18+ Only. Play Responsibly.
Bjorn was glowing x8.
The Draugr were disappearing.
The mountain was throwing pieces of itself at them.
The stump survived.
Not a magic stump.
Not a rune stump.
Not even a particularly large stump.
Just a chopped piece of Scandinavian tree sitting near the bottom of the 8×8 battlefield while an ancient guardian chosen by the gods fought the dead around it.
Another avalanche ripped through the symbols.
Purple warriors vanished.
Rocks moved.
Runes dropped.
Bjorn stayed lit in green.
The stump returned.
At that point I stopped considering it scenery.
It had tenure.
This was somewhere in the middle of the Bonus Game, with three Free Spins showing on the right and the Global Multiplier already at x8.
A purple group of Draugr had formed a useful cluster below Bjorn.
They connected.
The symbols broke.
New ones fell.
More fighting.
The payout climbed.
A fir tree landed where one of the dead men had been.
The mountain had replaced a supernatural warrior with forestry.
Bjorn had been selected by the gods to defend an ancient power.
Nobody had told him the ancient power might be woodland management.
The spin finished at €9.60.
The feature total moved higher.
There were still spins left.
And the stump was somehow winning the war.
I had started much earlier with €100.00 and €1.00 per spin.
Back then, Bjorn looked far less divine.
He stood in the middle of the grid surrounded by trees, rocks, runes and the occasional suspicious-looking piece of dead woodland.
The dark mountain valley behind him did most of the threatening.
Clouds.
Cliffs.
Pines.
Enough mist to suggest that sunlight had been formally removed from the region centuries ago.
The first spin made a little cluster.
The symbols disappeared.
New ones fell.
Another small connection followed.
€2.20.
Then the avalanches stopped.
Next spin:
rocks.
Trees.
Runes.
Bjorn.
Nothing particularly heroic.
The ancient threat appeared to be taking a coffee break.
A few spins later, a connected group formed on the left.
Avalanche.
Another group dropped into place.
€4.60 total.
Bjorn remained standing in the centre as though this had all been his plan.
A stump appeared two spaces below him.
No payout.
It was my first meeting with the real guardian.
The balance wandered around €96.
Then €93.
A purple Draugr appeared.
Another.
Not enough.
The next spin brought a larger patch of them.
That one connected.
They disappeared in a burst of colour.
New symbols dropped.
A Loot-related flash appeared underneath.
The little strip below the battlefield moved.
Bjorn had apparently found something useful among the dead.
The stump had found peace.
€5.40.
I kept the stake at €1.00.
For a game about an ancient warrior holding back supernatural hordes, Bjorn spent a surprising amount of time surrounded by conifers.
A tree.
Another tree.
Rock.
Rune.
Stump.
Bjorn.
If the Draugr had waited ten minutes, the forest might have reclaimed the ancient power without assistance.
The balance reached €88.00.
That was when I opened BET+.
There were several increasingly expensive hammers offering different levels of interference with destiny.
I took the smallest one.
€1.50 per spin.
A modest divine nudge.
Nothing that required Odin to personally cancel dinner.
The first boosted spin produced almost nothing.
€86.50.
The second built a small avalanche.
€3.00 back.
Then another dry one.
The boost was doing a very convincing impression of a normal mountain.
€84.50.
A purple group landed around Bjorn.
Enough connected.
They broke.
New symbols fell.
Another cluster followed.
Somewhere below, one of the Ability icons stirred.
The whole spin returned €6.30.
Now there was movement.
Not financial progress.
Movement.
The balance kept sliding.
€80.30.
€77.30.
A troll-like shape appeared near the top.
Draugr below.
Runes scattered everywhere.
Bjorn remained planted in the middle while the grid repeatedly changed around him.
It gave him the air of a man who had arrived early to a battle and refused to surrender the good standing spot.
A big cluster formed.
Avalanche.
More symbols fell.
Another.
The Global Multiplier had begun mattering.
Not huge yet.
But alive.
€7.80.
