This week I will review a slot from Merkur with the name of Magic Monk Rasputin. It is a slot with three reels and five winning lines, your mission is to gather a lot of wins with crowns, rings and faberge eggs to get all the way to the top. There’s a number of ways to play with your winnings, but there’s not any wild- or scatter symbols in this slot. The RTP that this mysterious slot is offering is looking pretty good at 94,80-97,97%.
Brief history of Rasputin – The man who wouldn’t die
Grigorij Jefimovitj Rasputin was born 1869 in the village Pokrovskoje in Sibiria. He grew up there in a peasant family that couldn’t read or write. He got in contact with a sect who believed that a man only could achieve God’s mercy by first sinning so deeply that he reach the bottom – and then ask for forgiveness in front of God. He is known as one of Russia’s most mythical men. According to his daughter, Rasputin first thought the sect was repelling. Later on Rasputin made use of the sect’s philosophy by offering women to sin together with him to be able to receive Gods full forgiveness through him as a medium. Rasputin was a Siberian preacher, faith healer and spiritual advisor. He arrived in St Petersburg in 1904 and became a regular counsellor to the tsarina because of his ability to help her son with his haemophiliac sickness. Time went and he won the tsarina’s trust, he eventually provided her with advice in politics which led to firing and switching ministers. Rasputin was practically running the entire russian empire. The tsar had sent out 15 million russians in WWI, every single month 300 000 russians died and the escape goat seemed to be Rasputin that was whispering everything that had to be done in the tsarinas ears. The romanov dynasti had to be saved and Rasputin was lured to a love trap the 16th december 1916. The leader of the complot was Feliks Jusupov, a dandy man who used to be described as Europes most beautiful man. He was married to Irina, the niece of the tsar and known as Russias most beautiful woman. Rasputin took the bait in the basement of Jusupovs palace. Feliks had spiked the wine and cakes with potassium cyanie, Rasputin ate and drank for two hours without dying. He got a little sleepy and wanted the late Irina to come home so that they could go to bed with each other. The complot started shooting Rasputin, stabbing him and kicking him in the head. Thereafter the body was lowered in the river Neva.
Gameplay
When you walk in to Magic Monk Rasputin you will notice that the slot has a very different, special slot mechanics. It doesn’t have any special symbols, no wilds or scatters. What it has is different “point ladders” that are linked to the different symbols in the slot. When you win on a line in the slot you will climb up in the ladder that matches your symbol. Every step up makes the potential cashout greater. You build up a “cash pot” which you can cash out whenever during the game. You can also choose to make partial cashouts where you cash out some of the wins and only drop down one level. If you are for example on level 8 and make a partial cashout you will land on level 7. But to gain the biggest wins in this slot you have to be on the higher levels of the ladder that goes all the way up to 20. So, what is the reason to cashout earlier if you can with a little bit of patience go to the top levels and also the biggest wins? This is where Rasputin comes in. This horrible man pops up and give you the creeps, at the same time he resets all the ladders. Which means that you are back on zero, all the points you had collected are removed and you have to start over again. This can trigger you quite a bit. To win big you have to risk it, but it might bite you if you go too far. Magic Monk Rasputin will give you a love-hate relationship.
Conclusion
We definitely like Magic Monk Rasputin! It is a slot that delivers a lot of psychological excitement. You have to constantly ask yourself if you should collect or keep on going for the biggest winnings which is an excellent feature that Merkur Gaming has succeeded with. Who knows when Rasputin pops up and destroys all you’ve built up in the slot, you have to play it cool and risk it to win big. I rate the slot 5/5 and wish you the best of luck with playing it!
