Does the Carnival Queen multiplier reset after every spin?
In the base game, yes. Every paid spin starts at x1, and each avalanche raises the level by one, so the second win of a spin pays at x2, the third at x3 and so on. The highest level that paid in our 750 base-game spins was x5. The free spins behaved differently in our log: the level carried from one free spin to the next. Our three bonus rounds began at x2 or x3 and finished between x9 and x15.
Masks, crowns and 4,096 pay ways under the jazz-club neon
The reels stand in a night street hung with purple, green and gold bunting, between a green "Jazz club" sign and a blue "Music" one. Under the reels runs a strip of multipliers, x1 lit and x2 waiting beside it.
The board is 6x4: six reels of four symbols, which gives 4 × 4 × 4 × 4 × 4 × 4 = 4,096 pay ways. A win needs matching symbols on adjacent reels from the leftmost one, and only the highest win per way is paid.
A purple crown tops the paytable and is the only symbol we saw paying for two: at the default €1.00 bet, two crowns are worth 1.00, three 2.50, four 5.00, five 10.00 and six 20.00. A woman in a red feathered mask needs three to pay 1.00, then climbs through 2.00 and 2.50 to 7.50 for six. Below them come a green-haired man in a green mask, a woman in a blue jester hat, a man in an orange mask and the card ranks A to 9, whose values our frames of the rules panel do not show.
Ways are what make the red mask worth watching. Our best base-game spin, spin 621, had her on all six reels with enough repeats for eight ways, and eight times 7.50 paid 60x with no avalanche needed.
One drop, one level: the avalanche ladder
After every win, the winning symbols disappear and new or existing symbols fall into the gaps. If the new arrangement pays, the same thing happens again, for as long as fresh wins keep appearing. Each of those avalanches moves the strip under the reels up one level, and the next win is multiplied by it.
Most spins never leave x1. Of the 268 winning spins in our log, 75 had a second paying drop at x2, 23 a third at x3, 10 a fourth at x4 and only 2 a fifth at x5. Those late drops still mattered: a little over two fifths of everything the base game paid us came at x2 or higher.
Spin 248 shows the pattern at its best: five paying drops, the fourth worth 8.00 before the multiplier and 32.00 after it at x4. The spin finished at 40.9x the stake, second only to the red-mask spin among our base-game results.
Twelve free spins, an exploding wild and a level that kept climbing
The scatter is a woman in a gold mask with purple and pink feathers over a BONUS banner. Three or more start the Bonus Game with 12 free spins, and each scatter beyond three adds 4. Inside the bonus, two scatters are enough for 3 extra spins, and each further one adds 3. The rules count scatters only once a spin's avalanches have stopped.
In the free spins the sky turns pink and the neon reads "Voodoo" and "Magic". The wild also changes job here: when a free spin has no winning combination, a wild explodes and removes every other symbol in its row and column, scatters excepted. The rules count that explosion as an avalanche, so symbols fall and the multiplier climbs even on a spin that paid nothing. Our two natural rounds had two explosions between them, both in the round from spin 122.
The rules we captured do not say what the multiplier does between free spins. Our log does: it never fell back to x1. Both natural rounds entered the bonus at x3, the level their trigger spins had reached, and our bought round entered at x2. The round from spin 122 ran 18 free spins after two retriggers of 3 and ended at x15. The round from spin 708 ran 15 and had reached x9 by its 14th free spin, which then paid at x9, x10 and x11 in one chain: 92.80 from a single free spin.
Spin by spin to 750: how our running total moved
Across 750 paid spins at €1.00 we got back €716.10 of €750.00, or 95.5%. That is above the published 94.16%, which a sample this size can easily miss in either direction.
- 750paid spins at €1.00 in the demo
- 95.5%of the stakes paid back
- 105.1xbest round, free spins included
- 2free spins rounds triggered
268 spins paid something, 35.7% of the session, but the median win was 0.8x, less than the stake. 8 wins reached 10x and the longest run without a win was 16 spins. The running total peaked at €5,024.40 on spin 122, the first bonus, then drifted down to €4,841.20 on spin 620, one spin before the red-mask hit of 60x. The second bonus, 586 spins after the first, paid 105.1x, and the running total closed at €4,966.10.
