Blood Suckers Slot Review: The Full NetEnt Vampire Family

NetEnt is one of the founding studios of the modern online slot business. Based in Sweden and now part of the Evolution group, the developer is known for clean math, polished presentation and a catalog that spans regulated markets across the United States and Europe. Blood Suckers is arguably NetEnt’s most quoted example of a high-RTP, low-volatility design, and it spawned two sequels: Blood Suckers 2 in 2017 and Blood Suckers Megaways, built by sister studio Red Tiger, in 2023. If you want to see where this family sits among the other titles worth playing, start at the BestSlotsUSA.com home page and work outward from there.

This review covers all three versions in detail. It lists the exact RTP for each release, breaks down the bonus symbols version by version, explains how the bonus rounds actually play once triggered, and confirms which titles are live in the United States regulated online market right now. Every spec below is drawn from the studio material and independent game databases. Where a figure is not published, this page says so rather than guessing.

Quick-view table: Blood Suckers, the flagship title

One point of clarification for the table above: the original Blood Suckers uses two separate special symbols, not one. The vampire bride is the scatter that pays free spins, and a distinct stake-and-mallet icon is the bonus symbol that starts the coffin pick game. The symbols section below explains how both work.

Why the RTP matters so much here

The special note this review keeps returning to is the return to player, because it is the single most important fact about the Blood Suckers name. Return to player, or RTP, is the share of all money wagered on a slot that the game is designed to pay back over a very large number of spins. A 98 percent figure means that, across millions of spins, the game returns 98 cents of every dollar staked and keeps 2 cents as the house edge. That 2 percent edge on the original Blood Suckers is roughly a third of the edge on a typical 96 percent slot, which is why the game earned its reputation as one of the most player-friendly video slots ever released.

Here are the exact figures side by side so there is no confusion. Blood Suckers returns 98 percent. Blood Suckers 2 returns 96.94 percent. Blood Suckers Megaways returns 97.66 percent in its headline configuration. Read in order of release, the family did not simply keep the high number and coast on it. NetEnt lowered the return on the 2017 sequel to fund a more exciting feature set, and Red Tiger set the 2023 Megaways edition between the two. The original remains the outlier and the reason players still seek the series out by name.

A high RTP is not a guarantee of winning, and it says nothing about how a single session will go. What it does change is the long-run cost of play and, on the low-volatility original, the survival time of a bankroll. That is why the 2010 game is a perennial recommendation for anyone working through a deposit-bonus wagering requirement: a lower house edge means the balance shrinks more slowly on average while the play-through counts down. The catch is that a low edge is paired with a low ceiling, so the original is a game of endurance rather than one big hit.

Version comparison table

Here is the whole family at a glance. Note the RTP trend: the original is the highest at 98 percent, the 2017 sequel trades some return for far more excitement, and the 2023 Megaways release sits in between on paper while adding a huge ceiling on the top prize.

There is no land-based only member of this family. Blood Suckers has always been an online product; NetEnt did not ship it as a physical casino cabinet, and neither sequel exists as a slot machine on a gaming floor. Every version discussed here is a digital title, so nothing needs to be filed away in a land-based only section. If you ever see a physical machine using the Blood Suckers name, treat it as an unrelated cabinet rather than a port of these games.

Game overview and how it plays

The original Blood Suckers is a five-reel, three-row slot with 25 fixed paylines. You cannot switch lines off, so every spin covers the full board. The bet is set by choosing a coin value and a bet level, which together move the total stake between 25 cents and 50 dollars per spin. Wins pay left to right from the leftmost reel, and the RNG-driven reels resolve into a Gothic crypt backdrop lit by torches and dripping candles. The pace is deliberate and the base game hits often, which is exactly what the low-volatility label promises: frequent small wins that keep the balance ticking rather than long dry spells punctuated by rare jackpots.

Because the theoretical return sits at 98 percent, Blood Suckers behaves differently from a modern high-variance release. You will not often see a single spin explode into hundreds of times your stake, and the published ceiling of roughly 1,014x the bet is modest by 2020s standards. What you get instead is staying power. That combination made the game a fixture on lists of titles suitable for meeting bonus play-through, since a higher return and low swings let a bankroll survive longer while wagering requirements are worked off. If you want to understand why that math matters, the concept is covered in plain terms on the RTP guide, and the wider low-variance style is one strand of the broader video slots category.

