Dark Summoning

I reckon Hacksaw Gaming must have a split personality. One minute they are making cute cartoons, and the next they drop something properly sinister like Dark Summoning. I sat down with this one and it is genuinely eerie—you have got a skeletal bloke in a robe staring at you from the left and a horned demon on the right. It is played on a 5-reel, 6-row grid wedged into some rocky altar, and it definitely sets a mood that is more about summoning demons than spinning for fruit.

The symbols fit the bill beautifully. You are not matching lemons here; it is bloody scissors, flies, crows, pyramids, and a goat head with red eyes as the top payer. What really caught my eye was the Super Cascade mechanic. Unlike your standard tumble where just the winning combo vanishes, here the game bins *all* instances of that winning symbol type from the grid. It clears the board nicely for new drops. Watch out for the Blue Wilds in the base game—they can land with multipliers up to 100x, which wakes you up a bit.

Things get mental if you land the Unholy scatters. Three of them get you the Trial by Hellfire bonus, where winning spots get marked and eventually turn into specific Wilds when another Unholy symbol hits. But the real cracker is the Rise to Salvation round. You need three Unholy symbols plus an Order symbol to trigger it.

This feature completely flips the script—literally. The symbols cascade *upwards* instead of down. It felt odd at first, but watching the Lost Soul symbols drift up to the top row to cash in multipliers or prizes is brilliant. It is persistent too, so those souls hang about until they ascend. It was definitely the highlight of my session.

Make no mistake, Dark Summoning is volatile—rated 4 out of 5 on the risk scale. You can go a fair few spins wondering where your bankroll went. The max win is a cheeky 10,666x the bet, because of course it is. Just be careful with the RTP; I played the 96.36% version, but some places might run it lower, so check the small print before you commit your cash.

If you enjoyed Rotten or other dark titles, you will be right at home here. It has that high-quality, creepy polish Hacksaw Gaming is getting famous for. It is not one for a casual, cheery flutter, but if you fancy something with a bit of bite and some clever mechanics like that reverse cascade, give it a go. Just bring your brave pants, mate.