Play Demo
Two spins in, and the reels were already shaking. Cash prize fireballs dropped across the grid, the collect symbol lit up on reel three, and fire effects pulsed through every animation. It looked like the slot was building towards a major payout. It paid £4. That opening moment captures Cash Strike Power Force 5 perfectly. Blueprint Gaming has dressed a five-line fruit machine in so much pyrotechnic presentation that even a small collect feels like a volcanic event, while the progressive bank above the reels keeps suggesting that the next trigger might be the one that finally brings everything together.
Two special symbol types drive the action outside the bonus. Cash prize symbols appear on reels 1, 2, 4, and 5, each carrying a random stake-multiplied value, while the collect symbol (marked Cash Strike) is exclusive to reel 3. When the collect symbol lands alongside any cash prizes, it sweeps up every visible cash value and pays it instantly. The split layout means reel 3 becomes the gatekeeper for all instant wins, and the collect can also appear during Power Play where only cash and collect symbols are on the reels.
Five glowing orbs sit above the reels, one per column, and they absorb every cash prize or collect symbol that lands in their column during play. The system is purely visual and doesn’t influence outcomes, but each bank corresponds to a specific upgrade: Expand (reel 1), Boost (reel 2), Power Force 5 (reel 3), Multiply (reel 4), and Respin (reel 5).
After a collection, any charged bank has a chance of triggering, which adds extra symbols to the reels and fires the Cash Strike Bonus with that upgrade active. Between one and four banks can trigger on a single spin, and any banks already charged when the Cash Strike Bonus activates carry their upgrades into the round.
Landing three or more special symbols (any mix of cash prizes and collect) on consecutive reels triggers the Cash Strike Bonus, a hold-and-win round that always starts with at least one progressive bank upgrade active. You get three spins to land more cash or collect symbols, and every new landing resets the counter back to three. Each upgrade changes the round in a different way.
Boost and Multiply are not guaranteed on every spin during the round, and their banks display an X when inactive for that spin. The bonus continues until all spins run out, then the accumulated total is paid.
When a collect symbol lands on reel 3, it has a random chance of triggering Power Force 5 instead of (or alongside) the standard bonus. This is the premium tier, where all four progressive bank upgrades activate simultaneously and in their enhanced state. Enhanced Expand pushes the grid out to 5×5 with two extra rows, Enhanced Boost locks at 5x the base bet, Enhanced Multiply locks at 5x, and Enhanced Respin starts with five spins and resets to five. The result is a fully loaded hold-and-win round where the grid is at maximum size, every cash value can be boosted and multiplied on the same spin, and you get more attempts to fill the board before the counter expires.
Power Play runs at five times the base stake and strips the reels to only cash prize and collect symbols, removing all fruit entirely. The mode is operator-dependent, meaning some casino configurations may not offer it. When active, it guarantees that every spin either builds the progressive banks or triggers a collect, which concentrates the action but raises the cost proportionally.
Cash Strike Power Force 5 pairs a stripped-back 5×3 grid with only five paylines, and all winning combinations pay on adjacent positions from left to right rather than requiring symbols to start from reel one. That adjacent-pay setup means a matching run starting on reel two or three still counts, which gives the five lines more coverage than a traditional left-to-right layout.
Bets run from £0.10 to £1,000, and Power Play (where available) costs 5x the base stake on its own scale.
The demo provides access to both modes, the progressive bank system, and the Cash Strike Bonus in free play. One helpful interface detail is that the game displays your running profit or loss alongside time played at the bottom of the screen, which is a small but useful addition that most slots in this category don’t include.
Operator RTP configurations are available at 92%, 93%, and 95%, and the in-game paytable confirms which version is active. Volatility is medium-high on Blueprint’s scale, though the bonus round itself plays closer to high variance given its hold-and-win structure.
The maximum payout is 9,600x, with an in-game hard cap of £250,000 or 50,000x total bet, whichever comes first. Four fixed jackpots sit to the left of the reels, running from Mini (25x) through Minor (50x) and Major (150x) up to Grand (1,000x), all scaling with the current stake. There is no bonus buy.
