Shadows Inc vs Slayers Inc: Same RTP, Same Game

TLDR

Shadows Inc is Slayers Inc with different paint, and this time nothing measurable changed. We put both in-game info screens side by side on 7 August 2026 and read them line by line. Same 96.28% RTP. Same 15,000x max win. Same 5 reels, 4 rows and 14 paylines. Same Slayer DuelReels. Same three free spins bonuses. Same Best of Bonus. Same symbol paytable, line for line. All seven bonus buy returns match to the decimal.

The only differences are the name, the artwork and the colour of the scatter. Slayers Inc is red and gold with a red FS scatter. Shadows Inc is purple and blue with a purple scatter on a blue underline.

That is worth saying out loud, because the last two Stake-side Hacksaw builds we checked were not like this. Rage of Egypt pays 1.25 points more than Hand of Anubis. LIT City pays 1.21 points more than RIP City. Shadows Inc pays exactly the same as the original. A Stake badge is not a promise of a better number, and this is the proof.

Is Shadows Inc the same as Slayers Inc?

Yes. We found no gameplay difference and no maths difference at all.

Both are Hacksaw Gaming games on one engine. You win by landing matching symbols on one of 14 predefined lines, on adjacent reels, from left to right, starting at the leftmost reel. Only the highest win on each line pays. The Shadows Inc paylines are the same 14 fixed lines as Slayers Inc, on the same 5 reel and 4 row grid.

The paytable matches exactly. The five low symbols each pay 2.00 for five, 1.00 for four and 0.20 for three. The high symbols pay 6.00, 6.00, 12.00, 12.00 and 20.00 for five of a kind, 3.00, 3.00, 6.00, 6.00 and 10.00 for four, and 1.00, 1.00, 2.00, 2.00 and 4.00 for three. The VS symbol pays 20.00 for five. Wild substitutes for every symbol in the paytable in both games.

Bet levels run from EUR 0.10 to EUR 2,000 on both. The Shadows Inc screen adds that feature buys can go above that ceiling.

If you loaded both without reading the title screen, the colour is the only thing that would tell you which one you were on.

Shadows Inc vs Slayers Inc: the full comparison

Every row that affects your money is a match. Every row that differs is decoration.

What is the Shadows Inc RTP?

96.28%, read from the game's own info screen, which also states the figure was calculated by simulating 10,000,000,000 rounds. Slayers Inc publishes the same 96.28%.

The gap is zero. Not small, not rounded away, zero.

Be careful with what you read elsewhere on this pair, because the public pages disagree with each other and with the games. Across public catalogue pages we found the paylines listed as both 14 and 20, the max win listed as both 15,000x and 25,000x, and the grid described as both 5 by 4 and as a six reel game. Some pages also carry extra return figures we could not find on either info screen, so we are not repeating them here.

The in-game info screen is the one source that cannot be out of date, because it ships with the build you are actually spinning. That is what we used, and it says 5 reels, 4 rows, 14 paylines, 15,000x and 96.28% for both games.

What is the Shadows Inc max win?

15,000x your bet, exactly the same ceiling as Slayers Inc. There is no Stake bonus on the cap any more than there is on the RTP.

That ceiling is not theoretical. In our all-time record book, Slayers Inc has actually reached 15,000x once, on Gamdom. Because the two games run the same maths, that is the same ceiling Shadows Inc runs. It does not make a max win likely, and nothing makes any spin due. It just means the number on the paytable has been touched by a real player rather than only promised.

Is the Shadows Inc bonus buy RTP any different?

No. This is the part that settles the argument, because bonus buys are where re-weighted builds usually give themselves away. All seven figures match to the decimal.

Two of those come with a condition, stated the same way in both games. FS symbols cannot land in Duo Duel FeatureSpins or in Trouble Trio FeatureSpins, so those two modes cannot bounce you into a free spins round.

Compare that with Rage of Egypt vs Hand of Anubis, where every buy on the Stake side sits more than a full point above the original. When Hacksaw does change the maths, the buys move too. Here they do not move at all.

How does Slayer DuelReels work?

Slayer DuelReels is the whole game, and the two titles describe it in the same words.

A landed VS symbol expands if it will form part of a win once expanded. It grows to cover the whole reel and shows two slayers carrying different multipliers. A duel takes place, and the surviving slayer's multiplier applies across that entire reel, which also turns Wild. If more than one duel is part of the same win, the values are added together first and then multiplied with the line wins.

The possible multipliers are 2x, 3x, 4x, 5x, 6x, 7x, 8x, 9x, 10x, 15x, 20x, 25x, 50x, 100x, 250x and 500x.

Two rules bound it. Each reel can land only one VS symbol at a time. Land a VS symbol on every reel and the whole grid is treated as Wild.

That last line is where the 15,000x lives, and it reads identically in Shadows Inc and Slayers Inc.

