There’s a creepy feel to the design in Dark Vortex. The reels are set within a stone frame that’s covered with skeletons, skulls and candles. There are 5 lower value magic books alongside 5 higher value grotesque creatures. The best of these is the devilish red imp you’ll get you 6 times your stake if you land 5 on adjacent reels. Winning combinations can start from both reel 1 and reel 5 as it has win both ways technology.
Central to the action here are the Vortex Reels which open when you land 2 Vortex symbols on the same spin. 2 Vortex Reels will then be open for 3 spins. Each extra Vortex symbol adds 2 more Vortex Spins to your total as well as opening up another Vortex Reel. This is known as the Vortex Spins feature. The Vortex Reels open up plenty of extra possibilities. The number of ways to win increase, up to a maximum of 3,125.
Look out too for the pink orbs that can hit on reels 1 and 5. These extend the size of the wild stacks in play when you land the free spins. The blue orbs appear on the middle 3 reels during Vortex Spins and increase the number of potential free spins on offer. This is known as the Orb Collection feature.
The Vortex Free Spins feature is triggered by opening up all 5 Vortex Reels. Once triggered, you can look forward to stacked wilds, stacked high paying symbols and spins on a fully expanded game engine that offers 3,125 ways to win. The number of free spins depends on how many blue orbs you’ve collected.
If you don’t fancy waiting to trigger the Vortex Free Spins feature, you can buy it for 80 times your stake. You’ll then pick cards to see how many free spins you’ll get (between 5 and 20) and the size of the wild stacks in play (between 2 and 10 symbols high).
The design here is good and just what we’d expect from an Yggdrasil Gaming game. The features are quite unusual though so we recommend dipping your toes via demo play. The gameplay does take a bit of getting used to. The Vortex Spins can deliver some very decent action though.
If you fancy playing a horror-themed slot game with some innovative extras, then it’s worth braving the Dark Vortex. Medium to high variance, you can win a horrifying 7,318 times your stake on every spin with 3,125 ways to win! If the horror theme appeals, Halloween Jack from Net Entertainment and Wolf Hunters from Yggdrasil Gaming are worth playing.