Creepy Castle Slot
Creepy Castle isn’t nearly as creepy as its name would suggest. That’s because, despite its pseudo-horror stylings, the ‘creepy’ creatures that appear on its board are little more than one-eyed octopuses and playing card symbols, like something out of Monsters Inc. Sure, they’ve got teeth, but they’ve also got cute in spades.
ReelPlay have crafted a 5-reel slot in which simple pleasures are to be derived from watching the zany characters pop, burst and squish as you record 3, 4 and 5 of a kind wins on the reels. The setting is a haunted castle of some kind complete with cobwebs, candelabras, stone pillars and a full moon glinting through a window.
Castle of Horrors
Creepy Castle is a 25 payline slot set within a standard 5x3 game board. The number of paylines can be adjusted, as can the bet per line which ranges between 0.01 and 50, making for a maximum bet of 1,250. ReelPlay have gone to the trouble of naming their monsters, and as evidence that they’re more mischievous than mean, their names are Ballie, Bato, Tally and Squido. The aim of the game is to turn these monsters wild to activate the Creepy Spins feature.
The game has an autoplay option which can be set between 10 and 100 spins or until you reach the feature. To access the paytable, select the small blue figure crouching to the bottom left of the reels. Any four of the game’s characters can turn wild, in the process substituting for other eligible symbols except for the castle.
Jeepers Creepers
The castle symbol, featuring the title of the slot with a spooky castle in the background, is scatter. Land between 3 and 5 of these in view to activate between 9 and 15 Creepy Spins. Here you’ll get to pick from various doors to identify the monsters lurking inside. Any of the monsters you find will be turned wild for the duration of your free spins. Any time a monster symbol turns wild, it will be identified as such by a green splat and the word ‘Wild’ overlaid in red.
With the maximum bet settings enabled, the playing card symbols are worth no more than 150 for 5. A quick word about their design: due to the singular eye appended to each one, plus the gruesome tongues and teeth, these symbols are full of life, and perfectly complement the monsters who appear in the game. The four monsters themselves are worth between 200 and 350 for 5. In addition to the monsters turning wild, there’s a standalone wild symbol, also a green splat, which is worth 500 for 5.
Other Creepily Good Slots
If Creepy Castle has taken your fancy, there are a good few other slots on the market that play just like this effort. This low to medium variance slot, which has an RTP of just over 95%, isn’t too far removed from Ray Gunn by Gamesys. It’s a 25-payline slot which will award 5 free spins. NextGen’s Neopolis is another contender, a 25-payline game whose primary symbols are diamonds and fruits.
What else? Let’s see, how about Little Duck? This one’s from Capecod Gaming and it has the same variance as Creepy Castle and similar volatility. There are at least a dozen free spins that can be picked up in this game. Like all of the aforementioned slots, one thing Creepy Castle doesn’t have is multipliers to accompany free spins. One final game you might want to try is Happy Holidays by Microgaming, a 243 ways game in which 10 free spins can be claimed.
In Summary
Creepy and cute are two genres that generally don’t overlap but ReelPlay have proven that not only can this be done, but it can be done exquisitely, combining horror lite with the sort of cute characters that could almost belong in a Pixar game. So the graphics and audio are good then. How about the gameplay? It’s pretty good too, even if more experienced players will be left lamenting the lack of any extras to liven things up.
Sure, there are scatters and wilds, but they all behave predictably, leaving you nursing the suspicion that more could have been with this game. Despite this, Creepy Castle is still a great little slot, one that’s big on fun and which never takes itself too seriously.
