Floating Dragon - Dragon Boat Festival Slot Review, Demo Play, Payout, Free Spins & Bonuses

Floating Dragon - Dragon Boat Festival Review

We didn’t really think the original Floating Dragon release would become as popular as it has proven to be, and we certainly did not imagine that this Asian-themed Big Bass Bonanza spin-off would turn into a trilogy. This is now a fact, however, as Reel Kingdom’s Floating Dragon Boat Festival is about to hit an online casino “near you”. It’s pretty similar to the original game overall, but it comes with a more robust math model and some other extras.

The visual style is similar as well, but Reel Kingdom has bothered to make a brand new theme for this release. You can now land cash fish prizes up to 10,000x in the free spins round, which is also the game’s capped max win, and this is twice what’s on offer in the original game. In addition, players in certain jurisdictions (not UK) can purchase both the Big Bass inspired FS round, and the Hold & Spin feature. An Ante Bet option has been included as well, and we prefer Floating Dragon Boat Festival over the original for all of these reasons.

Floating Dragon Boat Festival Slot - Reels Screen

Floating Dragon Boat Festival Slot Features

The premium symbols pay between 20 and 200 x your stake for 5 of a kind wins, and the lady Wild symbol can appear anywhere to step in for pay symbols to help complete and/or improve wins. The Wild does not substitute for scatter and money symbols, however, and the fish pay symbol serves double duty as a money symbol worth up to 10,000x as well (more about that below).

The Hold & Spin Bonus Round Triggers when you land 3+ regular (not fish) money symbols anywhere in view, and these regular money symbols come with values between 1x and 2,000x your stake.

The triggering money symbols become sticky on an otherwise cleared grid, and you start with 3 respins in your tally.

The triggering symbols add their values to your total win per round that follows, and the same goes for new money symbols that land. The new money symbols that appear do not become sticky, however, but they reset the respins tally to 3 each time. Your total win is summed up and paid when you run out of respins.

Floating Dragon Boat Festival Slot - Hold and Win

The Free Spins Bonus Round triggers when you land 3, 4, or 5 scatters anywhere in view, and this gives you 10, 15, or 20 free spins, respectively. The Lady Wild serves double duty as a Collector symbol, and she will collect all Fish Money symbols in view. The Wild itself is collected in the trail above the grid, and you get +10 extra spins per 4 collected wild symbols.

You can win the +10 extra spins 3 times, and this also gives you an x2, x3, and x10 multiplier that applies to all cash fish wins from that point forward, respectively.

The multiplier becomes active once your new batch of spins start to play out, and you cannot win extra spins after the 3rd retrigger. A Dragon can appear if at least 1 Wild Collector is present with no money fish, and it will add a bunch of money fish randomly to the grid to be collected.

You can play with the Ante Bet feature turned on if you wish, and this will cost you 50 % more per spin. This gives you a higher likelihood of landing scatters, which increases your bonus round chances. In addition, non-UK players can purchase either of the bonus rounds for 100x the stake. The bonus round has an organic hit rate of 1 in 233 spins without the Ante Bet turned on.

The 200 Spins Floating Dragon Boat Festival Slot Experience

You get a brief taste of the base game, before we purchase the free spins round at 0:36 into the 6:19-minute highlights video. We got 15 free spins from the 4 triggering scatters, and we then purchase the Hold & Spin feature at 4:21 into the video. You can see for yourself how we fared by hitting the play button below.

Review Summary

The original Floating Dragon has become a somewhat surprising success for Reel Kingdom, given that it’s basically an Asian-themed remake of Big Bass Bonanza with a Hold & Spin feature bolted on for good measure. The higher potential may partly explain this, although there are plenty of installments in the Big Bass series that beats the original game by now.

Floating Dragon Boat Festival stays more true to the original game than the Megaways release that came in-between, and the fish money symbol values, as well as the potential, has been doubled.

You can win up to 10,000x your stake from a single fish symbol, but the overall max win is twice as high in Floating Dragon Megaways. Reel Kingdom could’ve done more to make Floating Dragon Boat Festival stick out from the first game, perhaps, but then again, fans of the original Floating Dragon get more of the same with a larger potential in this follow-up. It’s essentially a remake, but the Ante Bet and Bonus Buy features may benefit people in certain jurisdictions. If you liked the first game, you will most likely enjoy Floating Dragon Boat Festival as well, and there is always the Megaways version if you want it even bigger and bolder.

Pros

• Hold & Spin w/ initial triggering symbols repeat wins
• Cash fish collection w/ multiplier/retrigger trail
• Land cash fish symbols up to 10,000x
• Win up to 10,000x (1 in 2,750,653 spins hit rate)

Cons

• A bit too similar to the original game
• Beware of adjustable RTP ranges

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