A growing domain of developers are eyeing Telegram as the new opportunity to scale their games.

South Korean studio Delabs is the latest to launch a mini-game within the platform — its baseball-themed Giga Chad Bat; “Hit ball, get BALL”.

While the team’s flagship title Rumble Racing Star has quickly grown to become the top game on Arbitrum since migrating from Polygon earlier in 2024, Giga Chad Bat marks a new strategic direction.

“Launching Giga Chad Bat on Telegram is a big swing for Delabs, expanding our reach and creating a more accessible gaming experience, especially for players that may be novices to web3 gaming,” commented Delabs Games CEO Joonmo Kwon. 

Another move comes from centralised crypto exchange OKX. Its Telegram-game OKX Racer gets players to guess the price of Bitcoin within a set timeframe. The team especially highlights the platform’s seamless game integration and opportunity to reach a wider crypto community.

OKX chief innovation officer Jason Lau said: “Telegram’s mini-app platform is quickly becoming a can’t-miss venue for those who are looking to engage the crypto community. At OKX, we want to embrace easy-to-use, interoperable and accessible platforms that cultivate communities, incentivize participation and encourage fun.”

In terms of Telegram itself, the company is undergoing significant updates to enhance its gaming integrations. Founder and CEO Pavel Durov recently unveiled on his Telegram channel that the company plans to launch a mini-app store for Telegram/TON games, as well as an in-app browser with web3 support.

Around 400 million of Telegram’s 900 million users are claimed to use the platform’s mini-apps. According to Durov, and other prominent names in the industry, this makes the platform a great opportunity to introduce web3 to “hundreds of millions of people”. 

One particular focus of tap games on Telegram is their generous reward systems, allowing players to earn points or tokens just through clicking.

Tap game Hamster Kombat has quickly risen to fame, as has Catizen and most recently Pixelverse’s PixelTap. While only a handful of games have launched a token, Pixelverse’s PIXFI token went live on Friday 19th July, and surged 304% within the first 48 hours. It has since dropped but remains up over 100% from launch.

In related news, Animoca Brands has announced a strategic partnership between the MOCA Foundation and the TON Foundation as part of a $20 million strategic growth deal.

South Korean web3 game developer Delabs Games has unveiled new strategic partnerships with web3 gaming companies including Ambrus Studio, Cow Cup and Proof of Play.

In a mutual quest, Delabs and E4C: Final Salvation-developer Ambrus Studio have announced a deal to “share resources” between their games. As well as offering strategic support, Ambrus Studio founder and gaming veteran Johnson Yeh will also onboard Delabs as an advisor. Yeh brings his experience in esports, having formerly been Riot Games’ managing director for Greater China, Japan, and Southeast Asia, contributing to the success of League of Legends and Valorant. 

Another partnership is with little known developer Cow Cup and its mobile-based battle royale MOBA Counter Fire. This collaboration entails cross-community airdrop campaigns such as Delabs Games’ Ladybug’s Journey and Counter Fire‘s Hill’s Treasure Hunt.

Additionally, Delabs’ platinum tickets and golden tickets will be airdropped to the Counter Fire community, while Counter Fire’s Founder’s Tag will be integrated into Delabs’ upcoming airdrop event part 3. Delabs community members joining Counter Fire’s pre-season testing will also be whitelist to the project’s Genesis Heroes mint.

The news follows Delabs’ recent announcement it’s moving all of its portfolio games to Arbitrum, having previously deployed its inaugural lawnmower racer Rumble Racing Star on Polygon. Initially only available for PC, the game’s now also expanded to mobile. The studio’s second game, Metabolts, is a dystopian character collection RPG, while the third title, space-themed survival game Space Frontier is still in development.

Following its move to Arbitrum, Delabs has also joined forces with Arbitrum-based RPG Pirate Nation from Proof of Play, airdropping Platinum tickets to holders of Gen 0 Pirate NFT holders, which give a 30% boost to leaderboard points in Rumble Racing Star.

In a quest to expand its player base and boost ecosystem engagement, the latest developer to launch its airdrop campaign is Delabs Games.

Helmed by former CEO of South Korean gaming company Nexon, Joonmo Kwon, and backed by game developer 4:33, Delabs recently rolled out phase one of its ongoing airdrop event, which allows players to accumulate points in lawnmower racer game Rumble Racing Star.

By joining daily and weekly missions, players can earn points and collect star badges, which all count towards RRS points. These will then be converted to Leaf Points at a 1:3 ratio.

Additional points can be earned from daily check-ins for users who hold Adventure Pass NFTs or Metabolts NFTs, while players can also receive rewards for Delabs’ GAME token, which is scheduled for release in June 2024. 

Delabs’ flagship title Rumble Racing Star is a racing game featuring interoperable PFPs from various prominent web3 projects. Initially available for PC, the game’s now also available on mobile via Google Play. The developer’s second game, Metabolts, is a dystopian character collection RPG containing 4,444 PFPs, currently in early alpha. In addition, the company is working on space-themed survival game Space Frontier.

You can read more about the campaign here.