Day Of The Dead Pokie
Although the name of this pokie from IGT suggests it’s going to be filled with zombies, it is in fact themed around the Mexican festival that honours deceased loved ones. It’s an annual celebration that takes place around October 31st, or the first couple of days in November, and while it may not be so well known outside Latin America, the opening sequence of the James Bond film Spectre, which is set in and around it, has given it international attention.
On to the pokie however, and what we see is a colourful and cheerful set of 5 reels filled with cartoon skeletons and a variety of flowers and tasty-looking drinks and snacks. There’s an unusual format to the reels, with the outer ones being 3 symbols high, the next ones in being 4 symbols and the middle reel having its symbols stacked 5-high.
A suitable Mexican-style soundtrack accompanies the action on the reels and while most pokies are best played with the sound muted, this is actually quite entertaining and suits the style very well.
Playing Day Of The Dead
With no conventional paylines across them, players instead win by matching 3, 4 or 5 symbols across adjacent reels running from the left or the right, and there’s a total of 720 different ways to achieve this.
Playable from just 1.00 up to 100.00, it’s also got IGT’s Multiway Xtra system that higher-stakes players will be able to activate and sees wins multiplied if more than one example of the same symbol is on any reel. This is an optional bet however, and as it costs more to activate, players may wish to stick to the standard format that doesn’t multiply wins.
Smaller wins are had when the flowers and snacks land across 3, 4 or 5 of the reels, with 5, 15 or 50 coins for the flowers, while a pie will be worth 15, 30 or 125. A couple of dancing skeletons and a dead Mariachi band will be worth more, and it’s all headed by the Day of the Dead logo that’s worth 50, 150 or 1000 coins when landing on 3, 4 or 5 reels.
Day Of The Dead
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Bonus Features
The wild symbols consists of 3 pastel-coloured cookies in the shape of coffins, which seems a bit grim, but as this icon can help players to land lots more wins by substituting for other symbols, it’s a welcome sight anyway. It will only appear on the middle 3 reels, but as wins pay in both directions and symbols can land in any reel positions, it’s still relatively easy to get a winning combination completed by the wild.
An even brighter scatter symbol will pay multiples of the total amount staked per spin when it stops in any positions. 3 scatters are worth 2x, 4 of them will pay 10 and if the maximum of 5 scatters land at once, the reward will be equal to 50x the bet amount.
A lipstick-wearing skull is a bonus symbols which will pay out 50 coins when it lands across all 5 reels, with players then receiving 8 free spins for each bonus combination. This can add up to a maximum of 96 free spins if the whole game is covered in the bonus icon, which isn’t particular likely, but theoretically possible. The free games can be re-triggered from within the round, until a maximum grand total of 240 games has been awarded.
One thing that can make a difference in the free games is the fact that symbols can be stacked, potentially leading to multiple payouts in a single spin, or big multipliers if the MultiwaysXtra is in play.
The Verdict
A colourful set of reels and fun theme is just the beginning of the perks that can be had playing Day of the Dead. The 720 ways to win format that sees combinations formed from the left and right sides should be enough to ensure that players get lots of winning spins, even if some of those payouts are relatively small.
Most people would prefer this to having just a few wins, even if they were for larger amounts. The bonus features are by and large standard, apart from the way in which the free spins can be awarded with each line, while wild substitutions and scatter wins should also help to keep the prizes coming in quite regularly.
The MultiwaysXtra bet may cost more, and might appear to reward players with bigger prizes, but overall there’s not a great advantage to activating it, as the extra wins are pretty much cancelled out by the extra stakes needed.
But anyone looking for a fun and colourful pokie, that even has a decent soundtrack, should try out the Day of the Dead game.