How Hamster Kombat controls players' minds
How Telegram mini-app managed to reach 250m players in just 3 months
Quarter billion players in just 3 months since the game has been launched. 4-5 million new users per day. The most polarized opinions: from praise to harsh insults towards the developers and those who play.
Hamster Kombat has become a growth hacking phenomenon, and I decided to understand the game in a little more detail than the average person and break down the mechanics that allow the game to achieve such growth.
Why is the game's audience growing so quickly? How are players retained in the game and which their weaknesses are being exploited? What reinforces the belief in a future in which you can get real money out of thin air? And how do the mechanics used in Hamster apply to business?
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Hamster Kombat has become a growth hacking phenomenon, and I decided to understand the game in a little more detail than the average person and break down the mechanics that allow the game to achieve such growth.
Why is the game's audience growing so quickly? How are players retained in the game and which their weaknesses are being exploited? What reinforces the belief in a future in which you can get real money out of thin air? And how do the mechanics used in Hamster apply to business?
Subscribe to my new articles on Telegram and share this one with colleagues.
What is the game about?
To begin with, I will briefly describe what the essence of the game is for those who are not in the know: players earn in-game currency in various ways, which with a certain chance can be converted into real money, since the game developer plans to list their currency on TON.
Contrary to popular belief, there are many more ways to earn money in the game than just monotonously tapping on the screen: players can make investments to further receive passive income, complete various tasks and invite friends.
Each of these ways of earning is equipped with a large number of mechanics aimed at maintaining long-term interest, retaining players and growing the user base. We will describe each of these mechanics in the article.
Tap and earn
You can start earning money by simply tapping on the screen. You have energy that restores over time. By tapping, you spend this energy and get coins.
This way of earning money does not require outstanding intellectual abilities. But, remembering Playrix, the simpler (can be replaced with a tougher word) the game is, the more there will be those who understand how to play - and begin to do it.
Doesn't this remind you of anything?
This mechanic is a reference to the recent NotCoin, which Pavel Durov mentioned and which you probably saw on the smartphone screens of people in the subway.
Firstly, this creates the familiarity effect: users are already accustomed to the pattern from the previous game and easily understand how to play the new one. This makes it easier to activate them.
Secondly, NotCoin is now a kind of “proof” that money can be made out of thin air: many, by tapping on the screen, converted it into TON and further into fiat currency. Of course, it would be a sin for the game developers that follow NotCoin not to exploit this “proof”.
Why is “proof” in quotation marks? Because [I'm just guessing] it could be good bait for fish you want to catch in the future if you're playing a multi-step game that's not limited to just NotCoin and you need to build up some initial trust.
Endorphins
It's worth noting that games like Hamster Kombat can be a form of escapism - an escape from the real world.
By pressing the screen, hamsters immediately notice how many coins they has just earned, and a pleasant haptic feedback enhances the effect: “this is not something ephemeral, but future earnings.” It leads to the release of endorphins: it’s nice that you did something simple and got a carrot.
And it may sound sad, but I will not be surprised that in some cases such pleasant “earnings” can be the only positive moment for a person for the whole day.
Process optimization
But just by tapping on the screen, even the most stupid hamster can at some point get tired, go crazy, or even worse – stop playing. At this point, in the early stages of the game, he is introduced to the optimization opportunity.
The topic of process optimization covers a huge number of areas: from IT giants to the worker under your window who has mastered a life hack and now lays tiles 1.5x faster.
Tapping on the screen can be optimized in three ways. The first is Multitap. Simply put, for one tap you get not one coin, but two. The second is to increase the amount of energy that can be spent on making coins for yourself.
Both of these mechanics put pressure on the basic convolutions of exhausted hamster: “now I’ll simplify a routine job and make my life easier.” But the problem is that this feature is broken down into many levels, and the cost of purchasing a new level increases exponentially.
At the same time, a hamster often does not understand over what period they will have to recoup such investments in simplifying their task. But money from tapping starts to run out.
And at this moment the third improvement comes: having spent all the energy, you can recharge it by collecting more coins for yourself - and you can do it up to 6 times a day: “the developers take care of their hamsters.”
But there is a nuance: 1 hour should pass between the recharges. This means that a motivated hamster will log into Hamster Kombat bot for this reason alone up to 6 times a day. This also means that he will open Telegram even if he had no other reason to do so.
This means that hamsters will complete their task: they will be counted in Telegram’s DAU (Daily Active Users), the KPI which will be discussed not by hamsters, but investors, guys from IB and so on.
However, the smarter part of the audience eventually notices that simply tapping is not quite rewarding, because there is a much more profitable alternative...
Mining
What could be better than passive income? Invest and let the business work for you. And you – sip a cocktail on a sun lounger looking at the ocean. The opportunity of lazily getting a stable income is exploited mercilessly in the game.
