Drop ’em Slot (Hacksaw Gaming) Slot Demo & Review

Pull your mind out of the gutter, my friends, when Hacksaw Gaming tells you to “Drop’em”, well, that isn’t what they meant! I mean, come on, Hacksaw is a developer of online slots, so what else would Drop’em be but another high-quality slot machine? The large playfield provides space for up to 7,776 pay ways, whilst the RTP can vary depending on the game mode used but tends to float around 96.21% in general. The top prize is a 10,000x stake jackpot, which should be enough to attract a good crowd of willing players!

Drop’em seems to have two main protagonists – one is a black and white animated mouse, whilst the other is a kind of … yellow walking trashcan. The infuriating thing about this pair is that I’m sure I recognise them from somewhere, but I just can’t seem to put my finger on it! Ah, eureka! It’s Canny the Can and the Mouse dude from Book of Time of course. Anyway, as for the feature set, the reels include special drop symbols that are used to remove additional symbols to improve your chances of hitting repeated wins from a single spin; there are also three different free spin modes – they’re all quite similar to one another, but it’s nice to get a noticeable upgrade when you are lucky enough to hit a four or five scatter trigger! Being a Hacksaw release, we obviously get a bonus buy menu with various featurespins options and the ability to purchase all of the various free spin modes.

Do the two characters described above sound familiar to you? If you think you might recognise this pair, be sure to check out our free demo slot of Drop’em, it’s available below.

Drop Em Slot
ProviderHacksaw Gaming
Reels5
Rows6
Paylines7,776
Bonus Rounds1
Bet Range0.10 - 100
VolatilityHigh
Max Win10,000x
Bonus BuyYes
RTP96.21%
Our Rating8.0

Casino Bonuses


Drop ’em Demo Slot


Drop ’em Slot Theme, Stakes, Pays & Symbols

Drop 'em Slot Paytable
Drop ‘Em Slot Paytable

Hacksaw had something of a golden period a little while back, but their recent output has been much more varied in both style and quality. The developer has released a whole bunch of ‘Dare2win’ games such as Lines, Mines, and Plinko – those types of simple gambling games must appeal to somebody, I guess, but they really aren’t the kind of thing that I would want to play for an extended period of time. There have been some great slot releases along the way too, thankfully – Break Bones, for example, was a particular highlight from memory. Drop’em is certainly a well-presented machine, but I did notice that it seemed to deliver a whole lot of dead spins… so, how about the winning ones?

The highest-paying symbol is the Wild, but it’s only worth 20x the total bet for a full payline of five of a kind. That’s a little alarming in my view, considering how many times I failed to win anything while playing this game. The regular symbols pay much worse, too – the Lightning Bolt awards 5x for all five symbols, whilst the Snake’s Head and Skull drop down to just 2x for five of a kind of those. There are two more ‘high’ symbols – a Bird and a Leaf – both share equal returns of 1.5x for all five symbols, and that just leaves the Five Royals, which all pay the same 0.5x for a five of a kind combination. Thankfully, the large maximum number of pay ways – 7,776 – along with the stacked symbol configurations – do go a long way towards righting the imbalance that these low paytable numbers seem to cause.

The betting range is identical to most other recent Hacksaw releases too – there are minimum/maximum bets of €0.10 and €100.00 respectively, with a fair amount of flexibility between the two extremes. Those who like to bet towards the upper end of the scale have far fewer options, but I think those players are probably rich enough not to be too fussed anyway!


Drop ’em Base Game & Modifiers

Drop 'em Slot Base Game
Drop ‘Em slot base game

Our two protagonists do, of course, have names – Canny and Mona, as the paytable will inform you, are dropping back in with a big bang! Their new game, Drop’em, is a five-reel slot with six rows and a payway-based payout mechanic. This style of game allows you to win several times from a single round, and the information pages go to great lengths to explain that the maximum jackpot prize of 10,000x the total bet is achievable in all game modes – you won’t be spending most of your time just waiting for a feature whilst playing this game.


Drop Symbol

When one or more drop symbols land on the reels, the drop mechanic will kick in and compress all symbols below it, essentially clearing the column for new symbols to drop in. This may sound like a relatively minor feature, but it definitely alters the likelihood of you hitting several consecutive wins from a single spin.


Drop ’em Slot Bonus Features

Drop 'em Slot Free Spins Feature
Drop ‘Em slot free spins feature

The number of scatter symbols you hit in this game determines the feature you will be awarded. There are three possibilities, one for each of the three, four, and five-scatter possible trigger configurations.


Drop Spins Bonus

Landing three scatter symbols will award ten free spins – the feature starts with all of the normal symbols on the reels, but landing further scatters whilst the bonus is active will remove lower-paying symbols from the reels. Each scatter can also add up to three more spins to your remaining total, and it’s even possible to hit an UPGRADE symbol that will transform the remainder of your bonus round into the more generous ‘High Drop Spins’.


High Drop Spins Bonus

Landing four scatter symbols will again award you ten free spins, only this time, the reels have had all their low-paying symbols removed right from the start! Landing extra scatters during this feature can still remove some of the lower-paying ‘high’ symbols and add extra free spins to your remaining total. Once again, there is an UPGRADE symbol present on the reels that can grant you access to the game’s third and final bonus feature.


Wild Drop Spins Bonus

We all know how rare five-scatter triggers are when playing online slots, so it’s great that Hacksaw has made it possible to trigger this mode by hitting the upgrade symbols present on the reels of the less profitable bonus rounds.

The wild drop spins once again award ten free spins, but now the drop symbol mechanic is guaranteed to only add wild symbols to the reels whenever it lands! I can imagine that this should make it much easier to hit a jackpot from this machine, but unfortunately, this is the one option that is not available from the bonus buy menu – if you want to experience the Wild Drop Spins, you’re going to need to put the time (and money) in to get there!


Bonus Buy

The bonus buy menu of Drop’em includes five options – for 3x the current stake; you can have a 400% increase in the odds of triggering some free spins. Boost your bet to 40x, and every spin will guarantee at least three drop symbols will land on the reels – if that’s not enough for you, 150x the current stake will assure you of five drop symbols, which probably guarantees you a win of some size – there’s no promising it will be a profit though!

The remaining two options are the regular Drop Spins (three-scatter trigger) at 100x and the High Drop Spins (four-scatter trigger) at 200x. It’s definitely a shame that there is no option to purchase the Wild Drop Spins, but I’d guess the cost would be prohibitively high anyway.


Pros

  • The cute theme, excellent presentation, and smooth animations – a high-quality game.
  • Three different bonus rounds to aim for and experience.
  • A maximum jackpot prize of 10,000x can be won during the base game and the free spin features.

Cons

  • No option to purchase the best bonus round on the bonus buy menu.
  • Regular paytable prizes aren’t up to much – you’ll need to win on many payways or several times to score yourself anything impressive.

Final Thoughts

I probably wouldn’t go as far as to say that Drop’em represents a return to Hacksaw’s recent glorious period of hit after hit, but it’s certainly an impressive game that deserves to be checked out. I doubt that many players are still going to be spinning this a year down the line, but then again, very few slots are able to engage players to that extent.

8.0

Top-Notch


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