LolliPop: Slot Overview

Online slot developer Avatar UX clearly recognises a winning formula. LolliPop is the studio’s tenth release, and with the exception of Lilith’s Inferno, every title has been built around the PopWins engine. At this point, anyone who has tried a couple of PopWins slots will likely have a firm view on them, as the underlying gameplay tends to stay consistent. For LolliPop, Avatar UX adds a bonus round that blends free spins with a hold & win-style setup. Will it convert the sceptics? Unlikely, but let’s take a closer look.

The more familiar the theme, the better these PopWins games often seem to land. If that holds true, LolliPop’s candy concept could work in its favour. The action unfolds in a pink, sugar-rush setting—think an intensely bright sweet shop—complete with a huge lollipop looming behind the 5-reel grid. If the goal of a candy slot is sensory overload, LolliPop certainly commits to it.

This candy-drenched slot runs smoothly on any device and supports stakes from 20 p/c to $/€100 per spin. It’s a highly volatile title using a pay-both-ways system, which delivers 486 ways to win on the standard 5×3 grid size. As wins land, the reels can expand, helping shape a theoretical return to player of 95.82%.

There are 10 standard pay symbols in total. The four lower-value icons are brightly coloured candies, paying 0.4 to 0.6x the bet for five of a kind. Above them sit six higher-paying symbols—gummy bears, cakes, muffins, hearts, stars, and candy canes—worth 1 to 4x the bet for five in a row. There are no wilds in Lollipops, so aside from the regular symbols, the only other icon you’ll see in the base game is the free spins scatter.

LolliPop: Slot Features

Expanding reels and increasing win ways are standard PopWins territory, and LolliPop delivers those along with a trademarked base-game mechanic called StickyPop. On top of that, there’s a bonus round that effectively combines free spins with hold & win elements.

StickyPop

Whenever a winning combination of at least three matching symbols lands on consecutive reels starting from either the left or right, the StickyPop feature is activated. The symbols forming the win, plus any matching symbols currently visible, become sticky and are held in place while all other positions are respun. This process repeats until there are no new winning combinations. Winning symbols also expand the reel by +1 position, up to a maximum of 5 high in the base game, which also boosts the available win ways.

Base Game Multiplier

As soon as a reel reaches its full height in the base game, an x2 win multiplier is granted for the first reel and increases by +1 for each additional extended reel. Once the respins finish, the total win is then boosted by the multiplier.

Free Spins Gamble

Hitting 3, 4, or 5 scatter symbols in the base game activates free spins. Before the round begins, players can choose to spin a gamble wheel. You may attempt this twice at the most, but a failed gamble means you lose the free spins entirely. The bonus starts on 5 reels and 3 rows; one successful gamble raises it to 4 rows, and a second successful gamble increases it to 5 rows.

Playing Free Spins

Free spins begin on a blank reel set where only scatter reward symbols or hearts appear. Scatter rewards arrive with a cash value shown on the symbol, while hearts add 1-2 more free spins. Both symbol types lock to the reels when they land, and scatters add +1 position to their reel up to 7 rows high. At the top end, there are 33,614 paylines available for wins. Any expanded reels stay expanded for the remainder of the feature and do not reset between spins.

An upgrade system also runs throughout free spins. Landing the right combination of scatter reward symbols upgrades them to the next value. For instance, collecting 2 of the x1 scatters upgrades them to x2, while collecting 7 of the x50 scatters upgrades them to x100. In addition, when a reel hits its maximum height, any scatters on that reel are doubled in value. The upgrade targets are shown beside the reels, so players can follow their progress.

Buy Bonus

Where available, LolliPop includes two bonus purchase options. One is priced at 100x the bet and equals triggering 3 scatters, after which players can gamble as described above. The second option, Buy Bonus Max, costs 300x the bet and launches free spins directly on the 5×5 game grid.

LolliPop: Slot Verdict

For anyone who enjoys PopWins slots, LolliPop will likely feel like another dependable addition to the lineup. Avatar UX could probably produce these games effortlessly by now, so it’s good to see a few fresh touches appear. That said, not everything here is entirely original—the underlying mechanics of StickyPop have shown up elsewhere before, with NetEnt’s Jack Hammer being a well-known example. Still, StickyPop is strengthened by the PopWins-style expanding reels, giving it a slightly different flavour, and overall the formula comes together nicely.

The free spins round brings something new to the PopWins format and should be more than enough to draw fans in for a try. It plays differently in general and can become genuinely engaging when multiple upgrades land in succession. Under the right conditions, it’s possible to climb to the 100x value fairly quickly, which can translate into respectable payouts. Running the numbers, if everything went perfectly and every position ended up filled with a 200x scatter (including the x2 boost for maxing a reel’s height), a fortunate player could leave with a 13,000x win—solid, though arguably a little modest for a PopWins bonus game in pure numerical terms.

If you already have a soft spot for PopWins, LolliPop is worth a spin. It includes a few extra ideas, and the bonus round is distinct enough that it might even tempt some non-PopWins diehards to take a look. It does feel like familiar territory overall, but it’s clear this formula continues to pay off for the Avatar UX cash cow.