Sweet Bonanza

Pragmatic Play is not alone in taking inspiration from one of the greatest mobile games in history, Candy Crush, but Sweet Bonanza is one of the most successful and popular interpretations made for the casino market.

The slot's greatness comes from combining three simple concepts;

1. Falling symbols
2. Scatter Pays and
3. super sweet multipliers in the free spins round.

The cute graphics also contribute to the game's popularity, but it's mainly - at least in our opinion - the Scatter Pays mechanic that makes it so good: what you see is what you get. No paylines to keep track of. More goodies of the same kind mean bigger pay. Simple as.

For the less patient degens among us the possibility to buy the bonus feature (for 100x the base bet) will be welcome, and for the not so redacted it is possible to flick a switch and pay 25% extra per spin and double the chance to trigger it manually. Even everyday plebs will find this useful, especially with a base game that completely lacks bonus functions.

Sweet Bonanza is played on a 6x5 board. A minimum of 8 symbols are required to pay out. Scatter Pays means that the position of the symbols doesn't matter, they can be scattered anywhere on the screen but still pay out as long as they are of the same type.

The game uses falling symbols. Or "tumbling reels" as it is also called in the world of slots. This means that when a win is created, the involved symbols disappear, and new ones are added from above. In Sweet Bonanza it is not associated with a win multiplier (which is common) but it is still possible to get nice wins.

The base game has no special features or special symbols other than the swirling lollipop which is the way to the free spins. The game has a medium volatility and a maximum win of a whopping 21,100x.

The game's return to player (RTP) is specified as a range of 96.48% to 96.51%, and unfortunately the rules don't specify where and why. However, given that the range is so small, only 0.03%, it doesn't matter whether it refers to straight bonus purchases or games with extra bets activated.

Buying directly into the bonus round costs 100x the bet and hitting the double chance free spins button will increase the base bet by 25%. As mentioned, these seem to be mathematically balanced costs that do not affect the payout significantly. As the slim RTP range suggests.

At least 4 lollipops are required to activate 10 free spins. Several will not give you more free spins but will instead give you a pretty substantial coin win.

• 4 lollipops give 10 free spins and 2x coin win.
• 5 lollipops give 10 free spins and 4x coin win
• 6 lollipops give 10 free spins and 80x coin win

Three additional lollies during free spins will award +5 free spins.

The gameplay during free spins is also very simple. It works like the base game except that a multiplier symbol is introduced on the reels: a colorful bomb with up to 100x win multiplier.

A multiplier symbol on its own does not give a win, it must have something to multiply to give something. After all tumbles (consecutive wins) are completed, all multipliers on the board will be collected (and added (not multiplied) together) and applied to the win.

Nothing fancy but it works extremely well.