LOCK AND POP

HOW TO PLAY POP AND LOCK

As mentioned above, this game keeps things on the straight and narrow. If you’ve ever played an online slot before, you won’t find a lot of surprises in the base game.

Lock and Pop is played on a standard slot setup with 5 reels and 3 rows. It has 20 fixed paylines, which means you have to hit matching symbols along pre-determined lines if you want to get a prize. You’ll need 3 symbols for a winning line, and all lines are calculated from left to right, starting with the leftmost reel. As we said, pretty standard stuff.

You’ll notice that the base game also contains two empty rows at the top and bottom of the reels. These are inactive during the base game and only become relevant once you trigger the bonus round.

Beyond that, the game also uses standard Wild Symbols. They can appear on any reel and can substitute any other symbol, except for the and Prize symbols.

Another type of special symbol in Lock and Pop slots is the Prize symbol. These gold squares act like normal symbols, for the most part, requiring three along a payline to collect. However, the value of each individual Prize symbol is randomized every time one appears on the reels. A single symbol can pay between 0.5x and 1,000x your stake.

Lock and Pop Free Spins

Hitting 6 or more Prize symbols anywhere in a single spin instantly triggers Free Spins in Lock and Pop slot. You start off with 7 free spins.

During this special bonus round, all regular symbols are removed from the reels, and only Prize symbols remain. All Prize symbols also become sticky, and remain in their position until the end of the round or a Lock and Pop feature is triggered.

Every reel position becomes sort of like its own reel, like in Hold and Win features in other games. However, compared to Hold & Win, Prize symbols are a lot more common and you get more spins.

You can activate Free Spins at any moment through the Feature Buy button at the bottom left. It costs 60x the stake.

Lock and Pop Bonus Feature

Once all three rows on a single reel are filled with Prize symbols, the Pop and Lock bonus feature triggers. The position below the filled-out reel activates with a special bonus. Once this special feature ends, all the Prizes on that reel are summed up and collected above said reel.

Several features can be activated this way:

• Retrigger awards 3 additional Free Spins.
• Adder adds +1x or +2x to all of the Prize symbols above it.
• Magnet copies the value of any Prize symbols present next to the winning Reel, and adds them to the Prize symbols on the winning reel.
• Super Magnet works the same way as the Magnet, except that it copies all values from all of the reels.
• Topper copies the value of the highest Prize symbol on its reel and applies it to all Prize symbols on its reel.
• Blaster adds +1x or +2x to all symbols on its reel. It also adds the sum of all of these prizes to the top and changes 3 random positions on the board with their value.
• Duplicator reproduces all of the symbols on its reel to a random position on the board. If the positions its duplicating to are filled, the values of existing symbols and duplicated symbols are added together.
• Big Bang doubles the value of all symbols on its reel. The symbols are then collected to the top row, doubled again, and then collected again.
• Super Collector collects the prizes on its reel as normal. It then adds the total values of all top positions to the top position on its own reel.
• Hammer collects prizes on its reel, adds them to the top, and then adds this sum value to all positions on its reel.

Casino Bloke Best tips for Lock and Pop Slot

• 1Surprisingly, the Feature Buy option in this game actually lowers its overall RTP. We suggest not using it, but the difference in RTP is relatively minor.
• 2Features such as the Big Bang and Super collector are rare, but they can massively increase the total payout of the bonus round.

PAYOUTS & RTP

There are 8 standard symbols in Lock and Pop by NetEnt. Royals from 10 to Queen pay 0.25x for three in a line, 0.50x for four, and 1x for five. Kings and Aces are a bit better with 0.50x/1x/2x. Finally, the three high-paying symbols pay 5x, 6.25x, and 7.5x for five-symbol combinations, respectively.

All of this adds up to a relatively non-volatile game. However, the bonus round completely switches things up once activated, which also means a huge bump to volatility. The maximum payout of the Lock and Pop slot game is 5,000x in the base game.

Lock and Pop RTP is 96.09%, which is a respectable rate by slot machine standards. However, using the Buy Feature button to instantly trigger free spins drops the game’s RTP down to 95.98%. It’s a shame for a game with such an exciting bonus round.

LOCK AND POP BY NETENT – CASINO BLOKE’S VERDICT

Lock and Pop combines simplicity with enjoyable special features very effectively. The base game itself can feel quite relaxing, and its tame volatility allows you to just sit back and enjoy the show. There isn’t much to it at this point, but we’re happy with what is there – a decent RTP rate and just enough variance to keep things interesting thanks to the Prize symbols.

However, the game really kicks into gear once you secure some Free Spins. Thanks to its unique approach to Hold and Win features, the bonus round is quite a thrill with plenty of twists and turns. We’ll let the 10 special symbols that can appear in this mode do the talking.

All in all, it’s a solid game that can be interesting to a lot of different kinds of players. We recommend checking it out if you like to keep things simple but still don’t mind a big special feature every now and then.