Lucky Neko Gigablox Slot Review

Released in June 2020, this game is available at online casinos such as LeoVegas, Casumo or Unibet.

Theme and general information

Lucky Neko Gigablox takes a firmly Japanese approach. We all know that little figurine of a cat waving with one paw, which can be found all over Asia. Some call it the Neko cat, but Neko actually just means ‘cat’ in Japanese. These cat figures are supposed to bring luck of course, which makes them suitable to adapt for a slot theme.

More prominent on the reels are the Daruma dolls, however, which are round, hollow dolls that you can also find in Japan. They represent the founder of Zen Buddhism, Bodhidharma.

Cultural aspects aside, Lucky Neko has been beautifully executed. It is an unusual light theme from Yggdrasil, which comes with superb graphics, a serene soundtrack and cute (or potentially annoying) voice overs in Japanese.

On the reels we find low value jars that are decorated with card suit symbols as well as high value Daruma dolls in various colours. The most valuable of them is the red doll, which is worth 8x our stake for 6 of a kind. The green and purple ones are worth 5x our stake for such a win and the yellow one pays 5.5x our stake.

There is a gold wild in the game and the scatters shows us the lucky Neko itself.

Despite playing on a 6×4 grid or reel symbols, we only get 40 paylines in the base game in Lucky Neko. Bet ranges are available from 0.08 to 100.00 per spin.

Gigablox

Gigablox are the main highlight to look out for in the base game. Yggdrasil gave us the Splitz mechanic in response to the immensely popular Megaways mechanic from Big Time Gaming. Now they are adding their Gigablox into the mix.

Those land randomly on the reels and come in 2×2, 3×3 and 4×4 sizes. Should they become part of a winning combination, they split into individual symbols, which basically makes it a little easier to follow the paylines.

Any symbol can be a Gigablox, including wilds and scatters.

Free spins with expanded reels and more

To trigger the free spins, we need at least 5 scatters anywhere in view. The number of scatters we get determines the number of free spins we will receive. For each scatter we get 1 free spin. So, the minimum is 5 and the maximum is a potential 24, though that is very unlikely to happen.

During the free spins, the scenery changes much more than usual. We now get expanded reels and play on a 6×8 grid. The number of paylines increases to 85.

Additionally, one of the reel symbols is randomly selected to become a “Blessed Symbol”, which now pays 5x its value in any winning combination.

Finally, the Gigablox can increase in size to cover 5×5 and even 6×6 symbols.

Verdict: Charming, beautiful and tough on your budget if you are out of luck

The theoretical RTP (Return to Player) for Lucky Neko Gigablox is 96.4%, which is excellent value. This slot leans towards the high end of medium variance, though it will often feel like a much more volatile slot than that because the hit rate is a disappointing 15.45%.

As such, gameplay can feel like a drag, in particular on your budget, if you keep spinning and no wins emerge.

The highlight is, of course, the free spins feature, but it doesn’t necessarily make up for the losses incurred if you are out of luck. It’s a bit of a hit and miss here.

The Gigablox mechanics is impressively done, especially with the reels shaking as massive blox come falling down. But they don’t often land in an advantageous position, which is disappointing. The Splitz mechanic strikes us as a little more intriguing at least.

Beyond that, Lucky Neko is utterly charming and beautifully done. But if the theme is not for you, there is probably very little to convince you to give it a try.