Rat Royale Guide: Rules, Rat King Gem Wilds, Free Spins Variants and Ante Bets
By the CasinoDemo editorial team · Updated 2026-11-09 · How we review
Rat Royale is a Pragmatic Play slot on a 5x5 grid where wins connect across rows instead of running along fixed lines. Normal wilds carry multipliers up to x100, and the Rat King wild on reel 3 can reach x500 and holds one of four coloured gems, each with its own effect.
We played the free demo at a $2 bet, read all eight rules pages and bought both bonus options. This guide covers how the ways work, what each gem does, how the three free spins variants differ, and what our two bought rounds paid.
Rat Royale at a glance
- Provider
- Pragmatic Play
- RTP
- 96.52%
- Demo
- Free, no sign-up
How Rat Royale works
The grid has 5 reels and 5 rows. Symbols pay from left to right on adjacent reels, and each symbol has to connect on the same row or one row up or down from the previous one. The rules give a maximum of 259 possible ways. Only the highest win is paid per winning combination on the same payway, and wins on several payways are added together.
At a $2 bet the red-gem rat pays $6 for five (3x the bet), the purple-gem rat $3, the green-gem rat $2 and the blue-gem rat $1.50. A and K pay $1.20 for five, Q pays $1 and J and 10 pay $0.60. A normal wild pays $6 for five. Those base pays are low; the multiplier wilds do the real work.
The demo starts at $2 with $100,000 in play money. The rules list a $0.20 minimum and a $1,200 maximum bet. Pragmatic rates Rat Royale medium volatility, which it describes as paying out steadily with a range of pays from low to very high.
Normal wilds and Rat King wilds
The normal wild substitutes for everything except the scatter. It can carry a random multiplier of x1, x2, x3, x4, x5, x6, x8, x10, x12, x15, x25, x50 or x100, applied to every win passing through it. When several wilds sit in the same win, their multipliers add together rather than multiply. A maximum of 3 wilds can hit on each reel.
Rat King wilds appear only on reel 3. They also substitute for everything except the scatter and carry a bigger range: x2 up to x500 (x2, x3, x4, x5, x6, x8, x10, x12, x15, x20, x25, x50, x100, x200 or x500). Each Rat King holds a gem:
Red gem: if the spin has at least one win, the Rat King expands to fill reel 3, then gains +1x for every rat symbol on screen holding a red gem.
Purple gem: the multipliers of all normal wilds on screen are added to the Rat King's multiplier.
Green gem: the Rat King adds its own multiplier to every normal wild on screen.
Blue gem: every rat symbol holding a blue gem turns into a normal wild with a random multiplier.
Free spins: Blood Ritual, Blood Pact and Blood Lust
Three, four or five scatters trigger free spins, and the number of scatters decides the variant: 3 for Blood Ritual, 4 for Blood Pact and 5 for Blood Lust. Every variant starts with 10 free spins. Three or more scatters during the round add 5 more spins. Special reels are used during the feature.
Blood Ritual plays like the base game, but every wild that lands carries at least x2. Blood Pact puts a Rat King wild in the middle cell of the grid for the whole round. Blood Lust goes further with a fully expanded Rat King filling the middle reel. In both Pact and Lust the Rat King gets a random gem on every free spin, and any multiplier added to it stays until the round ends. That persistence is why the upper variants matter so much.
Bonus buy options and our demo results
The Buy Feature menu offers Free Spins at 100x the base bet ($200 at $2) and Super Free Spins at 500x ($1,000), which guarantees the Blood Lust variant. The rules list the RTP as 96.54% for the regular buy and 96.52% for the super buy. A Rebuy button appears after a bought round.
Our $200 Free Spins buy landed four scatters, so it played as Blood Pact. The Rat King sat in the centre cell at x17, then a red gem stretched it across reel 3 at x18, and it was still in the x20s late in the round. Normal wilds at x22 joined in, and the round paid $640.20, about 320x the bet and 3.2 times the price.
