The founders revealed their third inspiration, and it’s a lesser known one: TikTok.
“First there was Musical.ly, which almost died,” the founders say of TikTok’s prototype. Then ByteDance (which acquired Musical.ly) found ways to encourage sharing. “People underestimate the power of these little things,” the founders say. “Sometimes they can be game-changers.”
Small mechanisms are everywhere Hamster CombatYou earn coins by inviting your friends to play the game, watching YouTube videos, subscribing to our Telegram channel, etc. “We knew the only way we could grow was to make everything in the game viral,” the founders claim. “We couldn’t afford to spend $50 million on marketing.”
Viral infection It happens by chance. The founders obsessively follow real-world events every day and incorporate them into the gameplay. “It was a dire situation when Dubai was hosting a crypto conference and it was suddenly flooded, but we found it ironic,” the creators say. “We made a card about this[in the game]and people started getting the card, taking screenshots, and posting it on social media.”
The game is self-aware and packed with crypto Easter eggs. Hamster Combat “Check out these inside jokes that reflect the community’s input,” says Amanda Cassatt, CEO of marketing firm Serotonin. “This game is fun and entertaining.”
When you first open Hamster Combatit looks so simple that it doesn’t even seem like a game. Tap, get coins. Tap, get coins. “I don’t think of it as a game, it’s a kind of entertainment,” says Matviy Dyadkov, founder of Bitmedia, a crypto ad network that creates and analyzes crypto games. “It’s even more primitive than hyper-casual games.”
But then something strange happens. As you explore the app, you’re faced with a dizzying menu of options to grow your Hamster cryptocurrency exchange: investing in a UX and UI team, building an NFT metaverse (remember that?), getting a legal license to operate in Nigeria, and more. These options cut deep into the world of Web3 geeks and often require a bit of research for outsiders. Each option has a cost (free coins you earn), but investing in it can increase Hamster’s profit per hour. This can get addictive.
“I realized that having a strategy can save me time and make me more efficient,” says Liliya Chumarina, a 24-year-old freelance marketer from Milan. At first, it was just a click, then an instructional video for the game, which has garnered a lot of views on social media, became a hit. Hamster CombatAfter creating the game, she created a spreadsheet to help her optimize revenue. Thanks to this automation, “it now takes me less than an hour a day,” Chumalina says. (Cassatt considers the game not as simple as tic-tac-toe, but not as complicated as chess: “It’s checkers.”)
The founders seem to resent the game being labeled “hyper casual.” “Some people call it a tap-to-play game, but that’s inaccurate and simplifies the game,” the developers say. “The tapping is the only part that requires you to tap. Soon you’ll have access to a passive income stream that will quickly surpass all others.”
