Microgaming has its own idea of what an evil scientist-themed game should be like, and we see it in this game, called Dr Watts Up. The evil scientist is far from a new topic, but Microgaming does it justice here. They’re not exactly known for a very high design quality, but in this case, they’ve outdone themselves. It’s a cartoon-style design, with various characters and objects that a lab might have on the reels, and without a single poker card in sight. It’s 100% themed on the reels and outside them, which is always a plus. It’s also a system with 243 pay lines, or ways to win as they’re called when they cover all possible combinations. Thanks to some higher than average maximum bets, the rewards will give you back up to $50,000. For the list of features, they’ve used a wild symbol, a couple of scatter symbols, free spins with random wild reels, and a bonus game that takes us to the laboratory.
The designers have chosen to use 30 lines, but just for betting purposes, since the reels are actually getting ways to win. Each of those virtual win lines will need 1 to 20 coins, while their denominations will start at $0.01 and can get to values of up to $1. The maximum bet for just one line is $20, while for all 30 lines, you can wager up to $600.
The title might give you the impression that it’s hinting at a saying, at "what’s up", but it actually appears to be much more inspired by electricity (Watts are used to measure power). This scientist is a bit evil, he uses electricity along with his various potions. The graphics are of an excellent quality, I haven’t found anything to complain about, and I usually do when Microgaming puts out a game. They haven’t resorted to using poker icons, they haven’t slacked with the design and the amount of details, and I genuinely think that you’re going to enjoy the look of Dr. Watts Up. It’s a cartoon-like design, with characters that show us the doctor, his lovely pink-haired assistant, a monkey in a lab coat, a robot, a pink potion, a brain, microscopes, laser guns and so on.
With the logo of Dr Watts Up on the reels, there are a couple of ways that you can profit from it. The most common one is when you don’t have the wilds on at least three neighboring reels, so they will not form combinations directly. It’s much more likely that they will be part of other combinations, since this is possible even if you have only one logo visible. As a substitute, it can be useful this way, especially if the game has ways to win like this one does. It’s not capable of replacing the scatter symbols though. Ideally, you get up to five wilds on five reels, and you get paid the jackpot of the slot, since this is the only way to get that maximum amount.
When it comes to favorite features, I find that I especially enjoy the free spins in games, particularly if they’re better than the regular paid spins in some way. It’s what happens in this case, where the free spins benefit from the presence of random wild reels. Each of the 10 to 20 free spins that are triggered will have one reel turned into a wild, completely at random. The number of triggered free spins depends on the triggering scatters, between 3 and 5 being needed.
Finally, we have the Laboratory Bonus. The bonus game needs three scattered Lab Rats, symbols which can only be found on the columns 1, 3 and 5. You can trigger this bonus game during the free spins only, so that is one limitation that I’m not happy about. The next screen will show you the inside of the lab, with the doctor, his assistant and the lab rat visible. There are chemical tubes on the right side, and you have to pick two of them, to reveal prizes. You can change your mind about the tube you selected, if you’re not satisfied with the prize, but you can only do this twice.
With the right amount of luck, a combination will form that will have five wild symbols in it, which will pay you 2,500x the line bet. For this particular game, this can be turned into a reward of $50,000, since bets can be on the high side. From what we found out, the average RTP that was calculated for this game is 96.45%, which would put it in an "OK to play" category.
For the players that love playing at Microgaming casinos, it’s likely that this is one of the better-looking games that you will find there, at least in the category reserved to this developer. It has an adequate average RTP, it gives you the usual collection of features, and it looks good, so it’s worth checking out.
Liam O'Sullivan, an Irish digital maestro, seamlessly fuses his impeccable command of English with an enthusiastic penchant for online gaming. Highly regarded for his localization expertise, Liam fine-tunes online casino guides, ensuring they resonate profoundly with the diverse English-speaking populace.