More by 1×2 Gaming
Under the Sea Slot Machines Overview
Atmosphere / Background
Under the Sea takes you to the ocean floor, where you’ll see kelp, coral, and
blue sandy hills.
You’ll also see a variety of tropical fish swimming behind the transparent
reels. This is by far one of the most active backgrounds we’ve seen in a 1×2
Gaming slot.
Another aspect worth mentioning is the game title at the top, which is orange
with an anchor at the end. This color perfectly contrasts the ocean background
and helps tie in the overall background.
Also note that you’ll see different phrases scroll across the bottom of the
reels. These include: Spin, you’ll have a whale of a time; Put a few squid on
the table; Scale the heights of slots; Don’t get crabby; Something to Octopie
your time; I bait this won’t go on any longer; Shoal’em what you got; Don’t be
so shellfish; Shrimply brilliant spinning; The sharks are circling; and Fins can
only get better.
These phrases are common in other 1×2 Gaming slots and are meant to add a
humorous touch to the action.
Music and Sound Effects
Our favorite part of Under the Sea is the music that plays throughout the
main game.
It’s a pleasant accordion style tune, with other instruments mixed in, that
makes you feel like you’re truly on an underwater adventure.
You’ll also hear sonar, whale sounds, and bubbles – all of which sound
realistic, rather than stock sounds used in other ocean games.
When you spin the reels, you’ll hear a stomping noise to indicate each reel
stopping. This is followed by either a ring to indicate a winning payout, or a
harsh sound to indicate a losing spin.
The only thing we don’t like about the sound effects is that if you let your
winning pay line sit for a few seconds, a loud accordion sound plays over and
over until you spin the reels again. But this lone drawback isn’t enough to
overshadow the music that we like so much.
Animations
Unlike many 1×2 Gaming slot machines, Under the Sea actually features several
animations during winning payouts.
These include: a shark eating the orange tropical fish, letters coming up in
bubbles, the shellfish’s legs coming out to walk, and clams opening to reveal a
pearl.
Under the Sea Pay Table and Graphics
You can look at the pay table by clicking the orange button in the lower
right hand corner. Here’s a look at the symbols and payouts that you’ll find.
Game Symbols:
Tropical Fish Wild
Featuring orange and white stripes, the tropical fish
substitutes for everything except the turtle scatter symbol and crab to form
wins.
Turtle Free Spins
When you land 3 or more turtles anywhere on the reels,
you trigger the free spins bonus.
Crab Mixed Seafood
When you get a crab mixed with other edible fish oyster
& whelk, you’ll receive a bonus prize – see more in bonus features section.
Whelk Shellfish
The whelk is the highest paying normal symbol, offering 400
coins for 5 symbols, 200 for 4 symbols, 45 for 3, and 8 for 2.
Seahorse
This exotic looking blue seahorse pays 350 coins for 5 symbols,
150 for 4 symbols, 40 for 3, and 7 for 2.
Jellyfish
The jellyfish delivers 300 coins for 5 symbols, 75 for 4 symbols,
32 for 3, and 7 for 2.
Oyster
The oyster pays 100 for 5 symbols, 40 for 4 symbols, 24 for 3, and 6
for 2.
Coral
The coral offers 80 coins for 5 symbols, 32 for 4, and 20 for 3.
Starfish – This yellow starfish pays 80 coins for 5 symbols, 32 for 4, and 20
for 3.
A
The A delivers 70 coins for 5 symbols, 26 for 4, and 15 for 3.
K
This letter pays 60 coins for 5 symbols, 24 for 4, and 12 for 3.
Q
The Q pays 45 for 5 symbols, 20 for 4, and 10 for 3.
J
This letter delivers 20 for 5 symbols, 14 for 4, and 10 for 3.
Symbol Graphics
One downside to Under the Sea is its symbol graphics, which aren’t on par
with the background. This isn’t to say that the symbols look terrible, but they
won’t impress you either.
The best detail can be seen in the topical fish wild and whelk symbols, while
the letters – encased in bubbles – also look good. But the crab, turtle,
seahorse, and coral look dim and don’t have many defining qualities.
However, there’s enough going on in the background that you won’t fixate on
the drab symbols.
Under the Sea Slot Bonus Features
Under the Sea isn’t filled with bonuses, but you can at least trigger free
spins and get special payouts for certain combinations. Here’s a closer look at
each of these features.
Free Spins
Free games are triggered by 3 or more turtle scatters anywhere on the reels.
The number of free spins you receive are as follows: 15 free spins for 5
turtles, 10 spins for 4, and 5 for 3.
All wins during the free games are doubled. You’ll also receive a regular
prize if your turtle helps form a winning pay line.
Payouts include: 1,000 coins for 5 turtles & regular symbols, 320 for 4, and
180 for 3.
When you trigger free spins, you’ll hear a voice announce them while a short
jingle plays. You’re then taken to the reels to watch your free games
automatically play out.
We hoped for more theatrics during the free spins, like a changing background
or special symbols. But the announcer voice and 2x multiplier are the only
differences between the bonus and regular play.
Mixed Seafood Payouts
As mentioned in the pay table section, the crab helps form Mixed Seafood
payouts along with oysters and whelk edible creatures.
You’ll receive a 150 coin bonus any time that you form one of these mixed pay
lines.
You’ll also get the following payouts for forming a win with just the crab:
200 coins for 5 crab symbols, 100 for 4, and 30 for 3.
