Fish and Bird

Elk Studios sends the fishing genre somewhere it rarely goes with Fish and Bird, swapping the usual bright, bubbly look for a dim, weathered seascape that still carries a cartoon edge. A lone fisherman rows out each morning against a shifting soundtrack that drifts between traditional folk and something closer to festival pop.

The action plays out on a 4x4 grid, an unusual shape for the genre, paying across 256 ways with wins forming from the leftmost reel across adjacent positions. Eight regular symbols split the paytable into two groups, four jellyfish worth less individually and four fish making up the stronger tier, and any of them can land as a single 1x1 tile or grow into 2x2, 3x3 and 4x4 blocks the game labels super, mega and epic. Four matching jellyfish return 0.2x the stake, while four matching fish pay between 0.5x and 2x.

Wilds and bonus symbols spread once they land: one appearing vertically fills its entire reel, while one landing horizontally fills its whole row, and either can substitute for any paying symbol. Above the grid sits a boat carrying the Collector, who gathers up whatever Prize fish, bonus symbol or bird multiplier occupies its column. A Super Collector goes further, pulling in every multiplier in its column plus every Prize fish and bonus symbol anywhere on the grid. Collecting a Prize fish pays out its value multiplied by whatever the global multiplier has reached, while collecting a bird adds that bird's value onto the multiplier instead. Each collection also banks a free spin and shifts the Collector one column left, and every round starts the multiplier back at its base. When Prize fish or bonus icons are visible without a Collector present, a Diver can drop down the grid on its own, sweeping up anything in its column.

Landing a bonus symbol in the base game opens the Bonus Game, which begins with one guaranteed Collector that moves left after every spin, with fresh Collectors free to join in as it runs; the round ends once none remain on screen. A rarer super bonus symbol swaps every Collector in the round for a Super Collector instead.

Fish and Bird's X-iter menu lets players buy into the action directly: 2.5x the stake buys a spin with better odds of triggering a bonus naturally, 10x guarantees a spreading wild, 25x guarantees a big fish symbol, and 50x or 250x buy straight into the regular or super bonus round respectively.

Fish and Bird's volatility rating of 6 out of 10 lines up with a 94% RTP, a 0.20-100 betting range, and a 10,000x maximum win at the top of the pay table.