This Week in Crypto Games: ‘Hamster Kombat’ Returns and ‘Fantasy Top’ 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

Hamster Kombat returns: Late last year, the anonymous development team behind smash hit Telegram game Hamster Kombat said that it would launch a "HamsterVerse" of connected games, after delaying its previously teased next season on multiple occasions.

'Hamster Kombat' Token Hits All-Time Low as Telegram Game Finally Returns

Months after its planned second season debut, smash hit Telegram game Hamster Kombat is finally back in action with a relaunched gameplay experience—but its token only fell further Tuesday, reaching a new all-time low price. HMSTR, which runs on The Open Network (TON), dropped as low as $0.001461 on Tuesday, per data from CoinGecko, marking its lowest price to date. Up slightly to a current price of $0.0015`, HMSTR is down nearly 7% on the day. The coin has plummeted 79% from its all-time high p...

On Tuesday, HamsterVerse arrived, led by Hamster Kombat: GameDev Hero—the experience that was set to be Hamster Kombat: Season 2. It maintains some of the tap-to-earn elements as before, but now you're building a team of developers and cranking out games, all of which helps boost your earnings.

Also found in the HamsterVerse mini app launch on Telegram is Hamster Fight Club, a simple combat experience. Other games, Hamster Boost and Hamster King, are listed as being in closed beta testing. All of the games are planned to offer HMSTR token rewards.

‘Hamster Kombat’ Returns—Should You Tap Back in for the ‘HamsterVerse’?

After amassing some 300 million players last year in a tap-to-earn bubble that made unexpected waves across the mainstream, Telegram game Hamster Kombat dropped its HMSTR token on The Open Network (TON) last September—to mostly negative reviews from recipients. And then it just sort of… disappeared. What was planned to be a couple-weeks-long “interlude” gameplay season stretched on for months, and stopped being updated after a while. The anonymous devs teased a second full season of gameplay, th...

Fantasy Top expands: Ethereum NFT game Fantasy Top is expanding from layer-2 network Blast after its launch last year created significant social media buzz. On Wednesday, the developers announced that a free-to-play version of the game will debut on the just-launched testnet of new layer-1 blockchain, Monad.

 NFT Revolution

Ethereum NFT Game 'Fantasy Top' Expands to Monad Alongside Testnet Launch

Ethereum NFT game Fantasy Top is expanding from layer-2 network Blast after its buzzy launch last year. On Wednesday, the developers announced that a free-to-play version of the game will debut on the just-launched testnet of new layer-1 blockchain, Monad.  The game, which mirrors traditional fantasy sports, replaces football and basketball stars with the top crypto social media personalities on X (formerly known as Twitter) that it calls “heroes.” For example, like athletes earn for performance...

The game is similar to traditional fantasy sport titles, replacing athletes with the top crypto social media personalities on X (formerly Twitter) that it calls “heroes.” These heroes earn points for their social engagement metrics. 

As part of the initiative, users can claim a free pack of 15 Fantasy Top hero cards and begin playing in contests that will reward users with prizes like XP, tickets, and fMON—the testnet token used for buying hero cards on the Fantasy Top marketplace. 

Card game drains wallets: Cardex, a trading card game on Ethereum layer-2 network Abstract, mishandled its private keys, according to Abstract network core contributors, leading to nearly $500K worth of Ethereum being drained from wallets that interacted with it.

With the game’s private key, an attacker was able to drain wallets that had an active “session” with the game. It appears that when playing Cardex, users were prompted to sign a transaction, referred to as a session, that would give the app full control over the wallet’s funds for a period of time—allegedly a month in this case, according to one developer who spoke with Decrypt.

Over the course of seven hours, the attacker successfully drained over 180 ETH, worth approximately $484,000, according to a Dune dashboard tracking the attacker’s wallet.

'Cardex' Game Exploit Drains Wallets on Ethereum Layer-2 Abstract

Cardex, a blockchain trading card game on Ethereum layer-2 network Abstract, mishandled its private keys, according to Abstract network core contributors, leading to over $470,000 worth of Ethereum being drained from wallets that interacted with it. Cardex offered tokenized digital versions of “high-end trading cards,” like a 1st Edition Shining Charizard Pokémon card, which could then be used to compete in online tournaments. Each card has a score that is calculated by its “performance” rating...

