 355, 31.0x the stake, with no bonus attached to it. No matter how you approach the game, the session concluded at 66.6% of everything wagered.

Gold Rush's sparse paperwork meant the game didn't feel quite as finished a package as it might have. The longest run without a win was eight spins, ending on spin 113. However, Gold Rush produced a number of thrills during testing. The balance closed at 1,473.95. 188 of the 450 spins paid something, even if 124 of those paid less than the stake, and mine collapses are enjoyable. That works out at 42% of spins returning something. The honest plainness was favourable on the whole, rendering Gold Rush a tidy enough entry in the Habanero catalogue.