The two sequels change the feel considerably. Blood Suckers 2 keeps the five-reel, 25-line frame but pushes the volatility up to medium-high and layers in a random Scatter Shot feature plus a treasure-hunt bonus. Blood Suckers Megaways throws out the fixed layout entirely, replacing it with a six-reel Megaways grid where the number of ways to win changes on every spin. The three games share a mood and a set of icons, but they play like three distinct products aimed at three different appetites for risk.

Symbols and what they pay

Blood Suckers dresses its reels entirely in vampire lore. There are no playing-card ranks here. The lower-value symbols are objects a vampire hunter would carry: garlic, a vial of holy water or potion, a bible marked with a cross, an antique pistol and a crossbow. The higher-value symbols are the creatures of the crypt, led by female and male vampire characters. This full-theme paytable was unusual for its era and is one reason the game still looks coherent today.

The wild is a vampire biting a maiden. It substitutes for every symbol except the scatter and the bonus symbol, and it is the top-paying icon in the game: five wilds on a line award 7,500 coins, the single largest line payout on the paytable. The exact coin values for the mid and low symbols are not published in a single official table that this review can cite with confidence, so those cells are left as not published rather than filled with invented numbers. What is verified is the hierarchy: the wild pays most, the vampire characters pay next, and the hunter-tool symbols pay least.

The reason the paytable feels generous in play rather than on paper is the low-variance math. With 25 fixed lines and a full board on every spin, the reels connect small combinations often, and the wild fills gaps frequently enough to turn near-misses into paying lines. NetEnt also programmed occasional full-screen wild wins that can appear at random in the base game, a moment where the whole grid fills with the vampire wild for a large payout. These are rare but they are one of the few ways the original produces an outsized single result. For the sequels the studios rebalanced the symbols: Blood Suckers 2 pushes more value into stacked and sticky wild behavior during free spins, and Blood Suckers Megaways replaces fixed line pays entirely with the cascading, ways-based math of the Megaways engine.

Bonus-symbol cross-check across the family

This is important, because the three versions do not use the same special symbols. Here is the breakdown.

• Blood Suckers (2010): Two different special symbols. The scatter is the vampire bride and it triggers the free spins. A separate stake-and-mallet bonus symbol triggers the coffin pick game. They are not interchangeable.
• Blood Suckers 2 (2017): Also two different special symbols, but redesigned. The scatter is the Blood Rose, which triggers free spins. The bonus trigger is the Golden Door symbol, which starts the Hidden Treasure pick game. The names and art both changed from the original.
• Blood Suckers Megaways (2023): A single scatter symbol handles the bonus. Landing three or more scatters triggers the free spins round, and a coffin pick step sits in front of the free spins rather than being paid by its own separate paytable symbol.

So the honest answer to whether every version uses the same scatter or bonus symbol is no. The original and the sequel each carry two distinct special symbols with different jobs, and the artwork differs between them. The Megaways edition simplifies to one scatter that opens the whole bonus sequence.

How to trigger the bonus

In the original Blood Suckers there are two separate ways in, matching the two special symbols. Land three or more vampire-bride scatters anywhere on the reels to trigger the free spins. Separately, land three or more stake-and-mallet bonus symbols on an active payline, running left to right from reel one, to enter the coffin pick game. The two triggers are independent, so a single spin can send you to one feature or the other depending on which symbol lines up.

Blood Suckers 2 works the same way in spirit but with its own symbols. Three or more Blood Rose scatters award the free spins, while three or more Golden Door symbols on a line open the Hidden Treasure bonus. The sequel adds one extra route: a random Scatter Shot event can strike during the base game and drop additional scatter or bonus symbols onto the reels, nudging a near-miss into an actual trigger.

Blood Suckers Megaways streamlines the entry. Land three or more scatters to start the bonus. Players who do not want to wait can use the optional bonus buy to purchase entry directly, at a price of 150x, 500x or 1,000x the stake depending on the version of the feature bought. That buy option is a key difference from the two NetEnt originals, neither of which offers a purchase.

