Magic Lab: Slot Overview

If you’re the type who enjoys tossing strange ingredients into a bubbling cauldron on dark, storm-lashed nights—wind rattling the shutters and lightning flashing across a candlelit room—then NetEnt may have built a slot that fits your mood. It’s called Magic Lab, a scatter-paying slot with a dark-magic flavour and a free spins bonus that can guarantee up to three different features. One of those is a sticky wild carrying a multiplier that climbs after winning avalanches, which can be especially useful in a scatter-paying format.

Magic Lab takes place in a workshop that looks like where Severus Snape would stash ingredients away from prying students—only with a big window letting in a bit of light. At first glance, it may not scream “spectacle,” but let’s give Magic Lab a chance; with the right mix of features, it might still unleash something properly magical.

Before any spells are cast, you’ll need to pick your stake, ranging from 10 c at the minimum up to $/€10 per game round. Every spin drops 30 symbols onto a 6-reel, 5-row grid, paying scatter wins whenever 8 or more matching pay symbols land anywhere on the screen. Magic Lab uses a medium-high volatile model, and among the non-jackpot RTP options, the default is 96.06%, or 96.1%, if you purchase the free spins bonus round.

Magic Lab includes ten standard pay symbols: five are low pays from 10-A, and the remaining five are potion bottles filled with different coloured liquids. Scatter wins with 8-9 matching symbols return 0.1 to 1.5 times the bet, while 15+ matching symbols pay 1 to 35 times the bet. Wild symbols replace all paying symbols, and only one can be present on the reels at a time. The wild stays on the grid after contributing to a win, and its multiplier increases by +1 with each avalanche while it remains in play.

Magic Lab: Slot Features

Added to the Magic Lab feature brew are avalanching wins, free spins that can include up to three different features, and a bonus buy option.

Avalanching Wins

Whenever a win hits, the winning symbols are removed, allowing new symbols to fall into the empty spaces. The avalanche chain continues until the next drop fails to create another win.

Free Spins

Players receive 5 Free Spins when 3 or more scatters appear anywhere on the grid. Based on the number of triggering scatters, specific features are guaranteed to occur during the free spins round. These features trigger in a fixed sequence on the relevant free spin before the reels come to rest:

• Guaranteed Wild – 1 locked wild is randomly added at the bottom of the reels. The wild stays in this position until free spins end.
• Remove Symbol – 1 symbol type is removed from the reels until the round ends.
• Double Multiplier – the wild multiplier accumulated during the free spins round is doubled when this feature triggers.

Triggering the feature with 3 scatters results in a guaranteed wild on the first spin, followed by remove symbol on the second and third spins. With 4 scatters, you get a guaranteed wild on the first spin, then remove symbol on the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th spins, while 5 scatters ensure a wild on the 1st spin, then remove symbol on the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th spins, and finally the double multiplier on the 5th spin.

Buy Free Spins

By paying 70 times the bet, players can purchase the free spins feature, which awards 3 scatter symbols to start the round.

Magic Lab: Slot Verdict

Is it only us, or does Magic Lab come across like something Red Tiger could have produced? That’s not a knock—more an observation that the overall style and feel carries a bit of a Red Tiger vibe. Maybe since the studios ended up under the same umbrella, there’s been a steady exchange of ideas, talent, and approaches, until the lines blur and both teams start releasing games that can be hard to tell apart.

Still, Magic Lab may not be a full-on occult blowout that die-hard arcana fans can’t resist, but it does deliver a fun wizardly atmosphere. Even if the theme isn’t groundbreaking, it’s attractive and ties in well with the feature set. And it almost goes without saying, but scatter-paying slots are blazing hot right now, and Magic Lab brings a few mechanics that could catch the attention of players who like this format. The locked wild that remains for the entire free spins round is a strong touch, since it can help form or enhance wins from any position. On top of that, the wild’s multiplier rises after each avalanche, and it reached decent levels during testing. At its peak, Magic Lab can produce wins up to 5,999x the bet. The symbol removal is another welcome element, and the multiplier doubling on a 5-scatter trigger is a nice extra—though it’s a shame you can’t buy a 5 scatter trigger via the feature buy.

Overall, Magic Lab is a solid entry in the scatter-paying slot space, which seems to keep expanding week after week. It doesn’t feel like Magic Lab has the power to unseat leaders like Gates of Olympus 1000, but for the right kind of player, there’s definitely some magic to be found here.