The Dog House Megaways: Overview

People often fall into two camps – dog lovers or cat lovers. If you’re firmly in the first group and don’t mind a bit of slobber or scooping up warm “souvenirs” on your walks, Pragmatic Play has something for you. Launched in May 2019, the original The Dog House proved to be a major success for the studio and quickly found a following among casino players. Its cheerful cartoon pups were a big part of the appeal, and the good news is they’re all back in a louder, tougher Megaways edition. As with many Megaways reworks, some elements stay familiar while others are trimmed away. With the changes in place, is The Dog House Megaways still man’s best friend?

If you enjoy sequels but don’t want things to feel too different, the presentation should be reassuring. The gang is back in essentially the same suburban yard with the white picket fence, looking as wide-eyed and wholesome as ever. The big change is the expanded play area built around a 6 reel Megaways layout. Each spin drops 2 to 7 symbols per reel, creating a massive range of win ways from 64 to 117,649. The current total for each spin is shown just above the reels.

Sharp-eyed players will also spot what’s missing: there’s no bonus reel and no cascade/reaction mechanic. Even the bonus round doesn’t include them. A win pays, then the next spin begins. It’s a bold call from Pragmatic, and one that will likely irritate some players.

With stakes from 20 p/c to $/€100, the math model feels close to the original, starting with a solid default RTP of 96.55%. Alongside that is high volatility, rated 5/5 by Pragmatic, which is the maximum. Even though free spins showed up fairly quickly during testing, sessions can still be punishing. The upside is the potential, which is nearly twice what the first Dog House could deliver.

The symbol set is lifted from the original Dog House, so you’ll see chunky 10 to A icons, bones, collars, dachshunds, pugs, Shih Tzus, and Rottweilers. Because the win ways have increased, the payouts have been toned down, meaning a line of premium dog symbols now pays from 1.5 to 7.5 times your stake.

The dog house symbol returns as the wild, showing up on reels 2, 3, 4, or 5 and substituting for everything except the scatter. When a wild lands, it can come with a random x2 or x3 multiplier. If multiple wilds contribute to the same win, their multipliers are added together.

The Dog House Megaways: Features

Much like the rest of the slot, the feature set mirrors the original with a couple of tweaks. It begins with dog paw scatter symbols that can land anywhere. Hitting 3 or more triggers the bonus game, where you pick between Sticky Wilds Free Spins or Raining Wilds Free Spins. Note that neither option can be retriggered.

Landing 3, 4, 5, or 6 scatters grants 7, 12, 15, or 20 free spins if you choose the Sticky Wilds Free Spins option. In this mode, 2 to 7 sticky wilds can land on each reel with multipliers from x1 to x3. They stay in place until the round ends, and their size adjusts with the reels depending on how many Megaways are generated.

A fresh addition is the Raining Wilds Free Spins feature – triggering it with 3, 4, 5, or 6 scatters awards 15, 18, 25, or 30 free spins respectively. Throughout this round, up to 6 wilds with a multiplier of 1x to 3x may be dropped onto the screen in random positions.

Lastly, instead of waiting for 3+ scatters to land naturally, you can choose to purchase the bonus. For 100 times the stake, the next spin will deliver a random 3 to 6 scatters.

The Dog House Megaways: Verdict

As noted earlier, The Dog House was a standout release for Pragmatic Play, so it’s no surprise many players have been eager to see it in Megaways form. Does it meet the hype? It depends on what you wanted. If you’re after a very similar experience on a Megaways grid, you’ll likely be delighted. If you expected something more transformative, it may feel less impressive.

One issue is that the base game can start to feel repetitive without extra modifiers to spice things up, or a cascade-style mechanic to keep the action moving. The dogs’ charm helps, but it can still turn into a waiting game for free spins at times. Or not, depending on your view of bonus buys and whether they’re permitted where you play.

The bonus rounds can be a real roll of the dice too, swinging from painful to seriously satisfying. As ever, it comes down to luck, and with the right run, wins of over 12,000 times the stake are technically achievable.

Overall, The Dog House Megaways is a reliable, attractive Megaways slot, even if it doesn’t bring much that’s genuinely new or especially thrilling. Fans of the original get another chance to enjoy the scruffy crew, but if dog-themed slots don’t do it for you, The Dog House Megaways isn’t exactly essential.