How the bonus works

Once triggered, the features are where the three versions separate most clearly, so each is described on its own below.

Blood Suckers free spins. Three or more bride scatters award 10 free spins, and every win during the round is multiplied by 3. Because the base game already returns often, a run of free spins with a flat triple multiplier is where most of the game’s better sessions come from. More scatters can land during the spins to retrigger and extend the round. This is a straightforward, generous feature with no wheel to spin and no picking to do; it simply plays out with the multiplier applied.

Blood Suckers coffin pick game. The separate bonus game moves you into a burial chamber lined with coffins. You open coffins one at a time. Most contain a sleeping vampire you stake for an instant coin prize, and you keep picking and collecting until you uncover empty coffins with bats inside. Uncovering the set of empty coffins ends the round and banks everything won. It is a classic pick-until-you-miss feature, and it pays independently of the free spins.

Blood Suckers 2 features. The free spins again award 10 spins, and here the multiplier and sticky wild behavior make the round the main draw, backed by the Scatter Shot mechanic that can seed extra symbols. The Hidden Treasure bonus, reached through the Golden Door symbols, is a pick game set in the vampire castle where the young vampiress Amilia hunts her ancestor’s fortune; you select items to reveal coin prizes until you hit a blank and the feature closes. The sequel’s medium-high volatility means these features carry more of the total return than in the original, so sessions swing harder between the bonus rounds.

Blood Suckers Megaways features. This version plays completely differently. The reels use a reactions mechanic, so winning symbols are removed and new ones drop in for repeated wins on a single spin. Four random base-game modifiers can fire at any time: random wilds, super wilds, extra bonus scatters and a win multiplier. When the bonus triggers, a coffin pick step comes first, granting one pick per triggering scatter up to a maximum of five, which sets how many free spins you start with. The free spins then run the Megaways engine with building multipliers, and the high volatility is what supports the enormous 20,521x top prize. If you want a primer on what that volatility label means for your bankroll, the volatility guide lays it out.

Version by version

Blood Suckers (2010)

The original launched in 2010 and set the template for the family. It is a five-reel, three-row game with 25 fixed paylines, a low-volatility profile and the headline 98 percent RTP that made it famous. Stakes run from 25 cents to 50 dollars a spin, and the published maximum win is about 1,014x the stake, with the wild worth 7,500 coins for five on a line. The game carries two features, the free spins with their flat 3x multiplier and the coffin pick bonus, each reached through its own special symbol.

What keeps the original relevant is the return. In a market now full of 96 percent and lower slots, a genuine 98 percent title stands out, and it is one of the first names that comes up whenever players talk about the highest RTP slots. The trade-off is a low ceiling; you are playing for longevity and steady returns, not a life-changing single spin. In the United States regulated market this version is online and widely distributed. NetEnt content is licensed in New Jersey, Michigan, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Connecticut, and the original Blood Suckers is one of the studio’s most commonly stocked classics in those lobbies. It is not a land-based machine.

The historical importance of the 2010 release is hard to overstate for anyone who followed online slots at the time. When it appeared, most video slots advertised returns in the mid-90s if they published a figure at all, and transparency about RTP was far less common than it is today. Blood Suckers put a high, clearly stated number front and center and paired it with a theme that had broad appeal, which turned it into a reference point that reviewers and players still cite. Casinos leaned into that reputation by allowing it toward bonus wagering, and a feedback loop formed: players sought it out to clear requirements, operators kept it stocked, and its name recognition grew well beyond what its modest top prize would otherwise support. That legacy is the whole reason the sequels carry the Blood Suckers title rather than launching as fresh brands.

Blood Suckers 2 (2017)

NetEnt released Blood Suckers 2 in 2017, seven years after the original, and used it to modernize the presentation and sharpen the risk. The layout stays familiar at five reels, three rows and 25 paylines, but the RTP drops to 96.94 percent and the volatility climbs to medium-high. The stake range widens to a maximum of 250 dollars a spin, and the top win rises to 1,298x, a little higher than the original. The sequel introduces the young vampiress Amilia as its lead character and wraps the reels in a richer castle setting.

