Honey Rush 100

Honey Rush 100: Slot Overview

Amongst the busy hive of activity in the bee-themed slot category, one which has stood out from the swarm and actually aged quite well is Play'n GO's 2019 release Honey Rush. It had a satisfying blend of bee-inspired activity, enjoyable gameplay (even if some may have been inspired from elsewhere), and enticing potential on top. So sweet, apparently, that the studio has gone back for seconds and come up with Honey Rush 100. For those unfamiliar, the '100' series from PnG represents an enhanced version of previous slot games. They maintain pretty much the same appearance and audio as the predecessors, but introduce increased potential. And so, Honey Rush 100 retains bits which fans of the first will recognise alongside a number of alterations to prompt players back for another go.

One thing that appears to have stayed the same is Honey Rush/Honey Rush 100's acoustic guitar-based soundtrack. The studio would have been hard-pressed to come up with a more homely tune, so it has wisely chosen to leave it alone. Music creates a link between the two games, and the connection is reinforced by the outdoor setting and a hexagonally structured gaming grid taking centre stage. The background this time is much more detailed than before, though, helping up the immersion factor, where nature lovers can take in the flowers, grassy hills, trees and so on in this outdoor arcadia. So far, it's all looking and sounding pretty positive.

On to bet selection, whereby tapping the minus or plus buttons, users may pick a stake of 10 p/c to £/€50 per paid drop. Official stats were sparse at the time of writing, but we can speculate and say players can expect a default RTP of circa 96.2%, along with a highly volatile math model – judging by past Play'n GO releases and the characteristic of the first Honey Rush slot. A cluster paying slot, Honey Rush 100's gaming is held on a 7-reel grid, arranged in a 4-5-6-7-6-5-4 formation, creating a win when at least 5 matching symbols are connected to each other.

Honey Rush 100's pay symbols include 4 flowers on the low side, then a bronze coin, a silver coin, a gold coin, and a diamond at the higher end of the paytable. When landing a cluster which includes 5 matching symbols, the rewards range from 0.1 to 0.5 times the bet, all the way up to 10 to 50 times the bet for a 37-of-a-kind cluster win. Eagle-eyed readers will note those values are quite a bit lower than they were in Honey Rush.

Honey Rush 100: Slot Features

As for features, Honey Rush 100 continues the trend of being somewhat old, somewhat new and includes things like cascading wins, Rush Meter features, Overcharge, Colony features, and a Sticky Wild feature.

Cluster Wins

When a winning cluster appears on the board, the game removes the applicable symbols. The gaps this leaves behind are filled with symbols dropping down from above, and a cascading win sequence ends when no new wins appear.

Rush Meter

The Rush Meter is charged by winning symbols removed by the cascade mechanic. Upon reaching certain collection levels, various Colony features are awarded. When no more wins occur, any queued Colony features are triggered. These are:

• Level 1 – when 30 symbols are collected, the Drone Colony is queued.
• Level 2 – when 60 symbols are collected, the Worker Colony is queued.
• Level 3 - when 90 symbols are collected, the Queen Colony is queued.

Colony Feature

When activated, the Drone Colony feature clones the central symbol while creating a cluster of at least 7 matching symbols with it. The Worker Colony does the same with a minimum cluster size of 10-15, as does the Queen Colony with a minimum cluster size of 20-37 symbols.

Sticky Wild Feature

W symbols are wild and substitute for all other symbols. If a sticky wild is part of a winning cluster, it moves downward to a free position. If it touches the bottom edge of the grid, it drops off into the honey pot, increasing the win multiplier by +1. A full grid of wilds is worth 500 times the bet.

Overcharge

When 90 symbols have been collected, the Rush Meter goes into Overcharge mode. Every 15 symbols collected when the Rush Meter is Overcharged causes the middle symbol to be upgraded. These symbols will upgrade until it is no longer possible to. If the maximum number of upgrades is achieved, the global multiplier will be increased by +3. After the Drone Colony is played, every wild that reaches the bottom of the screen adds +2 to the multiplier; after the Worker Colony and the Queeny Colony play out, falling wilds award +3 to the multiplier. The multiplier's maximum value is x100.

Honey Rush 100: Slot Verdict

After reviewing Sweet Alchemy 100 not long before this, there was a sneaky suspicion that Honey Rush 100 would turn out to be some sort of bee themed reskin of Moon Princess 100 like the Sweet Alchemy one was. What a nice surprise to find out Honey Rush 100 is closer to a sequel of Honey Rush rather than some unimaginative clone. It should be music to the ears of players who were on board with the first game since when designing Honey Rush 100, Play'n GO has ensured a mix of old and new elements have gone in.

Far dues, for some players, there might not be enough new stuff to really justify Honey Rush 100's release. The core gaming continues to revolve around collecting enough winning symbols to trigger Colony features. This time the Jammin' Jars-esque jumping wild symbols have been replaced with the sticky/falling wild feature, feeding into the game's win multiplier. Whereas before wild multipliers maxed out at x27, the win multiplier here can theoretically at least hit x100, hence the name. Winning potential was not available at the time of review, which may or may not be a deal breaker. One would assume it was higher than the original, as tends to be the case in the '100' series.

To sum up, Play'n GO has made another decent '100' version of one of its older slots, and fans should be pretty satiated with the outcome. As with Sweet Alchemy, the remake machine has once again turned out playable enough results. However, adding another do-over to the heap is unlikely to quieten any chatter that Play'n GO is running low creatively and is resorting to scraping the back catalogue for ideas.