Sugar Monster

Sugar Monster: Slot Overview

Normally, with a sugar-themed slot, we might warn players to make sure to protect their teeth before chomping in. Public health warnings aren't required when playing Sugar Monster from developer Red Tiger though, because it comes with an in-game character who does the munching for you. Sugar Monster is a pay-anywhere slot with sprinklings of cascades, multiplier symbol spewing wild, and free spins where the wild symbol plants itself on the board for the full duration.

Cute and quirky is a way of summing up not just Sugar Monster as a whole but certainly its main character and the world it lives in. This is a place where the buildings are quaintly crooked, there's a cupcake shop, and little candies lie spilt about the place. Perhaps the health risks associated with the overconsumption of sugar don't exist in this realm. Or maybe they do, but no one around here really cares. Certainly not the main monster, as it can't seem to get enough of the stuff.

When the monster is eating, it generally means wins are happening, too, so that's a good thing. As a scatter paying slot, it means when at least 12 matching symbols are in view in any position on the grid, a win is formed, and players collect a reward. A highly volatile slot, Sugar Monster's RTP wavers between a default value of 95.68% and 95.72% when buying a bonus. When choosing a stake, the options are 10 p/c to $/€8.

Each symbol in a win is removed from the board, making space for symbols to drop and replace them. These cascades continue like this until no new win appears on the reels. As for the symbols, since we're dealing with sugar, it makes sense the low-pay symbols are made up of 5 candies, while the high pays are 5 cake-like objects. Payouts for landing winning combinations are 0.3 to 2.5 times the bet for a 12-14 of-a-kind win and 4 to 50 times the bet for a 20+ sized scatter win.

Sugar Monster: Slot Features

Sugar Monster's features are built around a cascade mechanism, a very hungry Sugar Monster, Cotton Multipliers, free spins and bonus buys.

Sugar Monster

The Sugar Monster is a 1x1 sized wild symbol that may only land on an initial spin and can substitute for any regular pay symbol. However, the wild is not removed by the cascade feature when part of a win but stays on the board where it may be used again. Only one Sugar Monster can land at a time. Above the reels is a progress bar with 4 levels. When the wild participates in a win, it eats the symbols and causes a cascade. Each cascade fills the progress bar by +1 level. When 4 cascades on a single spin sequence occur, the bar is filled, and free spins are triggered.

Cotton Multipliers

Sugar Monsters may also barf up to 3 Cotton Candy symbols with multipliers after consuming a winning combination. At the end of the spin, the sum total of all multipliers is applied to the total win and paid. The multiplier values possible are x2-x6, x8, x10, x15, x20, x25, x50, and x100.

Free Spins

When the free spins bonus round is triggered, players are awarded 10 free spins. At the start of the feature, the Sugar Monster grows to 2x2 in size and locks itself in the middle of the reels, where it stays. During free spins, accumulated Cotton Multipliers persist for the full duration of the feature. The multiplier applies to all wins which occur on spins where Cotton Multipliers appear. If a multiplier was present on the triggering spin, it is used on that spin, then reset when the free spins round begins. Should the Sugar Monster consume 4 consecutive wins on a single free spin, +3 extra free spins are awarded.

Feature Buy

The feature buy comes with two options. One is a spin with a guaranteed Sugar Monster for 3x the bet, and the other triggers free spins for 80x the bet.

Sugar Monster: Slot Verdict

Scatter-paying slots have really taken off recently, and one studio that has shown considerable gusto is Red Tiger. As well as Sugar Monster, other scatter-paying related slots the studio has released around the same time were Here Kitty Kitty, Peggy Sweets, and Piñatas & Ponies. All very different games, and Sugar Monster manages to differentiate itself not just from them but other scatter-paying sweet slots like Sweet Bonanza. This is in part because its wild symbol appears in the form of a voracious monster. Wild symbols are easy to leave out of a scatter pays game as their inclusion may well throw a spanner in the mathematical works. Not only are wilds used in Sugar Monster, but Red Tiger has imbued them with a personality all their own.

So much so that Sugar Monster's whole hungry sugar-eating monster thing is so central it might be the game's make-or-break element. Too kiddy for some, just right for others, perhaps. For players who like the personal touch, and if eating sweets and barfing Cotton Multipliers appeals, then Sugar Monster lays on bags of monster charm. What's kinda neat is how much of the personality has been integrated with the features, such as the eating and barfing and so on. Kinda silly, kinda fun, and a max win of 10,806.6 times the bet helps negate the former.

So what is it with the regular matching of candy and scatter-paying slots? Is there a link we've overlooked somewhere, something that ties the two things together, like waffles and Nutella? Whatever it is, software providers can't get enough, and players who feel the same way get something fun, if not remarkable, to try in Sugar Monster.