Samurai Katsumi

What is Samurai Katsumi?

It has been a challenging few years for Entain, having cycled through four CEOs in short succession. In November 2023 Entain agreed to pay a financial penalty totalling £585 million, plus a £20 million charitable donation and £10 million in Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and HMRC costs. This related to a bribery case initiated by the CPS into the company’s historic operations in Turkey.

Troubles continued as it faced declining growth within its digital business. Reports of failed integrations amid a frenzy of acquisitions further dampened Entain’s reputation and the operator subsequently committed to a major turnaround effort to cut costs and return its digital business to growth.

Efforts to update its legacy tech were also set in motion, and short-lived CEO Gavin Isaacs told iGB at ICE in January 2025 that his biggest challenge in the role was to modernise its core platform.

About Samurai Katsumi

This is the marquee upgrade. In 2025, it was enough for physical monkeys to appear to fly off the screen and over your head. But more than 3.6 million people have already seen that stupid pet trick. The first-gen monkeys were 16-foot helium inflatables steered by drone operators. Their only motion, besides drifting forward, was wing-flapping. They floated more than they performed.

The new monkeys are animatronic. As shown in the video, they’re capable of moving their faces and bodies in menacing ways as they pass overhead during the witch’s attack. They also seem to be hanging from an overhead line, though the Sphere has not officially described the new flight system.

Smell is the quietest upgrade but may be the most powerful. (Scent anchors memories more strongly than any other sense.) The new Oz adds more scents timed to scene changes. Expect the room to smell different when Kansas gives way to Oz, when the orchard turns hostile, and when the poppy field knocks everyone out.

How to play Samurai Katsumi

Using data collected primarily through Chrome’s incognito mode to exclude personalised search histories, the KVA identified several autocomplete and pre-fill search queries that directly suggested illegal gambling platforms to users.

Examples included phrases like “online casino zonder Cruks” (online casino without CRUKS, the Dutch self-exclusion registry for problem gamblers) and “beste online casino buitenland” (best online casino abroad).

KVA expressed concern over the potential manipulation of Google’s autocomplete function by unauthorised operators and websites primarily set up to redirect Dutch consumers to illegal gambling offers.