Cretaceous Park Slot
You’ve heard about Jurassic Park, but have you heard about Cretaceous Park? With Microgaming snatching the licensing and naming rights to the popular film franchise for the incredibly popular Jurassic Park slot, other casino game designers don’t have much to work with when creating dino-themed slot games. So, instead of fighting with Microgaming over the name, the studio of Parlay Games decided to create a similar game named after the geological era that followed the Jurassic – the Cretaceous period. Creative, right?
Full of realistic images of the world's most well-known dinos that spin to the sound of an epic theme and against a dystopian background of the world from millions of years ago, this machine looks like it was designed by a geologist with a passion for slot games. And since it is a game built for modern players, this slot is also mobile-optimised and will work on any phone and tablet as well as all desktop machines.
The slot features 5 reels, 3 rows of symbols, and 20 paylines on which you can bet multiple coins, giving you plenty of space to line up some well-paying symbol combinations. And with its both-ways-to-win setup and extras like win multipliers, expanding wilds, cash bonus games, and a progressive jackpot prize, it is bound to electrify your gambling sessions every time.
Pick Your Favourite Dino
Unlike most new slots that are released for online gameplay, Cretaceous Park features dual controls for your bets. Apart from allowing you to choose how much you want to bet on each payline, the slot will also let you choose whether you want to bet 1 or more coins per payline. If you bet only 1 coin per line and choose the lowest coin value of 0.01 credits, you will be playing with the minimum bet of 0.20 credits per spin. Choosing the maximum coin value of 0.5 credits and playing with 5 coins per line, on the other hand, will let you play with a max bet of 50 credits per spin.
Winnings in this online slot are paid both ways, so you can line up symbols from any side you want to earn a payout. Another thing that isn't common in the game is that it puts the card symbols (Ace to 10) in the top-paying category instead of the dino symbols. The biggest payout is still offered by a dinosaur, though, which in this case is the T-Rex. The T-Rex pays 40x your line bet when you collect 3 of it and 500x for 4 symbols and it is the only symbol that pays for a combination of 5 - a payout that amounts to 5,000x your line bet. It also has a corresponding wild symbol, which is a picture of its skull that doesn’t offer payouts but only substitutes for other symbols.
The remaining 9 symbols (5 card symbols and 4 dinosaur symbols) pay only when you collect 3 or 4 of them on a payline. The most rewarding of this group of symbols is the Ace, which pays 40x and 250x payouts for combinations of 3 and 4 symbols, respectively, while the lowest rewards are offered by the 4 dinosaurs, all of which pay 4x and 8x your line bet when you collect any 3 or 4 identical symbols.
Since it's a 5-reel game, the slot also offers a reward for any 5-symbol combo you collect on a payline, which is always a ticket for the Wheel Bonus game. The Wheel Bonus has 3 segments, each offering different cash prizes. If you trigger the round with the 3 lowest paying symbols, you'll get to start at wheel 1. Triggering the feature with the middle-paying or high-paying symbols, however, will get you started at wheel 2 and 3, respectively.
You can also win your way to a different wheel bonus game by collecting a 5x multiplier with 5 consecutive wins during your session. You see, the game has a special multiplier bonus feature that adds a 1x multiplier after any win. The multiplier then increases by 1x with each consecutive win. If a losing spin interrupts the multiplier meter, it goes back to 1x. But if the meter reaches 5x, you'll see your winnings multiplied and the slot will take you to the Multiplier Wheel bonus game.
At the Multiplier Wheel, you'll get to win a multiplier for your next spin. The multiplier value starts with 5x and can be as high as 100x. But the trick is that this value is only applied to the spin right after the bonus game. So if you return to the base game and have a losing spin, the multiplier value will go back to 1x, per usual. But if it doesn't, you'll get your winnings multiplied by up to 100x.
And finally, if none of these bonuses get you any good rewards, you still have the progressive jackpot to hope for. The progressive jackpot is pooled with 1% of each bet and it can be won randomly during any spin, without any side-games. If you win the jackpot, you'll see a special animation appear on the screen to inform you. And naturally, if you bet bigger, you'll have better chances of winning the prize.
How Much is the Park Entrance Fee?
There are two ways you can play the Cretaceous Park: for real money, or for free. Playing for free doesn't take any preparation whatsoever, even if you're new to online casino games. To play the Cretaceous Park without spending money, you just need to find a casino that offers slot games from Parlay Gaming, register, and then choose the "Free Play/Play for Fun" mode when loading a game. You can also play our own free Cretaceous Park slot here on this page. On the other hand, if you want to play for real cash, you will need to do some shopping around to find the right place.
When looking for real money casinos where you can play this game, look for casinos that have an official gaming license and secure payment methods like MasterCard, Pay Pal, Visa, Skrill/Neteller, and so on. Also, make sure to check whether the casino site has an SSL-encrypted connection as well as a fair banking/payout policy. Browsing through the site to see the game variety as well as the player rewards is also worth putting on your list so that you can decide whether you want to play at the casino or not. If you find a site that scores good points on all of the above criteria, you have found yourself a reliable casino to play.
Once, Twice, Three Times a Clone
The combined efforts of Parlay Games and Concept Gaming have resulted in many slots that are clones of each other. Thus, not only does the Cretaceous Park borrow theme ideas from other game makers like Microgaming, it also shares the exact same features with other online slots.
For example, the Pompeii video slot from Parlay Games is identical to Cretaceous Park, from the betting sizes and layout to the consecutive win multipliers, the wheel bonus games, as well as the progressive jackpot. The Koi Fortunes slot is yet another identical clone, which has the same features but uses symbols of Koi fish instead.
What’s the Verdict?
The Cretaceous Park may not offer anything original, but it does pack enough to keep plenty of players happy. The game has a medium variance and a solid RTP of 95%, and thanks to its small-medium bet sizes, it can fit any budget. With this in mind, and the quite solid bonuses features it hides, it can easily tempt you into giving it a spin or two.
