A game studio and a casino are different companies with different regulators, and confusing the two is the most common mistake in this corner of the subject. These pages cover the studios whose titles turn up in Philippine-facing lobbies: who they are, what they are actually licensed to do, and whether they publish a return-to-player figure anyone can check. There are 7 pages below.
Everything in this section
| Studio | Publishes RTP | Specialisms | Licence position |
|---|---|---|---|
| JILI | No | slots, fishing games | PAGCOR (Electronic Gaming Licensing Department) |
| Pragmatic Play | Yes | slots, live casino | Malta Gaming Authority |
| PG Soft | Yes | slots | Malta Gaming Authority |
| Evolution | Yes | live dealer casino, live game shows | Malta Gaming Authority |
| FA CHAI Gaming | Yes | slots, 3D fishing games | Curacao Gaming Authority — status unresolved |
| JDB Gaming | No | fish shooting games, slots | PAGCOR (Electronic Gaming Licensing Department) |
| CQ9 Gaming | No | slots, fishing games | PAGCOR (Electronic Gaming Licensing Department) |
7 pages, each one covering a single entry rather than summarising several. Where a field above reads “not published”, the entry’s own page explains who would have had to publish it.
Each entry in a paragraph
Enough on each to know which page is the one worth opening.
JILI
Publishes no founding year, and states no headquarters. Builds slots, fishing games, table and card games, bingo.
The first record on its page is PAGCOR (Electronic Gaming Licensing Department). JILI titles appear on PAGCOR EGLD’s list of approved electronic games.
It publishes no RTP. This site quotes none for its titles, and the figures circulating elsewhere are third-party estimates that disagree with each other.
Pragmatic Play
Founded 2015, based in Gibraltar. Builds slots, live casino, bingo, crash games, virtual sports.
The first record on its page is Malta Gaming Authority. Licence MGA/B2B/619/2018, held by Pragmatic Solutions MT Limited.
It publishes RTP, so a figure quoted for one of its titles is traceable to the studio. Pragmatic publishes one RTP per title on its own game pages, and that figure is the top of a set.
PG Soft
Founded 2015, based in Valletta, Malta. Builds slots.
The first record on its page is Malta Gaming Authority. Licence MGA/B2B/435/2017, held by Pocket Games Software Limited (C 76195).
It publishes RTP, so a figure quoted for one of its titles is traceable to the studio. PG Soft publishes RTP in its game data but does not render it on the page a visitor sees: the visible field is a blank dash, while the figure sits in the data the server sends with the page.
Evolution
Founded 2006, based in Stockholm, Sweden. Builds live dealer casino, live game shows.
The first record on its page is Malta Gaming Authority. Licence MGA/CRP/187/2010, held by Evolution Gaming Malta Limited.
It publishes RTP, so a figure quoted for one of its titles is traceable to the studio. Recorded as publishing RTP on the strength of consistent third-party corroboration for its game-show titles.
FA CHAI Gaming
Founded 2019, and states no headquarters. Builds slots, 3D fishing games, arcade games, table games.
The first record on its page is Curacao Gaming Authority. Licence OGL/2024/1184/1010, held by WiseInNet Technologies B.V., which operates FA CHAI’s site.
It publishes RTP, so a figure quoted for one of its titles is traceable to the studio. FA CHAI shows RTP directly on its own public games listing, which makes it the most straightforwardly checkable of the seven studios here..
JDB Gaming
Publishes no founding year, and states no headquarters. Builds fish shooting games, slots.
The first record on its page is PAGCOR (Electronic Gaming Licensing Department). A game-content approval list exists on PAGCOR’s own site.
It publishes no RTP. This site quotes none for its titles, and the figures circulating elsewhere are third-party estimates that disagree with each other.
CQ9 Gaming
Publishes no founding year, and states no headquarters. Builds slots, fishing games, table games, arcade games.
The first record on its page is PAGCOR (Electronic Gaming Licensing Department). A game-content approval list exists on PAGCOR’s own site.
It publishes no RTP. This site quotes none for its titles, and the figures circulating elsewhere are third-party estimates that disagree with each other.
Checking any of this without trusting this site
Nothing here needs to be taken on trust. Every licence claim on these pages came from a public register, and those registers are open:
- For a Malta licence, open the MGA authorisation portal and search the company name rather than the brand name. The licensee is often a differently named subsidiary — Pragmatic Play’s Malta licence is held by Pragmatic Solutions MT Limited, not by anything called Pragmatic Play.
- For a UK licence, search the Gambling Commission public register by account number. An active licence shows its activities and the date each began, and any regulatory settlement against the holder appears on the same record.
- For a PAGCOR EGLD listing, find the studio’s approved-games PDF on pagcor.ph. Read what it is approving: game content for licensed operators. If the document does not say the studio holds a licence, it does not.
- For an RTP figure, open the studio’s own page for that specific title. If the figure is not there, no comparison site can supply it — and if two comparison sites disagree, that disagreement is the finding.
What this section does not cover
None of these pages claims a particular operator carries a particular studio. A studio’s catalogue is a fact about the studio; what any casino licenses from it is a commercial arrangement no outside site can verify.
That omission is deliberate and it is the same on every page in this section. A site that fills those gaps with plausible numbers reads better and is worth less.
The thing most often got wrong here
The distinction that matters most here is between a PAGCOR operator licence and a PAGCOR EGLD listing. An EGLD listing means PAGCOR has approved a studio’s game content for use by operators it licenses. It is not a licence held by the studio, and it says nothing about any casino that carries those games.
Four of the seven studios below have only that. Each of their pages says so in plain words, because “PAGCOR listed” and “PAGCOR licensed” are one word apart and worlds apart — and the second is what a reader is usually hoping to have found.
FAQ
Which of these studios publish an RTP figure?
Pragmatic Play, PG Soft, Evolution, FA CHAI Gaming. The rest do not, and this site quotes no RTP for their titles rather than borrowing one from a comparison site.
Does a studio licence protect a player?
Not directly. A studio licence covers the company making the games. A player's recourse runs through the operator's regulator, which is a different licence held by a different company.
Does BOSS77 carry all of these studios?
Unconfirmed. No BOSS77 lobby was reachable during research, so this site makes no claim about which studios that operator carries.
What is the difference between a PAGCOR licence and a PAGCOR EGLD listing?
An EGLD listing is approval of a studio's game content for use by operators PAGCOR licenses. A PAGCOR licence is held by an operator and authorises it to run a casino. Four of the studios here have the first and none of them has the second.
Why do some studios here have no founding year or headquarters?
Because they do not publish one. JILI and JDB Gaming and CQ9 Gaming disclose neither on their own sites. Figures for both circulate on affiliate listicles with no primary source, and none is repeated here.
Does a GLI or BMM certification mean a game is fair?
It means an independent test laboratory has examined the random number generator and the paytable against a standard. It is meaningful and it is not the same as a licence, and neither one says anything about the operator offering the game.