I Hate Fairytales: Slot Overview

Fairytales have existed for centuries, and the best-known stories are still with us today. As for the fairytales people chase in real life, those tend to shift with the times, our moods, and whatever the current zeitgeist happens to be. Where it once seemed like the ultimate goal was marrying a prince or princess and living happily ever after, today’s “modern fairytale” often skips that and focuses on blowing up on social media to rake in piles of money and clout.

Software provider Elysium Studios, as of early 2024 acquired by supplier Swintt for an undisclosed sum, has decided to put a new spin on some classic tales. The slot is I Hate Fairytales, dropping players into a magical, storybook world—only it’s been turned upside down by characters who are sick of the usual fairytale routine. Among graffiti-tagged castles, you’ll run into the likes of Snow Wild, Aria, and Rapunsell, in a setting that feels like something Walt Disney might have created if he’d grown tired of the kiddie vibe and swapped sugar, spice and everything nice for something a bit… nasty. Just a bit nasty.

The gameplay in I Hate Fairytales takes place on a 5×4 reelset with 1,024 ways to win used to work out payouts. Behind the scenes sits a 4 out of 5 medium/high volatile math model, offering a maximum RTP of 94%. Tap the coin+ button to access stake settings, with bets available from 20 c to $/€40.

I Hate Fairytales’ symbols look pretty slick, featuring 4 low-pay cupcakes with bites missing and four higher-paying character icons, including a unicorn firing a rainbow from its rear. Landing 5 OAK combinations pays 0.3 to 0.6 times the bet for the cupcakes and 0.7 to 1 times the bet for the other pay symbols. Wilds help create wins by substituting for any standard pay symbol.

I Hate Fairytales: Slot Features

I Hate Fairytales can randomly drop 3 character-linked features onto the reels during the base game as well as throughout the free spins bonus. The featured characters are Snow Wild, Aria, and Rapunsell.

• Snow Wild can appear at random to add wild symbols to the screen.
• Aria randomly drops wilds that cover entire reels and awards respins. With each free respin, every Mega Wild shifts one reel to the left until it moves off the grid. Free respins keep going until no Mega Wilds remain visible.
• Rapunsell may randomly extend the reels upward, with a win multiplier assigned to each expanded reel. Free respins are also granted. On every respin, the expanded reels contract again, and the win multipliers reduce as well. Free spins continue until all expanded reels return to their original size. All ways wins are multiplied by the sum of the win multipliers of participating reels.

Free Spins

Landing 3 free spins scatter symbols on the leftmost, middle, and rightmost reels awards 8 free spins. During the free spins round, every reel expands to 6 rows high, and the 3 Princess features may randomly activate. In free spins, Rapunsell does not expand reels. Instead, the Rapunsell feature randomly places win multipliers above reels, which do not reset until the round ends. If a multiplier lands on top of an existing multiplier, it increases the current value.

Smash Bonus

Hitting 3 bonus scatter symbols on the leftmost, middle, and rightmost reels triggers the Smash Bonus. Here, players click the on-screen entities with a hammer to reveal a bet multiplier. Once every entity has been smashed out of existence, the combined prize is awarded.

Bonus Buy

Both of I Hate Fairytales’ bonus rounds are available via the bonus buy. Free spins cost 150 times the bet and the Smash Bonus costs 27 times the bet.

I Hate Fairytales: Slot Verdict

No shade on the endless Jack and the Beanstalk-style slots, but it was genuinely nice to see a less kiddie take on fairytales show up in a game. Elysium Studios likely had a laugh or two while putting I Hate Fairytales together, and the unicorn blasting a rainbow from its butt is a surprisingly inspired touch. It’s all pretty amusing, and it wouldn’t be a terrible thing if Elysium leaned even harder into the comedy in future titles. Still, humour and gross-out can be a tightrope, and some jokes only land if you’re in on the gag.

Another highlight was I Hate Fairytales’ Smash Bonus. You don’t often get the chance to whack little critters for prizes. That said, this wasn’t where the big money seemed to come from. The highest result pulled from the Smash Bonus was 50x the bet. Whether huge, rare rewards can appear isn’t clearly stated. Maybe they can, maybe they can’t. Either way, the lack of clarity wasn’t exactly reassuring. On the plus side, I Hate Fairytales shows an impressive (at least on paper) 33,934x winning potential, suggesting either a massive reward is hidden inside the Smash Bonus or—more likely—the free spins mix of a larger reel set, multipliers, and wild-based features can really hit hard.

Someone at Elysium Studios might hate fairytales, but it’s tough to hate what they’ve built here. Even if it doesn’t scream top-tier production compared to some modern slots, the creativity and effort are obvious throughout. RTP aside—which plenty of studios seem happy to trim these days—I Hate Fairytales delivers a cheeky alternative to the usual storybook theme, pairing quirky curiosity-style features with the kind that can smack you across the face with a leather riding glove.