The main idea is that you are the new CEO of a crypto exchange and are responsible for the development of its business. You can:
- Expand the list of instruments traded on the exchange
- Upgrade your team and invest in marketing
- Enter new geographic markets
- Participate in special events
Diversity effect
There are about a hundred such investment alternatives, and each has its own profitability. By studying and comparing these, you become more involved in the game. And the game highlights that there are many strategies that will lead you to the coveted profit. This sparks interest and makes you start thinking.
Everything will fall apart without a CEO
But if you thought that you could just buy cards and receive income indefinitely, you are mistaken: after you leave the bot, the coins will only accumulate for 3 hours.
What does this mean? If you want to show progress in the game and accumulate funds, please log into Hamster Kombat 8 times a day.
This mechanic exploits FOMO (it’s a shame when your business is idle) and is designed to increase usage – both of the bot and the platform on which it is created.
Diminishing returns
Each of the cards (investment opportunities) has levels that can be upgraded, receiving more and more passive income.
But here’s the trick: with each new level you need to invest 1.5-2 times more, and the increase in passive income will not be nearly as significant. And in order to increase the speed of earnings, you need to accumulate more and more coins.
First, it highlights the importance of choosing higher-yielding cards and ignites the desire in the part of the audience who know how to count: develop an optimal purchasing strategy. By creating such interest, the developer can keep them in the game longer.
Secondly, with this mechanic the developer exploits such a cognitive bias as sunk cost fallacy: even if you are already bored, it’s a pity to just stop because you’ve already spent a lot of time and effort. We need to move on 😖
In business, level mechanics are also found in various forms. For example, in Lenta (retailer), discounts on 5 favorite product categories are activated progressively depending on the amount of purchases, and from level to level the amount for which you need to purchase additional products is steadily growing.
New cards
But sunk cost fallacy alone will not get you far: after all, even stubborn and diligent players will eventually give up on the Hamster. Therefore, we encounter a new mechanic: the developer regularly adds new, very profitable cards.
Firstly, again we see direct exploitation of FOMO: if you are too lazy to log into the bot, you will not receive enough money and will fall behind the others.
Secondly, new cards have a cooldown period: you won’t be able to boost these immediately to a high level – you need to enter the bot after a period of time, which increases from level to level.
Missed cards
In addition to new cards, we are also introduced to profitable opportunities that were missed. Thus, the developer puts pressure on FOMO and makes it clear that next time you need to make purchases on time.
Similar mechanics that put pressure on our subconscious fear of missing out on profits can often be found in business. For example, at the end of each month Yandex Go (transportation service) sends me notifications about how many Plus (Yandex Go subscription) points I would earn if I activated it.
Rating mechanics
Leaving a player in a vacuum, isolated from society, is not a good idea: this way they can easily lose interest and stop playing. Therefore, Hamster Kombat has implemented a special rating system based on coin earning rate.
The introduction of a rating allows you to ensure that the hamster does not stop and chill, by creating inner sense of urgency: “the world moves forward, the choice is yours: keep moving or stay behind.”
Social mechanics are often used in business. For example, T-Bank, collecting reviews about places and services, gives awards, highlights the percentage of clients which have received these, and separately highlights if the achievement is rare.
The user's progress in the game is divided into several levels, and a rating is calculated for each one. This allows you to make the possibility of reaching the first place more realistic compared to a single global ranking.
Referral program
Perhaps the referral program is the main driver of user audience growth. The game uses as many as 6 mechanics designed to encourage the hamster to bring friends. Let's start with simple ones and move forward to those which are more sophisticated:
Bonus for the inviter
The one who invites receives a reward for each referred user. This is the basic mechanic: the more players you refer, the more bonuses you receive.
Bonus for the invitee
If you join by invitation, you also receive a bonus, which you can immediately spend on leveling up: this allows the developer to quickly activate new players and involve them in the game.
In business, both of these mechanics are used frequently: they often motivate both the inviter and the invitee. For example, in FlowWow the first one receives bonuses, the second one gets a discount on the first order.
Bonus for progress
The player is motivated to invite those who will actually play, and will not close the bot after helping their dear friend. When the invitee reaches a new level, the inviter receives a one-time bonus.
The mechanics could be improved by introducing network marketing mechanics and replacing the one-time bonus with a portion of the profit received by the invited player. This way, the inviter’s interest will be more long-term, and he will be motivated to onboard the newcomer in the game.
Bonuses for premium subscription
The developer gives significantly more bonuses for inviting a player with Telegram Premium. Who might be interested in such differentiation?🤔
Is this a new project of Pavel Durov? Does the developer want to curry favor and reach out to the owner of the platform? Does Telegram have its own monetization program for developers, tied to the number of premium subscribers? This remains a mystery to us.
This mechanic could be improved by giving large bonuses not for inviting a premium subscriber, but for the fact that the inviter themselves is a premium subscriber. This would definitely encourage some players to purchase the subscription, thereby bringing money to the platform.
The downside of all the points described above is that from a certain level, invitation bonuses become insignificant compared to how much you get from mining without doing anything. But how to overcome the laziness of a hamster that has already relaxed and dangled its paws? This is where things get interesting...
