Deadeye  (Bigwinboard.com)

Deadeye: Slot Overview

Despite impressions to the contrary, maybe the Wild West wasn't such a bad place to be. All that clean air, country livin', working with your hands, knowing your neighbours, getting plenty of exercise, who knows, it might have been alright. However, that's not the gist generally given off in Western-themed slots. Around here, the West is a cold, unforgiving, unfriendly place where you're just as likely to get a bullet in the back as a pat on it. Bands of lawbreaking baddies roam the land doing what they will while the general populace gets to suffer their whims. So it appears to be in Deadeye, an online slot designed by software provider ELK Studios, where you're either quick, dead, or hiding behind the sheriff - if there is one.

The game starts on a fairly positive note, where the background town, quite realistically rendered, looks like a friendly enough place to visit. However, any feelings of complacency are flipped on their head when the bonus round triggers, and the entire place has gone up in flames. That's the slot West for you, huh? The characters in the game aren't exactly the friendliest sort of people you'll ever see, either, and since they can all end up on wild posters, they've clearly done something naughty.

Thirty paylines are embedded into Deadeye's 6x4 play area, creating winning combinations of 3-6 OAK starting from the leftmost reel onwards. Whether betting 20c to $/€100 per spin or buying features from the X-iter, Deadeye's RTP is the standard ELK Studios' figure of 94%, while the volatility rating is high.

Pay symbols in the game are 10-A card ranks, and five character symbols - the Kid, the Outlaw, the Calamity, the Goon, and the Gentleman. Six-of-a-kind wins pay 0.5x-1x for royals, or 1.25x-5x for characters. Wilds complete winning lines by substituting for all symbols except the scatter. In addition, the five character symbols can land as 1x1, 1x2, or 1x3 on any reel.

Deadeye: Slot Features

Deadeye isn't as festooned with features as some ELK Studios slots are, yet its extras include Shots Fired, duels, free spins, and X-iter feature buys.

Shots Fired

Before the reels stop spinning, shots may be fired at the steel plates above the reels. Shots fired at reels 1, 2, 5, and 6 add the portrait of one of the five characters to a wild poster above the reel. More than one character portrait can be added to the same poster. A character symbol that lands on a reel with the same character on a poster above it transforms into one or more 1x1 wilds. The first shot on one of the steel saloon doors above reels 3 and 4 adds a multiplier for the reel below of x2 to x100. Each time a shot is fired at one of the steel saloon doors that already has a multiplier, the value is doubled.

Duel

Saloon door symbols, 1x3 in size, may land on the middle two reels - only one may land per reel. If two saloon doors land at the same time, they always nudge to become aligned if they weren't already, and they trigger the duel feature. Saloon doors then reveal character symbols with multipliers. If there is a multiplier on the steel plate above the saloon door, it gets added to the character's multiplier. If one character survives the following duel, it expands into a 2x3 symbol, keeping its multiplier. Any defeated character symbols on the other reels convert to the winning character symbol. If both characters are killed in the duel, they are replaced with a 2x3 wild that sums the two multiplier values. After the duel a number of wilds are distributed across reels 1, 2, 5, and 6.

Free Spins

Hitting 3 or more scatters triggers the free spins bonus game. Each scatter carries 0-2 bullets when it lands. Bullets are collected when the bonus round is triggered and when scatters land during it. Every time 6 or more bullets are collected in the bonus game, +1 free spin is awarded, and 6 shots are fired at the steel plates above the reels or the free spins counter. Wild posters and multiplier values work as they do in the base game, except they are persistent during the bonus round. If shots hit the free spins counter, additional free spins are granted.

X-iter

Five bonus features may be bought from the X-iter. They are the Bonus Hunt at 3x the bet for one spin with more than triple the chance of triggering the bonus game, Shots Fired, where 3 or more shots will be fired for 10x, or a spin guaranteeing a duel for 25x. In addition, bonus round entry costs 100x, or the super bonus may be bought for 500x, where all scatter symbols carry 2 bullets.

Deadeye: Slot Verdict

Like a good old Western movie, Deadeye is at its best when bullets are flying about the place with reckless abandon. Bullets hitting steel plates produce wild posters, while those that strike above the two middle reels generate multipliers. Not bad in their own right, but it's the double saloon door triggered duel feature which really pulls them together. For one, that's how multipliers are thrown into the fray; for another, duels produce wilds and convert symbols. It's rather handy that saloon doors always nudge so they align to trigger the feature, while the two characters produce tension as they sort out which multiplier value will be bestowed, much the same way as Hacksaw Gaming's VS symbols do - Bullets and Bounty being a fine example of this style, reviewed around the same time as Deadeye.

Circling back, what's also appreciated about the duel is that players don't necessarily have to suffer through a long, drawn-out sequence for nothing if the wrong symbols are on the reels. For instance, if the Kid wins the duel, but there are no Kid symbols to connect to, the duel can add wilds or convert symbols, potentially turning a bunch of useless symbols into something fruitful by the end. As you would hope to see, the bonus round amplifies everything through the persistence of wild posters and multipliers. The super bonus even more, alas, it can only be bought from the X-iter and not organically triggered.

After the gun smoke wafted away, what's left is a solid Western game, packing a 10,000x win cap. However, some of the gameplay feels borrowed, it is a bit slow in parts (though duels can be clicked to skip), and not being able to naturally activate the super bonus is a bummer. So while Deadeye is unlikely to knock the all-timers off the top of the ladder, Dead or Alive 2, Wanted Dead or a Wild, Tombstone RIP, etc., it's not going to back down from any fight and isn't afraid to spray a few bullets around.