Candy Boom

Candy Boom Overview

Created by 3 Oaks Gaming, Candy Boom is a multi-coloured thrill ride with a light-hearted feel and a fun candy crush-Esque playing dynamic. Cascading or, in this case, collapsing icons give a pleasant continual movement to the screen. The large playing window also provides this game with a lot of scope to create plenty of wins. These wins may even grow as large as 7,000x the stake – the game's max payout. This game feels slick, high-quality and incredibly accessible, with a theme that everyone can get involved in. However, the real excitement in this game comes courtesy of the many bonus features.

Speaking of the bonuses, these begin with the collapse feature. This feature is triggered every time that a win is registered. When this happens, all of the winning symbols are removed from the reels, and a new set fills the vacated positions. This gives you multiple chances of scoring wins from the same spin. The other features in this game include a free spins round, triggered by landing four or more of the cupcake scatters on the reel at once. This round comes with multiplier icons, helping to boost wins by 2x to 100x. Finally, there is also a bonus buy feature. All bonuses will be explained in more detail later on in the review.

Theme and Symbols

The theme for this game is an old-fashioned candy store or, as we say in England- sweet shop. Another way of looking at it is that this is just another rip off of Candy Crush. Indeed, the symbols are close to identical and the way that the icons cascade and pop is very similar. However, you can't really criticise this game too much, as not only has almost every provider produced some sort of copycat game, but sweets are such a broad theme that it can be adopted very easily without incurring any sort of copyright infringement issues.

The background for this slot is just a plain blue background with white stripes reminiscent of the rays of sunshine on the traditional Japanese flag. The stripes give the impression of the central board (a candy kiosk) moving towards the player. With such a busy and colourful set of reels, it's probably not a bad idea that the background is so plain by contrast.
On the other hand, the playing board has been styled to look like a traditional candy purveyor's kiosk with a striped canopy and a window full of sweets.

The symbols are split into low-value, high-value and special symbols. The low-value symbols are softer-looking candies in different shapes in blue, green, red, yellow, and purple. The most valuable of these is the purple candy which pays out at 10x the stake. On the other hand, the higher value symbols are the rounded candies that have different patterns imprinted on their faces.

These begin with the blue candy with a circular slotted design on it. This one is followed by the green one with a small chip taken from it and finally the orange one with the flower pattern on it. However, the most valuable of the candies is the stripy purple candy with the Saturn-like ring around it. It pays out at 50x the stake for the top combination of 12 or more candies in a cluster. The special symbol finally is the cupcake, which is the most valuable symbol on the reels and helps trigger the free spins.

Game Play

Candy Boom is played on a 5-reel, 6-row cluster pay machine. To win combinations, players must land matching symbols in clusters of four or more. This means icons that are vertically or horizontally aligned and touching.
The betting range for Candy Boom is 20p to £24 per spin. To adjust their bet levels, players can toggle their stake up and down using the tool located at the bottom left-hand side of the screen.

Further information, including a short tutorial and a display of the paytable, can be found via the menu button in the right-hand corner of the screen. The spin and auto spin buttons are located in the centre of the screen.
Volatility for this slot is rated in the high range. The return to player percentage for Candy Boom is 95.52%, which is below average. The biggest payout that players can win on one spin is 7,223x your stake.

Features

The first feature in this game is the cascade feature, or as this game like to call it, the collapse feature. It is triggered every time that a win is registered. The winning symbols are taken off the board and replaced by a new set that falls into the previous set's vacated positions. This gives players multiple chances to score wins from the same spin. The cascades will continue until a new set does not form a win.

The second feature in this game is the free spins round triggered when players land four or more of the cupcake scatters on the reels at once. This will give you ten free spins. This round sees the activation of multiplier candy symbols, which can come in sizes of 2x to 100x the stake and help boost wins when they are part of them.
Finally, this game has a bonus buy option which allows you to buy your way into the free spins for a certain percentage of your current stake. Note, however, that this option is not always available depending on the country in which you are playing it.

Conclusion

This game is basically Candy Crush in slot form. Thus, if you enjoy the addictive mobile game, you are almost guaranteed to enjoy this one. However, be mindful that the RTP is poor, and the volatility is relatively high, so you might want to see what the game is like on the demo before risking any real money.