Day of Dead Slot Review, Demo Play, Payout, Free Spins & Bonuses

Day of Dead Review

We currently have 55 Día de los Muertos-themed slots in our catalog, and Pragmatic Play’s Day of Dead is a pretty superficial addition to the genre. It’s not anything like Book of Dead, just to get that out of the way immediately, as this game is all about expanded walking wild respins. The audiovisual presentation is technically good, but the game ironically lacks depth and soul.

You get these kinds of releases from Pragmatic, and others, once in a while, and some players probably don’t mind as long as the features are entertaining and the potential is decent. That is certainly the case with Day of Dead, as it’s hard to go wrong with walking wild respins. We miss some kind of multiplier action though, as 300x from a single spin is not all that exciting despite the overall 4,500x potential.

Day of Dead Slot - Reels Screen

Day of Dead Slot Features

The green regular wild steps in for all pay symbols to help you complete winning combos. The 4 character premiums pay between 6 and 15 x your stake for 5 of a kind, and there is also a special Tombstone Expanding Wild that ties in with the features we’ll take a closer look at below.

The Tombstone Wild expands to cover the full reel whenever it lands, and this also triggers the Walking Wild Respins feature. The Expanded Wild reel moves one step to the left per respin, until it walks off the grid.

You may land new expanding wilds during the feature, and the respins go on as long as there are walking wild reels present on the screen.

The Free Respin feature is triggered when you land 3 scatters on reels 1, 3 and 5, and it comes with an indefinite amount of free spins. The bonus round goes on as long as you have Walking Wilds present on the reels, and you start with 2 wilds in escrow above the reels. At least one of them is sent to a random reel as the feature starts however, and it kicks off the walking wild respins parade.

A tombstone without the word “wild” is (somewhat ironically) also a wild during the bonus round, and it’s collected in the expanding wild escrow above the grid. The Wilds from the escrow can be added to the reels at random times, or when the last wild walks off reel 1. The feature ends when there are no more wilds left in escrow or on the reels.

Finally, players who live in an eligible jurisdiction can take advantage of the Bonus Buy option (not available for UK players for sure).

This will set you back 100x your stake, and it triggers the Free Respin feature on the spin that follows. The RTP increase to 96.5 % is so slim that it’s barely worth a mention.

The 200 Spins Day of Dead Slot Experience

After a bit of base game grinding, we landed an Expanding Wild on reel 5, which gave us a decent respins run. The bonus round is triggered as the walking wild feature comes to an end, and this happens around the 1-minute mark into the 4:21-minute highlights video. The feature plays out with plenty of walking wild action, and you can see it all for yourself by hitting the play button below.

Review Summary

This is one of those Pragmatic Play releases that gets the job done, but completely lacks real charm, soul and depth. It strongly reminds us of Hot Fiesta, which was released earlier in 2021, only this time the subject matter is Día de los Muertos. The Walking Wilds are paraded in front of you like clockwork, and the game just goes through the motions without ever leaving a lasting impression.

Sure, the tried-and-tested features can be highly effective at times, but nobody can accuse Pragmatic for being original with this release. It’s a run-of-the-mill effort following a template that will appeal to some players, although the 4,500x potential is a tad below the usual 5,000x. You could say that Day of Dead has the same appeal as a fast food meal, but you kind of regret it after the first few bites.

Pros

• Fully expanded walking wild respins
• FS as long as walking wilds are in escrow
• Collect extra walking wilds during the feature
• Win up to 4,500x your stake

Cons

• Very slick and superficial vibe
• Single spin max win is only 300x

If you enjoy Day of Dead Slot you should also try:

Hot Fiesta - is a Pragmatic Play release that takes you to a less morbid kind of Mexican fiesta, and it comes with 5x3 reels and 25 betlines.

You’ll benefit from multiplier wilds up to x5 in the base game, and these become roaming wilds in the bonus round. This can lead to payouts up to 5,000x your stake.

Esqueleto Explosivo 2 - is even better than the original Thunderkick classic, and the singing skeletons come with all the charm and soul the game at hand is lacking. You’ll benefit from a cascading wins multiplier that goes up to x32, and exploding wilds also increase the multiplier. The bonus round comes with wild collection and an unlockable x64 multiplier. The max win is 5,000x your stake.

Diablo Reels - is a somewhat different take on the day of the dead genre, and it’s part of ELK’s classic series. It thus comes with only 3 reels, but these are double-stacked.

You can land stacked wilds, nuding multiplier wilds and you can win up to 2,500x your stake in the bonus round.

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