Mini Dragons seems like quite a simplistic game when you first load it up, but there are a couple of interesting aspects to it that you’ll learn about by reading our in-depth review.
Special Features
There are two main special features to Mini Dragons, which we’ll have a look at here. If you’re thinking of giving the game a look then make sure you have a read of this first so you know what to keep your eye out for.
Cascading Reels
You might well have heard of the Cascading Reels feature by another name, with Disappearing Reels and Exploding Reels being common examples. The idea is essentially the same regardless of what name it’s been given, with winning symbols being counted up and the prize money added to your account before the symbols ‘explode’ and are replaced by ones above them. This happens until there aren’t any symbols left to drop, at which point new ones will arrive. If they’re winners too then they’ll explode and be replaced, with this continuing until there are no more winning lines.
The Golden Egg Feature
At any point during your game a Golden Egg can appear on your reels. If you then land a winning line whilst it’s there then you’re in luck, as the Golden Egg Feature will kick-in. Your win will play out exactly as normal, with prize money being added to your account and the winning symbols exploding and being replaced via the Cascading Reels aspect of the game.
Once there are no more wins and you would normally return to the main game, the Golden Egg will hatch and a Golden Dragon will appear. It will make some symbols disappear from your reels at random, creating a new cascade but one that is guaranteed to be a winner. Once that’s been counted up those symbols will also disappear and another cascade will begin, with that continuing until there’s no more winning to be had. The Golden Egg can also appear during a cascade, so don’t think you haven’t managed it just because it isn’t on your main reel initially.
Gameplay & RTP
There’s plenty to enjoy about Mini Dragons, which is essentially a game that was designed to be mildly distracting but has enough about it to encourage you to return for more. One of the main things that a lot of users will enjoy is the decent Return To Player average of 95.51%. That puts the House’s Edge at 4.49%, meaning that you could start the game with a relatively small stake and play for a while without needing to top up too urgently. There are games with better RTPs out there, with 98% being one of the highest you’re likely to come across if you limit yourself to games from the Virtue Fusion canon, but there are also games with much lower averages that you might end up playing if you’re not careful. Anything over 94% is good enough to encourage us to consider it as ‘strong’, so 95.51% definitely ticks that particular box. Yet, as we always say, a game’s Return To Player average alone shouldn’t dictate whether or not you play it. There are slots with an RTP of 98% that are boring as anything and others with low RTP averages that are great fun to get involved with. The question is, where does Mini Dragons fit on this scale?
This isn’t a game that has countless special features that will have you off playing mini-games left right and centre or engaging with the characters in it enough to make you feel like you want to go back for more on a regular basis. If that’s the sort of thing you’re after then you’re going to want to look elsewhere. Instead, it’s something of a minor distraction of a game, but one that’s well made and quirky enough to maintain your interest. For starters, let’s talk about the theme. The idea seems to be that there is some sort of floating dinosaur kingdom, so behind the reels is a cloudy sky with turrets. The symbols don’t sit still on the reels, instead bouncing up and down as if they too are floating. They’re made up of differently coloured Dinosaurs, an open Chest of Money and a Crown, as well as the famed Golden Egg. It works, though it’s a little bit disappointing that they haven’t carried it on all the way through the game’s set-up. For example, the line numbers are made up of blue rectangles surrounded by a gold outline, but could they not have been miniature dinosaur eggs? Likewise, the ‘Info’, ‘Spin’, ’Autoplay’ and other buttons are the same as you’d find on virtually any game, with no thought for the theme put into them at all.
That might just be us being particularly fussy, however, given that the game is actually great fun to play. The graphics work really well and the power of the game means that it can easily cope with them, so there’s no blurring of the reels or anything like that. When it comes to the special features of the game they work really well. As we mentioned a moment ago, this isn’t a slot that is packed full of them but the ones that are there are solid. The Cascading Reels Feature is a good one that can make you feel like you’ll never stop winning money (though of course you will). The Golden Egg Feature, meanwhile, helps the game to transcend above others that also offer Disappearing Reels but little else. Waiting for the Golden Egg to appear on your reels is fun in and of itself, constantly keeping an eye out for it and getting excited only for it to turn out to be a Crown or the Chest of Money. When the feature gets going it adds to your sense of being a winner, with the the fact that it’s tied to the Cascading Reels Feature meaning that you know you’ve got an added bonus still to come. All told. Mini Dragons is one of our favourites of the games that aren’t exactly over-whelming in their features but are entertaining enough to keep us coming back for more.