This Week in Crypto Games: 'Hamster Kombat' Players Get Crafty as Pre-Market Trading Expands

The crypto and NFT gaming space is busier than ever lately, what with prominent games starting to release, token airdrops piling up, and a seemingly constant array of other things happening at all times. It’s a lot to take in!

Luckily, Decrypt’s GG is all over it. And if you need a quick way to get caught up on the latest moves around crypto video games, we’re happy to present This Week in Crypto Games.

Our weekend roundup serves up the biggest news from the past week, along with a few other tidbits you might have missed. We also showcase a few of our original stories from the week.

Biggest news

Crafty Kombat players: How wild is the Hamster Kombat craze getting? Just days after Telegram CEO Pavel Durov said that the game had amassed 239 million players and counting, a report from a Russian news outlet claimed that percussion massage guns sales had surged due to players using them to super-charge their in-game tapping. One brand was actually using Hamster Kombat imagery on its product listings.

‘Hamster Kombat’ Players Snap Up Massage Guns for Turbo Tap-to-Earn Rewards

Hamster Kombat players are getting crafty: Russian retailers are reporting surging massage gun sales amid the rise of the viral Telegram crypto game, as players are using the percussion massagers to amplify their screen tapping. According to Russian news outlet Vedomosti, as spotted by Protos, leading online retailer Wildberries reported a 179% month-over-month sales spike for percussion massagers in June, while rival site Ozon has seen a 33% year-over-year rise in such sales across June and Jul...

In fact, Decrypt's GG found that there are many unique ways that people are trying to exploit the tap-to-earn game, including with a sewing machine and some apparent custom-made contraptions. Here's a look at some of the wildest examples.

The Wildest Ways 'Hamster Kombat' Players Are Boosting Their Telegram Tapping

Hamster Kombat is the crypto game that rewards you for tapping the screen over and over—and the more you tap, the more you earn. Well, at least within the Telegram game; we'll see how the token airdrop pans out. Unsurprisingly, as the game becomes a large-scale phenomenon with 250 million purported players, people have started to get creative with the ways they tap their screens. For example, massage gun sales in Russia are apparently surging, reportedly due to craft Hamster Kombat players figur...

Pre-market trading expands: Another cryptocurrency exchange, Bybit, began pre-market trading for Hamster Kombat's HMSTR token last week, offering an additional way for traders to get in on the Telegram gaming phenomenon as its token launch approaches. As of this writing, HMSTR is trading for approximately $0.20 in USDT stablecoin on Bybit’s pre-market platform. 

The developers of Hamster Kombat have yet to announce the conversation rate at which they will award players on-chain tokens in exchange for the in-game coins they earned. That uncertainty makes pre-market trading even more of a gamble. Players are jumping into the game in droves ahead of the planned token launch on The Open Network (TON), which is targeted for sometime still in July.

'Hamster Kombat' Pre-Market Trading Expands as Viral Telegram Game’s Token Launch Nears

Another cryptocurrency exchange began offering pre-market trading for Hamster Kombat's HMSTR token on Monday, offering an additional way for traders to get in on the Telegram gaming phenomenon as its token launch approaches. Bybit is the latest exchange to join the fray, enabling trading of in-game points ahead of the on-chain token launch. As of this writing, HMSTR is trading for approximately $0.12 in USDT stablecoin on Bybit’s pre-market platform. The developers of Hamster Kombat have yet to...

Gaming token unlocks: July is poised to be a big month for crypto gaming token unlocks, which will see over $148 million possibly enter the market. This week, we saw Immutable unlock $38.32 million worth of IMX tokens which were invested into project and ecosystem development. But the rest of the month is looking just as juicy.

On July 19, Ronin farming game Pixels will unlock $10.19 million worth of PIXEL tokens, which will account for 7.05% of its circulating supply. ApeCoin—the Ethereum token tied to the Bored Ape Yacht Club ecosystem including the Otherside metaverse game—is set to release 15.6 million APE ($10.89 million) on July 17, accounting for 2.31% of its circulating supply. And, Parallel will finish the month unlocking $5.54 million in PRIME tokens to those who invested in the studio behind the Ethereum NFT card-battler.