ICYMI

• Blockchain gaming franchise Illuvium announced a restructuring, which included some staff being laid off—Illuvium Breach gameplay was also revealed.
• Telegram game Zoo started its airdrop claim on Tuesday, ahead of its token launch on The Open Network (TON).
• Crypto esports platform Community Gaming launched its CGX token on Wednesday along with its Forkast prediction market on Ronin.

Community Gaming Launches CGX Airdrop, Prediction Market on Ethereum’s Ronin Network

Community Gaming, a blockchain-powered esports platform, launched its CGX token on Wednesday on Ethereum sidechain network Ronin, alongside its Forkast prediction markets platform that’s focused on video games and internet culture. Forkast, which is built around the CGX token, allows users to create and participate in prediction markets centered around gaming, streamers, esports events, and Web3 assets. The platform is integrated with Ronin's Waypoint wallet to provide users with gasless transac...

• Telegram game Farm Frens had a bunch of issues with last week's airdrop, the developers admitted, with a migration planned to messaging app Line.
• Indian game publisher SuperGaming, which has attracted over 200 million players to its mobile games to date, will launch a gamechain on the B3 layer-3 network on Ethereum's Base.
• Ethereum metaverse game Nifty Island now lets creators add AI agents as in-game characters via a drag-and-drop process.

 NFT Revolution

Ethereum Game 'Nifty Island' Now Lets Creators Drop AI Agents Into 3D Worlds

Ethereum-based metaverse game Nifty Island has added support for interactive AI agents, letting creators drag and drop them into their in-game islands to turn them into interactive characters. Players can choose to easily integrate a selection of popular AI agents like Luna, AgentYP, or VaderAI, or they can create and deploy their own custom agent. Once placed on an island, players can then engage with the agents who can talk back, dance, and take actions on-chain.  “Just as we've done with NFTs...

• Idle RPG revealed its Abstract token HERO will be earned via in-game progression, and more.
• Telegram game Trump Empire announced presale for its upcoming token will start on February 26.
• Ethereum metaverse game Decentraland celebrated its fifth birthday.
• Tomarket has migrated from Aptos to TON, following Telegram’s exclusivity with TON.
• Telegram game W-Coin released NFTs that allow premarket trading of its soon-to-launch token.

• Crypto sci-fi franchise Cross The Ages’ latest game Arise is now available to wishlist on the Epic Games Store.
• Ronin-based strategy game Fableborne Kingdoms’ NFT presale raised over $21 million.
• AI agent project Virtuals Protocol introduced AiVeronica, an AI that is claimed improve AI capabilities in games.
• Visual artist Karol Dembowski made a cool physical art piece of one of Parallel’s cards.
• Ethereum layer-2 network Ronin has reported a “significant uptick” in interest in building on the network, after it opened its doors to anyone.

• Wild Forest, a free-to-play strategy game, announced its new battle pass, featuring skins relating to the Kaidro crypto franchise.
• Trading card game Gods Unchained released its Fallen Age expansion.
• Rockstar Games is reportedly in talks with top metaverse creators in an attempt to make GTA 6 the next big creator platform.

GG spotlight

Here are a couple of our recent original stories that we think are well worth a weekend read:

Here Are Today's ‘Hamster Kombat: GameDev Heroes’ Daily Combo and Cipher Code

Telegram-based game Hamster Kombat became a massive hit last year, reaching some 300 million players ahead of its The Open Network (TON) token launch in September. Now, after a monthslong respite, the game has relaunched as HamsterVerse, a hub featuring multiple games—including what was originally teased as the game's Season 2 update, now called Hamster Kombat: GameDev Heroes. And it has some of the familiar elements from the original tap-to-earn sensation. One of the fastest ways to earn in-gam...

GTA 6 Preview: Everything You Need to Know About the New Grand Theft Auto

It’s been over a decade since Grand Theft Auto 5 was released—but what will the sequel bring? The massively popular open-world action franchise has sold over 430 million copies as of August 2024, putting it in the pantheon of the all-time best-selling game series. And that success has ignited widespread excitement over the next entry. Now Grand Theft Auto 6 has been officially revealed, and there’s plenty we already know from the first trailer and announcement, along with subsequent reveals. Her...

Edited by Andrew Hayward