El Cowboy Megaways: Slot Overview
Load up your six-shooter, saddle your stead, put on some face paint, and head to the sunny vistas of Mexico with software provider Stakelogic in an online slot titled El Cowboy Megaways. Following on from a previous game called El Patron, it takes on a brighter look than the game it was built on. However, at first, El Cowboy Megaways might seem less dangerous than El Patron - a slot about crime, yet it was a surprisingly tightly wound game, which could pop like a Day of the Dead firework in the right circumstance.
As partially alluded to, El Cowboy Megaways mixes elements of Day of the Dead with a bundle of cowboy iconography. It's located in a hot-looking Mexican town, done in a traditional or stereotypical style, with a wagon, cactus, colourful buildings, pennants, and so on. A lawless Wild West spirit infuses the proceedings, too, expressed through things like the characters and icons hitting on the reels. It's a little mismatched in the beginning, yet everything came together when the action heated up.
Technically, El Cowboy Megaways is playable on any device, but it does get a little squished on a mobile screen, especially in portrait mode. Part of the reason is the active gaming area which consists of a 6-reel Megaways grid holding 2-7 symbols each, plus two bonus reels – one above the regular reels, one below it. Since the number of symbols in view changes, so does the number of ways to win, maxing out at 117,649. Bets vary from 20 p/ to $/€100 per spin, while the highly volatile math model churns out a theoretical return value of 96.21%.
A set of rough 'n ready symbols greet players when inspecting the paytable. From low to high are liquor bottles and cups, cigars, knuckle dusters, guns, cigar cutters, and five different character symbols. Landing a six of a kind winning way pays 0.6x the bet up to 12x the bet at the most. Winning ways are removed from the board by the cascade feature when they hit, and new symbols drop down to close any gaps. Cascades continue to trigger until no new win appears.
El Cowboy Megaways: Slot Features
Wild symbols replace any regular pay symbol and are injected by the two bonus reels. The top bonus reel contains Action Symbols, and the bottom bonus reel has wild symbols. If the two bonus reels align, they trigger one of these modifiers:
- Expanding Wilds – a wild symbol is placed on the reel and expands to cover all of it.
- Dropping Wilds – 5 wild symbols are placed on the reel and drop down one position with a respin on each drop until they fall off the grid.
- Multiplier Wilds – wilds with an x2, x3, x4, or x5 multiplier are placed on the reel. If more than one multiplier is used in a win, the values are multiplied together.
Free Spins
Getting 4, 5, or 6 scatter symbols in view awards 15, 20, or 25 free spins, respectively. In free spins, one bonus reel has dynamite symbols, while the other bonus reel has wilds or multiplier wild symbols. When the two reels align, the following is triggered:
- Wild symbol – up to 15 wilds are placed anywhere except the first reel.
- Multiplier wild symbol – multiplier wild symbols with values of x2, x3, x4, or x5 land on reels 2-6.
In addition, a random win multiplier is active on every spin. It takes a value of x2, x3, x4, x5, x6, x8, x10, x12, x15, x20, x25, x50, or x100.
Buy Feature
El Cowboy Megaways may also come with four bonus buy options. This is a regular free spins trigger for 100x the bet, free spins with 5,040 minimum ways on every spin for 300x the bet, free spins with 117,649 ways on every spin for 1,000x the bet, or randomly collect one of the previous three options for 250x the bet.
El Cowboy Megaways: Slot Verdict
Stakelogic's tagline is 'Think Bigger', and in El Cowboy Megaways, the studio has lived up to the exhortation in one or two ways. There are things about El Cowboy Megaways which could have been stronger. The audio, for one, feels like an afterthought, though, to be fair, perhaps it hadn't been fully finished for the demo. However, this is a game containing a bunch of thoughtful features and player options that can hit rather hard. One thing about El Cowboy Megaways in particular hit harder than waking up in a cactus patch in the middle of the Chihuahuan Desert after a rough night of El Luchador tequila shots.
This is none other than the 1,000x bonus buy, delivering an enticing full Megaways and random win multiplier combo. The interesting thing is, it isn't some 5 free spins, all or nothing, desperado event. Players get a large number of 15-25 free spins with all the bells and whistles to see what'll happen. It's not cheap at 1,000x the bet, but it's far from being the most expensive bonus buy out there, and whilst not every buy is likely to end up in a major fiesta, it felt like decent value. Keep in mind free spins come with a couple of other extras in the form of wilds and multiplier wilds from the bonus reels. It was nice to see Stakelogic make such a bold move. One ever so slight niggle was the 10,000x the bet win cap put in place for the base game and bonus round. Though there's nothing sad with the amount, as such, El Cowboy Megaways felt like one of those games which could have surpassed that amount and made a real name for itself.
Outside the premium bonus buy, El Cowboy Megaways isn't quite so intriguing, but there are still interesting things going on here for gunslingers or Megaways buffs to take a look at. It does seem like a game that gets better the more you are willing to put into it, which is a gamble in itself, perhaps, yet should the punt pay off, El Cowboy Megaways can be surprisingly good.
It's not without its wrinkles, but El Cowboy Megaways has some rather intriguing stuff to offer Megaways buffs or bonus buy players.