The mechanical changes are the real story. Blood Suckers 2 swaps in the Blood Rose scatter for free spins and the Golden Door symbol for the Hidden Treasure pick game, and it adds the Scatter Shot feature that randomly injects extra special symbols into the base game to help trigger those rounds. Because more of the return is packed into the features, the base game runs colder than the original and the swings are wider. This is the version to choose when you want the same theme with genuine tension rather than the gentle grind of the 2010 release. In the US regulated market it is online, distributed through the same NetEnt licensing, and like its predecessor it has no land-based counterpart.

Blood Suckers Megaways (2023)

Blood Suckers Megaways arrived in 2023, and it is the only member of the family not built by NetEnt itself. It was developed by Red Tiger, NetEnt’s sister studio inside the Evolution group, under the Megaways license from Big Time Gaming. That change of studio brings a change of engine. Gone are the 25 fixed paylines; in their place is a six-reel grid that can show up to seven symbols per reel and generate as many as 117,649 ways to win on a single spin. The published RTP is 97.66 percent, which is high for a Megaways release, though Red Tiger games are frequently supplied to operators in configurable RTP builds, so the exact figure in any given lobby can differ and is sometimes not published on the operator’s own page. Where a specific operator does not display the number, treat it as not published rather than assuming 97.66 percent.

This version is the volatile one. It carries a High volatility rating, a stake range from 10 cents to 400 dollars, and a top win of 20,521x the stake, a ceiling roughly twenty times higher than either NetEnt original. It plays with cascading reactions, four random base-game modifiers, a coffin pick step that sets the free-spin count, and a building multiplier during the bonus. It is also the only version with a bonus buy, priced at 150x, 500x or 1,000x. That makes it a natural fit for the how to choose a slot question, since it targets players who want big swings and instant feature access rather than the slow, high-return grind of 2010. Red Tiger content is live in the United States regulated market through Evolution, so this title is online where operators carry the Red Tiger catalog, though its distribution is thinner than the two NetEnt classics and not every lobby stocks it. It is not a land-based machine.

A note on studios for anyone tracking who made what: the two originals are pure NetEnt, and you can read more about the developer on the NetEnt studio page. The Megaways edition is a Red Tiger production under license, which is why its mechanics feel closer to Red Tiger’s other cascading titles than to the measured pace of the 2010 game.

Mobile play

All three versions are built to run in a mobile browser, so you do not need to download anything to play on a phone or tablet. The original and Blood Suckers 2 were reworked for touch screens years ago and load quickly even on older hardware, while Blood Suckers Megaways is a newer HTML5 build designed for portrait play from the start. Controls reduce to a tap to spin, a swipe or menu for bet size, and an autoplay option, and the 25-line originals in particular sip data because the reels are simple. For a fuller look at how these games behave on the small screen, see the guide to mobile slots.

Where to play

If you are in a regulated state and want to play any of these titles for cash, the place to start is the list of vetted, licensed operators. You can compare the legal options, check which states each one serves, and read the detail on bonuses and banking on the legal US casino sites page. From there you can decide where to open an account and play real money slots. Because Blood Suckers is a Halloween-friendly, vampire-themed game, it also turns up on seasonal collections, which are gathered on the Halloween slots page.

Which version should you play

The three games serve three different players, and the choice comes down to how much variance you want. Pick the original Blood Suckers if your priority is stretching a bankroll, playing through a bonus, or simply enjoying long sessions with frequent small wins; its 98 percent return and low volatility are built for exactly that, and the 50 dollar maximum bet keeps it accessible. Pick Blood Suckers 2 if you like the theme but want the base game to carry more tension and the features to matter more, accepting a slightly lower 96.94 percent return and medium-high swings in exchange for a bigger stake range and the Scatter Shot and Hidden Treasure extras. Pick Blood Suckers Megaways if you are chasing a large multiplier, want up to 117,649 ways on a cascading grid, or value the ability to buy the bonus outright; just go in expecting high volatility and long gaps between the big hits that its 20,521x ceiling exists to deliver.

One practical reminder ties the whole family together. The published RTP is a property of the game math, but operators sometimes stock configurable versions, especially of the Red Tiger Megaways title, so the number shown in your specific lobby is the one that counts. Check the information panel inside the game before you play, and if the figure is not displayed, treat it as unconfirmed rather than assuming the headline number applies.

Responsible Gambling