Everyone wants a Mexican themed game. This genre remains one of the most popular in the slots world, offering a rather reductive picture of Mexican culture to slot players around the world (although, we shouldn’t perhaps expect slot developers to be delivering in-depth cultural criticism – feel free to do some reading yourself if you’re interested!)
Pragmatic Play are behind this collection of Mexican clichés, largely culinary in origin for some reason, and definitely spicy.
It’s got a great look and feel, with a really nicely realised set of symbols and wonderful colours. It’s really rich and vibrant.
The Chilli Heat slot game itself is quite simple and doesn’t come with any particular gimmick or branded special feature. It’s a big hit though, still in the top 40 of UK titles well past its two year release anniversary.
Is this a chilli to wrap in your tortilla though?
Let’s have a look!
Pragmatic Play can’t be blamed for having a boring name, we suppose, perhaps it seemed like the best thing to do back in 2015 when this Malta-based company was set up.
Malta is the home of choice of the European gambling industry, and Pragmatic Play has made a big splash on the island. It’s less than five years since the company was founded, but they already have 200 titles and more on the market, including some very big hits.
The Pragmatic brand is already considered a marque of quality, and their games do well, including hits like the Gold series – Wolf Gold and Mustang Gold – which have put their moody Wild West-style in the UK top 20.
Pragmatic like the Wild West, but their games cover a huge variety of styles, including sci-fi, historical, culturally themed like this title, and retro games. They also provide table games (roulette and card games) and are now producing a small range of live casino tables.
Pragmatic Play may have a boring name, but they have among the last boring stories in the modern casino industry.
There’s a big, generous and meaty figure at the top of the stats from Chilli Heat. The theoretical return to player is 96.5% or a house edge of about 3.5%. This is around half a percentage point more generous than the current industry average! Thank you.
The game is rated as medium in volatility. Volatility calculates a ratio between how often prizes are played out against the size of the prizes. High volatility games, which are usually aimed at riskier players, pay out big prizes less often. Medium volatility means you shouldn’t get too many surprises here.
It’s possible to win big though, though there is no progressive jackpot if you bet at the top of a massive staking scale from 0.25 to 125 coins (25p to £125).
The Chilli Heat slot is a standard grid game using Flash, JavaScript, and HTML5.
This game is a couple of years old, but it’s very modern in look and feel, including the classic modern control style.
The spin button is at the bottom right of the screen, with the Autoplay function triggered underneath it and betting controlled to either side.
The central window is filled with game information and news.
At the left of this window is the balance, your bet amount, and a little set of symbols to open up the information window, control the volume, and set game settings.
Look for other controls in the game frame and remember to read the rules before you play.
The pay table is not big, with eight standard symbols.
At the bottom of the pay table are the usual card symbols.
They pay, read from a 25 coin bet: 5, 10, and 50 coins across the board, jacks to aces.
The higher paying symbols are a tequila glass that pays up to four times stake for a full house. A tabasco bottle pays five times the stake for a full house. The Chihuahua pays seven times stake for a full house. The Mexican musician pays eight-times stake for a full house.
There is a wild symbol too – the game logo – that subs for everything apart from other specials.
The sun symbol appears as a scatter. It pays one-times stake for a set of three.
The money symbol triggers respins.
Let’s start with the respins feature.
The money symbol appears on the reels with a value attached to it, taken at random or from the mini or major jackpot values. A set of six money symbols trigger a Money Respin feature.
This is a three spin game with money symbols staying on the reels as they appear. New money symbols retrigger the feature. At the end of the feature, you will be awarded the total of the values on the symbol or the Grande Jackpot if you have a screen full.
Players will recognise this feature from the Gold games.
The scatter appears only on the middle reels, and sets of three trigger eight free spins. Free spins ditch all the low paying symbols and can be retriggered without limits. This is where your big wins may lie!
Chilli Heat slot is a nutritious and tasty gaming experience that lives up to Pragmatic Play’s growing reputation and has been a deserving hit.
What more can you ask of a game than great design, good gameplay, value, and the potential to win big?
Not much really.
If you enjoy Mexican games you should definitely check it out, and if you are not such a fan of the Wild West theming of the Gold games then you can enjoy a very similar game here but in a different setting.
This Chilli Heat slot game is great fun and will bring a smile to most faces with its bright colours and cheery animations, even if you don’t hit big on the first spin.