All values below are from the in-game paytable at £1.00 total stake, with wins paying on adjacent positions across any of the five active lines.
| Symbol | x5 | x4 | x3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flaming 7 | £100.00 | £60.00 | £40.00 |
| Star | £80.00 | £40.00 | £30.00 |
| Bell | £40.00 | £30.00 | £20.00 |
| Grapes | £20.00 | £15.00 | £10.00 |
| Watermelon | £20.00 | £15.00 | £10.00 |
| Orange | £8.00 | £5.00 | £3.00 |
| Plum | £8.00 | £5.00 | £3.00 |
| Lemon | £8.00 | £5.00 | £3.00 |
| Cherry | £3.00 | £2.00 | £1.00 |
Cash Strike Power Force 5 is built for a specific kind of player, someone who finds the slow charge of hold-and-win banks satisfying in itself and doesn't need constant payouts to stay engaged. The bonus, when it fires with multiple upgrades active, is well-constructed and visually dramatic. The rest of the time, this is a very quiet slot dressed in very loud clothes. A 3/5 feels right for a game that does one thing well but asks you to sit through extended stretches of nothing to experience it.
The progressive bank system is the standout idea. Watching five separate upgrade orbs charge passively while you play creates the feeling that something is always building in the background, even when the reels themselves are returning nothing. When two or three banks trigger together and the Cash Strike Bonus launches with Expand, Boost, and Multiply all active, the hold-and-win round plays completely differently from the standard single-upgrade version. Power Force 5, the maximum tier where all four enhanced upgrades fire at once on a 5×5 grid, is rare enough to feel like an event.
The reel animations are noticeably rougher than most modern Blueprint releases. There’s a slight jank to how the symbols land that breaks the otherwise polished fire-and-gold presentation, and it’s the kind of thing you notice more during quiet stretches because there’s nothing else happening. The 92% RTP on the demo configuration also sits below average for the category, and while operators can set it higher, the version most players will encounter in free play doesn’t make the strongest first impression.
The opening two spins set the tone. Cash prizes and the collect symbol appeared together, the reels shook with fire effects and a deep whoosh of audio as values pulled into the progressive bank, and the whole screen looked ready to deliver something significant. The collection paid £4. That gap between the presentation and the actual payout is something this slot leans into heavily, and it defined the next seventy spins: coins banking regularly, the five orbs above the reels glowing a little brighter each time, but nothing larger landing until a £60 star-filled payline hit around spin seventy.
Twenty minutes in, no progressive bank upgrades had triggered. No Expand, no Boost, no Multiply, no Respin, and nothing close to Power Force 5. The balance sat at minus £48, which isn’t catastrophic for that length of play, but felt flat given how much visual energy the game puts into every minor collect. Then the Cash Boost bank finally fired. The green orb above reel two sent fireballs arcing into the cash symbols below, the bonus launched with five respins and the Boost upgrade active, and £105 landed across the round. One trigger erased the entire deficit and pushed the balance to £55 above the starting point.
Switching to Power Play stripped the fruit symbols entirely, leaving only cash prizes and the collect on the reels. The difference in feel was immediate. Where standard mode could run ten or fifteen spins with nothing but low-value fruit lines, Power Play kept the grid alive with fireballs and reel shakes on almost every spin as cash values landed and pulled into the banks. A few decent collects came through, and the running balance held steady, but no progressive bank upgrades triggered during the Power Play stretch either. It’s a more engaging way to play through the quiet periods, though at five times the stake it accelerates the cost just as much as the action.
Triple Action Cash Strike, which also carries the Blueprint Cash Strike branding, earned a 3.3/5 on this site with a different take on the same core system, splitting its bonus into three separate action types. It feels busier between features but lacks the progressive bank charging loop that gives Power Force 5 its sense of build-up. Coin Strike XXL from Playson scored higher at 3.8/5, partly because its hold-and-win round triggers more reliably and the pacing feels less back-loaded.
Cash Strike Power Force 5 sits below both on overall experience, largely because it asks for more patience without offering a correspondingly higher peak. The fire aesthetic and sound design land well where they count, and the running win/loss tracker at the bottom of the screen is a transparency touch more slots should adopt, but the slightly janky reel stop animations undercut the premium feel. As a review of the series so far, Power Force 5 pushes the right ideas forward but doesn’t land the full package.
