In the Sweet Bonanza 2500 slot game, a single candy bomb can rewrite a spin. A small tumble turns into a big one the moment a multiplier drops onto it, and here the bombs run as high as 2500x, the largest the candy series has offered. The 6×5 grid of sweets and fruit pays the usual way, eight or more of a kind in view, but the bombs only turn up once the free spins start, and a spin can stack a few at once.
A win needs eight or more matching symbols over the 6×5 grid, with no lines to follow. Each win then tumbles, the matched symbols clearing out, the remaining ones dropping down and new sweets falling in, and the run carries on while fresh wins form. Most spins pay in small change this way, and the tumbles keep things moving in the quiet spells.
Land 4 or more lollipop scatters and you are into the free spins with 10 to start. Three or more lollipops during the round add 5 more. The round is where the candy bombs live.
Each carries a random multiplier from 2x up to 2500x, and they hang on the grid until a spin’s tumbling stops. Then every bomb value on screen is summed, and the whole sequence win is multiplied by that figure. Two or three bombs on a spin are where the big results come from, and in a game this volatile, they are what you wait for.
Alongside the standard stake, 4 special bets give more choice than the series usually offers.
The two ante bets raise the odds of reaching the free spins: the first by around 8 times for 2.5x the stake, the second by 10 times for 12x, which also guarantees a 20x minimum on multipliers in the round.
The two Super Spins work differently, dropping a candy bomb onto the reels every spin, the cheaper at 20x and the pricier at 250x with its bomb worth at least 25x. The catch is that the free spins cannot trigger while a Super Spin runs.
For skipping straight to the bonus, there are three buys. These are separate from the Super Spin bets above. The names echo, but where those play on in normal mode, the buys drop you straight into the free spins.
There are no paylines in Sweet Bonanza 2500, so symbols do not need to line up. A win is simply 8 or more of the same sweet or fruit across the six reels, and the more that land, the more it pays, with several symbol wins on a spin combined. The lollipop is the scatter, paying in its own right for 4 or more and opening the free spins.
Sweet Bonanza 2500 runs at a 96.52% RTP, a touch above the norm, and the volatility sits at the top end. The most you can win is 25,000x the bet, level with Sweet Bonanza 1000. The base stake starts from $0.20, and the special bets and buys are priced as multiples of that base, so what a spin costs varies widely with the option you pick.
| Symbol | 8-9 | 10-11 | 12+ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red Heart | $10.00 | $25.00 | $50.00 |
| Purple Square | $2.50 | $10.00 | $25.00 |
| Green Pentagon | $2.00 | $5.00 | $15.00 |
| Blue Oval | $1.50 | $2.00 | $12.00 |
| Apple | $1.00 | $1.50 | $10.00 |
| Plum | $0.80 | $1.20 | $8.00 |
| Watermelon | $0.50 | $1.00 | $5.00 |
| Grapes | $0.40 | $0.90 | $4.00 |
| Banana | $0.25 | $0.75 | $2.00 |
Table values use a $1.00 base bet. The lollipop scatter pays $3, $5 and $100 for 4, 5 and 6 at this stake.
Sweet Bonanza 2500 is the most loaded the candy series has been, and that is what nudges it past its 3.5-rated siblings to a 4/5. Nothing in the core has changed, the same tumble and the same free-spins bombs as ever, but the bombs now reach 2500x, there are four special bets in place of one, and the third buy adds a progressive multiplier none of the others have. The downsides are the usual ones. The main game is quiet, the big wins ride on rare bombs, and the priciest bets and buys can empty a balance fast. As an all-rounder, no other Sweet Bonanza gives you this many ways to play.
For this review, we opened on the special bets rather than a buy. 20 spins of Ante Bet 1, paying 2.5x the stake for a far stronger shot at the free spins, came to nothing in a cold run. Super Spins 1 paid off faster. At a $1 base it comes to 20x and puts a candy bomb in play every spin, so a 5-tumble win of $4.45 arrived with a 12x attached and paid $53.40. The audio earns a mention here too, each winning bounce in a chain ringing a slightly higher note than the last, a subtle signal that a run is building before the numbers catch up.
Super Spins 2, the dearer of the two special bets, is the same thing dialled up. At 250x a spin, it guarantees a multiplier of 25x or more, and over our play, those ran from 25x to 500x. When a big one hits a real win, the payouts are huge. A $0.65 scrap became $325, a $1.50 win turned into $750, and our best, a $13.95 tumble, paid $6,975. The catch is the cost. At $250 a spin, a small multiplier on a quiet board stings, one returning just $12.50. It is all peaks and troughs, and best played to a budget.
With nothing landing naturally from the special bets, we moved to the buys, starting with Super Free Spins 1 at 500x, the one that keeps the bombs to 20x or more. 4 scatters dropped us into the round on a fresh backdrop, fruit flying in either side of the reels. The first 3 spins were flat at $7.55. Then spin 4 changed it, a 50x bomb landing on a $4.15 tumble for $207.50. Spin 9 topped that, a 100x and a 25x together for $518.75. The round closed at $730.15, and the striking part is that only 2 of the 10 spins actually had a bomb apply. Those two carried the whole round.
Then the priciest buy, Super Free Spins 2 at 1000x. Its bombs start at 10x, but it adds the progressive total. The buy-in spin paid $100. On spin 4 a 50x turned a $5.20 tumble into $260, and that 50x then sat in the total, so a later $0.50 win became $25 and further small wins were boosted likewise. Only one bomb landed all round, so the progressive never got to climb, but the lone 50x boosting three later wins hinted at what it could do with more bombs feeding in. It finished at $397.
The numbers make a neat point. The cheaper 500x buy returned $730, the 1000x buy $397, so spending more did not return more. Both came in under their cost in our session, the volatile reality of buying these rounds. What decides the result is not the price of the buy but whether the bombs come, and come early enough for the progressive total to compound. A big multiplier in the opening spins of the 1000x round would tell a very different story.
What marks this variant out from the series is choice. Where earlier entries stop at just an ante and a buy or two, this one sets 4 special bets and 3 buys side by side. The special bets run from 2.5x for a stronger free-spins chance up to 250x for a 25x bomb a spin. The buys run from 100x for a plain round to 1000x for the progressive option. That spread lets you spend a little for a nudge or a lot for a guarantee, a real plus, even if the top prices are steep.
Set against the family, it is the best-equipped without being the biggest. Sweet Bonanza 1000 pushed the bombs to 1000x; this one takes them to 2500x and piles on the options. Sweet Bonanza Super Scatter still holds the highest max win at 50,000x, but it gets there through a single instant-prize symbol, not the bomb-stacking this round is built on. The original Sweet Bonanza is the gentler, lower-variance way in for anyone who finds all this a bit much. For everyone else, this is the most complete candy game Pragmatic has made, and the free play demo lets you test its many entry points without spending a thing.
