Beautiful Bones

Though not particularly familiar to people outside of Mexico, the Day of the Dead celebration is an important part of their culture, so naturally, it was only a matter of time until someone gave it a try and make it up into a slot. Microgaming decided to tackle this challenge and created a relatively enjoyable game filled with an interesting mechanic that inverts player expectations. This time around, it’s Wilds that appear if three symbols appear next to one another, which means it follows up a win every time. Meanwhile, Scatters are collected and stored off to the side, where you’re later prompted to spin right now, or pick up more Scatters for the next tier of free spins and multiplier prizes.

It isn’t anything particularly impressive in how it looks. A little animation of the sparkles falling in the background could have done a much better job at making it feel more alive. Right now, static is a good way to describe this slot. The men and women move in a rather minimal fashion, despite looking pretty in their Day of the Dead makeup. Meanwhile, the lower paying symbols such as 9, 10, J, K, Q, and A forgo even that to just blink on and off when they are part of a winning combination. And despite the fun mechanics, the game suffers from lots of dead spins, paired with a paytable that solidly places it in the low variance field.

The core idea behind Beautiful Bones is that you will be sinking and losing money until you win enough Scatters to win it back and even more after a satisfying free spins round with a strong multiplier. If you plan to play, we suggest finding one bet level that works for you and staying there, and not for the reason you might think. If you were hoping to play for $0.30 a pop and then bump up the amount of cash you’re betting when you’re one or two Scatters away, you’ll find that Microgaming thought ahead. They remove all your collected Scatters when you change bet, but they return when you switch back to the same wager you collected them on rather than disappearing fully.

In a way, these Scatters are a progressive jackpot without the actual progressive jackpot, as you’re sinking time and money in hopes of winning a massive prize. It has its upsides and downsides. The upside is that you can clearly see how many Scatters you need for each tier, and the small skulls let you keep track of how close you are to activating one of them.

This ability to view your progress is a step up from the progressive jackpot, which is entirely random. The downside is that at best, the slot will usually end up averaging with your money back or a little bit on the upside, but no amazing win you can brag to all your friends about. Beautiful Bones is playable for $0.30 up to $30 per spin, which should be enough to appease both low rollers and serious gamblers alike. That being said, more casual players who don’t want to spend too much money in a single game should look elsewhere, as you will need to ‘invest’ by collecting Scatters before you see any big win. We’d even suggest to the high rollers to tone down how much they wager each turn.

You can find a mixture of poker card icons and unique symbols on the playing field. 9, 10, J, Q, K and A look nice, but in our opinion don’t really fit well with the stylized drawing of people who have their skull makeup on while dressed in nice, stylish outfits.

Overall, what’s on the reels could have used a bit more polish just as much as the backdrop, but it is perfectly serviceable. If three symbols line up next to one another, apart from rewarding a win, they also create a Wild and cause a re-spin, which is a nice bonus. It means that your win is usually followed up with another win, though it isn’t guaranteed. Overall, the free spins and multiplier we’ve already gone into detail across this review. It is an integral part of the slot, and if you plan to play it, you should understand that much. It will take a while to go through the tiers, so we suggest having a fair amount of cash banked.