What do the free spins bonuses do?

Three FS scatter tiers, same in both games, all paying 10 free spins to start.

Rise of the Syndicate needs 3 FS scatters in the base game. Ten free spins with a higher chance of a VS symbol. Extra scatters during the feature add spins: 2 FS gives 2 extra spins, 3 FS gives 4 extra spins.

Wild Slayers needs 4 FS scatters. Ten free spins that keep the base game mechanics and add the Slicer, which can activate whenever a VS symbol lands and drops a full row of Wild symbols on a randomly chosen row.

One Slayer To Slay Them All needs 5 FS scatters. Ten free spins with the Wild Slayers mechanics, except both DuelReels and the Slicer are guaranteed to activate on every spin. FS symbols do not appear inside this feature.

Best of Bonus is the overlay on top. Land the Best of Bonus scatter at the same time as the required FS scatters and you get the Best of version of that round. Three rounds play out one after another, each round's win is stored on a scoreboard outside the grid, and the highest of the three is the one you are paid. The Best of Bonus symbol only appears in the base game.

Word for word, that is the same feature set in both titles.

Is the Shadows Inc Stake exclusive claim permanent?

The game's own info footer says "Only on Stake". That is what the game says about itself today, and our feeds agree so far: the only casino we see Shadows Inc on is Stake.

Treat it as a statement about right now, not a permanent fact about distribution. Hacksaw has run casino-first releases before. Some of those games reached other lobbies later and some did not, so whether Shadows Inc goes wide is not something anybody can tell you yet.

Slayers Inc is the opposite case. It is everywhere. It has paid a win of 250x or more on 18 different casinos in our record book, and it is live in our feeds right now on JackBit, Roobet, BitStarz, Shuffle and Gamdom.

Is there a Shadows Inc demo?

Not yet. No public demo exists while the game sits on Stake only, and we will add one to the Shadows Inc page the moment it appears.

Here is the useful part, and it only works because the two games are identical. The free Slayers Inc demo is an accurate preview of Shadows Inc. Same grid, same 14 lines, same DuelReels multipliers, same three bonuses, same paytable, same 96.28%. Spin the demo in red and gold and you have learned the purple game without spending anything. Our full free slot demos list runs the rest of the catalogue the same way.

That advice would be wrong for the other two pairs on this site. Playing the RIP City demo tells you how LIT City feels, but not what it returns. Here, it tells you both.

What is a Hacksaw Stake exclusive reskin?

A Hacksaw Stake exclusive reskin is the same game engine released a second time under a new name and a new coat of paint, usually on one casino first. The studio has done it repeatedly, and players have learned to expect a catch in the player's favour, because the two best known examples both raised the RTP.

Shadows Inc is the version of that story where the catch does not exist. The reskin is exactly a reskin.

So the honest rule is not "Stake exclusives pay more" and it is not "Stake exclusives are the same". It is that you have to check, every time, in the info screen of the build you loaded.

Which Stake exclusive slots have higher RTP?

Two that do, and one that does not. All three were read from the games themselves.

The Rage of Egypt vs Hand of Anubis RTP gap is 1.25 percentage points on identical maths, and LIT City vs RIP City is 1.21. Both of those are real, both came off the info screens, and both are worth acting on if you have the choice.

Shadows Inc breaks the pattern, and that is exactly why the pattern is not a rule. Two cases out of three is a habit, not a guarantee. Our real RTP tracker compares published returns against what games actually pay in our feeds, and our boosted RTP slots tracker lists the higher return builds we see real bets on.

What does our live bet data show?

This is the part a spec sheet cannot give you. We read live bet feeds from more than 20 crypto casinos, so we can report what these games have actually paid rather than what the paytable promises.

Read that Shadows Inc column as a clock, not a verdict. The game has only just been added to the site and its Stake bets start logging now, so a zero there means "no data yet", nothing more. A game with none of the traffic will show none of the monster wins no matter how good its maths are, and here we already know its maths are the same.

Where to play Slayers Inc is the easy part, since 18 casinos in our record book have paid a big win on it. Gamdom has logged the most by a distance, and Gamdom is also where the single 15,000x landed. That reflects where the volume is in our feeds rather than where the game pays best, and it is not a reason to pick a casino.

There is one more version to know about. We track Slayers Inc Boosted as a separate title on Gamdom, with 873 wins of 250x or more in our records and a best logged hit of 5,862.07x. We have not read its info screen, so we publish no RTP figure for it, and neither should anybody else.

Both slot pages update as bets land, and our methodology page sets out exactly what we count and where the limits of the data are.

What an identical RTP actually means for you

RTP is the share of everything wagered that a game is designed to hand back over an enormous number of rounds. The rest is the house edge. At 96.28%, both of these games are built to keep about EUR 3.72 of every EUR 100 staked over the long run.

