Micro Knights (ELK Studios): Overview
It might not be their forte, but ELK Studios have
chosen to head into the cluster 🤑 pays genre with their new Micro Knights title. The
result is similar in feel to Relax Gaming’s’ Snake Arena with 🤑 a dash of Rabcat’s
Treasure Heroes. On mobile devices, Micro Knights looks like a smartphone game you’d
download from iTunes 🤑 or Google Play. Everything is small and intricately detailed, and
that goes for the grid as well. In portrait you 🤑 won’t notice, but in landscape mode,
the grid is shrunk down to reveal more of the surrounding countryside. It’s one 🤑 of the
smallest grids you will see. Thankfully, modern phones have such high resolutions. A
few years back, you’d be 🤑 staring at a pixilated blur. Next to the grid are knights that
join the melee at times, as does the 🤑 dragon that looks like Toothless the Night Fury
from How To Train Your Dragon.
The action takes place on a chess 🤑 inspired 7x7 grid
where 49 symbols tumble into place with each new spin. Micro Knights uses a cluster
pays system, 🤑 meaning 5 or more matching symbols landing adjacent to each other results
in a payout. When that happens, the winning 🤑 symbols are removed from the grid to let
new ones fall into the gaps. A common system, and one that 🤑 can result in chains of wins
from just one spin. With Micro Knights, it's also the way that many of 🤑 the features are
pulled into the game as well.
To get involved, players choose stakes from 20 c/p
toR$/€100 per spin 🤑 – on manual or auto which is called traditional betting. ELK has
once again provided their four betting strategies - 🤑 Jumper, Booster, Leveller and
Optimiser if you want to take a strategic approach. When it comes to symbols, like most
🤑 grid slots, each one is custom-built for the game in question. Micro Knights uses meat
on the bone, water wells, 🤑 arrow targets, and mushrooms as the low pays. The high pays
are bunnies, frogs, goats, and bulls. At the most, 🤑 a cluster of 20 or more bulls
returns 250 times the stake. The golden chalice is the final symbol of 🤑 note in this
section and is wild - it can substitute for any symbol except the bonus
symbol.
Important stats include 🤑 the return to player rate which is nicely average at
bang on 96%. Overall potential is nothing to get too 🤑 excited about unfortunately as ELK
has decided to cap its game once again, but a medium/high variance math model produces
🤑 a balance of those smaller one-off wins, with the bigger, feature fueled ones.
Micro
Knights (ELK Studios): Features
Like a good grid 🤑 slot should, Micro Knights is one of
those games that can get on nice rolls of consecutive wins. These are 🤑 the best moments
by a long shot, and you’ll need to activate as many features as possible to make that
🤑 happen. The first initial spins are a little confusing, but if you've ever played other
grid slots such as Reactoonz, 🤑 for example, you'll quickly get the grasp of it.
One of
the most used features is The Queue and is the 🤑 hardest one to explain. To the left of
the reels is the Charging Knight who randomly runs across the grid, 🤑 pushing one row
off. This row moves below the gird, and the symbols line up in a queue.
Matching
symbols are 🤑 grouped together. Say there are two clusters of three bunnies on the grid,
and next in the queue are two 🤑 bunnies. The symbols from the queue will drop onto every
cluster on the grid that could make them a winner. 🤑 In this case, the two groups of 3
bunnies. Once those symbols have been taken from the queue, the next 🤑 in line can be
used if possible. Fresh spins remove all symbols from the queue. At the top left of 🤑 the
grid is the Smashing Knight. He also comes into play at random, and when he does he
increases each 🤑 symbol counter in the queue by one.
Along with cluster pays is a win
meter to the right of the grid. 🤑 Each winning cluster moves the meter along, and if it
is filled it triggers one of these Feature Flags each 🤑 time it is filled, in this
order:
Inferno – the dragon burns all low value symbols from the grid.
– the dragon
🤑 burns all low value symbols from the grid. Extra Wilds – places 3 to 15 wilds on the
grid at 🤑 random.
– places 3 to 15 wilds on the grid at random. Super Size – drops a big
sized symbol up 🤑 to 4x4 onto the grid.
– drops a big sized symbol up to 4x4 onto the
grid. Charge –moves 2-5 rows 🤑 of symbols into the queue.
–moves 2-5 rows of symbols into
the queue. Epic Charge – moves all of the symbols 🤑 into the queue.
– moves all of the
symbols into the queue. Boosted Queue – uses all of the symbols in 🤑 the queue to make
winning combos.
The meter will keep filling and awarding features as long as clusters
continue to form. 🤑 During the base game, the meter resets with each new spin.
The final
feature is the Bonus Game which is triggered 🤑 when 3 bonus symbols are in view. The
bonus game consists of 5 free spins where the win meter and 🤑 the queue are sticky and do
not reset between spins.
Micro Knights (ELK Studios): Verdict
Micro Knights is one of
those games 🤑 that has several elements that remind you of other slots. Despite that, it
doesn’t feel like a cheap attempt to 🤑 make something quick and easy. Indeed, Micro
Knights is extremely well put together, from the excellent intro to the intricately
🤑 detailed graphics, ELK Studios has put their craftspeople to good use. There is more
than enough personality injected and feature 🤑 add-ons to make the experience a fairly
original one. It’s fun too, with a crazy ‘I want more’ factor to 🤑 it.
What makes it
compelling is partly the speed at which things happen. Partly because one spin is all
it takes 🤑 to set a train of features rolling which is neat when several do link
together. It’s much easier to accomplish 🤑 that during free spins, and you can see why
you only get 5 to start with.
Although ELK has accomplished quite 🤑 a decent grid slot
there is some downsides too. The biggest gripe is the potential which ELK, for whatever
reason, 🤑 have once again capped at 2,500 times the stake. That factor alone results in a
game that lacks the bite 🤑 to compete with the big grid slot competitors out there.
Matching it with one of those beasts is like putting 🤑 Aunt Franny’s Chihuahua up against
the neighbour’s Pitbull. While it can go on and on, when the features chain together,
🤑 it doesn’t quite go as berserk as massively volatile grid slots like Dragon Fall or
Jammin' Jars that can go 🤑 on and on.
Nevertheless, Micro Knights is a well designed game
that has plenty of fun moments and entertaining gameplay. It 🤑 might be a little
underpowered to be a top contender, but is still worthy of a session or two.
