Big Bass Bonanza Keeping It Reel

Theme and Design

An Alaskan Setting For Another Jaunty Adventure With Your Favourite Fisherman

It’s time for another Big Bass adventure and you know the drill by now. This time we’re out on what looks like an Alaskan lake with snow-capped peaks in the background and icy blue waters under which the reel set sits. There is something very cosy and familiar about the Big Bass brand and that friendly fisherman who plays a key role in the gameplay, as well as the jaunty soundtrack to your spins. It’s one big reason behind the success of the brand. There are many fishing slots out there but none have quite the charm of this one.

RTP and Variance

Keeping It Reel has 3 available RTP settings – 96.07%, 95.07% and 94.07%. To find out which setting your casino has chosen, hit the ‘I’ button under the reels then scroll through the pages until you see ‘Game Rules’. Browse down the page until you see ‘Theoretical RTP’.

Ideally you want to play at 96.07%, but not many slot sites will offer that. In our testing, MrQ from Lindar Media has consistently run Pragmatic Play slots at the highest RTP rates so I recommend playing there.

Of course, this is also a high variance game. All Big Bass slots are. Therefore, expect high volatility in the pay out distribution. As our test session showed, the hit rate is low and it's all about waiting for that big bonus round moment where the keep net fills up before a Golden Wild lands to unlock the riches.

Maximum Win

Onto the maximum payout and this is 10,000x which is good enough. The only Big Bass slot with a higher max win to date is Hold and Spinner Megaways (20,000x). You can find games with higher potential in our list of Pragmatic Play’s highest max win slots.

Symbols and Paytable

There is a standard paytable format for Big Bass games, and it goes like this: there are 5 reels, each with 3 rows. There are 10 paylines to score wins on, requiring 3 or more identical symbols to drop from left to right, starting at the left most reel.

And there are 10 pay symbols in the table. The low payers are the cards, 10 through to Ace. These are valued at from 0.2x for 3 10s up to 10x for 5 Aces. The premiums are the shoal of fish, tackle box, may fly, rod and reel and float. These come in at 1x for 3 shoals up to 200x for 5 floats.

And again, the Wild symbol is your friendly fisherman with beard. He will substitute for any pay symbol to complete a win and helps you to collect cash values from the fish in the free spins round.

Features and Gameplay

The format for Keeping It Reel will be familiar to Big Bass fishing fans. There are some minor alterations, but as usual, it’s all about hitting the free spins round for the big wins.

Land 3 Or More Scatter To Trigger The Free Spins Bonus

The scatter is represented by the leaping fish. You need to land 3 or more to trigger the free spins round. Spins are awarded as follows:

• 3 Scatters: 10 free spins
• 4 Scatters: 15 free spins
• 5 Scatters: 20 free spins

As in other Big Bass games there is a second chance feature that may randomly trigger when you land just 2 scatters. Then, a hook may appear over the game area and pull up a reel to reveal the extra scatter.

Money Symbols Are Worth Up To 1,000x

In the free spins round, fish symbols land with money values attached to them. They can be 1x, 2x, 3x, 5x, 10x, 15x, 25x, 50x, 100x, 250x, 500x or 1,000x.

Wilds and Golden Wilds Collect Fish Values

A new Golden Wild becomes active in the free spins round. And the value of fish symbols is only activated when the Golden Wild or Regular Wild lands at the same time. However, in this instance, fish symbol values that are NOT collected don’t just disappear. Instead, they are stored in a landing net and when a Golden Wild lands then it will also collect the value of what’s in the net.

But watch out, because with each free spin one of the fish symbols in the next will escape and swim off, so the total value diminishes each time.

Wild Symbols And Progressive Multiplier

During the free spins round, all wild symbols – gold and regular – are collected in a meter. Once 4 have been collected, the round is extended by 10 more spins and a 2x win multiplier comes into play. Once 8 have been collected then the round is further extended by 10 spins and the multiplier goes up to 3x. Finally, once 12 wilds have been collected, then 10 more spins are awarded and the multiplier goes up to 10x.

Second Chance Features

Again, Pragmatic Play introduce a ‘second chance’ feature here, one that is found in other Big Bass slots. It increases your odds of collecting the cash.

When wilds land but no fish – dynamite explosions cause fish to drop in randomly on the reels OR a boat appears and drives across the reels with a net behind it, randomly replacing standard symbols with fish as it does.

When fish land but no wilds – a hook appears and randomly pulls a reel up with a wild on it.