Shadow Society

Shadow Society: Slot Overview

Like Joseph Heller wrote in Catch-22, 'Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you.' Those who think humanity is run by a hidden group secretly pulling the strings from darkened back rooms might want to step away from Shadow Society by Red Tiger, lest it adds another layer of distrust to their personal worldviews. Shadow Society never gets overly controversial, though, barely scratching the surface of any sort of world order theorem. Instead, it playfully toys with its subject matter while eking out features via a progress mechanic and free spins with a rising multiplier.

Instead of glimpsing darkly lit rooms where powerful individuals watch clips of the moon landings being made in a top-secret film studio on earth, Shadow Society rewinds the clock to an earlier era where its participants wear Venetian masks to hide their identities. Not very well, though, it must be said, as the masks only offer partial cover. The game's setting is fairly perplexing, partially made up of what looks like ripped parchment, behind a 3x3 game grid, with a progress meter sitting up top. The soundtrack is pretty shadowy, possessing a synth-like effect which gives the game a breathless 1980s quality. It matches the mood, which is secretive-ish, but the game doesn't give off the impression it possesses the sort of hidden knowledge that would upend societies and have people questioning everything they know about reality.

Shadow Society is available on tablet, mobile, or desktop devices, and players are able to pick stakes of 10 p/c to $/€40 per spin. It's a medium-high volatile slot, with a maximum theoretical return to player value of 95.76%. The grid can grow as you unlock things, but its starting layout is 3-reels, 3-rows, with 9 ways to win. At full capacity, it can expand to 5x5, with 25 win lines in play.

Wins are created when three to five matching symbols land on adjacent reels, starting from the left, and can be made using 9 regular pay symbols. These are writing instruments, keys, scrolls, pocket watches, and rings as the low pays and four masked characters as the highs. In the beginning, high pays are not present on the reels – more on this below. Shadow Society also doesn't have a wild symbol, but there are some extra special symbols sitting on the reels to help boost the action.

Shadow Society: Slot Features

The first thing to get to grips with is Shadow Society's progress bar & progress symbol. Each time the 1x2 progress symbol hits, players move one step along the progress bar. After 5 steps have been completed on the bar a reward is unlocked. The bar has 8 rewards in total to be unlocked:

• Reward 1 – unlocks the purple character symbol.
• Reward 2 – unlocks an extra reel.
• Reward 3 – unlocks the green character symbol.
• Reward 4 – unlocks an extra row.
• Reward 5 – unlocks the red character symbol.
• Reward 6 – unlocks an additional reel.
• Reward 7 – unlocks the golden character symbol.
• Reward 8 – unlocks an extra row.

Free Spins

At all reel sizes, the free spins scatter appears on the far-left, middle, and far-right reels. Landing 3 scatter symbols awards 10 free spins. Progress on the progress bar can be made during free spins, and +5 additional free spins can be won in the feature if 3 scatters land. The free spins bonus round also comes with a win multiplier starting at x1. Each time a win occurs, the multiplier increases by +1 up to a maximum of x15. The win multiplier is removed when the bonus round ends.

Shadow Society: Slot Verdict

In someone else's hands, a slot about secret societies could have been a riot of tongue-in-cheek satire or a deadly serious dissection of the way the world may be run. Red Tiger, however, has played it safe by marrying an interesting topic to their typical set of goto style of artwork. That's not to disparage it. Few do intriguing semi-mystical visuals as consistently as Red Tiger.

Another thing the studio likes to do every so often is to make these progressive slots that require time and patience to get the game off of, or in some cases, back to, a level of baseline. Usually, the progression involves unlocking features like in 10,001 Nights Megaways; here, it unlocks symbols and features. Doing things this way adds a certain quest element, but you can understand why some players prefer to start a session at least at ground level rather than in an underground space without windows, having to claw their way out of the basement to catch a glimpse of sunlight. Okay, Shadow Society isn't as dire as that in the beginning, yet still, this method won't be for all tastes, and it might be interesting to know if and how there is any effect on the return to player value.

There is a sneaky suspicion that if certain users are okay with having to unlock features, they probably aren't too fussed about slight variations in the RTP. And to be fair, it didn't take too long to unlock a few levels along the trail. When everything's unlocked, however, then what? There are free spins with the rising multiplier, yet once you've unlocked everything, seen the free spins (or not), the quest is complete, and Shadow Society is in danger of dropping in desirability. Potential might not be a major motivator either, maxing out at 1957.7x the bet.

All up, Shadow Society was an okay game. It wouldn't have hurt if Red Tiger had done something more daring with the secret society idea, and the progression element won't appeal to everyone. It's hard to pin down the target audience, but there are clearly enough players out there lapping up these progressive-style games for Red Tiger to keep firing them out.