Skipping the wait for 80x, and what Reborn added
The BUY FEATURE button opens a dialog with a single option, the Bonus Game, priced at 80x the stake (€80.00 on a €1.00 spin). Thunderkick certifies the bought round at 94.50%, slightly above the 94.16% of the game played spin by spin.
Both percentages belong to the build listed on Thunderkick's game page, and that build is what this demo loads. Thunderkick also certifies a version at 87.13%; a casino chooses which version it runs, and some markets do not permit feature buys at all.
| Option | Price | At €1.00 | RTP of the buy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bonus Game buy | 80x | €80.00 | 94.50% |
The buy is what the 2024 Reborn build brought. Thunderkick has not published an explanation of Reborn, but its eCOGRA test reports treat this game as a new build of the February 2019 slot, certified separately with a game ID of its own. The new build adds the Feature Buy with an RTP of its own and a set of RTP versions; theme, grid, 4,096 pay ways and features carry over unchanged.
Our single purchase, the round in the video above, cost €80.00 and returned €30.40: one draw, which says nothing about the 94.50% figure.
The carnival next to the goats and the skeletons
The closest relative on this site is Pink Elephants 2, on the same 6x4 board with 4,096 connecting pay ways. It is rated high volatility, publishes 96.13% and stops at 10,000x, against medium, 94.16% and 22,700x here.
Esqueleto Explosivo 2 also clears winning symbols and drops new ones while a multiplier climbs, but on a 5x3 board with 99 pay ways, an RTP of 96.13% and a cap of 5,000x.
For a different shape of game, Sword of Khans also first came out in 2019, was rebuilt in 2024 and sells its bonus for 80x, but it runs 10 paylines at high volatility.
Of the 8 Thunderkick games reviewed here, Carnival Queen has the highest cap and the lowest published RTP.
The case for and against Carnival Queen
For it: a base game where a modest win can turn into a chain that pays at x3, x4 or x5, and a Bonus Game in which, on our evidence, that ladder keeps its height from one free spin to the next. The medium rating matched what we saw: frequent small returns and no losing run longer than 16 spins.
Against it: the RTP. 94.16% is the lowest of the 8 games on this site, and the certified 87.13% version is lower still. Most single wins are small, too: our median win was 0.8x, and the multiplier climbed highest inside a bonus, which took us 122 spins to reach the first time and 586 more the second.
Esqueleto Explosivo 2 demo review
Pink Elephants 2 demo review
Midas Golden Touch demo reviewWhat people ask about Carnival Queen
Five answers, each checked against the rules screens, the demo server or our log.
How much play money does the Carnival Queen demo give you?
The demo above is Thunderkick's own play-money client, and it starts you with €5,000.00 of credit. Nothing is deposited and nothing real is paid out. There are 14 stake levels between €0.10 and €100.00, and the game opens at €1.00.
What starts the free spins, and how long do they last?
Three or more scatters, the masked woman with the BONUS banner, start the Bonus Game with 12 free spins, and every scatter beyond three adds 4. Inside the bonus, two scatters add 3 more spins and each extra one adds 3. Scatters are counted once the avalanches of a spin have stopped. Our longest round ran 18 free spins.
What does the wild do in the free spins?
In the base game the W wild only stands in for other symbols, never for the scatter. In the Bonus Game it gets a second job: when a free spin has no winning combination, a wild explodes and clears every other symbol in its row and column, except scatters. That explosion counts as an avalanche, so new symbols fall and the multiplier rises a level.
Why does the Reborn version list a lower RTP than the original?
Thunderkick's game information sheet for the February 2019 original listed an RTP of 96.1%. The game page for the Reborn build lists 94.16%, the bought bonus is certified at 94.50%, and Thunderkick's test reports list another version at 87.13%. The demo here runs the 94.16% build; a casino decides which certified version it offers.
Is 22,700x the bet ever reached?
It is the ceiling set in the configuration of Thunderkick's demo server, the most one round can pay: €22,700.00 at a €1.00 stake. Our own top result over 750 paid spins came from the free spins triggered on spin 708: 105.1x. The top base-game spin reached 60x.