La Calaca Bingo
Taking inspiration from the decorations of the Mexican Day of the Dead, the free La Calaca is bingo for fun with a unique edge. This isn’t a morbid game by any means, as these skeletons, or calacas to give them their Spanish name, are brightly painted and wear hats! You could be joining in with the celebrations with a top prize of 50,000 and a bony bonus mini game to play.
The game uses neat 3D graphics for the design from software by Zitro Interactive. It features a blue gradient background to contrast the balls and the wonderful skull design of the ball generator. The numbered balls all have a colourful skull silhouette on each one, and when the 44 balls are released, it makes quite a colourful cascade as they file into the rib cage of the skeleton. It's good to have the option of turbo speed with such a large amount of balls.
Cards of Fortune
Along the top of the screen are the 12 patterns displayed to match on the cards. Similar to many video bingo games, there are up to 4 cards to play. For La Calaca, these are in a 5x5 grid with the middle square given a skeleton nose hole design. The card numbers are random and these can be changed for a new set, but doing so will change all of the cards and not just one. It’s possible to play with 1, 2, 3 or 4 cards and playing with less than the defaulted 4 leaves the games logo nicely taking the place of the card.
When a released ball matches, the numbered square is highlighted in black rather than being crossed out. Not only does this look nicer, but it helps show the patterns more easily. Yellow squares suggest if that number was to fall, it would complete a pattern for a prize. Sometimes the machine will generate a number of extra balls to bet on. Don’t get too excited as it doesn’t guarantee those numbers will necessarily make an appearance, just that there is a good chance. Some balls do come for free, which is handy.
Betting Balls
Each card can take a bet of 1 to 20, so how much punters are prepared to pay is reliant on how many cards are on the screen. It goes without saying that the more cards, the more chances, but this also means the more to wager as the bets move to the high limit of 80. The top prize comes when playing that max bet. A talisman is always on hand for those players who want to trust to a bit of good old fashioned luck.
Among the many prizes is the chance for a bonus mini game which is suitably a pattern of a skull to match on the cards. More skulls feature on a new screen in a special pick and reveal game, and when over, play resumes on the main screen. The sound bites include celebratory shouts of glee at some of the wins are great and really help set the mood. You may need to brush up on your Spanish to understand what is being said, but it’s not really important as the tone is enough to join in the fun!
Musical Balls
With celebration, comes music, but in a game we have lined up for you to check out, it’s not quite the same kind of celebration as La Calaca. It has up to 4 cards to play but only 30 balls are released in the free Music Ball bingo game by nJoy Interactive. Like in our feature game, it has 10 extra balls to bet on, but with Music Ball, it has the occasional free one with a treble clef symbol, plus balls may have multipliers added so if that ball makes a prize, it’s multiplied with the value given.
It has a mechanical design with solid graphics and an easy to use game interface that can be minimised to free up space on the game screen. It has 12 winning prize patterns with a high paying 15,000 at max bet of 40 per card. There is a jackpot that will trigger for a minimum bet of 3 with all cards in play if bingo is made within the first 30 balls. There’s no bonus game with this one, but the payouts are enough to keep it interesting.
Celebrate Good Times!
La Calaca is a surprisingly enjoyable online bingo game. Despite its dark appearance, it manages to bring the colour into the game to be part of a celebration. The mood is great too with the sounds adding to that greatly when certain matches are successfully made. Zitro Interactive bingo games can have a tendency to all look or play the same, but it’s the themes that make them unique and the addition of a bonus helps with that.
Real money players should have opportunities for happy cash out, and for those who like small screen gaming, it is mobile optimised. It may be based on the day of the dead traditions, but this game is full of life.
