Exotic Cats

Who doesn’t love cats? Discounting people with allergies, truly nobody could deny our cute and cuddly companions. But these aren’t your regular run of the mill kittens that plead for your attention and pose to be posted on the internet. No, these are fierce predators, bloodthirsty animals that could snap your bones with a single bite and tear apart animals bigger than themselves in a span of seconds. Sure, not all of them may be jungle dwellers, where this slot is set, but Microgaming clearly chose to go for cool rather than accurate.

The title has a 5×3 playing field with 243 ways to win, and two special features to occupy your time. The first, and most visible, is the fact every exotic cat has its own reel – and if a lion appears on the lion’s reel, it will transform that whole reel into Wild. The second bonus, by extent, is far less flashy, and those are the humble, yet effective, free spins, which not only let you spin without having to pay, but also bring a small cash prize of their own as an added bonus.

Honestly, we have to admit, we were hoping for something a bit more eye-catching. Microgaming has shown they’re more than capable of producing some really gorgeous slots when they want to, but Exotic Cats doesn’t quite do anything to really stand out. The backdrop is that of a river-covered jungle and is entirely static, the reels are somewhat boring – the one small detail that pops up occasionally and that we really liked was the fact each cat will occasionally peer at you from the top of their respective reel, sizing up their future meal, and, if a symbol lands in the right position, move down to slam the reel and make it Wild.

On the gameplay side of things, what you see is what you get, for the most part. The free spins are somewhat frequent, though their pays can be hit and miss, for the most part. All higher paying symbols can also give a small reward for two-of-a-kind wins instead of three-of-a-kind, but that’s a relatively minor thing compared to the presence of reel Wilds. Their activation isn’t as frequent as we’d like it to be, and we theorize the developers made them more frequent during free spins. We have no way of confirming that, unfortunately.

You can wager between $0.15 up to $30 per spin, giving everyone but the high rollers something to look forward to in the title. The slot boasts an RTP of 96.33%, which is slightly above average, though there’s no information on its volatility anywhere. Best we could tell, it seems to be a medium variance game, with a maximum jackpot of 106,000 coins.

The symbols are split into higher and lower paying icons. Higher paying ones include Wild and the five different cats, which all share the same pays, while the lower paying icons include a paw print, a girl, a heart, a spade, a diamond and a club. The latter type don’t have any animations tied to them, while the cats will move about slightly when highlighted by a win, though nothing major or eye catching. Collecting three or more Scatters rewards the player with 10 free spins. If you have more than four Scatters, also a small cash bonus on top of that will be awarded. The feature can be retriggered by collecting three or more Scatters again, which adds 5 additional free spins on top of the ones you already have.