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6 January 2025 
Le Viking Slot Review
After a long journey at sea, a particularly sneaky raccoon finds himself on solid ground in Hacksaw Gaming’s latest release, Le Viking!
Dive back into the chaotic lifestyle of Smokey the raccoon as he explores the Viking age in his latest endeavour, Le Viking. Since being introduced to Smokey in Le Bandit, we’ve been hoping to see him pop up in more releases from Hacksaw Gaming.
After playing tricks on the citizens of Paris, Smokey took to the sands of Egypt in Le Pharoah in September of 2024. With such a brief pause between Le Pharoah and this one, will Le Viking be just as compelling as those before it? Let’s play on and find out!
Base Game & Features
Le Viking is a 6-reel, 5-row Video Slot with 15,625 ways to win and varying bet sizes between £.€0.10 and £.€100 per spin. This game offers a Medium Voltility rating, an overall RTP of 96.32% and a generous max win cap of 10,000x your bet.
Wins are accessible when 3 or more matching symbols land from left to right, starting from the leftmost reel. Depending on the winning sequence, payouts between 0.1x and 3x your bet are awarded.
Raid Spins Mode
In the base game, special Bronze, Silver, and Gold Coins can land on the reels. When 6 or more of any kind appear in a single spin, the Raid Spins Mode is activated. Once active, 3 Respins are awarded, with only Coins, Diamonds, Clover, and Dead symbols in play.
During this round, all Coin, Diamond, and Clover symbols become sticky on the reels, remaining in place for the duration of the feature. Each symbol (except Dead) has a unique function throughout the round:
- Bronze Coins: Reveal individual values between 0.2x and 4x your bet
- Silver Coins: Reveal individual values between 5x and 20x your bet
- Gold Coins: Reveal values between 25x and 100x your bet
- Diamonds: Reveal a value of 150x, 250x, and 500x your bet
- Green Clover: Multiplies Coin and Diamond symbols on adjacent squares by x2, x3, x4, x5, x10, or x20
- Gold Clover: Multiplies all Coin and Diamond symbols across the grid by x2, x3, x4, x5, x10, or x20
During Raid Spins, each spin consumes 1 Life. Whenever a new Diamond, Clover, or Coin symbol hits, your remaining lives refill to 3. At the end of this round, all Coin and Diamond values are tallied up and applied to your total win of the round.
Bonus Buy
- Bonushunt Featurespins: Each spin is 5 times more likely to trigger a Free Spins mode (3x your bet)
- Raider Featurespins: Enter Raid Spins with 3 refilling Lives (30x your bet)
- Berserk Free Spins: Awards 3 Lives and 3 Grid Multipliers (100x your bet)
- Ragnarok Free Spins: Awards 3 Lives and 5 Grid Multipliers (200x your bet)
Berserk Free Spins
Landing 3 Scatter symbols anywhere in the base game triggers Berserk Free Spins, awarding 3 refilling Lives. In this round, Dead, Coin, Diamond, Magic Cauldron, Heart, and both Clover symbols are present.
At the start of the round, the positions of each triggering Scatter will activate a special x2 Grid Multiplier. These multipliers will remain sticky throughout Free Spins, until the end of the round. Each coin, diamond, and clover symbol that hits will become sticky until collected by a Magic Cauldron.
When the Magic Cauldron symbol appears, all Grid Multipliers and Clover symbols are activated, applying their values to any coin, diamond, or previous magic cauldron symbols in the area they affect. Clover symbols behave in the same manner as in Raid Spins and award the same values as mentioned previously.
Each coin, diamond, or previous magic cauldrons are collected into a new magic cauldron, which remains in view until it is collected. Once all Lives are consumed, the free spins round ends.
Landing a Heart symbol will increase your overall Lives by +1, up to a maximum of 5. At the end of the feature, all coin and diamond symbols will reveal a value from a predefined set, which is then multiplied by any Grid Multipliers and Clover symbols in view.
Valkyrie Free Spins
Landing 4 Scatters in the base game triggers Valkyrie Free Spins, awarding 3 refilling Lives. This round retains the same mechanics from Berserk Free Spins but with 4 Grid Multipliers active at x3.
Ragnarok Free Spins
Landing 5 Scatters in the base game triggers Ragnarok Free Spins, awarding 3 refilling Lives. This round follows the same structure as Berserk Free Spins, only with 5 Grid Multipliers active at x5.
Journey to Valhalla Free Spins
Landing 6 Scatters in the base game triggers Valhalla Free Spins, awarding 3 refilling Lives. This round also follows the same structure as Berserk Free Spins, only with 6 Grid Multipliers active at x10. In addition, Bronze and Silver Coins do not appear at this time, drastically increasing your chances of landing big wins.
Our Verdict
Hacksaw Gaming’s humble French racoon has become somewhat of an international jet setter, or perhaps time traveller is a more apt way to describe him. The modest and quaint streets of Paris gave way to the sands of Egypt and now the stormy Scandanavian sea that offers both familiarity and a fresh perspective.
Surprisingly, Hacksaw has done away with the marked positions that would reveal coin symbols in favour of a bonus round that has lives, and specific positions that host multipliers. Much else of what made the ‘Le’ series what it is has remained, such as clover multipliers, yet we feel somewhat cheated of a choice after Le Pharaoh gave us two options to choose from.
Le Bandit is still a popular choice, despite its simplicity, and Le Pharaoh isn’t quite as memorable as a sequel but is still an objectively better slot. Le Viking isn’t bad and is nice in the sense that it’s fresh, but we still feel that it lacks a certain charm.
Statistically speaking it is every bit as capable as Le Bandit, and the RTP difference between them is so negligible that it shouldn’t be a consideration. If you’re to pick, we’d stick with the original, and if you were to pick from all of them, our vote goes to Le Pharoah.
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