Overview
Reels: 6 | Paylines: 117,649
Calling someone 'coo-coo' generally means they're a bit crazy or acting nonsensical, while the phrase 'coo coo ca choo' evokes The Beatles' I Am the Walrus or Simon & Garfunkel's Mrs. Robinson. However, Coo Coo Cashoo is the name of an online slot designed by software provider Yggdrasil, one which takes the phrase and gives it monetary connotations. If coo-coo is used to describe someone acting a little bit out there and eccentric, then and after playing Yggdrasil's slot for a bit, well, it's a bit out there and eccentric as well, though unfortunately, not in a way that is going to wow veteran gamblers with off-the-hook psychedelic features. Coo Coo Cashoo is an unusual study in time keeping paired with mechanics which have been at least partly inspired by elsewhere, such as a dynamic playing area and rising win multiplier.
The main character in Coo Coo Cashoo is an Albert Einstein, Doc Brown type guy, an older gentleman with frizzy white hair and round spectacles, who looks like he might have walked straight in from a Pixar film. His name, as indicated by the tag on his chest, is Ben, giving a Benjamin Franklin, scientist vibe. However, instead of lightning, stoves, or musical instruments, the Ben of this tale is more concerned with time, as evidenced by the collection of clocks on the wall behind the grid. Why time? It's not clear exactly what Coo Coo Cashoo is getting at, other than being quirkily eccentric. Maybe the game has nothing deeper to say, maybe there's a lesson here?
Coo Coo Cashoo's stab at mechanical originality is its Lighting Line concept, though it is very similar to Big Time Gaming's Megaways idea. On each spin, 2 to 7 symbols may land on each of the 6 reels. Like Megaways, this alters the number of ways to win up to a maximum of 117,649. Players may stake $/€0.10 to $/€10 in this game, where the RTP tops out at 96%, and the volatility is high.
Nine different clocks and time pieces are Coo Coo Cashoo's regular paying symbols. Hitting a 6 OAK winning combination pays from 0.4x to 5x the bet. The wild symbol substitutes for all regular paying symbols. Wilds are present on all reels, and they have the same value as the highest paying clock pay symbol when making their own wins.
Coo Coo Cashoo: Slot Features
Coo Coo Cashoo keeps it short and sweet with a scatter multiplier, instant prizes, free spins, and feature buys.
Win Multiplier
Time card scatter symbols are able to trigger an instant prize and increase the win multiplier. Hitting 1 to 6 time card symbols pays 1x to 10x the bet. In addition, each time card symbol increases the global multiplier by +1 for ways wins. The multiplier resets at the end of each base game spin.
Gameplay & Features
Coo Coo Cashoo keeps it short and sweet with a scatter multiplier, instant prizes, free spins, and feature buys.
Win Multiplier
Time card scatter symbols are able to trigger an instant prize and increase the win multiplier. Hitting 1 to 6 time card symbols pays 1x to 10x the bet. In addition, each time card symbol increases the global multiplier by +1 for ways wins. The multiplier resets at the end of each base game spin.
Final Thoughts
Time may teach us that nothing stays the same, pain passes, joy fades, and the one constant is change. Ironic then that Coo Coo Cashoo feels like a slot which might have rocked 8-9 years ago, but now seems terribly late to the party. The game uses Lightning Reels, a system which competes with (or imitates) Megaways with its changing number of symbols on the reels and the alternating number of ways to win. The thing is, Big Time Gaming dropped Bonanza ten years ago, and Coo Coo Cashoo feels like it literally just discovered the BTG hit and decided to do something similar.
There's not much else to the game either. Instant prizes are modest in value and are not affected by the win multiplier either. The win multiplier itself might be useful, and during free spins, it was possible to collect quite a lot of time cards in order to grow its value, which persists till the bonus round ends. So in some ways, Coo Coo Cashoo's simple combination of masses of ways to win and a win multiplier might be quite potent, yet winning potential suggests otherwise. If Doc Brown thought 1.21 gigawatts was insane, the scientist would lose his mind to know that Coo Coo Cashoo's max recorded win happened in 1:1 quintillion simulated spins. Yes, a quintillion, one with eighteen zeroes behind it. Even if that was a typo, the recorded max win of 5,333x isn't a hugely impressive figure if Yggdrasil designed this to appeal to Megaways fans.
Despite an eccentric theme and glimpses of multiplier-driven entertainment, Coo Coo Cashoo feels like a time machine that got stuck in the past. Seasoned Megaways fanatics might be drawn in for a look, but there is little here they won't have seen before in one form or another, more vigorously performed, it might be added.
