Explode the Toad Megaways

Explode the Toad Megaways review

Explode the Toad Megaways is a bright six reel game from Barstruck set in a crazy science lab. It uses the Megaways engine, Rolling Reels, growing multipliers and a four level jackpot bonus to keep things moving.

Theme, style and layout

The game takes place in a wild laboratory where a slightly unhinged scientist toad is experimenting with glowing gems and explosives. The reels are filled with chunky card symbols and colorful crystals, with tubes and gadgets in the background.

The layout sticks to the classic Megaways setup. There are six main reels that can show a different number of symbols on every spin, plus an extra horizontal reel sitting on top of the middle four reels. That extra strip feeds in extra symbols and is also where wilds can show up.

Reels, Megaways and how wins work

Instead of fixed lines, the game uses ways to win. Each of the six reels can land a random number of symbols on every spin. When all reels are fully loaded you can get up to 117649 possible ways.

You win by landing matching symbols on adjacent reels starting from the leftmost reel. It does not matter where on each reel those symbols sit. If there is at least one matching symbol on reel one, then reel two, and so on, the game counts that as a winning way.

Rolling Reels cascades

Every win triggers the Rolling Reels feature. After the game pays out, all symbols that were part of the win are removed from the grid. New symbols then drop down from above to fill the empty spots and fresh symbols slide into the extra horizontal reel.

If the new layout creates another win, the process repeats. You can chain several wins off a single paid spin this way. The feature is always on in both the base game and the bonus round, so every spin has a chance to grow into a run of back to back payouts.

Symbols and payouts

The low symbols are the card royals from 9 up to A. They pay smaller amounts but show up often. As a guide, landing six of a kind gives you around one bet or less, with 9 at the bottom and A at the top of the group.

The high symbols are bright gems in different colors. Blue and green gems pay better than the royals, with six of a kind paying about two times your bet. The yellow gem steps this up and the pink gem is the top symbol, paying fifty times your stake for six on a way.

Payout values are shown as multipliers of your total bet, so if you are betting one unit per spin, a fifty times hit from the pink gem would pay fifty units before any other wins from that spin are added.

Wild symbols

The wild symbol helps you complete winning combinations by standing in for regular pay symbols. It cannot replace scatters.

Wilds only appear on the extra horizontal reel above the middle four reels. Because that strip feeds symbols into several different reels, a single wild can end up helping more than one winning way at once, especially when Rolling Reels create new layouts under it.

Scatter symbols and free spins

Scatter symbols are special icons that spell out the word TOAD. You need to land all four letters on the same spin to start the free spins feature.

Hitting T O A D at once awards 12 free spins. If you land more scatter symbols than the four needed to spell the word, each extra scatter adds five more spins to the starting amount, giving you a longer bonus round.

Win multiplier in free spins

During free spins there is a win multiplier that sits above the reels. It starts at one times at the beginning of the round.

Every time Rolling Reels create a new win during free spins, the multiplier increases by one. So your first chain of wins might pay at one times, then two times, then three times and so on, as long as you keep hitting new cascades off the same spin.

This multiplier does not reset between spins while you are in the bonus. It only goes back to one times when the free spins feature ends. That means long bonus rounds with lots of Rolling Reels can build some serious multiplier levels by the end.

Jackpot pick bonus game

The toad in the lab is not just for show. Every time you get a wild symbol as part of a Rolling Reels win, that wild is collected into the toad’s mouth. On any spin where you collect at least one wild, the toad can randomly explode and launch the jackpot bonus.

When this happens, the main reels disappear and you move to a separate screen with a grid of 12 bomb tokens. Each bomb hides one of four jackpot symbols.

You pick bombs one at a time. Each pick reveals a jackpot icon. You keep choosing until you have revealed three of the same type. When you match three, you win the prize linked to that jackpot and the feature ends.

There are four fixed jackpot levels:

• Mini pays 15 times your bet
• Minor pays 50 times your bet
• Major pays 100 times your bet
• Mega pays 5000 times your bet

These are fixed amounts based on your current stake, not progressive pots. Hitting the Mega is where the biggest single prize in the game comes from.

Betting options and controls

The game lets you choose stakes from small casual bets up to larger spins for more serious play. The usual range runs from 0.10 per spin up to 20.00, though the exact currency depends on your casino.

You can spin manually or use autoplay to set up a number of automatic spins. There is also a quick spin setting if you prefer faster animations. A menu button opens the paytable and detailed rules so you can check symbol values and feature information any time.

RTP, volatility and max win

The stated return to player is 95.98 percent, which is slightly below some other Megaways titles but still in a normal range. Volatility sits around the middle, so you can expect a mix of small and medium wins with the occasional big hit from the bonus features.

The top prize comes from the Mega jackpot at 5000 times your bet, but regular wins, Rolling Reels chains and the growing multiplier in free spins can also stack up to sizable totals, especially when several features line up in the same round.