Bring N hamsters
Perhaps this is the key reason for the rapid growth of the Hamster Kombat audience: to open a significant part of the cards (the most profitable ones), you need to invite up to 9 friends. Otherwise, you can forget about the active growth in profits and total accumulated funds.
Bring +1 hamster
An even more cruel mechanic is that, regardless of the number of invitees, from time to time cards that appear require inviting 1 more friend to get collected. Even if you have already brought 100,500 players, please work hard again.
So, in addition to the basic mechanism of a fixed growth of the audience volume (up to 9 invitees per player), we get mechanics that will continue to exploit players at later stages of the their journey.
And, of course, the developer will put pressure on the sunk cost fallacy and FOMO with this mechanic: after all, it will be a shame not to find just 1 more friend and miss the opportunity to buy the most profitable cards.
Completing tasks
In addition to tapping, mining and inviting friends, hamsters can also perform various tasks to earn coveted coins. The completion of tasks is implemented in a multifaceted way, using the diversity effect. They can be divided into one-time and regular.
One-time tasks
The main purpose of one-time tasks is to activate new players. At this moment, they do not yet have large amounts of coins, and an extra 5-25-100 thousand coins will be a good addition to what they earn. This means that they will be able to more easily move from the basic tapping stage to mining.
One-time tasks come down to subscribing to Hamster’s channels, and this greatly boosts the audience of subscribers on social networks. In particular, such mechanics allowed Hamster to become the largest channel on Telegram according to TGStat. And the audience can can bring good income.
Regular tasks are divided into watching YouTube videos, daily rewards, combos and ciphers. Let's explore each one.
Watching the videos
Hamster's YouTube videos are mostly educational in nature and talk about the world of cryptocurrency. This allows even those with zero knowledge in this area to take the first step. And often it is this first step from a complete lack of awareness that is the barrier.
Of course, hamsters are rewarded with coins for a reason: YouTube algorithms see that these educational videos are watched by a large number of people. As a result, they are more likely to be included in recommendations, and their reach becomes even wider.
But why are hamsters watching the videos to the end? Because the developer has introduced a “check” mechanic. In quotes because technically you can’t track it. You can only track that the user has followed a link, start a timer and give out coins when it expires. But I feel that with an audience of such size it pays off.
By the way, the mechanics of “checking” the video watches is another source of growth in the usage of the bot and Telegram in general: after you have watched the video, you need to get back to the game 1 hour later. And when you get back to receive coins, you can also buy cards, check your place in the ranking, etc.
Daily reward
Basically, it's free cheese without a mousetrap. By logging in every day, you can collect a reward for investing in the growth of Telegram's DAU. Moreover, within every 10 days, the reward gradually increases: on the first day it is 500 coins, and on the tenth day – as much as 5 million. And so on – every 10 days.
But, as with all other mechanics, there is a nuance: in order to collect everything up to 5 million, you must log in every day. If you forgot to pick up your reward on the 9th day, sorry, but the counter starts again – from the first day, and you get 500 coins instead of 5,000,000.
Thus, the mechanics do not promote sporadic bursts of activity, but a regular use of the bot and the platform.
Ciphers and card combos
Every day the player is invited to enter a cipher and guess the secret combination of cards by purchasing them. I combined these mechanics because it is either difficult to solve both without clues (pick up 3 cards out of 100, buying one by one) or impossible (guessing a cipher).
Particularly for ciphers, in the previous version of the game interface there were not even any UI elements which would highlight that it could be entered: you had to tap 3 times on a certain part of the screen. This created an atmosphere of secrecy. How do players know that they can hack the system?
And here the new stakeholders enter the scene: a large number of Telegram channels that leak this content. They perform an important function: they exploit the desire of users to earn money by gaining insider knowledge. A-la "a cheat code only for friends". The original source of the insights, I think, is clear.
It's worth noting that daily rewards, ciphers and combos are not updated at once, but are spaced out over time throughout the day, increasing the chances that the player will enter the game not once a day, but three – again, increasing the usage of the bot and Telegram.
The role of alerts is played by Telegram channels that leak “insights” not all at once, but separately, thereby further increasing the chances that the hamster will wake up from work and other mundane affairs and open Hamster Kombat.
To be continued...
I'd like to believe that advertising from one of the betting companies, which is now broadcast in the game every day to a quarter billion people, was not the developer's ultimate goal, and the hamsters will soon make a fortune during the listing. But for some reason it is hard to believe.
As we can see, such a powerful growth did not happen by chance, but was the result of a large number of intertwined behavior control mechanics, used at various stages of the customer gamer hamster journey.
Such mechanics and their combinations can be used far beyond the game. In particular, in the area of my domain expertise, e-commerce, I believe that gamification still has great growth potential.
And these mechanics can be used not only to enrich the person who implements them, but also to make the customer’s journey more exciting and interesting.
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