I stayed with the boost.
This was the exact sort of decision a mountain warrior would approve of and a balance would not.
€75.60.
€74.10.
Then €72.60.
The gods remained silent.
A fir tree landed beside Bjorn.
The stump appeared below.
The local vegetation had excellent attendance.
At €69.50, the screen changed.
Bonus Game.
No purchase.
No €150 hammer.
The boosted spins had eventually dragged the door open naturally.
The dark valley stayed.
Bjorn stayed.
The difference was that the fight stopped pretending it might be brief.
Free Spins began.
The first one produced a respectable patch of enemies.
Avalanche.
New drop.
A few symbols joined.
Another avalanche.
The meter beneath Bjorn climbed.
€3.80.
Nothing enormous.
But the battle had finally acquired continuity.
Next spin.
A Draugr cluster appeared on the lower left.
Bjorn flashed.
Symbols broke.
Something from the Ability strip joined the mess.
The Global Multiplier rose.
New symbols dropped into the spaces.
A rock immediately landed where the supernatural excitement had been.
The mountain was restoring itself after each act of violence.
€5.20.
A later spin pushed the multiplier again.
Bjorn started glowing more aggressively.
The battlefield had reached that useful stage where every new connected group felt less like a line win and more like somebody opening another door in a longhouse full of angry dead people.
Purple Draugr connected.
Gone.
Trees fell in.
No connection.
A rune group formed.
Avalanche.
Another enemy patch.
Gone.
The payout kept moving.
The feature did not suddenly become rich.
It became busy.
That was better.
Bjorn was acquiring strength.
Loot was arriving.
Ability effects were firing.
The Global Multiplier kept climbing.
The gods had apparently decided not to solve the problem directly.
They were giving one man increasingly dramatic tools and watching what happened.
Then x8 arrived.
Bjorn glowed.
The green number sat over the battlefield.
A thick purple cluster formed around the lower half of the grid.
This was the opening spin.
The Draugr connected.
Avalanche.
More symbols dropped.
Another connection.
More vanished.
A pine tree arrived.
Then the stump.
Of course the stump.
The ancient dead had been removed at x8.
The stump had not even been inconvenienced.
€9.60.
The feature total passed €20.
Three Free Spins remained.
One was nearly empty.
Rocks.
Runes.
Trees.
Bjorn standing among them with x8 power and nobody worth hitting.
The gods had built a siege engine and the enemies had gone behind a fir.
€0.00.
Next one produced a smaller avalanche.
€3.20.
A green outline flickered around Bjorn again.
The multiplier remained useful.
One final decent cluster broke.
€4.10.
Then the feature ended.
€27.60 total.
Balance:
€97.10.
I had entered the Bonus Game at €69.50.
Bjorn had nearly dragged the entire expedition home.
Nearly.
Considering he had spent part of it fighting landscaping, €27.60 felt respectable.
I switched BET+ off.
Back to €1.00.
The gods could fund their own hammer now.
First normal spin:
nothing.
€96.10.
Second:
small rune cluster.
Avalanche.
€2.00.
€97.10.
Third:
a few Draugr.
Not enough.
€96.10.
Fourth:
trees everywhere.
A stump.
Bjorn.
No fight.
€95.10.
The battlefield looked almost peaceful.
The ancient power was still there.
Bjorn was still guarding it.
The dead had temporarily stopped arriving.
The forest had moved back in.
I gave it two more.
One small avalanche returned €1.00.
The last spin did nothing.
Balance:
€93.10.
I stopped.
Bjorn stood in the centre.
A rune sat above him.
Two rocks had gathered near the bottom.
There were several fir trees.
No Draugr.
No Troll.
No glowing x8.
No gods.
And near the lower edge of the grid sat another stump.
Bjorn had survived the undead.
The undead had survived me often enough to cost €6.90.
The stump had survived absolutely everything.
I knew who I would choose to guard the ancient power next time.
3 Coin Treasures doesn’t offer features. It offers judgment.