Fear the Dark (Hacksaw Gaming) Slot Review

Fear The Dark: Slot Overview

We’re sure everyone of you has had a bad dream before, where they’ve been scared by evil looking monsters. But what if we told you that monsters can actually also be quite nice and friendly? Despite the name, that’s what Hacksaw Gaming wants to tell us in their humoristic online slot game called Fear the Dark.

Playing Board

Fear the Dark is played on a 6×6 grid, meaning that there are always 36 symbols present on the playing board. To determine wins, the game uses Cluster Pays, which means that 5 or more of the same symbol, connected horizontally or vertically adjacent, form a win. As for bet sizes, these range from 0.10€ to 100€ (or equivalent), but may vary depending on where you play.

Winning Symbols

Hacksaw Gaming have been very creative and humorous when designing their winning symbols. In Fear the Dark you will find 10 different winning symbols, with 5 of them being low-paying and the other 5 on the higher end. Let’s begin with the lower paying symbols. Here you will find black-and-white symbols that kind of fit the theme, but some of them seem a bit random. So first we have the Staircase and the Tombstone with the label „Ouch“, both paying 12.8 times your bet size for a full cluster of 14 or more symbols. Next is the half full Glass, clocking in at 19.2 times your bet size. Second to last is the Hexagon with the letters „O“ and „K“, netting you 24 times your bet size. And on the top of the low-tier symbols you will find the Cross for 28 times your bet size. You might now get why we said that these winning symbols feel a bit random.

On the higher paying end you will find 5 colorful monsters. We will do our best to describe them. So first you will find the Spooky Ghost, paying 40 times your bet size for a full cluster of 14 symbols or more. Next up is the Slimey Monster, clocking in at 48 times your bet size. Right in the middle you will find the Pigface, worth 64 times your bet size. Second to last is the Funny Monster with a hat and a pink bear, netting you 80 times your bet size. And last but not least, the Teal Zombie, paying 120 times your bet size for a full cluster.

Fear the Dark: Special Symbols and Stats

Usually Hacksaw Gaming use quite a few Special symbols in their games. But Fear the Dark is different in that regard. Let’s see what the game has in store for us.

Scatter Symbol

Of course a Scatter symbol has to be part of the game. This one is portrayed by a lit candle. Landing 3 or 4 of those will put you in the Alone in the Dark feature game. What exactly this feature is and does will be covered in detail in the Feature Overview section of this online slot review.

Moon Man

The Moon Man is actually the only Special symbol outside of the Scatter symbol. Whenever this symbol lands, it will give you the Full Moon feature. This feature will play a very important role in Fear the Dark, so make sure you read the Feature Overview to know what it does.

Stats

Fear the Dark comes with a base RTP of 96.25%, which is pretty solid. As for the volatility of this game, to our surprise, Fear the Dark only received a 3 out of 5 volatility rating by Hacksaw Gaming themselves, putting the game at a medium volatility level. But that could be because the max win potential of Fear the Dark is capped at 5,000 times your base bet size, which is round about half of what Hacksaw Gaming usually caps their games at. Additionally, Fear the Dark comes with a Hit Frequency of 42%, meaning that you will get a win once every around 2 to 3 spins, which is not that bad and might explain the medium volatility.

Fear the Dark: Feature Overview

Now that we know what the Special symbols in Fear the Dark are, let us take a look at what they actually do and how they work.

Full Moon

Full Moon is triggered when a Moon Man symbol lands anywhere on the screen. If he lands, he will choose 2 to 5 random premium symbols and give them a multiplier. This multiplier is also random and can range from 2x to 100x. You can see all of the available symbols and multipliers right above the playing board

What happens next is that you will get some sort of Redrops. If the current playing board does not yield any more wins, then the left most symbol and multiplier are removed from the bar on top. Additionally, this symbol and all low-paying symbols are then destroyed and new symbols fall into the grid. It is also possible to get the Moon Man during the Full Moon feature, in which case he will again add a random amount of symbols and a multiplier. If all symbols were deleted from the top bar, the feature is over.

Free Spins Feature

As we already mentioned, 3 or 4 Scatters will let you enter the Free Spins feature. You will get 10 or 15 Free Spins, depending on the amount of Scatters you have triggered with. The Free Spins feature basically works just like the base game, with the exception that the Moon Man symbol is more likely to appear. Plus there’s an additional catch.

When you first enter the Free Spins feature you will see a lot of candles around the playing board. As long as you still have Free Spins, these candles remain lit. But once you run out, they will run out to and you will enter the Darkness Spins.

Darkness Spins

During Darkness Spins, the playing board will shrink, first to a 4×4 grid, then to a 2×2 grid. So you basically have 2 extra spins. Now, in order to reset this, you will need to land either a Moon Man or a Scatter symbol. The latter will actually grand you 4 additional Free Spins and will put you back into the Free Spins feature.

If you could not land a Moon Man or Scatter symbol during Darkness Spins, the feature will end and you’ll be brought back to the base game.

Bonus Buy Feature

Just like many Hacksaw Gaming games, Fear the Dark also features Bonus Buy options. In this game you can choose between 2 base game feature options and 2 Bonus Buy options. Here’s a list with the features:

Fear the Dark: Conclusion

Fear the Dark is a really well made game with an old comic style that reminds us of the very early days of Mickey Mouse. The humorous design choice really works well with this game.

Although the game is not innovative, it is still a lot of fun. It kind of feels like a less volatile version of Hacksaw Gaming’s Rocket Reels. They might not share the exact same game mechanic, but it is very close. With that being said, Fear the Dark definitely has its thrilling moments, when you get a high multiplier and you’re just waiting for those premium symbols to drop down.

All in all, Fear the Dark is a lot of fun and we had a blast testing this game. A medium volatility suits this game really well and will maybe reach an even greater audience than many of Hacksaw Gaming’s high volatility games.