Are hamsters fighting now? Not exactly—but while Hamster Kombat’s title might be a little misleading, this Telegram-based tapping game quickly became a dominant leader in the play-to-earn space by expanding upon Notcoin’s winning model.

Hamster Kombat racked up over 300 million total players before launching its HMSTR token and airdrop for players via The Open Network (TON) in late September 2024. It became one of the year's biggest gaming token launches, based on the peak value.

But Hamster Kombat isn't stopping there. A second full season of gameplay and rewards is on the horizon, along with plans to expand beyond the Telegram ecosystem. Here's everything you need to know.

What is Hamster Kombat?

Similar to Notcoin, Hamster Kombat had players tapping away to earn coins in a Telegram-native application (or “mini app”)—which means to play the game, you just open a chat on Telegram.

Hamster Kombat’s core concept is similar to Notcoin, with some slightly richer game mechanics layered on top of it. In short: It’s a tap-to-earn game mixed with a crypto exchange simulator.

In Hamster Kombat, you’re the CEO of an up-and-coming crypto exchange, and it’s your job to grow the exchange to new heights never before seen… in the world of hamsters. In order to do so, you must tap an image of a cartoon hamster to earn coins, and then use those coins to buy upgrades for your exchange.

How to play Hamster Kombat

Originally, Hamster Kombat started off in a manner familiar to Notcoin users, with players tapping away at the screen in the Telegram app to earn in-game coins.

Once players have earned some coins, they can start using them to upgrade their exchange in the “Mine” tab of the game. This tab shows all kinds of upgrades that players can purchase (purely with in-game coins) for their exchange, and include things like adding coins or new features to their fictional exchange, or faux marketing efforts.

Every upgrade you purchased for your exchange earned you more coins passively. For example, adding a Bitcoin pair to your exchange cost 250 coins, but then earned you 40 coins per hour. In other words, those additions quickly paid off and helped propel your exchange further along.

Hamster Kombat concluded its first season of gameplay in September before the token launch. Currently, as of this writing, the game is holding a short "Interlude" season in which players can earn in-game diamonds ahead of the full second season ahead. The diamonds will reportedly give players some sort of advantage in the next season.

What is HMSTR?

What’s the point to earning in-game coins? Similarly to Notcoin, Hamster Kombat also incentivized players with a token airdrop, drawing hundreds of millions of players in the process.

Hamster Kombat's airdrop took place on September 26 on The Open Network (TON), the same date that the HMSTR token was generated and launched on major exchanges. The HMSTR token was originally targeted for July, but ultimately missed that ETA. The team attributed the delay to the challenge of dropping a token to such a huge player base.

HMSTR reached a peak market cap of about $646 million on the launch date, though the value of the token has fallen sharply since then. Given the immense size of the player base, many users complained about small allocations worth $10 or less, which some players called "dust." Fellow Telegram game Catizen, which launched its token the week before, saw similar complaints.

What's next?

Hamster Kombat has shared a lengthy roadmap that extends into 2025 and includes more rewards, more gameplay, and plans to spread outside of Telegram.

Following the current "interlude season" that's only expected to last a couple weeks, Hamster Kombat plans to launch a new full Season 2 of gameplay, with plans to pay that off with another airdrop next summer. Season 2 will shift the focus of the game to that of running a video game development company and platform, rather than operating a crypto exchange.

The developers shared a teaser trailer for the new season in October and told Decrypt that it was planned to launch by the end of October, but that estimate has since come and gone without an update.

The number of monthly active users in Hamster Kombat has plunged amid the wait, dropping from over 100 million in late September to about 41 million as of November 4. The HMSTR token has similarly plummeted in price, hitting an all-time low price of $0.0022 on November 3—a 77% dip from the peak, per data from CoinMarketCap.

Hamster Kombat will also continue to integrate other third-party games, evolving into a platform for various titles. Furthermore, Hamster Kombat plans to launch a progressive web app (PWA) for the game that will be playable via iOS, Android, and desktop computers without running the Telegram mini app.

Beyond that, the developers plan to integrate with desktop games, bring NFTs into Hamster Kombat, and buy and burn (or effectively destroy) HMSTR tokens over time in an effort to boost the price by cutting the token supply.

“Telegram will always be a crucial part of Hamster Kombat and its ecosystem of products. Still, we are looking to expand in order to capture the audience that isn't on Telegram yet,” the team told Decrypt in September. “Ultimately, we see it as a positive development both for Hamster Kombat and Telegram itself as a platform for mini apps, since it will bring additional exposure.”

Edited by Andrew Hayward

Editor's note: This story was originally published on June 2, 2024 and last updated with new details on November 4.