Holmes-and-the-Stolen-Stones

Sherlock Holmes remains as compelling a figure today as when he first appeared in print more than 130 years ago. In Yggdrasil’s reimagining of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s master detective, he still smokes the pipe, and the ever-faithful Dr Watson remains at his side, but Holmes has discarded the tweed suit and rolled up his sleeves to reveal powerful, heavily tattooed forearms. The formidable intellect for which he’s renowned now goes hand in hand with sufficient brawn to do any nightclub bouncer proud – making this Holmes someone you definitely want to be on the right side of! And that’s exactly where this game puts you, as you join Holmes and Watson on a quest to track down and reclaim the precious gemstones that have fallen into the wrong hands.
The excellent graphics that characterize Yggdrasil games are very much in evidence in this 5 x 3, 20 line slot. Their quality, in tandem with a foreboding soundtrack that adds to the suspense and intrigue, makes the 19th century London in which the action takes place feel very gritty and real. Bet sizes range from €0.20 to €40, RTP is 96.8%, and the maximum possible win is 30,000 coins. Two features can be triggered from the Base Game. The Warehouse bonus is a ‘pick me’ feature that can award prizes and diamond shards. Of course, the feature worth hunting down is Jackpot Free Spins, which can be triggered in two ways. Along with the prospect of winning one of five Local Progressive Jackpots, the feature also comes with a 3x multiplier on all wins. A prize is awarded when either the Warehouse Bonus or Jackpot Free Spins is unlocked by 4 or 5 triggering symbols. Together, these things result in a gameplay experience that can get a little more breathless than you may expect from a medium volatility game.
The game features 4 high and 4 low-value symbols, along with 2 special ones in the Bonus and Free Spin symbols. These symbols, which feature two different keyholes, function as Scatters, and unlock the Warehouse Bonus and Jackpot Free Spins respectively. Unusually, there’s no Wild symbol, but this doesn’t have any impact on gameplay. Holmes is the top-paying symbol, followed by Watson, the leather-bound notebook and magnifying glass symbols. The card suit lows are ranked from Spade, through Heart and Diamond, to Club. Here’s what the Holmes and the Stolen Stones paytable looks like:
Holmes and the Stolen Stones has two bonus features, namely the Warehouse Bonus, and Jackpot Free Spins.
Warehouse Bonus
This ‘pick me’ feature is triggered when 3 or more Bonus symbols land on the reels during the Base Game. When the feature is triggered by a quartet of Bonus symbols, a payout of 1,000 coins is awarded. When triggered by 5 symbols, the prize soars to a very attractive 10,000 coins. The scene shifts from the dark alley in which the Base Game plays out, to a large warehouse where 18 sealed wooden crates are stacked invitingly. Pick crates to reveal bags containing 20, 40, 100, 200 or 1000 coins, precious diamond shards, and the one you don’t want – the smoke bomb that ends the feature. Diamond shards won during the Warehouse Bonus are transferred to the container above the reels on return to the Base Game, taking you that little bit closer to unlocking the big one, Jackpot Free Spins.
Jackpot Free Spins
This feature can be triggered in two ways: by landing 3 or more Free Spin symbols, or collecting 5 diamond shards above a reel. In the latter scenario, the Jackpot Free Spins feature begins with one diamond already collected. This gives you the advantage of needing only 4 more shards of that colour diamond to win the associated Jackpot. As with the Warehouse Bonus, when triggered by 4 or 5 symbols respectively, 1,000 and 10,000 coins are awarded. During the feature, every win is multiplied 3x, introducing the potential to win up to 600x your stake by landing 5 of the top symbol. Diamonds land frequently during the feature, and collecting 5 of the same colour results in the associated Jackpot being awarded. The 5 Local Progressive Jackpots above the reels are arranged in order of value from left to right. Their starting values are €40, €200, €600, €1500 and €10 000. 3.4% of all bets contribute to these Jackpots, and while there’s no ceiling to their values, they are designed to trigger frequently, rather than reach enormous values. On average, each jackpot can be expected to drop when it reaches 3x its starting value. Jackpot Free Spins cannot be retriggered, so make the most of your 10 spins every time you unlock the feature!
You don’t need to do any detective work before playing Holmes and the Stolen Stones, but here are some pointers to get you on your way.
Now that you have an idea what to expect from Holmes and the Stolen Stones, you’re probably curious to see for yourself what this slot has to offer. All that’s to be decided is whether to dive in and play for real money from the get go, or feel your way into the game by playing a demo version first. Whichever you decide to do, we have options right here.
Play for real money
If you’ve read enough, and are ready for the excitement of playing a new game with real money, look no further. For our pick of top licensed casinos where you can play Holmes and the Stolen Stones right away, just click this link:Best casinos to play Holmes & the Stolen Stones.
