A VS symbol drops onto a reel and the reel stretches to full height. Two slayers stand on it, each holding a different multiplier, and a second later only one is still upright. The survivor's number takes the whole reel, that reel turns Wild, and every line win running through it is multiplied. That duel is the engine of Shadows Inc. It is also the engine of Slayers Inc, because Shadows Inc is the Stake version of the same Hacksaw Gaming build with nothing underneath it changed.
Two slayers, one reel, one survivor
The grid is 5 reels by 4 rows with 14 fixed paylines. Matching symbols pay from the leftmost reel across adjacent reels, and only the highest win on each line counts, so the base game reads like a plain line slot right up until a VS symbol arrives.
A VS only expands when expanding it will form part of a win, so a duel never plays out for nothing. Once it covers the reel, the two slayers fight and the surviving multiplier applies across that entire reel while turning it Wild. The ladder of possible values climbs in single steps from 2x to 10x, then jumps to 15x, 20x, 25x, 50x, 100x, 250x and 500x. Two or more duels inside one win do not compound each other: the values are added together first, and that total then multiplies the line wins. Each reel holds only one VS at a time, and a VS on all five reels turns the whole grid Wild.
Stakes run from $0.10 to $2,000, and the feature buys can go above that ceiling. The rhythm is familiar from the rest of the Hacksaw Gaming catalogue: modest line wins while nothing expands, then one reel-wide multiplier that rewrites the spin.
Three scatter counts, three different bonuses
Free spins scatters decide which round opens, and the count matters more here than usual because there are three destinations rather than one.
Three scatters trigger Rise of the Syndicate, which is 10 free spins with a raised chance of a VS symbol landing. Extra scatters during the round extend it, with two more scatters worth 2 additional spins and three worth 4.
Four scatters trigger Wild Slayers. It keeps every base game rule and adds the Slicer, which can activate whenever a VS symbol lands and drops a full row of Wild symbols onto a randomly chosen row. Ten spins again, with two different ways for one spin to fill with Wilds.
Five scatters trigger One Slayer To Slay Them All. Ten spins, the Wild Slayers rules intact, and both DuelReels and the Slicer guaranteed to activate on every spin. FS symbols do not appear inside that round at all, so it is ten spins of everything at once.
Sitting alongside those rounds is the Best of Bonus. Its symbol appears only in the base game, and landing it alongside the scatters that trigger a round starts the Best of version instead. Three rounds then play out back to back, each result posts to a scoreboard outside the grid, and only the highest of the three is paid. Two results get thrown away, which turns the round into a hunt for one strong outcome.
Shadows Inc bonus buy RTP: what the seven FeatureSpins return
Seven purchase options sit in the buy menu, and all seven land inside a 0.12 point spread:
- BonusHunt FeatureSpins, 96.28%
- Duo Duel FeatureSpins, 96.33%
- Trouble Trio FeatureSpins, 96.3%
- Rise of the Syndicate, 96.38%
- Wild Slayers, 96.28%
- Best of Rise of the Syndicate, 96.29%
- Best of Wild Slayers, 96.26%
Rise of the Syndicate is the pick of them at 96.38%. FS symbols cannot land during Duo Duel or Trouble Trio, so neither of those two can roll on into a free spins round. Every figure on that list matches Slayers Inc to the decimal, the first sign that the two games are one build wearing different paint. A buy is still a concentrated bet whichever number is attached to it, and it costs many times a single spin.
Shadows Inc vs Slayers Inc: same game, different paint
Put the two specification screens side by side and they match line for line. Shadows Inc returns 96.28%, a figure Hacksaw quotes from a simulation of 10,000,000,000 rounds, and Slayers Inc returns exactly the same. Both cap at 15,000x, so a $1 spin at the ceiling pays $15,000, the scale of result that ends up on the list of all-time biggest slot wins. Both use 5 reels, 4 rows and 14 paylines. Both run DuelReels, all three free spin rounds and the Best of Bonus.
The paytable is identical too. The five low symbols each pay 2.00 for five, 1.00 for four and 0.20 for three. The high symbols pay 6.00, 6.00, 12.00, 12.00 and 20.00 for five of a kind, 3.00, 3.00, 6.00, 6.00 and 10.00 for four, and 1.00, 1.00, 2.00, 2.00 and 4.00 for three. The VS symbol pays 20.00 for five, and Wild substitutes for everything in that table.
What changed is the artwork. Slayers Inc is red and gold with a red scatter. Shadows Inc is purple and blue, and its scatter is purple with a blue underline. That is the entire list of differences, and it makes this the odd one out among Stake's Hacksaw exclusives, where Rage of Egypt pays 1.25 percentage points more than Hand of Anubis and LIT City pays 1.21 more than RIP City.
Should you play Shadows Inc?
On Stake the choice between the two is cosmetic. Neither holds a return advantage over the other, so pick the art you prefer. Away from Stake nothing is being missed either: Slayers Inc has the identical maths and a free demo anyone can spin, and RTPspy tracks its live bets across a wide spread of crypto casinos. Shadows Inc has no public demo yet, so there is currently no way to try it without staking real money.
One caution carries over from the original. A separate Slayers Inc Boosted build exists on some casinos, listed as its own title with its own maths, so the version loaded matters as much as the name on the tile. Read the RTP line in the info screen of the game in front of you and trust it over any review page, including this one.
It suits players who accept a slow base game in exchange for one loud moment. The top symbol pays 20.00 for five, so the 15,000x comes from stacked duels and Wild-flooded free spins or it does not come at all. Anyone who prefers frequent, steady returns will find the waiting long. Set a limit before opening it and stop there rather than when the balance decides.
