Blood & Shadow Slot Review

Blood & Shadow Slot RTP, Details and Wager Limits

The Blood & Shadow slot is initially played with 5 reels, 4 rows and 1,024 ways to win. Winning combinations are simply created by landing 3, 4 or 5 matching symbols anywhere across successive reels, beginning from the leftmost reel. There’s up to 3,125 ways to win as you’ll discover later on. You’ll also see a Ritual Bar below the reels which we go into more detail below.

You can play Blood & Shadow from 20p to £280 a spin. Like with other Nolimit City slot games, click/press the Dollar sign icon below the reels. This will bring up all 25 stake options. Players outside the UK have 2 more gameplay options. There is Autoplay where you can enable up to 1,000 autospins with balance and single win limits. Additionally, the Lightning Mode (lightning icon at bottom of screen) speeds up the spins.

The Blood & Shadow RTP is 96.13% which is above the 96% average. However, NLC offer 94.03% and 92.04% RTP versions which may be on offer at some UK casinos. To verify which RTP rate you’re playing with, head to the Paytable.

Extreme high volatility (10/10), Blood & Shadow offers a 27.18% hit frequency rate. This means a winning combination forms every 3.68 spins on average.

Finally, the Blood & Shadow slot offers 6,666 x bet max wins. The max payout probability is 1 in every 97 million spins. Winning 100 x your total bet or higher will occur every 914 spins (on average). Furthermore, you will trigger the Candle Spins feature every 13 spins with the Cursed Spins feature activating every 10,030 spins.

Theme – enact the ritual for eternal youth

With a black magic theme, the Blood & Shadow slot is the sequel to the Book of Shadows slot. Set deep in the shadows of an abandoned cathedral, a dark mist lays where the underworld is free to roam and immortality beckons (according to Nolimit City).

Nightmare-inducing demons rule the night and are ever-thirsty for your soul. Once you’re hexed, there’s no returning in blood or in shadow. The story focuses on Shadow Girl who has studied the forbidden arts for decades away from any form of civilisation. Join her as she enacts the ritual for eternal youth.

Visually, Blood & Shadow is very dark with skulls and candles laid out in preparation for Shadow Girl’s ritual. It is inspired by the Book of Shadows book which was created by Gerald Gardner (the father is Wicca). Truth be told, it looks like a scene for an Ozzy Osbourne music video.

In terms of the soundtrack, you’ll hear harrowing winds as you spin the reels. Each symbol landing sounds like footsteps which adds to the eerie atmosphere. Whilst it doesn’t have a backing track, the intensity and hollow noises will have you spinning with trepidation. Aesthetically, Nolimit City has done a great job and will surely appeal to those who like the horror genre.

On the reels, you have low value icons for the below symbols (raven, snake, ram, wolf and the triple goddess). Then you have ravens, snakes, rams, wolves and an old woman (who looks like a skeleton). These are medium value symbols. Highest paying is the old woman symbol who are awards 0.5, 1 or 1.5 x bet for 3, 4 or 5 across a payline.

Higher value symbols include the demon raven, demon snake, demon ram, demon wolf and the Shadow Girl herself. The Shadow Girl symbol is the best paying with 2.5, 4 or 8 x your total bet awarded for 3, 4 or 5 in combination. These only appear once you level-up from the Ritual Bar (more details below).

Finally, other symbols include the Sticky Wild which lands on reels 2, 3, 4 and/or 5. It appears during the 2 free spins features. Then you have the xSplit symbol which is activated during the Cursed Spins feature. Lastly, there is a Heart Scatter symbol that appears during the Cursed Spins feature only.

Symbol	Payouts/Info
Raven Icon	3, 4 or 5 = 0.05, 0.1 or 0.15 x bet
Snake Icon	3, 4 or 5 = 0.05, 0.1 or 0.15 x bet
Ram Icon	3, 4 or 5 = 0.1, 0.2 or 0.3 x bet
Wolf Icon	3, 4 or 5 = 0.1, 0.2 or 0.3 x bet
Triple Goddess Icon	3, 4 or 5 = 0.2, 0.4 or 0.6 x bet
Raven	3, 4 or 5 = 0.3, 0.6 or 0.9 x bet
Ram	3, 4 or 5 = 0.3, 0.6 or 0.9 x bet
Snake	3, 4 or 5 = 0.4, 0.8 or 1.2 x bet
Wolf	3, 4 or 5 = 0.4, 0.8 or 1.2 x bet
Old Woman	3, 4 or 5 = 0.5, 1 or 1.5 x bet
Demon Raven	3, 4 or 5 = 0.75, 1.5 or 3 x bet
Demon Snake	3, 4 or 5 = 1, 2 or 4 x bet
Demon Ram	3, 4 or 5 = 1.5, 2.5 or 5 x bet
Demon Wolf	3, 4 or 5 = 2, 3 or 6 x bet
Shadow Girl	3, 4 or 5 = 2.5, 4 or 8 x bet
Sticky Wild	Appears during 2 free spins features
xSplit	Only appears during Cursed Spins feature
Heart Scatter	Adds 10 points to Ritual Bar + free spins in Cursed Spins feature

Blood & Shadow Mobile

Released on the 7^th of March 2023, the Blood & Shadow slot has been created using HTML5 technology. This means it can be played on mobile, laptop, PC and tablet devices. Responsive to whatever device you play on, mobile players can enjoy this Nolimit City release on iOS, Android and Windows powered smartphones.

