Theme & Design

A Strange Slot Concept With A Sloth Dreaming of Building His Own Themepark!

Epic Dreams features the character, Chip, who also showed up in Relax’s Slot Tumble game. He’s an amiable-looking guy whose smiling mug appears to the left of the grid, complete with sleep mask and pyjamas. But far from being lazy, this one is industrious, intent on building something big. What that is, is unclear. But maybe the backdrop gives us a clue. It looks like some kind of theme park with roller coaster and gift shop. All very random, but cheery and fun, with a nice jaunty brass band tune in the background. Yes, very random.

RTP and Variance

Epic Dreams runs with a fixed RTP of 96.1%. That is about average for an online slot game, and as its fixed at that level you won’t see this game with a lower RTP anywhere. Which is good as many slot studios now build games with more than one RTP rate which can mean you find yourself playing at a lower rate than expected.

This is another high variance slot from Relax so expect volatile gameplay and an uneven win distribution. There is potential for big moments in the two bonus rounds, but they will be rare events, so patience and sensible bankroll management is required.

Maximum Win

The maximum payout here is 5,000x which is unusually low for a high variance game from Relax. You can find much higher potential in our list of their highest max win slots.

Symbols and Paytable

The grid layout is 6 reels, each displaying 7 rows of symbols. However, at the start of each game round, the bottom 4 rows of every reel are made up of stone blocks which only break apart as a result of wins on the reels above. More on that in the next part of this review.

To trigger wins you need to land 3 or more identical symbols on adjacent reels, regardless of their row position, from left to right. When all 6 reels are open with 7 rows, then that gives you 117,649 win ways on each spin (7x7x7x7x7x7). If that number looks familiar to you that is because it’s the same number of win ways found in most Megaways slots.

There are 9 pay symbols in all.

The low payers are the card suits: clubs, diamonds, spades and hearts, valued at from 0.1x for 3 clubs up to 0.4x for 6 hearts. The premiums are the 4 gems in purple, green, yellow and red. These are valued at from 0.2x for 3 purples up to 1.5x for 6 reds. The top paying symbol is the sloth himself, valued at 0.5x, 1x, 2x, 3x or 4x for 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6 on a win way.

Finally, there is also a Wild, represented by the letter W, which can substitute for any pay symbol to complete a win way.

Features and Gameplay

Cascading Wins 

This is a Cascading Wins game. But it works slightly differently to other games in this format due to the stone block rows.

Each of the 4 rows of stone blocks contains ONE pay symbol at the start of the game round. That symbol can be part of a win way. And after a win, all winning symbols are removed from the grid, which may include one from a stone block row. When this happens, all stone blocks in that row are also removed.

Then, all existing symbols on the grid drop down to fill spaces, and new symbols drop in from above to fill the rest of the grid. If more wins are created, the process repeats. Until no more win occur.

NOTE: You may also see coins in the stone block rows. These award their value (as a multiplier of your stake) if they are destroyed in a cascade.

Two Bonus Rounds To Play

Your objective in the base game is to clear the grid of stone blocks. Once this is done, you get a Bonus Pick, which is the chance to choose which bonus round to go into – Dig Bonus or Build Bonus. Or, if a Super Bonus block was visible in the bottom row when you cleared the grid, you’ll get a Super Bonus Pick which allows you to pick between enhanced configurations of each bonus round.

Here is how those bonus rounds look.

Dig Bonus and Super Dig Bonus

The Dig Bonus round starts you with 5 spins. Your objective is once again to destroy all stone block rows. However, every time you destroy one, a new one is added to the bottom of the grid. And this continues, until you either run out of spins or destroy 50 rows when you’ll be awarded the 5,000x max payout. And there are some extras too:

• Every 3^rd row destroyed gets you one more free spin.
• Treasure Chests now randomly appear in some rows. When they are destroyed the either reveal, a Coin Add which adds 1 to 3 coins to visible stone blocks, an Upgrade, which upgrades the value of between 1 and 3 visible coins, or a Wild Add, which adds a wild to between 1 and 3 stone block rows.
• Treasure Chests can also contain up to 3 Super Orbs. Collecting 3 or these upgrades the round to a Super Dig Bonus one. That gets you 5 more spins immediately, and from then on, each 3^rd row destroyed will get you 2 free spins rather than 1.

NOTE: If you went straight into the Super Dig Bonus you would start with 10 spins and each 3^rd row destroyed would get you 2 more spins from the start of the round.

Build Bonus and Super Build Bonus

The Build Bonus is a different format. Now you start with 3 plays, in each of which 3 symbols drop randomly into one of the 6 columns on the grid, dropping down to the lowest available spot. To trigger a win you need to fill a row with symbols, each of which will pay out the same amount as a 3 of a kind win from the paytable. And, if you can keep going right to the top, at the 50^th row you’ll be rewarded with that 5,000x top payout!

Each time a row is filled and a win is triggered, then your spin counter re-sets to 3.

The interesting part is the multiplier ladder displayed on the right of the grid. It starts with a 1x, and with each row that is filled it increases by 1x. This multiplier value is applied to the win from that row each time. Coin values on the row also have the multiplier applied to them.

Once again, Treasure Chests play a part in the bonus round, dropping randomly instead of pay symbols at any time. They immediately reveal any of the following:

• Coin Add – another free drop that doesn’t affect the counter value is triggered, where ONLY coins drop down.
• Filler – between 1 and 3 rows are automatically filled with symbols for a win.
• +1 Drop – all future spins will include an extra symbol – i.e. 4 rather than 3.
• Up to 3 Super Orbs which are collected. Once 3 Orbs have been collected, the round upgrades to the Super version. Now, the counter sets to 4 and going forward, each time it re-sets, it goes back to 4.

NOTE: If you went straight into the Super Build Bonus you would start with 4 drops and each time a win occurs, the counter would re-set to 4.

The Final Verdict

This is a top-class slot from Relax Gaming. The theme and sloth character might not be everyone’s cup of tea but the gameplay is brilliantly configured for a really entertaining play. The base game ticks along with enough wins to keep you interested whilst waiting for the next bonus round to drop, and once there either Dig or Build option is as good. To really score a big payout you’ll need to get lucky with Treasure Chests and maybe an upgrade to the Super round, but there is no question this one can deliver real big thrills.