Established in 2024 in Manchester, England, Kitsune Gaming Studios is a new name in the iGaming industry with bold plans ahead. With a dedicated team of developers, artists, and storytellers, the studio is focused on creating the next wave of online slots, delivering engaging gameplay, exciting mechanics, and unforgettable soundtracks.
Kitsune has made a strong start in its efforts to make an impact by partnering with Hacksaw Gaming through its OpenRGS™ platform, which allows smaller studios to use its distribution network and reach over 20 gambling markets globally.
We’re excited to be joining Kitsune Gaming Studios at the start of their journey, and we have a feeling you’ll be eager to learn all about them, too. Our dedicated page gives you that opportunity, where you can learn more about the brand itself, play free demo slots from the provider’s portfolio, and discover their best slots to play, ranked by RTP, expert rating and jackpot size.
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Kitsune Gaming Studios Demo Slots
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History & Company Background
Kitsune Studios was founded by Phillip “Dougie” Douglas, a self-proclaimed “casino industry veteran” who boasts over a decade of experience, including work in customer support, casino management, and game development. After years working for other operators and providers, Douglas desigdecidedut together his own team of developers, artists, and musicians in 2024, with the goal of becoming a successful independent studio.
Interestingly, the name Kitsune is actually Japanese for Fox, and from the beginning, the studio’s philosophy has been to “bring a fresh perspective to slot games by combining imaginative storytelling, vibrant art, and novel mechanics.”
Pretty much immediately after launching, Kitsune caught the eye of Hacksaw Gaming, and this, combined with Douglas’ industry connections, allowed the newly created company to enter a distribution agreement with Hacksaw Gaming on their remote OpenRGS server. This gave Kitsune instant access to expert technical support and, more importantly, a vast distribution network, which is how the company has planned to grow during its infant years.
Key Milestones, Timeline & Awards
Mid-2024 – Kitsune Studios is founded in Manchester, UK, with founder Phillip Douglas assuming the role of CEO.
October 2024 – The company reveals its first slot, The Library, with pretty positive press releases helping the studio to gain pre-game popularity.
Early 2025 – Kitsune Studios officially joins Hacksaw Gaming’s OpenRGS platform as the fifth studio partner. This partnership provides Kitsune with the technology and licensing framework to distribute games across multiple regions.
March 2025 – The Library is released, marking Kitsune’s first live slot in online casinos.
March 2025 – Kitsune Studios demo slots are added to the demoslot.com platform.
April 2025 – Kitsune Studios signs a partnership with a casino review and affiliate platform to promote and review its games.
July 2025 – Kitsune’s second slot, Club Cabana, is released, transporting players to an upbeat 1980s pool party setting.
July-December 2025 – Throughout 2025, Kitsune Studios plans to release a total of six games.
Kitsune Gaming Studios Highest RTP Slots
It’s a sensible tactic, regardless of the provider, to play their games which offer a better return to player percentage. Yes, the RTP may be calculated over millions or billions of spins, but the higher this value, the more spins you will theoretically get from your bankroll, which increases the chances of hitting a bonus round where you could win huge multiples of your stake. If you’re seeking the best RTP slots Kitsune Gaming Studios offers, you can find them ranked below in our helpful table.
| Slot Name | RTP |
|---|---|
| 1. The Jack & Rose | 96.36% |
| 2. The Library | 96.34% |
| 3. Miss Candy's Sweet Escape | 96.33% |
| 4. Evil Dozen | 96.33% |
| 5. Bonnie's Buccaneers | 96.32% |
| 6. Club Cabana | 96.31% |
| 7. Thurisaz | 96.30% |
| 8. Totem Poles | 96.27% |
Kitsune Studios Product Portfolio
As of now, Kitsune Studios has only released a handful of slots to date. In the next section, we’ll take a look at some of their best offerings to date.
Online Slot Games
The Library
The Library was Kitsune Studios’ first release, and the game’s designed around a 5-reel, 4-row setup, with the action taking place inside a mysterious grand library! It looks superb, we think it’s fair to say, and all of the game’s symbols are inspired by famous literary figures; think characters inspired by the likes of Lewis Carroll, Dante Alighieri, Edgar Allan Poe, and Beatrix Potter!
Alongside the solid visuals, The Library also introduces an innovative Stackways mechanic, borrowed from Kitsune’s platform partner, Hacksaw Gaming. This means Stackways symbols can land on any reel, stacking between two and ten identical symbols when they do, massively increasing the game’s number of ways to win! This means that during the base game there can be up to 100,000 ways to win and a whopping 3,200,000 during the free spins bonus!