Our $1,000 Super Free Spins buy started on a five-scatter spin and played as Blood Lust. The expanded Rat King took an x12 multiplier early and never gained more, even with green and blue gems along the way. A green-gem spin left a normal wild showing x14 beside it. The round paid $562.10, about 281x the bet but only 56% of what it cost. Two single rounds, opposite results: the cheaper buy beat the expensive one here, and that tells you nothing about averages.
Ante Bet 1 and Ante Bet 2
The Special Bets panel has two ante options. The rules state them as bet multipliers against 20x for normal play, so Ante Bet 1 costs 2.5x the base bet and Ante Bet 2 costs 5x. At $2 the menu showed $5 and $10.
Ante Bet 1 makes free spins 4 times more likely to trigger, with an RTP of 96.54%. Ante Bet 2 also raises the trigger chance and guarantees that any feature won while it is active is the Blood Lust variant. Its RTP is 96.48%, the lowest figure in the game. We did not play spins with either ante switched on.
RTP, max win and volatility
The theoretical RTP is 96.52%. Ante Bet 1 and the Free Spins buy run at 96.54%, the Super Free Spins buy at 96.52% and Ante Bet 2 at 96.48%. The maximum win is 15,000x the bet. If a round reaches that cap it ends immediately, the win is paid and remaining features are forfeited. The game's data puts the odds of hitting the max win at 1 in 55,248,619. Volatility is rated medium.
Our verdict
Rat Royale has more going on than most wild-multiplier slots. Each gem changes how multipliers move between the Rat King and the normal wilds, and in Blood Pact and Blood Lust those gains stick for the whole round. The connected-ways grid keeps base pays small, so the game lives on the free spins. Our Blood Pact buy paid well and our Blood Lust buy stalled at x12, which shows how much rides on the gem draws. The medium volatility rating and a 15,000x cap make it a sensible pick if you like layered features without extreme swings. Try the demo before playing for real.
How to play Rat Royale free in Canada
Press Play demo for free on the game page and the Pragmatic Play demo loads with virtual credits. There is nothing to download, no account to create and no deposit to make, and it works in your browser on desktop and mobile.
Demo credits have no cash value, so you can test bet sizes, trigger the features and learn the paytable without risking anything.
Playing Rat Royale for real money in Canada
Real-money online gambling in Canada is regulated province by province. Ontario runs a regulated market where licensed operators are overseen by iGaming Ontario and the AGCO; other provinces offer play through their own provincial sites, such as PlayNow (British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan), Loto-Québec, PlayAlberta and ALC in Atlantic Canada.
The legal age is 19 in most provinces and 18 in Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec. Only play at sites licensed where you live, set limits before you start, and treat gambling as entertainment, never as a way to make money.
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Rat Royale FAQ
- What is the RTP of Rat Royale?
- The rules list 96.52%. Ante Bet 1 and the Free Spins buy run at 96.54%, the Super Free Spins buy at 96.52% and Ante Bet 2 at 96.48%.
- What is the max win in Rat Royale?
- 15,000x the bet. A round that reaches the cap ends at once and the win is paid. The game's data puts the odds at 1 in 55,248,619.
- How do the Rat Royale free spins variants work?
- 3 scatters give Blood Ritual (all wilds at least x2), 4 give Blood Pact (a Rat King wild fixed in the centre cell) and 5 give Blood Lust (a fully expanded Rat King on the middle reel). All start with 10 spins, and 3 or more scatters add 5 more.
- How much is the Rat Royale bonus buy?
- Free Spins costs 100x the base bet. Super Free Spins costs 500x and guarantees the Blood Lust variant.
- What do the Rat King gems do?
- Red expands the Rat King on a winning spin and adds +1x per red-gem rat on screen. Purple adds all normal wild multipliers to the Rat King. Green adds the Rat King's multiplier to all normal wilds. Blue turns blue-gem rats into normal wilds with random multipliers.
- How many ways to win does Rat Royale have?
- Wins connect left to right on the same row or one row up or down, for a maximum of 259 ways.
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