Xai, Immutable, and Pixels Among July's Biggest Ethereum Gaming Token Unlocks

July is poised to be a big month for crypto gaming token unlocks. Throughout the month of July, over $148 million worth of crypto gaming tokens will be unlocked and can enter the market, according to data from TokenUnlocks. And all of the projects in question have launched tokens on Ethereum. Many crypto projects make their total supply of tokens available across days, weeks, months or years. Often, when a project launches its token, it locks up a significant amount of the supply that’s intended...

'Attack on Titan' enters metaverse: Popular Japanese anime and manga series "Attack on Titan" is set to enter the crypto gaming world through a collaboration with The Sandbox, an Ethereum metaverse game. The collaboration, announced last Monday, will create an interactive "Attack on Titan Land" within The Sandbox's virtual world.

The Sandbox, along with companies Minto and Copro Corporation, received authorization from IP owner Kodansha Ltd. to produce NFTs and develop the themed area. The collaboration aims to bring the post-apocalyptic world of the franchise to life in a new interactive format. The themed environment and accompanying experience are set to launch later this year.

 NFT Revolution

Anime Hit ‘Attack on Titan’ Coming to Ethereum Game ‘The Sandbox’

Popular Japanese anime and manga series "Attack on Titan" is set to enter the crypto gaming world through a collaboration with The Sandbox, an Ethereum metaverse game. The collaboration, announced Monday, will create an interactive "Attack on Titan Land" within The Sandbox's virtual world. The Sandbox, along with companies Minto and Copro Corporation, received authorization from IP owner Kodansha Ltd. to produce NFTs and develop the themed area. The collaboration aims to bring the post-apocalypt...

ICYMI

• Telegram game Notcoin launched an accelerator to support the development of TON apps.
• Forgotten Runiverse announced it will migrate to Ethereum network Ronin ahead of its Epic Games Store launch.
• Mobile shooter game For The Win from developer Jungle will launch on Solana.
• Pixelverse, the company behind the hit Telegram game PixelTap, raised another $7.5 million in funding.
• A vape-to-earn device was shown at EthCC. We’re not sure if this counts as gaming…

• Trading card game The Lost Glitches announced the start date for its pre-launch season, which begins August 15.
• Ethereum gaming platform Immutable announced partnerships with Asian firms QAQA and Seamoon Protocol.
• Hamster Kombat released a “hip-chill-hop” stream with two hours of vibey tunes.
• Oasys now exclusively holds the rights to bring of all 139 of Edia's retro game titles to Web3.
• Delabs Games' Rumble Racing Star surpasses 2 million races in five months.

GG spotlight

Here are a few of our original stories from this past week that we think are well worth a weekend read:

Telegram Game ‘Musk Empire’ Lets You Earn Crypto While Upgrading Elon

Ever thought you could out-Elon the prominent head of Tesla, SpaceX, and Twitter? Well, now a Telegram tap-to-earn game gives you the opportunity to command your very own virtual Elon Musk as you earn towards a crypto airdrop all the while. Musk Empire is a new Telegram-based game that is purportedly racking up millions of players, following in the footsteps of hits like Hamster Kombat and Notcoin. In fact, it’s very similar to Hamster Kombat in core design, as you tap your smartphone screen to...

'Catizen' Review: Should You Play the Telegram Game Ahead of the Airdrop?

I’ve played the Telegram swipe-to-earn game Catizen for hours over the past few weeks, but despite this, I still can’t decide if it’s actually fun... or just mildly infuriating.  Catizen is, for the most part, similar to the other tap-to-earn games that are currently racking up millions of players on Telegram, with the key difference here being that you need to swipe instead of tap.  You run what is essentially a cat café, with higher-level cats earning you more passive income. Cats periodically...

Edited by Andrew Hayward