The game’s main feature is called Stack the Shelves, and this free spins bonus is triggered by landing 3 book scatter symbols anywhere in view. Doing so awards you with 10 free spins.
Before the bonus begins, a special symbol is chosen at random and functions similarly to the classic “Book of…” mechanic. When it lands, it expands and pays on any 3+ reels regardless of position. However, Stackways symbols can also land during the bonus and convert into the special symbol, increasing the stack height up to 20 symbols per reel!
The game also boasts an upgraded “Super Stack the Shelves Spins” round that’s triggered by landing four scatter symbols in view, and here, you receive ten free spins with two special expanding symbols! In both bonuses, the free spins can be retriggered with 2+ scatter symbols, and if you land 3+ during the standard bonus, you’ll upgrade to the Super Bonus!
Club Cabana
Club Cabana is the second planned release from Kitsune Studios, and while not all of the game’s details have been released yet, we do know enough to include it here. Here, you’ll find yourself transported to an upbeat 1980s pool party scene. The slot gives off some pretty retro club vibes, and you’ll see neon-themed colour schemes, palm trees, and a cast of attractive characters each time you hit spin!
Released on July 1, 2025, it uses the same five-reel, four-row layout as we saw in The Library. It will also use a ways-to-win mechanic, so you don’t need to worry about conventional paylines, as wins can be formed simply by landing enough matching symbols on the first three reels. Club Cabana has been designed around a medium variance math model, and it’s expected to boast a maximum win potential of 10,000x, the same as The Library.
Jackpot Slots
As of now, Kitsune Studios does not offer any progressive jackpot games, nor have they announced the intention to develop such games. While this may change in the future, for now, it seems unlikely.
Table Games, Bingo & Other Casino Games
Kitsune Studios has also not revealed any plans to develop casino table games, bingo titles, or live dealer games, and, again, it doesn’t look as though this will change any time soon.
Kitsune Studios Slots With The Biggest Payouts
| Slot Name | Max Win |
|---|---|
| 1. The Jack & Rose | 15,000x bet |
| 2. Miss Candy's Sweet Escape | 10,000x bet |
| 3. Totem Poles | 10,000x bet |
| 4. Thurisaz | 10,000x bet |
| 5. Bonnie's Buccaneers | 10,000x bet |
| 6. The Library | 10,000x bet |
| 7. Club Cabana | 10,000x bet |
| 8. Evil Dozen | 7,500x bet |
Game Mechanics, How They Work & Unique Features
In the section that follows, we’ll explore the in-game features and mechanics that are used in Kitsune Studios and explain to you how each of these works.
Ways to Win
Currently, Kitsune has only released (or announced) games that use a ways-to-win mechanic. This means you won’t find any payline-based games from them. Ways-to-win games have become increasingly popular in recent years, as you don’t need to worry about where individual symbols land on the reels. Instead, as long as you land 3+ (or, rarely, 2+) on consecutive reels from left to right, you form a win, regardless of the exact position on the reel where the symbols land!
Popular Ways to Win Games From Kitsune Studios:
- The Library
- Club Cabana
Kitsune Studios Unique Mechanics
Stackways Super Stacks
Kitsune’s debut game introduced players to Hacksaw Gaming’s Stackways mechanic, and while it’s not technically a Kitsune innovation, we felt it was fair to mention it here as the game developer launched using it. Also worth noting is that the Stackways mechanic is not common to see outside of Hacksaw Gaming’s in-house slots, so it’s pretty impressive that Kitsune were able to use it!
In Stackways games, special Stackways symbols can land on any of the five reels. When they do, they trigger a stacking transformation, selecting one of the regular pay symbols and stacking between 2 to 10 copies of that symbol on the same reel. This massively increases the number of potential win combinations, and it also greatly increases the number of ways to win on that spin!
Now, if multiple Stackways symbols land on different reels in the same spin, the effect basically compounds itself, creating dozens or even hundreds of matching symbols across the grid. You’d be surprised how many ways to win you can hit with just two or three Stackways symbols!
Best Kitsune Studios Slots Ranked By Demoslot Rating
Demo & Review
Our Conclusion:
Thurisaz is only the 6th release from Kitsune Studios, and like all of their other games released so far, it’s powered by Hacksaw Gaming’s aggregation platform, so the layout and user interface looks almost identical to Hacksaw’s own games. Thurisaz isn’t the most exciting game in the world, but it offers quite a straightforward, deliberate selection of bonuses and features, and there’s some decent action in the base game thanks to the Multiplier Frames and Dropping Wilds.