Blood & Shadow Bonus Features

The Blood & Shadow slot comes with 5 bonus features. Tumbles lead to symbols/points being collected in the Ritual Bar which then increases your level. Symbols are replaced by high value ones as well as give you Candle Spins with sticky wilds. Make it to level 5 to play the Cursed Spins feature which is played with 3,125 ways to win and an xSplit symbol that awards multipliers.

Tumble feature

When you land a winning combination, the Tumble feature is triggered. Winning symbols are destroyed with the remaining symbols tumbling down to fill the vacated positions. This then allows for new symbols to fall in and hopefully award another winning outcome.

Ritual Bar

Below the reels, you will notice a Ritual Bar. This fills up with winning combinations of medium or high value symbols as well as Heart Scatters:

• +1 per winning symbol: medium value symbols
• +2 per winning symbol: high value symbols
• +10 per scatter symbol: Heart Scatters only

At the Ritual Bar, there are 5 levels of progression. With the Ritual Bar resetting for each level-up, exceeding collects are carried over to the next level. Below is a table showing the number of points needed and the average number of spins it will take to reach that level:

With each level you reach, the lowest paying symbol is removed from play and converts medium paying symbols to high paying symbols. The higher the level you reach, the more lucrative the symbols on the reels basically.

Candle Spins feature

The Candle Spins feature is activated when you reach a new level of the Ritual Bar, until level 4. You will be rewarded with 2 free spins (or Candle Spins) each time. If you manage to reach level 5, you will enter the Cursed Spins feature with 6 free spins.

During the Candle Spins, a Sticky Wild symbol can appear (on reels 2 through 5) which drops down to the bottom of the reel until is part of a winning combination.

Cursed Spins feature

When you reach level 5 of the Ritual Bar, the Cursed Spins feature will be triggered. The Ritual Bar is removed and you’ll play with 5 rows meaning 3,125 ways to win. On top of this, only high value symbols appear on the reels.

As with the Candle Spins, Sticky Wilds remain on the reels until part of a win. Landing a Heart Scatter symbol will reward you with 1 additional free spin, with no limits.

Furthermore, the xSplit feature comes into play. When an xSplit symbol lands, it will either split the row or the reel. It will split any symbol and multiply the symbol size by 2. Multiple xSplit symbols can land on the same row but not on the same reel.

Nolimit Bonus feature

As with all Nolimit City slots these days, the Blood & Shadow slot comes with an optional Nolimit City Bonus. Not available in the UK, you can buy various extras from between 66 and 500 x your total bet. With 4 options available, the RTP changes too. Here are all the details:

If you go for the Baphomet Rite option, you will instantly progress the Ritual Bar to level 3 with 6 free spins in the Candle Spins feature. 3 low and medium value symbols will be replaced by 3 high value symbols too. The 1-5 Lucky Draw option will see you randomly be placed at level 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5. Alternatively, the 3-5 Lucky Draw option will see you enter at level 3, 4 or 5.

Blood & Shadow Review Summary – new type of collection slot from Nolimit City

First and foremost, the Blood & Shadow slot is visually superb. Following on from Book of Shadows, the imagery is dark and twisted but not to the degree found in the Serial and Mental slots. I do think, however, that the sounds used are brilliant and really make you feel like something bad is going to happen at any given moment.

The other thing I noticed is how the collected/winning symbols are destroyed and turn to blood when then fills the Ritual Bar. Whilst Book & Shadow may be a follow-up thematically to the Book of Shadows slot, the gameplay is completely different to anything Nolimit City has previously released.

It’s a collection game where you add points to the Ritual Bar in order to progress through the levels. With each level, low value symbols are replaced with high value ones. Once you enter the Candle Spins feature, you’ll benefit from Sticky Wilds which remain in play until you win from them.

In the Cursed Spins feature, you’ll play with 3,125 ways to win and only high value symbols. However, I found the xSplit feature to be the key to winning decent amounts though. Splitting the row or reel will land to multipliers being applied. That said, it will take approximately 10,030 spins to trigger the Cursed Spins as opposed to 13 for the Candle Spins.

Whilst the Blood & Shadow slot doesn’t offer the max win potential of Book of Shadows or other Nolimit City slots for that matter, features trigger regularly to keep you coming back in order to find eternal youth. With 6,666 x bet max wins, Nolimit City have gone for a different approach that’s well worth undertaking.

In terms of win potential, winning 100 x bet or high will occur every 1,076 spins whilst it will happen every 39,000 spins on average for wins of 500 x bet or higher. If you manage to trigger the Cursed Spins feature, the max win will occur every 767 spins. From the Baphomet Rite option (for non UK players), it will take approximately 258,000 spins.

The key is the Cursed Spins feature from a payout perspective but the journey with the Shadow Girl is well worth investigating. What is guaranteed is a unique experience that surely Nolimit City will explore and expand on with future releases.