Crypto Gaming Roundup: Hamster Kombat Airdrop, $47M Scam, and More
The crypto gaming space has never been busier, with new game releases, token airdrops, and a constant flow of updates. Keeping up with it all can be overwhelming, but Decrypt’s GG brings you the highlights of the week in This Week in Crypto Games. Here’s a look at some of the most significant news.
Hamster Kombat Airdrop and Token Drama
The viral Telegram mini-app, Hamster Kombat, launched its HMSTR token on The Open Network (TON) last Thursday. The tap-to-earn game, which attracted over 300 million users, airdropped tokens to 131 million eligible players—though 2.3 million accounts were disqualified due to cheating.
Not everyone was thrilled with the airdrop. Many players referred to their HMSTR reward as "dust," as the token price dropped to $0.006, far below the pre-market trading prediction of $0.095. Still, the token remained highly traded, with over $1.2 billion worth of HMSTR tokens exchanged in the first 24 hours. Despite concerns, TON held up under the high trading volume.
Looking ahead, Hamster Kombat has an ambitious roadmap for the year, including plans to release NFTs, develop new games, and expand beyond Telegram. Their first move will be to launch a Progressive Web App (PWA) for iOS, Android, and desktop, before integrating directly into desktop games.
$47M Gaming Scam Busted
In another major story, Binance assisted Indian law enforcement in the arrest of four individuals suspected of defrauding victims of $47.6 million through the Fiewin online betting app. Fiewin lured users with promises of easy money but eventually froze accounts after users accumulated significant funds.
The scam involved transferring stolen funds through various cryptocurrency wallets to make the transactions harder to trace. However, Binance's Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) was able to provide the technical expertise needed to track the movement of the funds and assist with the arrests.
