Cygnus 4

Cygnus 4: Slot Overview

If two's company and three's a crowd, what's four? Maybe developer ELK Studios knows since it's gone and designed slot number 4 in the celestially inspired Cygnus range. Cygnus 4 gives players another helping of gravity-influenced avalanche action where you want certain symbols to hit the leftmost pillar of the grid or its bottom. One new thing about Cygnus 4 is that its multiplier pillar can level up, and when reaching the top of the third and final multiplier pillar, players instantly collect the game's impressive maximum payout.

Released in 2019, the original Cygnus took place in Egypt, the follow up, Cygnus 2 (2022), in a fancy observatory, Cygnus 3 (2023) in a Colosseum kinda place, and Cygnus 4 looks like it's held in a stylised representation of London from the days of yore. The main clue is that the four towered building sitting behind the game grid looks a lot like the White Tower at the famous Tower of London, one of the oldest buildings in the capital. Above it in the night sky hangs the Cygnus constellation, serving as a link to tie the four games together.

Another thing tying Cygnus slots together is that they begin each base game spin by dropping 4-rows of symbols into a 6-reel grid, where the reels sit unevenly next to each other so symbols can roll sideways when avalanche wins occur. At the base level, there are 4,096 ways to win, but this number climbs to 262,144 when the grid reaches its maximum 8 rows high. All have been in the medium/high to high category in terms of volatility, which Cygnus 4 is as well. Remember Cygnus's 96.1% RTP? Well, those days are gone, and Cygnus 4 produces an RTP of 94% either when betting 20 c to $/€100 per spin or when using any of the X-iter features.

Wins occur when matching symbols land on adjacent reels starting from the leftmost side, and the avalanche feature removes winning symbols. The remaining symbols fall downwards/sideways until reaching a resting position, then an additional row of symbols is added – up to 8 rows high. Avalanche wins repeat like this until no new win appears, then the grid resets to its default configuration for the next spin. The pay symbols are circular items displaying blue, green, and red gems, a serpent, a unicorn, a gryphon, and an eyed pyramid. Very Illuminati. Winning ways of 6 OAK award payouts of 0.2 to 0.5 times the bet for the gems and the creature symbols, or 10x the bet for 6 of the pyramids. When wilds appear, they substitute for any regular pay symbol.

Cygnus 4: Slot Features

Features aren't wildly different to those found in the first two Cygnus slots, where we come across a win multiplier, levelling up, free drops, and X-iter feature buys.

Multiplier

Multiplier symbols land randomly on the grid, and a multiplier pillar makes up the leftmost side of the gaming grid. If a multiplier symbol reaches the leftmost column or the bottom of the reels, it increases the current multiplier value, then turns into a wild symbol. The multiplier increases, and symbol transformation takes place before the payout.

Level Up

Should a level-up symbol reach the leftmost column or the bottom of the reels, it levels up the entire multiplier pillar, then turns into a wild. The multiplier pillar rotates, and the current multiplier takes the same relative position on the new pillar. The multiplier pillar has 3 levels, and when reaching the top of the third pillar, the game will pay out the remaining amount needed to reach the win cap. If a level-up and a multiplier symbol activate at the same time, the pillar will level up first, then the multiplier value will increase. Levelling up and multiplier progress resets at the start of a new base game round.

Free Drops

When a scatter symbol reaches the leftmost column, then 7 free drops are awarded. It gets a helping hand in some ways because when a scatter hits the bottom of reels 2-6, it is added to the top of the next reel to the left – this may occur once per cycle. The current active multiplier, as well as pillar level, are carried over to the bonus round when it starts. Each new free drop starts with 4 rows of symbols, and the active multiplier and pillar level persist till the round ends. Bonus symbols reaching the leftmost column trigger additional free drops.

X-iter

From the X-iter, players can buy certain features, including some that are not available otherwise.

• Bonus Hunt – one drop for 3x the bet with more than double the chance of triggering free spins.
• Multiplier Pillar on Level 3 – one drop where the multiplier pillar starts at level 3 for 10x the bet.
• Multiplier Wilds – one drop where multiplier symbols are also wild for 25x the bet. Multiplier wilds remain until they transform into regular wilds by reaching the leftmost side or bottom of the grid.
• Bonus – 100x the bet to trigger free spins.
• Super Bonus – 500x the bet for free spins where multiplier symbols are also wild. Multiplier wilds remain until they transform into regular wilds by reaching the leftmost side or bottom of the grid.

Cygnus 4: Slot Verdict

Remember how Cygnus 3 diverted wildly from the two slots that came before it by offering the Cygnus Wheel, where instant wins, free drops, or jackpot prizes could be won? Cygnus 4 brings the action back to more familiar territory, having more in common with the first two Cygnus slots than with the third sibling on the family tree. One wonders how many gamblers will be ruing the Cygnus Wheel's exclusion, especially with the way it could turn a 500x the bet outlay into a 5x the bet prize in mere moments. No, Cygnus 4 is a return to the old ways of rolling multiplier symbols and free spins symbols to the leftmost pillar (or bottom) in order to activate their abilities, along with gravity-assisted avalanches and row additions while looking glorious in the process.

Then again, Cygnus 4 does have a vague jackpot-chasing element, though. Sort of. That is, striving to reach the highest level on the level 3 pillar, thereby achieving Cygnus 4's 50,000x the bet top prize. It's a bit like uncovering the Max Win coin in Pirots 2, where that game would also top you up to the max win if and when doing so. Possibly more if than win, given ELK Studios slots' reputation. However, doing things this way provides an extra incentive, if one was needed, to level up and climb the multiplier pillars. Starting off on Level 3 via X-iter might come in handy here, and utilising this feature buy was one of the more exciting ways to play Cygnus 4. As far as excitement goes, Cygnus 4 was more satisfying than Cygnus 3, but it was not spectacularly better than 1 or 2. Let's call it around the same or so.

That, in some ways, makes Cygnus 4 a teensy bit disappointing. Despite certain stats dragging the game down, as per usual, the visual presentation is flawless, and the general execution has been done to ELK Studios' typically top-tier standard. The levelling-up action of the multiplier pillar and the chance of striking it big when progressing all the way provides a solid belt of titillation, but the rest of the game is a bit too samey to call Cygnus essential viewing.