Panda Chef

Panda Chef, the ursine cuisine slot from Skywind, offers a main course of up to 18 free games with win multipliers as high as 10x, accompanied by an insanely cute side of order of pandas busying themselves in the kitchen.

Theme

The Skywind design team opts for a simple visual design here, with the five reels framed by a red background with lanterns and pillars, a green, pagoda-style roof, and a hardwood floorboards. Gaming symbols include an array of dishes including a handsome plate of meat, which pays 1000x for five-of-a-kind, a bowl of noodles, dumplings, and green vegetables, as well as the playing card values ace through jack. The panda chef acts as wild, while also paying a game-best 8,888x for five-f-a-kind combinations; a purple scatter symbol which pays regardless of reel position; and a red bonus symbol triggers free games when appearing on reels one and five. Plucked strings and xylophone tones do their best to conjure an East Asian atmosphere.

Betting Options and Functions

Skywind was founded in 2012 by one of the original founders of gaming giant Playtech, so it comes as no surprise that gaming fundamentals are well attended-to here. There are 20 fixed paylines, all paying from left to right. Coin value can be adjusted from 0.01–10.00 for a broad overall per-spin betting range of 0.20–200.00 times the betting currency. Autoplay is available for up to 99 spins at a time, or until a bonus feature is triggered – players should be careful, however, as there are no loss limits available. Turbo mode can be engaged, should players wish for a quicker game tempo. Game rules, paytable information, and player settings are available on separate screens. There is only one blemish: RTP information is not available about this slot, ordinarily a huge red flag for players.

Features

The Chef Free Games feature begins when bonus symbols appear on the outer two reels. Players first choose a bamboo steamer to reveal how many free games will be awarded, up to a maximum of 18; then, players choose a dumpling to reveal the win multiplier that will apply to the bonus round, up to a maximum of 10x. After this culinary preamble, free spins begin in earnest – it can be extended by a random number of free spins, should scatter symbols again appear on reels one and five.

Our Take

As usual, Skywind has delivered a quality slot – the adorable theme and multi-tiered bonus system is sure to win many fans. Also as usual, there is no RTP information available, making it difficult to say just how favorable or unfavorable the odds are, and requiring players to proceed with caution.