Betting Options
Wagering options include changing pay lines from 1 25, coin size from $0.01
to $0.50, and 1 5 coins per line. This makes the minimum bet worth one cent and
the max wager $62.50 per spin.
You can also auto play the reels with your selected betting options for
between 1 and 100 spins. To do this, click auto bet and adjust the amount with
the preset options, 5, 10, 25, 50, 100, or the arrows.
Note that you can turn all betting options to their minimum value with the
Reset Bets button, or max out pay lines and coins per line with Max Bet.
Other Options
You can adjust the volume with the speaker button in the lower left hand
corner.
This area also includes a gear button that allows you to adjust graphics
settings to low, medium, or high. The low setting is good if your PC or
smartphone is slow and you want the game to run faster.
One last option is the Show Winlines button located in the lower right hand
corner, which allows you to see all active pay lines.
Win Frequency
The win frequency for Under the Sea is average for a 25 pay line slot
machine.
While you’ll win on a fair amount of turns, we also experienced spurts where
we didn’t win for 4 5 straight spins. Considering this, we recommend keeping
your coins size between one cent and $0.10 when you’re playing 25 lines.
On the bright side, free spins occur with more frequency than other online
slot machines. We played for 250 300 spins and triggered free spins four times.
The downside is that we never got 15 free spins, but we’ll take 5 and 10 free
games with more frequency any day.
Return to Player RTP
RTP is 96.80%, which is really good for an online slot machine.
Upon checking RTP, we were surprised to see that it was this high, given the
mediocre win frequency. Also, this game doesn’t have any huge payouts to justify
the average win rate.
But what drives up the RTP is the high frequency of free spins. In any case,
Under the Sea offers great payback.
Game Rules
Since it’s not immediately apparent where you find the game rules, note that
you must click the question mark in the lower left hand corner. Below you can
see the main rules featured in this section:
- Payouts are multiplied by your coin size and coins per line, i.e. 100
coins x $0.01 coin size x 5 coins per line = $5.00 win. The lone exception
to this rule is the Mixed Seafood payout, which delivers a 150 coin bonus no
matter what.
- When two or more wins occur in the same pay line, only the largest
payout is awarded.
- All payouts must form from left to right, beginning with the leftmost
reel.
- The fish wild symbol can’t help form Mixed Seafood or turtle scatter
payouts. Also, the fish won’t help trigger free spins.
Comparison to Other Sea themed Slot Machines
While sea life isn’t the biggest slots theme, there are still plenty of slot
machines that match Under the Sea’s concept. For the sake of comparisons, we’ve
chosen Betsoft’s Ocean Life and EGT’s Ocean Rush.
Betsoft’s Ocean Life
Ocean Life is the closest slot we’ve seen to Under the Sea in terms of solely
focusing on sea life.
One of the best aspects of this 3 reel game is its music, which is a positive
Caribbean tune. You’ll also hear various sound effects for wins and a rock n
roll beat for big wins.
On the downside, Ocean Life’s background graphics are far worse than Under
the Sea. Everything from the glitchy waves at the top of the screen to the
poorly detailed ocean make this slot look outdated.
Another problem is that this is a single pay line game, and you’ll rarely
form wins. While you can bet as little as one cent, it still gets boring waiting
multiple spins for a payout.
Ending on a positive note, Ocean Life has three different progressive
jackpots in the Cash Grab (usually pays at $2k $5k), Mystery Jackpot (pays at
$10k), and Super Slots Jackpot (usually pays at $40k $50k).
Most aspects of Ocean Life are on a lower level than Under the Sea, but the
three random jackpots give you a reason to play.
EGT’s Ocean Rush
This 5 reel, 15 pay line game is a generic take on The Little Mermaid, which
is obvious from the symbols that look like Ariel, King Triton, and Sebastian.
Other symbols include a clam, shark, starfish, tropical fish, and treasure
chest.
Some of the symbol graphics may remind you of the Nickelodeon show SpongeBob
SquarePants, while others, like the king and mermaid, are more realistic
cartoons.
One of the sound effects during winning payouts sounds like a dead ringer for
The Little Mermaid’s Under the Sea song.
The best element to this slot is its bonuses, which include a scattered
pearls pick me round, jackpot cards pick me round, and Lucky Dive bonus.
Regarding the latter, you’re presented with 12 shells, and you pick among them
to get free games and multipliers.
When compared to Under the Sea, Ocean Rush has qualities that are both
better; bonuses and symbol graphics, and worse, too cartoonish and cliche theme.
This being the case, we put it on equal footing with Under the Sea.
Conclusion
If you want a realistic adventure into the depths of the ocean, then Under
the Sea is a good choice.
The thing that we liked right away when opening this game is the music, which
creates a sense of wonderment. We also like that 1×2 Gaming has added a few more
animations for winning payouts than they normally do.
Another good element to this game is its background, which features a
realistic ocean floor and fish swimming across the screen.
One huge perk is the 96.80% RTP, which gives you a better long term chance of
winning than most slots. You’ll also appreciate how free spins come up more
often in this game when compared to other slot machines.
Downsides include below average symbol graphics, limited sound effects, and
uninspiring bonuses.
Some of the symbols don’t look bad, but the majority just don’t match the
quality seen in the rest of the game.
As for the bonuses, we won’t complain that you can get both free spins and
Mixed Seafood payouts. But they also don’t give you a reason to choose this game
over other ocean themed slots.
Despite the downsides, we like the music, background, and high RTP enough to
fully recommend this game to deep sea lovers.
