Fisticuffs Slots

This is a simple slot by the standards of many games created by casino software giant Net Entertainment. Fisticuffs is has a boxing theme – or rather a retro boxing theme which takes you back turn of the last century. This is a 5 reel video slot setup with boxing-related symbols. There are 10 win-lines in total, and just the one feature to make the game stand out. When the 2 different boxers appear adjacently they will fight, creating some more wild symbols. If you enjoy entertaining and no-frills slot games, this could be a great game for you to try.

A complete overview of the NetEnt Fisticuffs slot game can be found in this detailed review. First of all the basic game-play and setup is covered. This includes the coins you will need to spin as well as the winning combinations. After that the ‘boxing’ feature round is described, this works in 2 ways depending on where the boxer symbols land. At the end of this page are the pros and cons of this game.

How to play the Fisticuffs Slot

This slot has 10 winning lines, which can go from left to right and (unusually) from right to left too. You can select the ‘both ways’, though not the number of lines, which are fixed. Instead you will get to choose the number of coins you play per line, and the size of those coins. These can start at 1c (NetEnt slots are often denominated in Euros) with the smallest spin at 20c and the biggest at EUR200.

The symbols are all boxing related, and include very retro looking boots, stools, gloves and a Champions belt. The regular payouts are on the smaller side, with 500 coins for 5 belts, 250 coins for 5 trophies and 150 for 5 gloves as the biggest single reward. Remember that if you have ‘both ways’ switched on you could end up with those 5 of a kind wins paying out double in this game.

There are wild symbols in this game, which take the form of the two boxers. One is a huge guy and the other a skinny guy with a classic Victorian-era handlebar mustache. As well as kicking off the only feature round in this game, these symbols will substitute for any others during the current spin.

You will not find any scatter symbols in this game, and other than the feature there is nothing particularly noteworthy happening on the reels during play.

Fisticuffs has the standard NetEnt’s auto-play facility. The basic settings in this allow you to select between 10 and 1000 spins before stopping. If you click the advanced settings button then you will get more options with win or loss stop criteria too. The game settings allow you to choose which sounds and to lower the quality of the graphics in case your internet connection is not capable of handling the high-res images.

Fisticuffs Slot Feature Round

By many standards, this is a basic feature round. It is in keeping with the tone of the slot and can be entertaining at least for the first few times it happens. When the boxers appear on adjacent reels they will fight, which will create many more wild symbols which stay in place for one additional spin.

Who wins the fight depends on their relative positions. The big guy only appears in the middle reel and the skinny guy in reels 2 or 4. When they are next to each other the big guy punches the skinny guy over to reel 1 or 5, which becomes entirely wild. When they are diagonally next to each other the skinny guy wins, punching up or down and creating a double-wild in the middle of the reels accordingly.

It is a bit of a shame that you only get one more free spin to take advantage of all these extra wilds. On the positive side, these can create a lot of winning combinations.

There are no other bonuses or features attached to this particular game, which also lacks a progressive jackpot.

Fisticuffs Summary

This game is not going to attract players used to the cutting edge 243-way slots with complex (progressive) interactive feature rounds. What NetEnt have done with Fisticuffs is to get back to basics, creating an easy to play game which has a lot of retro-charm in the symbols and the game-play.

While the feature round within the reels is amusing, it is too short for my taste and would be better accompanied by more free spins. The payouts for winning symbols are also not the most generous. One thing I did like was the ‘both ways’ option. Slots have been left to right for years – it is great to see one going in the other direction for once. This is a simple slot game, and is very professionally put together.