Unusually for Hacksaw-powered slots, Thurisaz only contains one Free Spins form; there are no enhancements for landing additional Scatters (besides getting a few more spins), but this makes the game simpler to understand; this may appeal more to casual players and those who don’t like the multitude of complex features found in many slots today.
Thurisaz is still volatile, however, and it’s common to see lengthy dry spells in the base game. Bonuses can pay, but you need a good combination of Multiplier Frames and Dropping Wilds working together to get towards the game’s maximum win potential of 10,000x. So, overall, Thurisaz is a fairly decent game that offers familiar mechanics, decent win potential, with a Norse mythological theme. It won’t suit everyone, but it’s a fairly enjoyable slot, we thought.
Demo & Review
Our Conclusion:
Evil Dozen is visually half-decent, and the mechanics inside the game are good, too. However, anyone familiar with Hacksaw Gaming will immediately recognise the DNA here. Kitsune Studios is a Hacksaw partner, and Evil Dozen feels extremely similar to Pug Life. It appears as though all that’s changed is the theme, and a few small mechanics, but other than that, it’s basically the same game - for better or worse.
That being said, the game does offer plenty of action. The Gingerbread Houses mechanic is the best, offering you sticky wild multipliers that can grow pretty fast, especially during the She’s a Witch Spins feature. Sure, the theme isn’t the best, and the maximum win potential of 7,500x isn’t the highest by 2025’s standards, but it’s an OK slot; just don’t expect anything brand new or unique.
Demo & Review
Our Conclusion:
Despite being a new slot provider for 2025, Kitsune Studios has already made a strong impression with their debut release of The Library, incorporating Hacksaw Gaming's Stackways mechanic, a popular engine among online slot players. We did wonder how the fledgling software house would approach their 2nd title, and in Club Cabana it would appear they have played it safe by using tried and tested in-game mechanics (namely those seen in the scores of fishing slots that are available to play).
Yes, this means you'll have the collector mechanic in play, with the chance to work your way along the progression meter in the free spins, whilst also having an opportunity to gamble for a better start in the pre-bonus wheel gamble if you wish to take more of a risk and give yourself a better shot at that 10,000x max win.
Summing up, Club Cabana might not be a game that's going to get you on the edge of your seat with regard to its feature set, but it's a steady 2nd release from a new studio looking to find their way in a competitive industry, so you can't really fault Kitsune too much for getting another title under their belt using a gaming engine they know has brought success to others in the past.
Demo & Review
Our Conclusion:
Totem Poles is one of Kitsune Studios’ most interesting releases. Again, the provider continues to surprise us. For most new game developers, we really are used to seeing breakthrough mechanics, innovative features, and “stand out” designs, it’s a common approach to try and gain attention.
Kitsune Studios, on the other hand, appear far happier to take existing, well-loved mechanics and give them a slight facelift. Totem Poles is a good example of that strategy in action, and it’s simple in structure, yes, but surprisingly deep in its feature design.
We really like the stacked-reel triggering system. Once the Spirit Wheel is activated, the game quickly gets pretty intense with lots of different awards/modifiers available. Both free spins bonuses are decent, if a little short. The maximum win potential of 10,000x is a nice touch, too, so Totem Poles gets a thumbs up from us!
Demo & Review
Our Conclusion:
It's been success stories all around so far for the partner studios who are using Hacksaw Gaming's OpenRGS platform, and that trend looks as if it's set to continue as the newbie Kitsune Gaming Studios comes racing out of the traps with their Library slot, which utilises the popular Stackways mechanic, seen in previous releases from Hacksaw titled Mayan Stackways and Ronin Stackways.
The decision to use an established mechanic from the fledging provider was a good choice, and they have put their own mark on it, too, with the free spins feature having the potential to award up to 32,000,00 ways to win. Whilst there is a long road ahead for Kitsune to get themselves established with future releases incorporating their own gaming engines, I'm sure players will be more than eager to try The Library out, with it being one of a handful of slots using the popular Stackways.
Commitment to Player Safety & Fairness
Licensing & Regulation
As a new game studio, we weren’t expecting to see Kitsune Studios launching with their own online gambling licenses, and this turned out to, indeed, be the case. However, thanks to their partnership with Hacksaw Gaming and their ability to distribute their games via their OpenRGS platform, all of its titles automatically fall under the regulations and licensing that Hacksaw operates with.
For players, this means Kitsune’s games are legitimate and fair; the studio is effectively covered by Hacksaw’s licenses, like the ones held by the Malta Gaming Authority (MGA) and the United Kingdom Gambling Commission (UKGC). Essentially, Kitsune Studios is “piggybacking” on Hacksaw Gaming’s licenses.