Because the number is the same, there is no maths argument for picking one over the other. Pick the colour you prefer, or pick the casino you already trust, and stop there. Anybody telling you the Stake version pays better is guessing.

What still matters is the version you load. The published RTP belongs to the build, not to the name on the tile, and Hacksaw ships separate higher return builds under its Boosted branding that casinos can choose to run. Open the game, read the RTP line in its own info tab, and trust that over any review page, including this one. Two lobbies can serve you the same game name at different returns. Enhanced RTP and boosted slots explained covers how those mechanisms differ.

And over one session none of this decides anything. Our slot database rates Slayers Inc high volatility, and the identical maths means Shadows Inc runs the same model, on the same 15,000x ceiling. Your night is dominated by whether a duel chain lands, not by a decimal place. A session can lose every spin. A session can hit the cap. Neither outcome says anything about the RTP, and neither game is ever due for anything. The reels have no memory of your last hundred spins, which is why your session never matches the RTP.

Set a limit before you open either game, treat the stake as the price of the entertainment, and stop when you reach the limit rather than when the balance decides for you. If gambling stops feeling like a choice, take a break and talk to a support service in your country.

FAQ

Is Shadows Inc the same game as Slayers Inc?

Yes, in every way that affects play or payout. We compared both in-game info screens on 7 August 2026 and found the same 96.28% RTP, the same 15,000x max win, the same 5 reel and 4 row grid, the same 14 paylines, the same Slayer DuelReels mechanic with the same multiplier values, the same three free spins bonuses, the same Best of Bonus, the same seven bonus buy returns and the same symbol paytable line for line. The name, the artwork and the scatter colour are the only differences.

Does Shadows Inc have a higher RTP because it is on Stake?

No. It returns 96.28%, taken from the game's own info screen, which states the figure was calculated by simulating 10,000,000,000 rounds. Its bonus buys run from 96.26% to 96.38% depending on which one you take. Every one of those figures is identical to Slayers Inc.

What is the Slayers Inc RTP?

96.28% for the standard build, the same as Shadows Inc, with bonus buys from 96.26% to 96.38%. A separate Slayers Inc Boosted version also exists as its own game on some casinos, so always read the RTP line in the info screen of the version you have loaded rather than trusting the game name.

What is the Slayers Inc max win?

15,000x your bet, and so is the Shadows Inc max win. It can be reached in the base game or in any of the free spins bonuses, and the biggest route to it is a VS symbol on every reel, which turns the whole grid Wild. Slayers Inc has actually reached 15,000x once in our records, on Gamdom.

What is Slayers Inc Boosted?

A separate build of the same game, listed as its own title rather than a hidden setting. We track it live on Gamdom and have 873 wins of 250x or more recorded on it, with a best logged hit of 5,862.07x. We have not read its in-game info screen, so we publish no RTP figure for it. Hacksaw's Boosted line works this way across several of its games, which is why the version you load matters as much as the game you pick.

Are Stake exclusive slots higher RTP?

Sometimes, and Shadows Inc is the case that proves it is not automatic. Rage of Egypt returns 97.49% against Hand of Anubis at 96.24%, and LIT City returns 97.43% against RIP City at 96.22%. Shadows Inc returns 96.28%, exactly the same as Slayers Inc. Stake exclusive slots are worth checking, not worth assuming, and a higher RTP tells you nothing about volatility, bonus terms or wagering requirements.

Where can you play Shadows Inc?

On Stake. The game's own footer reads "Only on Stake", and Stake is the only casino we see it on in our feeds. Whether it reaches other lobbies later, time will tell. Slayers Inc is the one to look for everywhere else, and 18 casinos in our record book have paid a big win on it.

Can you play Shadows Inc for free?

Not yet, because no public demo exists while the game is on Stake only. The free Slayers Inc demo on our Slayers Inc page is an exact stand in, since the two games share the same grid, paylines, mechanics, bonuses, paytable and RTP. We will add a Shadows Inc demo to its own page the moment one appears.

Shadows Inc or Slayers Inc: which is better?

Neither, on the maths, and that is an unusual answer on this site. Same RTP, same max win, same features, same paytable. Slayers Inc wins on availability, since it runs on many casinos and has a free demo. Shadows Inc wins if you prefer the purple and blue art. Neither is more likely to pay big on your next spin.

How do you check these numbers?

Every specification on this page was read from the two games' own in-game info screens on 7 August 2026, and the win figures come from our live bet tracking across more than 20 crypto casinos. The high volatility rating comes from our slot database, not from the info screens, which carry no volatility line for either game. Public catalogues currently disagree with each other on this pair, listing the paylines as 14 or 20 and the max win as 15,000x or 25,000x, so where they conflicted with the info screens we used the info screens and said so. Our methodology page explains what we count and what we exclude.