Game On: The Hottest Upcoming Gaming Token Airdrops

Airdrop season is in full swing, with apps, protocols, and other projects seizing upon signs this spring's bear market vibes to finally drop their tokens—and potentially reward millions of crypto users in the process.

What exactly is an airdrop, though? When it comes to crypto tokens, an airdrop is typically a way for a project to reward its early users and contributors by giving them a share of a newly launched token, all while spreading the tokens far and wide for decentralized governance.

When it comes to blockchain networks and tokens primed specifically for gaming, there are some pretty compelling airdrops on the horizon in the months ahead. Here’s a look at what’s coming for gamers—there may still be time to get involved and score some tokens ahead.

Hamster Kombat

Notcoin ended up being quite the big deal, with the Telegram-based clicker game amassing 35 million players ahead of May's airdrop—and then the price surged in early June as The Open Network-based token flourished. Now there's a new game on Telegram that's following a similar model.

Hamster Kombat similarly revolves around tapping or clicking the screen, but there's more to do with your earned coins. That's because you're a hamster CEO running your own crypto exchange in the game, and each upgrade to your marketing, licenses, and other business aspects earns your more "passive income" in the game.

Now the game's developers are gearing up to launch a Hamster Kombat token on The Open Network, which means now's the time to start racking up in-game coins that are likely to translate into crypto tokens in some manner. No timeline has been revealed for the token drop, which was first announced at the end of May.

Immutable zkEVM

Ethereum gaming platform Immutable has launched "The Main Quest," a rewards campaign tied to the growth of its recently-launched Immutable zkEVM layer-2 network.

Immutable says it will serve up at least $50 million worth of IMX token rewards for early users who play certain games like Guild of Guardians and MetalCore—both expected to launch in the near future—as well as users who trade Immutable NFTs and use Immutable zkEVM decentralized exchanges. More details here.

Saga Protocol

Saga is a new blockchain network designed primarily for gaming, so it makes sense that the way users could potentially earn a share of the airdrop was by playing games. Following “play-to-airdrop” campaigns across several games running on testnet, as well as other networks, the SAGA airdrop took place and the token is now live alongside mainnet.

Now that the mainnet is live, Saga is amping up the rewards engine again with a new set of airdrops planned for SAGA token stakers. The network is teaming up with projects across Ethereum, Solana, and Avalanche to offer stakers packs of tokens and NFTs from various games and apps. The first such airdrop will hand out $10 million worth of SAGA to stakers.

Illuvium

Illuvium is one of the most anticipated crypto gaming franchises, spanning multiple interoperable games—and the team behind them aims to boost adoption amid its open beta launch by tying in an airdrop campaign.

The team opened up Illuvium via a testnet open beta in late May, offering airdrop reward points for players. At some point thereafter, the open beta will launch on mainnet and continue to award airdrop points to players. The team previously said in a press release that the airdrop will be collectively valued at $25 million or more.

Nifty Island

Launched in open beta in January, Nifty Island is a sandbox-style game that mashes up the feel of Animal Crossing, Roblox, and Fortnite's Creative mode, letting you customize your own island and play with other users. And it offers a play-to-airdrop campaign with many different ways to potentially earn ISLAND tokens.

According to a tweet thread, Nifty Island will award users points based on factors like how much they play, how many players they refer into the game, and which other NFT assets they own in connected wallets. It's unclear when the token drop will happen, but people are flooding in to get a potential share of the ISLAND launch ahead.

Crypto Unicorns

One of the crypto world's stalwart gaming brands, Crypto Unicorns, is currently migrating from one Ethereum scaling network to another—from Polygon to Xai, the Arbitrum-powered layer-3 network. And as part of the process, developer Laguna Games plans to serve up a play-to-airdrop campaign with token rewards once the game is live again in late June.

MetalCore

MetalCore, a mech shooter building on Immutable zkEVM, is offering closed beta players "marks" (or points) that will translate into an airdrop allocation of the upcoming MCG token when it's generated. Studio369 previously told Decrypt's GG that it was aiming to launch an open beta and the token sometime in May, though the team clearly is still building up to that milestone as of this early June update.

On top of all this, MetalCore also announced a collaboration with the Mon Protocol that's operating the MON token tied to fellow Immutable zkEVM game, Pixelmon. MetalCore will add special quests that let players earn MON tokens, though it's still unclear when given that the games still aren't open to the public.

Delabs Games

Delabs Games, the publisher behind the Mario Kart-esque Rumble Racing Star and other upcoming games, has launched its Ladybug's Journey Campaign, serving up reward points that will translate to an airdrop of GAME tokens. Points are given for playing games and completing missions tied to social media engagement and other acts.

As of mid-May, Delabs has launched its "Race for Riches" phase that lasts until July 16, with $100,000 USDC plus GAME tokens offered to Rumble Racing Star players.

Pirate Nation

Pirate Nation, a fully on-chain strategy game built on an Arbitrum-based network, has launched a BOOTY reward points system tied to gameplay and social interactions, with accumulated points potentially used to "determine rewards further out to sea." Sounds like an airdrop to us. More details here.

BloodLoop

BloodLoop, an Overwatch-esque 5v5 hero shooter running on Avalanche, revealed its play-to-airdrop campaign on March 4. Now, it appears that the BLS token will launch on June 10, and then the play-to-airdrop campaign will officially follow later in June, letting people play the game with "millions" of BLS tokens up for grabs.

"Millions of BLS have been set aside as rewards to be dynamically distributed among players based on their performance," an official tweet reads. "What matters isn't how much time you spend farming, but rather how much progress you make in the game during the available time."

AI Arena

AI Arena, a game that pairs Super Smash Bros-style brawling with artificial intelligence smarts, completed a play-to-airdrop campaign in March with 40 million NRN tokens up for grabs. Another 40 million tokens will be allocated for the game's NRN prize boxes. The game challenges players to train AI combatants that fight automatically on their behalf.

Following the conclusion of the latest play-to-airdrop competition wave, AI Arena's developers are sorting through the data before the token drops. No timeline has been announced yet.

Edited by Ryan Ozawa.

Editor's note: This story was originally published on December 27, 2023 and was last updated with new info on June 3.