Play free demo version
Many players prefer to get a feel for a slot before they invest real money in it. If that’s you, then the demo version of Holmes and the Stolen Stones is where you should start. The demo offers plenty of free play, and you’ll soon know if you want to raise the stakes or not. To play Holmes and the Stolen Stones for free right here on Slot Catalog, click this link:Play Holmes and the Stolen Stones for free.
Of course, as any experienced player will tell you, you need to play a slot for an extended period to discover everything it has to offer. As they say though, first impressions count, and while a 200 spin trial doesn’t yield results of any statistical significance, it is a great way to get a general feeling for a game. Here’s what we found when we took Holmes and the Stolen Stones for a 200 spin trial.
We set our bet at €1, as this makes it easy to confirm the win per total stake on the paytable. The symbols pay from 1x total stake for 3 of the lowest symbol, to 200x total stake for 5 of the top symbol. As is typical of medium volatility slots, our base game experience was peppered with regular wins, but none of these were worth getting excited about. Amongst our many forgettable wins were two slightly better ones that yielded 8.75x our stake.
It seemed luck was on our side when we triggered Jackpot Free Spins after just 25 spins, and on the very first spin of the feature, proceeded to land diamonds on 4 of the 5 reels! More diamonds followed, and we ended up just one short of winning the lowest of the 5 jackpots. Excitement aplenty, but disappointingly, we achieved only one low win over the course of 10 spins, exiting the feature with just 3x our triggering stake. Hmmmph!
We needed more than 150 spins to trigger the Warehouse Bonus. Once in, we made a series of lucky picks that saw us returning to Base Game with 66x our triggering stake, plus a couple of diamond shards. Not enough to turn us into millionaires, but this was a bit more like it!
The beauty of random slot gameplay is that if you took Holmes and the Stolen Stones for 200 spins right now, the only certainty is that your experience would be different to ours. Clearly, Jackpot Free Spins is where the real money is. In our case, the fact that we didn’t capitalize during the feature, either by winning a jackpot, or landing 5 high symbols to take advantage of the 3x multiplier, put paid to our hopes of making our trial a winning experience. Still, we enjoyed our session, and it certainly felt like things were starting to happen for us in the Warehouse Bonus. The story may well have had a different ending if we’d played for a little longer.
This isn’t the first slot to star Sherlock Holmes, but it may well be the most striking. Its aesthetic merits are an obvious part of this game’s appeal, but the solid engine it’s built on is equally important to the fluidity of the experience. You’re never in any doubt that it’s all about the pursuit of stones – be it shards in the Base Game and Warehouse Bonus, or complete diamonds in Jackpot Free Spins. The fact that shards are transferred from the Warehouse Bonus to Base Game, and can also be converted to a diamond on entry into Jackpot Free Spins if 5 shards of 1 colour have been collected, creates a seamless flow between game states.
If there’s a catch, it’s that diamonds don’t grow on trees! Landing a diamond shard in the Base Game is a relatively rare occurrence, and while the Warehouse Bonus is a sure bet to boost your shard collection, it is far easier to trigger Jackpot Free Spins by landing 3 (we didn’t ever manage the 4 or 5 that result in a payout) Free Spin symbols than by amassing 5 shards of the same colour. During Jackpot Free Spins, diamonds land on nearly every spin, but we never managed to collect quite enough of the same colour diamond to win a jackpot. The 3x win multiplier is Jackpot Free Spins looks to hold plenty of potential, but lining up the 5 highs that get you into the serious money is no easy feat.
Pros
Cons
The combination of a strong theme, breasutiful graphics and exciting mechanics with the potential to win 5 progressive jackpots has seen Holmes and the Stolen Stones becoming something of a classic since its release in 2015. If these are the things that draw you to the game, there are two other Yggdrasil games you’ll also enjoy.
Ozwin’s Jackpot, released in 2018, has as its hero a young apprentice magician, Ozwin. He has been transformed into an owl, and must be turned back into a magician if the world is to be saved. While the theme is entirely different to that of Holmes and the Stolen Stones, the two games share identical mechanics.
Yggdrasil announced Jackpot Raiders to be ‘the successor to Holmes and Ozwin’s Jackpot’ when it was launched in 2019. The game stars two adventurers, Sir Bear Buckingham and Sam Campbell, and is based on similar mechanics to its predecessors, with some notable additions. These include a second Free Spins feature with a 10x multiplier, and the Treasure Hunt, an immersive bonus game that offers two different volatility options. As with its predecessors, this game’s main attraction is the 5 Local Progressive Jackpots that are there to be won.
If Sherlock himself is the main reason you like Holmes and the Stolen Stones, there are several other Holmes-themed slots on the market that you’ll probably like. One that comes highly recommended is Rabcat’s 2019 release, Sherlock of London. While this game doesn’t offer jackpots, something it does have in common with Holmes and the Stolen Stones is the combination of fantastic graphics with great features to create a superior experience. Features include the Connecting Wild, Double Win and Bonus Spins feature (all of which involve the Wild symbol that is central to gameplay), as well as Free Spins.