Mayan Stackways Slot Review

Mayan Stackways - Slot Overview

Mayan Stackways is a Hacksaw Gaming slot that drags you straight into a heavy jungle setting, with a zombie Mayan chieftain glowering beside the reels. It feels much darker than the average temple game, especially on desktop where the character stays in view. I went in expecting a standard Mayan or Aztec clone, but the mix of eerie artwork, pounding drums, and sharp reel animations makes it stand out fast.

The Mayan Stackways slot runs on a 5 reel, 4 row layout with a win-all-ways pay system that can stretch up to 100,000 ways. Stakes range from 0.10 to 100 per spin, so I could test both low and high stakes quite easily. Default RTP is 96.23%, though operators can select lower settings, and the volatility sits in the medium to high band with a 10,000x max win.

Gameplay and Mechanics in Mayan Stackways

From a gameplay angle, Mayan Stackways takes a familiar framework and twists it with dynamic reels. Wins land when three or more matching symbols appear on adjacent reels from the left side. There are no paylines, just ways, so once the grid starts stretching, things escalate quickly. Even without cascades, the slot keeps a brisk pace because every new Stackways symbol can reshape the board outright.

The Stackways symbol is the star of the Mayan Stackways game. When it lands, it fills its reel with between two and ten copies of a chosen symbol. The game always picks the symbol that forms the longest winning chain from what is already on screen. If more than one choice works, it picks at random. The mechanic only fires when it will create a win, which keeps the feature feeling meaningful rather than wasted.

Symbols and Paytable in Mayan Stackways

The Mayan Stackways paytable is split between five low and five high symbols. Tens through Aces sit at the bottom, paying up to 0.7x the bet for five of a kind. Premiums are carved creatures and warriors – lizard, bird, snake, female warrior, and male warrior – worth roughly 2x to 4x for full lines. There is no wild symbol at all, so scatters, coins, multipliers, Collect and Stackways carry the weight on the feature side.

Symbols and Paytable

Symbol	Quantity	Payout
	5	x4
	4	x2.5
	3	x1.5
	5	x3
	4	x2
	3	x1
	5	x2.5
	4	x1.5
	3	x0.7
	5	x2.2
	4	x1.2
	3	x0.6
	5	x2
	4	x1
	3	x0.5
	5	x0.7
	4	x0.3
	3	x0.1
	5	x0.7
	4	x0.3
	3	x0.1
	5	x0.7
	4	x0.3
	3	x0.1
	5	x0.7
	4	x0.3
	3	x0.1
	5	x0.7
	4	x0.3
	3	x0.1
	Scatter

Bonus Features in Mayan Stackways

Stackways acts as both a base game and bonus engine in Mayan Stackways. Any Stackways symbol can raise a reel to ten high and push the ways count towards that 100,000 ceiling, and in the right setup I have seen base game hits jump out of nowhere. Three golden Skull scatters trigger 10 Stack Spins, where Stackways symbols appear more often. A Reel Activator scatter can switch a reel on, giving guaranteed Stackways on that reel for the rest of the round, while three extra Skulls add four more spins.

Four Skulls launch the Mayan Gold Bonus feature. Here only blanks, Coins, multipliers, Stackways and Collect symbols appear. Bronze coins add 1 to 5 to the counter above their reel, silver coins 10, 15, or 20, and gold coins 25 up to 1000. Multipliers of 2x, 3x, 4x, or 5x hit those counters. When Stackways lands, it fills that reel with coins at the stored value and locks it until a Collect symbol drops, banking the total into a Vault and freeing the reel again. The feature only ends when all five reels are locked at once.

A Golden Opportunity in Mayan Stackways is the rarer twist. Hitting five Skull scatters starts the same Mayan Gold structure but every reel begins with 50 already on the counters, so you enter with a serious head start. You cannot buy this; it has to land naturally. Outside the UK, there is a BonusHunt FeatureSpins mode at 3x bet, Stackways FeatureSpins at 40x, direct Stack Spins for 110x, and straight Mayan Gold entry for 200x, each with its own volatility tweak.

Bonus Buy Feature

Bonus Hunt Feature Spins Each spin triggers the bonus game 5 times more often
Feature Cost:	x3 Bet
RTP:	-
Volatility:	High
StackWays Feature Spins Each spin guarantees at least two StackWays symbols to land
Feature Cost:	x40 Bet
RTP:	-
Volatility:	High
Stack Spins 10 free spins with increased chances of landing StackWays symbols
Feature Cost:	x110 Bet
RTP:	-
Volatility:	High
Mayan Gold Collect and stack coins on each reel
Feature Cost:	x200 Bet
RTP:	-
Volatility:	Average

RTP, Volatility and Win Potential in Mayan Stackways

Stat wise, Mayan Stackways feels built for players who enjoy swings. The headline RTP is 96.23%, but Hacksaw also supplies 94.29%, 92.41%, and 88.38% profiles, so I always check the info screen first. Volatility sits on the high side of medium, edging into proper high variance once you start flirting with bonus buys and Mayan Gold. Hit rate is not stated, and in practice the game can run quite streaky.

The maximum win in Mayan Stackways is 10,000x the bet, reachable in the base game, Stack Spins, or Mayan Gold. The top hit rate is quoted at around one in three million spins, which matches how rare a full blowout feels. Most of my bigger sessions saw the balance move in plateaus – long periods of smaller hits, then sudden spikes when multiple reels stacked or a Mayan Gold round lined up with a few decent multipliers.

Mayan Stackways - Personal Verdict

After a lot of sessions on Mayan Stackways, I rate it as one of Hacksaw’s more engaging designs. The Stackways symbol keeps even the base game alive, Stack Spins can snowball hard once a couple of reels activate, and Mayan Gold scratches that coin-collect streak for big risk runs. It can absolutely bite on a cold run, but with the right RTP setting and sensible stakes, I find the 10,000x chase here worth the ride.

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