Dragon Age Hold & Win Slot Review
Pale sandstone peaks rise out of a soft haze over a green valley, and a sword-carrying woman in a white robe watches the reels from the frame’s edge. That painterly East Asian fantasy is the best thing in BGaming‘s Dragon Age Hold & Win, and the gap between the artwork and the maths underneath it is the whole story of this slot. The paint is bespoke. The payouts are a hold-and-win template.
It runs on a 5×3 grid with 25 paylines at 96.14% RTP and high volatility, with a fixed 5,000x jackpot buried in the coin-collecting bonus round. It’s familiar territory next to Wild Coin Gold and Chicken Fire, and it sits near Dragon Queen Megaways in the studio’s dragon-flavoured corner.
Symbols and Pays
Twenty-five fixed lines pay left to right across the five reels, and only the highest combination on each line counts. The dragon head is the wild, substituting for everything except the Scatter and Coin symbols, and it doubles as the richest symbol on the board. Values below are multiples of the total bet.
- Wild dragon head / Gold ingot: 25x, 100x, 500x for three, four, five
- Money bag: 15x, 50x, 200x
- Pagoda firecracker: 10x, 40x, 150x
- Green fan: 10x, 30x, 125x
- A, K, Q, J royals: 5x, 10x, 50x
Three Scatters pay 1x the bet and trigger the free spins. The Coin symbol pays nothing on the lines. Its whole job is counting towards the bonus round, which is where the real money lives.
The gap between tiers is steep at the top and flat at the bottom, so the high symbols carry almost all of the line-pay weight. A four-of-a-kind ingot win is already a strong hit for the base game. That’s the shape of it: thin in the middle, rich at the very top.
Bets are set through the Total bet field, and higher bets scale every win proportionally, including the coin values and the jackpot in the respin round. Autospins can be configured by round count, with the total cost confirmed up front as the number of spins multiplied by the bet.
A quick spin toggle speeds the reels up, though licensing rules can keep it switched off in some markets. It’s a small mercy on a high volatility game where most spins return nothing.
Free Spins
Three Scatters on reels one, three and five award 10 free spins. If three more Scatters fall during the round, another 10 spins are added, and there’s no cap on how many times that can happen. It’s a plain retrigger, with no multiplier upgrade or special symbol behaviour attached.
One restriction is worth knowing: the Free Spins feature and the Gold Respin can’t be triggered on the same spin. Land the Scatters and six coins together, and only the free spins count. That keeps the two rounds cleanly separated, but it also means the biggest bonus on offer can’t stack with the scatter trigger.
There’s no multiplier, no expanding symbol and no symbol removal in play here. The round uses the same reels, the same paytable and the same wild as the base game, so the only thing a retrigger buys is more of what came before it.
Gold Respin
Six or more Coin symbols anywhere on the reels trigger the Gold Respin, the hold-and-win round the game is named for. Coins lock in place for the duration, and each carries a value from the ladder below, as a multiple of the bet.
- x1, x2, x3, x4, x5, x6, x7, x8, x10, x14, x16, x18, x20
- Starting respins: six, with every Plus spin symbol adding one more
- Collect symbol: sums the values of all Gold Coins present on the screen
- Coins lock on landing and stay until the round ends
Every new coin that lands sticks where it fell. Nothing resets the respin count except a Plus spin symbol, and multiple Plus spins on a single spin stack their awards, so a lucky spin can buy the round several extra lives at once.
The Collect symbol works differently from the coins around it. It doesn’t hold a value of its own; it sums up the values of all Gold Coins present on the screen.
One quirk deserves plain spelling out. A screen that would normally show six or more coins can have some of them substituted with other symbols, which cancels the trigger entirely. Starting the round with a completely full screen of coins isn’t possible either. So the respin can look guaranteed and still not arrive.
The 5,000x Jackpot
Fill all 15 positions on the reels with coins during the Gold Respin and the jackpot lands: x5,000 the bet, paid on top of the round’s coin total. At that point the bonus ends and you’re returned to the main game. Fifteen coins can’t land in the base game or the free spins round, so this prize belongs to the respin alone.
Because every coin is locked from the moment it lands, the jackpot is a straight fill-the-grid exercise. Plus spin symbols are the difference between running out of respins and completing the screen, which makes them the most valuable symbols in the round despite paying nothing themselves.
The ladder’s shape matters too. Values jump from x8 to x10, x14, x16, x18 and x20 at the top, so the last few coins a screen collects are worth far more than the first. Reaching the grid’s final positions rewards you twice over: the bigger coin values, and the jackpot that lands with them.
Our Honest Verdict
Overall Rating: 7/10
This is a slot you play for one reason: to fill a temple-carved screen with coins and see whether the 5,000x jackpot at the end of it lands. Everything between bonus rounds is a wait, and the free spins round barely qualifies as a bonus at all. But the Gold Respin genuinely builds. Locked coins, stacking Plus spins and a prize that only exists behind a full fifteen-coin screen give the round a tension the rest of the game never approaches.
The weakness is that the substitution rule can take a six-coin screen away from you after it’s already landed. Nothing else here comes close to being that unfair, and nothing else here has any ideas the format hasn’t had for years.
If you love the hold-and-win grind and want the prettiest version of it going, this valley is worth the walk. Anyone chasing a bonus round with a surprise in it will find the dragon hoarding the same old gold.
Frequently Asked Questions
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What is the RTP of Dragon Age Hold & Win?
The RTP is 96.14%. If you buy the bonus rather than triggering it, the RTP is 96.01%. -
Is Dragon Age Hold & Win high volatility?
Yes, it’s a high volatility slot, so wins are less frequent but can be considerably larger when they arrive. -
How many paylines does Dragon Age Hold & Win have?
It has 25 fixed paylines, paying left to right across the 5×3 grid. -
How do you trigger the Gold Respin bonus?
Six or more Coin symbols anywhere on the reels start the Gold Respin. You get six respins with coins locked in place, and Plus spin symbols add extra respins. Note that a screen showing six or more coins can sometimes have coins substituted for other symbols, which cancels the trigger. -
Can free spins retrigger in Dragon Age Hold & Win?
Yes. Three Scatters on reels one, three and five award 10 free spins, and three more Scatters during the round add another 10. Free Spins and the Gold Respin can’t be triggered on the same spin. -
How do you win the jackpot in Dragon Age Hold & Win?
Fill all 15 reel positions with Coin symbols during the Gold Respin to win the 5,000x jackpot, paid on top of your coin wins for the round. The jackpot can’t be won in the base game or free spins. -
Can you buy the bonus on Dragon Age Hold & Win?
Yes, the game has a Buy Bonus button that takes you straight to the feature. The RTP in the Buy Bonus is 96.01%. -
When is Dragon Age Hold & Win released?
Dragon Age Hold & Win’s release date is 18 June 2024.
