Grid slots are one of the best innovations to appear in the online slots industry during the past decade or so, and this new game, COBA online slot from Elk Studios, takes the grid slot formula and innovates even further, creating a game that is quite literally unlike anything I have seen before. Even describing the layout is tough – there are seven rows, four of which have seven symbols whilst the other three have only six. There are no pay lines or pay ways used here – wins are awarded for scoring five or more adjacent matching symbols, whilst the maximum possible win is an enormous 25,000x your bet. The RTP of the game is a minor sticking point – at 95%, it’s a whole percentage point lower than the current industry average of 96%, and that 1% can make a huge difference in online slots.
I spent a short while just spinning COBA video slot in the base game before starting to write this review and was surprised that there didn’t seem to be much in the way of base game features – the introduction screens seemed to indicate that there were lots of bonuses to find in this game. It turns out that the way to find success playing COBA is to fill the snake meter to the right of the reel area, and there aren’t many features which do not rely on this mechanic in one way or another.
This is one of those games that is much easier to understand once you have played it for a while – for that reason, why not check out our free demo slot of COBA before reading the rest of our review? Just remember to come back once you’ve finished… you might be there for a while!
| Provider | Elk Studios |
| Reels | 7 |
| Rows | 7 |
| Paylines | Cluster Pays |
| Bonus Rounds | 1 |
| Bet Range | 0.20 - 100 |
| Volatility | High |
| Max Win | 25,000x |
| Bonus Buy | Yes |
| RTP | 95.00% |
| Our Rating | 7.3 |
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Coba Slot Theme, Stakes, Pays & Symbols
The theme of COBA is almost certainly intended to represent the look of the ancient South American civilisations such as the Aztecs and Mayans, and the “reel strips” are filled with a mixture of carved stones and jewels. The carved stones are the lower-paying symbols, whilst the gems and jewels make up the more valuable half of the paytable. This theme has been used for dozens of slot machines over the years but exploded in popularity after the release of NetEnt’s hit title Gonzo’s Quest – it could be argued that Elk Studios have taken some inspiration from that game whilst drawing the graphics for their COBA slot game, as the two games undoubtedly share a similar visual style.
The theme of COBA may be relatively like other existing online slots, but the same cannot be said about the game’s payout mechanic. Grid slots have used a variety of ways to pay the player for hitting winning combinations over the years, and the setup used in COBA feels a little familiar whilst also being unique at the same time. You can potentially hit combinations of between five and fifteen matching symbols organically when they drop in adjacent positions during regular play. However, the “snake meter” we mentioned earlier plays a big part in making the largest of these combinations possible.
A golden jewel bearing a skull logo is the highest-paying symbol of the bunch, with a return of 500x your stake if fifteen of them happen to line up on adjacent spaces. The same symbol returns just 1x your stake if you only manage to land five of them next to each other on the grid, which gives you an idea of just how large the spread is between the minimum and maximum prizes awarded for each symbol in COBA. A red jewel takes second place on the paytable, and the prize for hitting fifteen of these is just 50x your stake – a tenth of the amount awarded for hitting the same number of the first-place golden jewel.
The prizes awarded for hitting fifteen of the blue and green jewels are just 20x and 15x your stake, which indicates that it probably isn’t that difficult to land these combinations. What is unlikely is hitting fifteen of any of these symbols at the same time as the game’s biggest multipliers – I saw up to 128x during my testing – and you are going to need a combination of a big multiplier and many matching adjacent symbols to win big from this game.
As far as wagers are concerned, you can bet as little as €0.20 per spin or as much as €100.00, but it didn’t seem to matter how much I bet on each spin whilst I played COBA – I always struggled to get in front of my starting balance. I’m sure I was just unlucky, of course, but I can’t help but feel a little bit troubled by the fact that I purchased several dozen bonus rounds and never came out with a profit even once from them.
Base Game & Modifiers
The base game of COBA online slot has 46 positions, divided between four rows of seven symbols and three rows of six symbols. Winning combinations of five or more matching symbols are immediately removed from the grid, allowing new symbols to drop in and replace them whilst also filling the “snake meter” shown to the right of the game’s “reel strips”.
Snakes
After hitting two or three winning combinations from a single spin, a snake will be released from one of the six positioned snakes (arranged in two sets of three spots on either side of the grid). Snakes grow by eating symbols of their matching colour, which allows them to grow and create larger winning clusters.
When two or more snakes are active on the grid simultaneously, they can cross over each other’s paths, which will add a multiplier to that colour groupings winnings. You’ll need to hit a massive number of consecutive wins to get the maximum number of six snakes moving around the grid at the same time – I never saw this during my testing, except when using the bonus buy feature
Coba Slot Bonus Feature
The snakes described in the previous section are the main bonus feature of COBA online slot, so it seems strange that not every aspect of the way they work is described fully on the game’s paytable.
The game does explain that filling the snake meter to each of its four levels will release additional snakes – one snake for level one, two for level two, three for level three, or six for level four. The snakes will stay active from one spin to the next if they can eat another symbol of their same colour or avoid biting themselves. If there is nowhere else for the snake to go, it will die, leaving the remaining snakes to continue moving around the grid until they have eaten all the available symbols.
Unfortunately, it isn’t clear exactly how many symbols must be consumed to get the maximum of six snakes on the screen, so if you cannot use the bonus buy function, you are left to figure things out for yourself. Even if you are allowed to use the bonus buy option in your jurisdiction, deciding if it is worth using is difficult when you can’t establish precisely how difficult each available option is to hit.
X-iter Feature
The bonus buy feature has several options which determine how many snakes will launch onto the grid after you have placed your bet. At the top end of the scale, you can bet 500x your current snake and have all six snakes active on the screen, but no matter how many times I tried this, I always failed to make a profit from the bonus buy.
The next option down costs 100x your bet and grants you just three snakes, but I did at least manage to make a profit from this option on a couple of occasions. After this, you have two snakes for 25x your bet and one snake for 10x, neither of which I found to be very valuable choices during my testing of the game.
Coba Slot Review Final Thoughts
I feel as if ELK Studios are on the right lines with their COBA game. Still, they could have done a much better job of defining exactly how the snake meter works – I read through the several pages of text included in the help files several times. Still, ultimately, I could never guess exactly what was going to happen at the end of each spin.
This is a shame, as COBA was a fun game to play and felt as if it had a lot of winning potential – I just never saw that potential whilst I was testing it. The lack of hitting even a single profitable bonus round from the top bonus buy option left me struggling to know whether to recommend this game or not. Give it a try and see if you like it.
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