Chilli Heat Spicy Spins

Chilli Heat Spicy Spins: Slot Overview

Developer Pragmatic Play has booked seats for a trip to sunny Mexico for the third game in its Chilli Heat set of slots. The original, Chilli Heat, was pretty low-key for a so-called spicy slot, though it was released in 2018, while the sequel, Chilli Heat Megaways, was thrust into the future thanks to the Megaways engine on license from Big Time Gaming. For the third one, Chilli Heat Spicy Spins, Pragmatic Play has taken the game back to basics, relying on a respins quirk and impressive (for the series) winning potential to provide the spicy bits.

At the start of the session, players find themselves in one of those excellently quaint Mexican scenes casino game makers love to recreate. You know, a cobbled street, pot plants, a blue sky, string with colourful materials hanging from it, balconies, etcetera. It's the sort of street you can imagine tourists walking slowly down on their holiday, taking photos of every single charming nook and cranny. Equally excellent in-theme music keeps the spirits up, especially in the respin round, which removes the street scene and replaces it with roaring flames and raining chillies. It's not the most original view by a long shot, but an agreeable one if this sort of thing is of interest.

Chilli Heat Spicy Spins' base game is an ironically spice-free phase, played on a 5x3 reelset in combinsation with 10 paylines to evaluate wins and no real features to speak of. The maximum theoretical RTP comes in at 96.58% either when betting 10 c to $/€250 per spin or when buying the respins feature. Volatility is pretty tangy, though, if you're the sort of gambler who prefers a high setting.

Ten types of pay symbols exist on the reel strips. They are 10 to Ace, maracas, glasses, hot sauce, doggies, and guitar players. Five-of-a-kind royal wins are worth 10x the stake, while a line of 5 matching premium symbols pays 20x to 200x the stake. Wilds substitute all symbols except for scatters. Wilds land on all reels and have the same value as the guitar player symbol.

Chilli Heat Spicy Spins: Slot Features

Nada features add zest to the base game, so it's not till the bonus round is triggered that anything particularly special happens. Scatters land on the leftmost, middle and rightmost reel. Hitting 3 scatters triggers the respins feature, which is played on a 5x5 matrix. During the feature, only Money symbols and blanks can stop on the reels. All landed Money symbols remain on the grid until the round ends.

3 respins are initially awarded, and every time a new Money symbol hits, the respin count resets. Money symbols connected horizontally or vertically form groups that get a multiplier assigned to them with multipliers reaching up to x50. When the feature ends, the values of all Money symbols in view are multiplied by any group multipliers, added together, and then paid. If the screen was filled with 25 Money symbols the max win is awarded.

Feature Buy

The respins feature can be triggered instantly from the base game by buying it for 100 times the current total bet.

Chilli Heat Spicy Spins: Slot Verdict

Online gamblers are hardly short of Mexican-themed slots to choose from. The heat, the food, the music, it's like catnip to software providers who love to take players on trips to the colourful Latin American country. However, they generally stick to a limited side of the theme, which includes things like chilli peppers, mariachi music, Day of the Dead festivals, and so on. Pragmatic Play's Chilli Heat slots certainly don't break out of the box to let players sample other aspects of the culture. On the contrary, Chilli Heat Spicy Spins doubles down on the cliches, throwing up a lively mix of the colourful visuals and energetic music endemic in this category of casino games. It's all agreeably done, but maybe don't pick Chilli Heat Spicy Spins if you're the sort of traveller who likes to get off the beaten path to avoid tourist traps.

Maybe pick it, however, if the typical way these slots are presented gets the pulse a-ticking - and you're not too fussed about a long list of uniquely innovative features. That's one thing Chilli Heat Spicy Spins does not have. Aside from some solid symbol values, the base game is bare. The respin round is, too, but that is where the game's one minor novelty can be found. It's a pretty interesting one, which gets more exciting the more Money symbols are able to join together in orthogonal directions. As an out-there comparison, it's not as sophisticated as Slotmill's Coin Clusters concept, which came to mind during testing for some reason, but gamblers who want a basic hold 'n' win round with an uncomplicated extra might be intrigued.

Winning potential might be of intrigue as well, and the 10,000x cap is double what Chilli Heat Megaways was able to boast. However, outside of filling the screen during respins, it might be a little tough to picture that happening. The game has spirit, history, and may attract players who shy away from complexity, but it's also hard to see Chilli Heat Spicy Spins really firing up the Mexican-themed sector of the market a whole lot.