The seas are a dangerous place – untold miles of never-ending, cold, deep water, with who knows what vagabonds could be lurking out there with AK47s ready to rob you at any time! Yup that sounds fairly dangerous alright – but not satisfactorily so for Hacksaw Gaming, it would seem. No, the developer has decided that the seas must also be cursed before they are scary enough to play a part in their new Cursed Seas online slot! This is a 26-payline game with a 12,500x jackpot and a 96.22% RTP calculated via a 10-billion-round simulation.
Hacksaw’s typical machines include a bunch of special features, and Cursed Seas is no different. The reels include Cursed Chest symbols, which, funnily enough, don’t seem so cursed to me – they can contain multipliers of up to 200x! There’s also a Sunken Treasure bonus game, triggered by hitting three bonus scatter symbols, and a more lucrative Dead Men Tell No Tales bonus, which requires four or more scatters to activate. Of course, both features are available for purchase from the bonus buy menu, along with a ‘Bonushunt Featurespins’ option which gives you 5x the odds of triggering a bonus round naturally on every spin – for 3x the normal price, of course!
Dare you journey with us onto the seas built on an Indian Burial Ground? You’ll have to be quick – you know somebody is making a horror movie about just that plot as we speak! No need to wait, though – our free demo slot of Cursed Seas is available to play below right now!
| Provider | Hacksaw Gaming |
| Reels | 5 |
| Rows | 4 |
| Paylines | 26 |
| Bonus Rounds | 2 |
| Bet Range | 0.10 - 100 |
| Volatility | High |
| Max Win | 12,500x |
| Bonus Buy | Yes |
| RTP | 96.22% |
| Our Rating | 8.0 |
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Cursed Seas Demo Slot
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Cursed Seas Slot Theme, Stakes, Pays & Symbols
There’s not much you can say about the sea itself – it’s just deep water. However, games such as Shifting Seas, Captain Venture: Treasures of the Sea, and Wild Buccaneers all serve to prove that it’s the presence of us pesky humans out there which is really what makes them interesting.. and dangerous! As mentioned in the opening paragraphs, Hacksaw wasn’t happy to stop there – although I will say that one of the characters on the reels of this game bares a striking resemblance to Jack Sparrow of Pirates of the Caribbean Fame! I’m sure that most of you will be able to identify him easily enough, but if not, then he’s the lowest-paying of the character symbols – uncanny, don’t you think?
Elsewhere on the paytable, you’ll find the regular wild and cursed chest wild symbols to be the most valuable booty on offer, both of which offer returns of 50x the total bet for a full pay line of five-of-a-kind. There are four high-paying character symbols – some look alive, others not so much – but their payouts range between 10x for all five symbols down to just 3x for the Jack Sparrow impersonator. As for the low pays, I’m pleased to see that Hacksaw hasn’t decided just to include plain old royals in this release. Instead, we get various sea and pirate-themed symbols such as an anchor and skull and crossbones – their returns aren’t so exciting, however, ranging between just 1x and 1.5x the total bet for all five symbols.
Hacksaw typically offers a wide betting range in their slots, and the minimum/maximum available in Cursed Seas have been set at €0.10 and €100.00, respectively. The upper end of the range is a little thin on intermediate bets, but the bottom half has plenty of options available – and that’s where it matters most, in my eyes.
Base Game & Modifiers
The playfield used in Cursed Seas features five reels of four rows each – a little larger than a typical 5×3 video slot, which does make the 26 fixed paylines feel a little bit sparse as a result. However, all the symbols are stacked on the reels, so wins do come in a little more often than you might expect for such a playfield configuration.
Cursed Chests
Whenever a cursed chest symbol lands on the reels, it will create a cursed area between the position where it lands and the top of its reel. Then, when the chest opens, it will reveal a multiplier of 2x, 3x, 4x, 5x, 10x, 15x, 20x, 25x, 50x, 100x, or 200x. This multiplier will then be applied to any payline which passes through the created cursed area.
Cursed Seas Slot Bonus Features
Hacksaw will often include one standard bonus round and an enhanced version that is activated if more than three scatter symbols land on the reels. However, the developer has taken a different tact this time, as the two main features of Cursed Seas are very different.
Sunken Treasure Bonus
Landing three lantern scatter symbols simultaneously will award ten free spins. In this mode, any cursed chests that land are guaranteed to open up and create a cursed area, even if doing so will not result in any winning combinations being formed. Why would that matter? Because now the cursed areas persist for the duration of the feature!
If multiple cursed chests land on the same reel, their values are added together and shown in a total above each of the game’s five reels. Likewise, if a payline passes through multiple reels containing cursed areas, their values will be added together before being applied to each pay line win. You can re-trigger this mode with two, four, or six additional spins by hitting three, four, or five scatter symbols, respectively.
Dead Men Tell No Tales Bonus
The higher-value bonus round requires you to hit at least four lantern scatters simultaneously during the base game. This will take you to a three-spin feature, where the normal reels are replaced by new ones containing only special skull and Kraken symbols.
Each reel has a multiplier displayed above it, similar to the Sunken Treasure bonus game, except this time, you’ll need to collect skull symbols to increase the value of these multipliers throughout the feature. The Kraken symbol is even more valuable, as this can add a multiplier of up to 500x to the amount shown above all five reels in one go.
The feature will end if three spins go by without any new symbols landing on the reels. When this occurs, all multipliers shown above the reels are added together and applied to the current staking before being awarded as your final bonus round payout.
Bonus Buy
The bonus buy menu has three options to choose from:
- Bonushunt Featurespins: Costs 3x the total bet and increases the odds of triggering a bonus round by 500%
- Sunken Treasure Bonus Game: The three-scatter feature can be purchased for 100x the current stake.
- Dead Men Tell No Tales Bonus Game: If you really want to splash out, 200x the total bet will buy you instant entry to the more valuable bonus round. However, this is by far the most volatile option of the bunch, so caution is advised before purchasing this particular bonus!
Pros
- Great looking game, despite the limited colour palette – it suits the theme perfectly.
- The base game has lots of potential for big wins.
- Two different features to look forward to.
Cons
- The four-scatter bonus round is much more difficult to hit but also harder to win big from – not an ideal combination!
- A few more paylines wouldn’t have gone amiss here – be prepared for lots of dead spins between wins.
Cursed Seas Slot Review Final Thoughts
I feel like I’ve said this a few times now, but Hacksaw has rapidly become one of my favourite online slot developers over the past year! The jackpots are always good, the features are unique and diverse, and their games' presentation is always superb. This probably isn’t their finest effort – but it’s a solid release that’s well worth a look all the same.
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