Fair Play & Security
Unfortunately, Kitsune Studios hasn’t revealed any information about how they test their games, and they don’t list, publicly, which testing houses they provide their source code to to certify their titles. However, it’s likely they use a testing house like BMM (BMM Testlabs), GLI (Gaming Laboratories International), or eCOGRA (eCommerce Online Gaming Regulation and Assurance), as these are the leading names in the online gambling industry and are companies that Hacksaw Gaming also works with.
Of course, all Kitsune Studios slots use a random number generator that is independently tested and certified by one of these third-party laboratories, and if they weren’t, Hacksaw Gaming wouldn’t allow them to run their games through their aggregation platform!
It would, however, be nice to have a bit more transparency in this department. We always like to see where software providers are having their games tested and certified.
Partnerships & Collaborations
Being a small studio, Kitsune has, wisely, in our opinion, decided to try and partner with studios and aggregators right from their founding, rather than trying to do everything themselves. Their most significant collaboration, of course, is with Hacksaw Gaming through the OpenRGS platform. Thanks to this deal, Kitsune develops the game clients while Hacksaw’s remote gaming server manages the back-end infrastructure, including integration with online casinos, certification across multiple regulated markets, and compliance with legal and technical standards.
To give you an idea of how important this partnership alone was, it allowed Kitsune Studios to launch its debut game, The Library, in more than 20 regulated markets on the day it was released. This is something that would be virtually impossible for an independent startup without extensive resources, and as Kitsune doesn’t need to worry about licensing, it gives them more time to focus on creating the games.
In April 2025, Kitsune Studios also entered into a partnership with Slotsjudge, a competitor to DemoSlot. Under the deal, Kitsune Studios would offer Slotsjudge early access to games and media packs, and, in return, Slotsjudge would write reviews on all of the provider’s games, along with other exclusive content like developer interviews.
It’s likely that we’ll see more collaborations forming in the future, but for now, Kitsune Studios are pretty well set thanks to their partnership with Hacksaw Gaming. The fact that, just months after launching, their games are already being pushed out via the OpenRGS aggregator network is… impressive, to say the least!
Corporate Social Responsibility
Being a new studio, Kitsune is actively building its reputation not just through games, but also through positive involvement in the industry and community. One aspect of this is industry presence! For example, despite their very young age, Kitsune Studios has already attempted to exhibit at key industry events and conferences!
In January 2025, the team attended the ICE Gaming Expo in Barcelona (ICE 2025), one of the largest events of the year for the iGaming industry. It’s unclear what, if any, partnerships or connections they managed to make here, but it’s definitely a good sign.
Kitsune Studios is also very vocal about its roots. As mentioned, the company is based in Manchester, and the founders have expressed an intent to help their local community currently by hiring local employees.
This, of course, includes a lot more than just slot developers but also creative designers, musicians, and mathematicians, too! It’s likely that, in the future, we’ll see them running Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives in Manchester, although as of now, they don’t appear to run any specific programmes.
Kitsune Studios Transparency Checklist
| Licenses Held/Used Displayed On Their Website | ❌ |
| Licences Are Clickable To View | ❌ |
| RNG Testing Displayed On Their Website | ❌ |
| Testing Logos Are Clickable To View | ❌ |
| Open Dialogue With Demoslot | ✅ |
| Contact Details Available On Their Website | ✅ |
| Responsible Gambling Links On Their Website | ❌ |
| Active On Social Media | ✅ |
| Last Audit | 01/06/2025 |
| Total Score | 3 Out Of 8 |
Final Summary
Kitsune Studios may be a fresh face in the iGaming world. They have, pretty impressively, managed to attract players in a short space of time! Just a couple of months after launching, the studio managed to launch its first slot, The Library, and partner with Hacksaw Gaming to distribute its titles on the OpenRGS network, and it’s clear that the software provider has big plans for the future!
It’s also pretty impressive to see the wide variety of mechanics found in their first release alone! Sure, Stackways isn’t an original innovation, but it’s one rarely seen outside of Hacksaw Gaming’s own slots, and it’s one that should, we imagine, set the tone for what’s to come in future releases. The fact that Kitsune Studios is experimenting with innovations and mechanics like this so early on clearly proves that they’ve got big things coming in the future, and that’s always something we like to see.
Sure, they will need to work hard in order to differentiate themselves, especially in a market that’s more crowded than ever, but, as things stand, Kitsune Studios appears to be on the right track, and we’re looking forward to joining them in their journey as they continue to prepare new releases and innovate within the online gambling industry!