Floating Dragon Megaways Hold & Spin: Slot Overview

Kites have long been a big part of Chinese culture. Some accounts even claim they were first created in China during the Warring States Period of 475-221 BC by two philosophers, Lu Ban and Mozi. Supposedly, their earliest use was military—helping measure distances to aid troop movements—whereas today they’re mostly associated with harmless fun. They’ve also helped inspire games such as Floating Dragon Megaways from Pragmatic Play and partner studio Reel Kingdom. It’s a follow-up to Floating Dragon Hold & Spin, a title that found a fanbase among parts of the streaming community. Does Floating Dragon Megaways deliver the same appeal? Send a kite skyward and let’s see.

The key thing to understand about Floating Dragon Megaways and the earlier release is that both are Asian-themed slots packed with vibrant kites, a wide blue-sky backdrop, dragons, vivid greenery, and a woman who gathers fish money symbols rather than the usual angler character. She sits beside the reels, striking a sultry over-the-shoulder pose, with a couple of feature buy buttons nearby where available.

One major change compared to the earlier game is the hugely expanded reel setup. Instead of a straightforward 5×3 layout, Floating Dragon Megaways uses a large grid featuring 6 main reels with up to 6 symbols on each reel, plus 3 rows of 4 symbols each positioned on top of reels 2, 3, 4, and 5. The highest row only contains wilds or blanks, while the two rows beneath it can show any symbol. Symbols across the top 3 rows are locked or unlocked randomly, and only the unlocked ones can contribute to wins. When fully expanded, the format delivers up to 147,456 ways to win.

On the stats side, Floating Dragon Megaways has plenty going for it. The RTP is 96.7% (though lower versions exist), and it remains the same whether you play normally or purchase either bonus. Meanwhile, volatility is high with a 5 out of 5 rating. Stakes range from 20 p/c to $/€250 per spin.

In Floating Dragon Megaways, wins are formed when matching symbols land on adjacent reels starting from the leftmost reel. The paytable begins with 10-A card royals, then moves on to fish money symbols, a face kite, a butterfly kite, a bird kite, and a ship. A full six-of-a-kind way pays between 0.5 to 50 times the stake. As noted, wild symbols appear on the topmost row and substitute for any standard pay symbol.

Floating Dragon Megaways Hold & Spin: Slot Features

Most of the core mechanics return from the earlier title, adjusted to suit the Megaways format. Expect tumbles, fish money symbols, mystery symbols, free spins, a Hold & Spin Bonus, and feature buys.

Tumble Feature

After each spin, winning ways are paid out and the symbols that created them are removed from the board. New symbols then fall into place to fill the empty spaces. If the refill creates another win, an additional tumble occurs. This keeps going until no further win is produced.

Fish Money Symbol

Fish money symbols carry a random value of 2-5,000x the bet, and these values can only be collected in free spins. In the base game, fish money symbols disappear and tumble like regular symbols; however, during free spins they are not removed and instead drop to the bottom of the screen as tumbles continue.

Mystery Symbols

Mystery symbols appear in both the base game and free spins. In the base game, all mystery symbols transform into the same pay symbol. In free spins, when the lady symbol is visible and there are no fish money symbols on screen, mystery symbols can randomly appear and then change into any other random symbol.

Free Spins

Landing 3, 4, 5, or 6 dragon scatter symbols awards 10, 15, 20, or 25 free spins, respectively. The lady symbol shows up during free spins and collects the values of fish money symbols whenever both are visible at the same time. Lady symbols are also collected whenever they land. Each time 4 Ladies are collected, +10 free spins are retriggered and a multiplier is generated—these multipliers boost the fish money symbol collections. The first collection creates an x2, then an x3, then an x10 multiplier. After that, every retrigger adds +x10 to the multiplier without limit. Multipliers carry over to retriggered spins, which are played once the current set of free spins finishes. At random, if lady symbols are on screen but no fish are present, fish may be added to the grid.

Hold & Spin

Coin money symbols can land anywhere except the topmost reel and show values of 1 to 2,000 times the total bet. Hitting 3 or more coin symbols activates the Hold & Spin Bonus. The feature begins with the triggering coins locked in place as all other symbols are cleared away. Once it starts, you receive 3 respins, and any newly landing coin symbols lock in while resetting respins back to 3. In addition, diamonds may also appear with values of 50 to 2,000x the bet. When the respins end, you win the combined value of all visible symbols. If the total is less than 20x the bet, 3 respins are granted.

Feature Buys

Where available, players can purchase the free spins feature for 100x the bet or the Hold & Spin Bonus for 120x the bet.

Floating Dragon Megaways Hold & Spin: Slot Verdict

If anything, Pragmatic Play has taken an already feature-heavy concept and turned the dial up even further. Floating Dragon Megaways feels like a packed buffet of familiar mechanics—none of them rare, but there are lots of them. Since the original slot enjoyed a decent level of success, it’s understandable the studio chose to keep the fundamentals intact. That’s exactly what’s happened here, with the focus placed on expanding everything to suit the much larger Megaways grid rather than radically reinventing the experience.

As for the features, they weren’t particularly groundbreaking before and they aren’t now either. The two headline attractions are dependable staples that players have encountered many times. One is a straightforward hold ’n win-style round without any special symbol twists—land money symbols and collect, end of story. The other main component leans strongly on Big Bass Bonanza and similar titles that popularised fish money symbol collecting. One free spins detail that may catch some attention is the multiplier having no cap. Previously, it typically maxed out at x10 and stayed there. If you’re thinking that unlimited scaling should influence the maximum win, you’d be correct. Where Floating Dragon topped out at 5,000x, Floating Dragon Megaways raises the limit to 20,000x the bet. Adding another point of interest, the max win probability is 1 in 1,496,522, which looks fairly reasonable versus much of the competition.

It’s difficult to criticise Floating Dragon Megaways on the numbers, though the overall feel and gameplay style won’t suit everyone. That said, if the original was your kind of slot, there’s a strong chance the bigger, more loaded Floating Dragon Megaways will be just as entertaining.