NetEnt has returned to the food and sweets themes more often than usual in recent times, and perhaps it’s a sign of their subconscious hunger for the good ole’ glory days, who knows. 101 Candies is a cluster pays slot with avalanche wins, and the 7×7 grid is placed in the front of a red candy-seller vehicle. The symbol values aren’t super high on their own, but the conveyor multiplier wild system can wreak havoc in all stages of the game.
It comes with additive multiplier wilds up to x101, and they leap down from the top reel per consecutive cascade. Feature coins can land at random times to apply 1 of 4 different modifiers as well, and you get more of the same in the bonus round. You can winup to 3,580x your stake, and the bonus buy option may sweeten the deal for eligible players. There was something about the slow pace of 101 Candies game that was a bit of a turn-off for us, however, but we might be too particular in that sense.
NetEnthas been around since 1996, and they used to be at the leading edge of the iGaming world of online slots. They aren’t as productive and creative as they used to be after being acquired by Evolution, however, but the laurels they are resting on are massive to say the least.Gonzo’s Questis their most iconic release, and NetEnt has won more than 32 high prestige awards over the years.
Well, if Postman Pat decided to become a candy salesman instead of a postman, he would definitely go for the car found in 101 Candies by NetEnt. The visual style reminded us of that children’s show as well, and it might tug on that nostalgic heart string for players old enough to remember it. As usual with the sweet tooth theme, players on a diet should go for something else entirely.
The top-tier 101 Candies RTP of96.08 %is a tad above average. However, operators can adjust the RTP down to96.05, 94.09, 94.07, or 88.02 %, depending on the market. The 101 Candies max win is 3,580x your stake, which is decent for a low to medium volatility game.
You win by landing 5 to 16+ matching symbols in a cluster anywhere on the 7×7 grid, and clusters form horizontally and/or vertically. You can choose bet levels between £0.2 and £120 per spin, which caters to most player types, and 101 Candies slot comes with cascading wins known as the Avalanche feature in this game.
101 Candies doesn’t come with the highest symbol values we’ve seen in a cluster pays grid slot, far from it actually, but the somewhat unusual multiplier wild system does compensate for that issue pretty well.
All winning symbols are removed each time, which makes room for new and existing symbols to drop down to fill the empty positions. If a new cluster win is generated from this redrop, the process repeats. This goes on until you land a non-winning redrop. The Avalanche mechanic gives you indefinite extra wins per round, essentially.
You will see the Wild Conveyor above the main grid in all stages of the 101 Candies game, and it’s filled with multiplier wilds between x2 and x101 per wild. New random multiplier wilds appear on this conveyor top reel per base game spin, and wilds that replace used wilds tend to come with a higher multiplier value.
The leftmost multiplier wild from the conveyor reel leaps down onto the grid per consecutive Avalanche win, and a new multiplier wild then comes in from the rightmost side to push the other wilds to the left. Multiplier wilds on the main grid will boost any cluster win they become part of, and multipliers are added together if more than one wild is part of the same cluster win. The wilds leap to random positions each time, just to be clear.
You will sometimes land a Feature Coin duringAvalanche sequences, and this happens at random times to trigger a modifier that corresponds to the coin type you get. The feature coin is removed as the modifier is triggered, and a multiplier wild from the conveyor reel leaps onto the grid as usual. Below is an overview of the feature coin modifiers:
Landing3, 4, 5, 6, 7, or 8 scattersin the same avalanche sequence, or on the very same spin, triggers the Bonus Round in 101 Candies slot. This gives you10, 11, 12, 13, 14, or 15 free spins, respectively, and the wilds on the conveyor reel don’t reset between free spins. While not explicitly stated anywhere, it’s our experience that you tend to get higher multiplier wilds, as well as more frequent feature coin triggers, during the bonus round.
Eligible players can purchase the bonus round directly from the in-game Buy Feature menu. This will set you back100x the stake, and you get between 10 and 15 free spins from the triggering spin that follows.
You get to see a feature coin modifier in the base game, before we purchase and trigger the bonus round at 0:27 into the 4:29-minute highlights video. We got 4 triggering scatters which gave us 11 free spins, and you can see for yourself how we fared by hitting the play button below.
We have to say that 101 Candies slot didn’t really come across as a NetEnt release, or at least not the NetEnt we used to know before they were swooped up by Evolution Gaming more than 3 years ago. Sweets and balloons abound, and the candy saleswagon looks like it was converted from Postman Pat’s old car. The pace is a bit too sluggish for our taste, and a turbo option would’ve been appreciated. Despite being a tad childish, the visuals are okay, but not really all that engaging either.
The multiplier wild conveyor system is admittedly somewhat original, and it can lead to decent to solid payouts also in the base game. The feature coins come in handy once in a while, without really doing anything revolutionary most of the time. Everything heats up in the bonus round, as you seemingly get more frequent feature coins and higher wild multipliers, and the3,580x potentialis solid enough for a mid-range release like this. We’ve seen far better from NetEnt, but a certain sweet tooth crowd might appreciate 101 Candies more than we did.
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Now that you’ve read our verdict about this game, perhaps you would like to engage in some 101 Candies real money play. The good news is that we have an always up to date 101 Candies casino list at the top of this page, as we scan all the online casinos on a daily basis:
If you enjoy 101 Candies, you should also check:
Milkshake XXXtreme- is not as extreme as it sounds, as this is a low/medium volatile NetEnt installment in the sweets genre. It comes with random milkshake multipliers up to x100, as well as a random booster feature, and you can win up to a solid 7,100x your stake.
Cupcakes- is another candy-themed release from NetEnt, and this one is more volatile. It comes with a scatter pay system and cascading wins, and 2×2-sized cupcake symbols accumulate gumdrop multipliers. The multiplier only keeps building in the free spins round, and the max win is 2,762x your stake.
Fruit Shop Frenzy- is a recent fruity installment also from NetEnt, and winning with fruit symbols gives you 2 streak free spins that continue indefinitely as long as you keep winning. A frenzy mode multiplier system can also kick in, and this can lead to payouts up to 10,868x your stake.
Playing 101 Candies on your mobile phone or tablet device is no problem, of course, as all casino games are optimized for mobile play these days. The good news is that you don’t even have to download any app to play, as the games work directly in your mobile browser. You can thus play 101 Candies slot with Android or iOS phones as you see fit.
While no bulletproof winning strategy exists with online slots, there are a few 101 Candies tips to consider. First of all, make sure to play at a casino that gives you the top-tier RTP setting (ask if in doubt). Take note of the 100x bonus buy, as it indicates your average returns from the feature also when triggered organically. Get a sense of the undisclosed bonus round hit rate before playing for real money, and adjust your bet level accordingly.
Playing the free 101 Candies demo (found at the top of this page) is a great way to, among other things, gauge the bonus round hit rate (which NetEnt has not disclosed for this game). You can experiment with different bet levels, and see what level is suitable to keep you afloat between bonus round triggers depending on your bankroll.
Pro Tip: sometimes casinos will give you a 101 Candies free spin or ten if you simply ask customer support nicely.