Play Cubana Tropicana for Free

Bright and colourful is nothing new for slot games. Since the early days of fruit machines, developers have clearly been keen to suck in gamers with the promise of big riches and immersive gameplay – the brighter, the better. Cubana Tropicana takes things to a whole new level, though. The reels are superimposed over a gorgeous sandy beach. The water scraping the shore is of the deepest, most vibrant aquamarine. Either side of the reels, palm trees slouch. A barrel (no doubt sloshing with finest-quality rum) lays embedded in the sand. A toucan sits on a branch. The blue sky is flecked with long strands of high cirrus, but it’s clear that no storm will be coming today. This is paradise, people.

Playing across the reels is succession of beautiful woman. The Cuban bevy includes a gorgeous brunette in a teal bikini clutching a conch and a costumed dancer who looks like she got lost on the way to a street party in Rio; there’s also a toucan, a wooden mask, a purple muscle car and a tray bearing a bottle of rum and several glasses. The traditional playing card symbols are included, though they’ve been modified a little.

While you listen to the funky, Cuban-inspired music (or hit mute, one of the two), you should probably think about how much cash you want to stake. A range of betting options are available to suit all budgets. Gamers can stake a minimum coin size of 0.2, with a single coin needed for every pay-line. Thus, it can cost as little as 1 to spin the reels. The maximum coin size per reel, incidentally, is 2 – not ideal if you’re a high roller who wants to stake a fair bit.

Cubana Tropicana’s base game is just that – a base game. There’s nothing too wild going on: it’s all about the gamer trying to hit matching combinations to trigger pay-outs. No multipliers here, though you can elect to take advantage of the autoplay option.

What you should know is that the wooden mask acts as the game’s wild: it is able to replace other symbols to complete winning combinations. It cannot, however, stand in for the muscle car scatter. In Cubana Tropicana, the scatter holds the key to free spins. Land three, four or five to trigger five, ten or 15 free spins.

As well as wilds and scatters, you should also look out for the bonus drinks tray on the 5x3 grid. Three or more of these elusive symbols triggers a ‘Who’s Your Date?’ bonus game.

The aforementioned symbols don’t yield pay-out wins, but the pay-outs elsewhere are fairly generous. Five toucans pays the jackpot, 2,000, but you can still get 500 for landing five of the comely Cuban females. You can also get 300 for a line of four toucans.

The Who’s Your Date bonus is good fun. Essentially you’ll be given the chance to invite a lady for drinks; but which lady? That’ll depend which of the four windows you choose. The contents are concealed behind roller blinds, though you can discern the silhouettes of one every girl. Needless to say, all four represent different prizes.

Cubana Tropicana is a charming video slot from a software developer who consistently delivers. GamesOS might not be the biggest fish in the pond, but it’s certainly causing a ripple in the water. This slot is well-designed, fun to play and offers the prospect of solid pay-outs. While we always want more – a multiplier would have been nice, so would a progressive jackpot – we can be content with the fact that Cubana Tropicana is a fine game.