For most people just looking to dip their toes in the water (i.e. me), shelling out even $30 on NFTs or new tokens bots insist will be "going to the moon" is very intimidating! And I think this is where the fascination with 'free' sources of crypto tokens and NFTs comes from.

Now, there's no such thing as a free lunch, but there are tons of helpful Reddit Threads on the topic citing everything from Airdrops, Edu Programs and Faucets to the subject of today's post—mobile games that run on the Ethereum blockchain.

Two specific games, Crypto Cats and Crypto Dragons, kept coming up in blog posts and threads during my research, so I decided to try them out on Android.

So, How's the Gameplay?

If I'm being honest, both games are grindy as hell—which is not unusual for a mobile game—but after just a few minutes, it was pretty clear this is the kind of game I can only hyper-fixate on for so long before it becomes mind-numbingly repetitive.

The gameplay is straightforward.

You start with x amount of cats that you merge into even fancier and cooler cats. Each 'level up' allows the cat you set on the racetrack to whizz around and earn more money to buy more cats, make better cats, and pay for upgrades so your cats can earn even more money. And so on.

For Crypto Dragons, it's the same but with Dragons.

**Update** Forgot to mention. Crypto Cats is superior to Crypto Dragons in design and playability. If you only want to try one, try Crypto Cats because Crypto Dragons has some irritating glitches.

Overall Strengths of the Game

Now, I will give some props to the developers behind Crypto Cats and Crypto Dragons, the Realis Network. Neither game is a cash grab. It's very clear there was a lot of thought and effort put into keeping the rewards system balanced and fun for Standard and Premium users.

✅ There are frequent 'airdrops' that provide the player with extra cats or extra coins for free. This allows the player to keep making progress even at extremely high levels where similar games would slow progress to a screeching halt to force in-app purchases.

✅ You even get a 'free' cat or 'free' upgrades to buy more expensive cats every couple of minutes, regardless of your level. 

✅ While all quests are worth the same amount of LIS (x0.0148), the native utility token used for in-game payments and purchases, they are surprisingly easy to complete. Each quest revolves around 'launching' x amount of x-level cats' which can be achieved by moving the SAME cat on and off the racetrack. Or the quest will revolve around creating 'x amount of x-level cats'. 

I've made something like 1.1692 LIS after only 24 hours of playing both games on my Android. I didn't even have to spend a dime! Of course, it's not a lot, but I am pleasantly surprised.

✅ You can earn a small amount of LIS from opening a free "Super Cat Capsule" every couple of hours.

✅LIS can be used across all Realis games to make in-app purchases or transfer from the platform to a NEAR protocol-based test wallet once you've set it up.

And lastly,

✅ The player base is strong with this one. Just from peeking at the leaderboard, it's pretty apparent that thousands of users are excited enough about the game and the Realis project to shell out hundreds of dollars on premium memberships to rank up. (The memberships can range from 300 LIS and some game perks every month to 3000 LIS per month).

From playing hundreds of mobile games, I can confidently say that the LIS in-game rewards system is pretty generous.

And while the following notes in Weakness and Threats are important factors to consider, I appreciate how transparent the Realis team is overall.

Weaknesses and Threats

There is one glaring issue for users that want more than a slick ecosystem to play and earn upgrades. LIS isn't exactly tradeable at the moment. Last year Realis announced they'd be switching from their original in-game currency, SOUL, to LIS.

The devs were smart enough to set up a system that allows long-time players to swap their $SOUL tokens to $LIS at a 1:1 ratio. And recently released their newest game, Legends of Listeria, which already has 100k+ downloads on the Google Play store.

But, some long-time players are getting a little antsy that it's been almost a year with little more than a whisper about officially integrating LIS into the blockchain. While most still seem loyal and optimistic that Realis games could be a cool-little earner, the anxiety is there.

Especially after a recent split and declining profits for the team behind Realis was announced this August.

Opportunities

I'm cautiously optimistic that Legends of Listeria will not be a carbon copy of Crypto Cats and Crypto Dragons. Creativity could help keep the fanbase engaged, attract new players and buy the Realis team time while they are figuring out the issues with getting LIS represented on a currency exchange platform.

If the Devs managed to make SOUL coin work, I have no doubt they can manage to do it again. But an anxious player base will be challenging to manage, especially after downsizing staff. Whenever things look uncertain, investors tend to panic.

Lastly, I think the internal issues regarding a decrease in revenue will ultimately depend on whether or not the team decides to incorporate a successful ad system into their current projects. 

Because there are no ads in either game, the entire project hinges on monthly membership tiers, which are somewhere in the $200 - $300 range.

While the SOUL coin was tradable, players were happy to pay these prices. But, with Realis working out the kinks in getting LIS up and running there is naturally going to be a decrease in memberships. And an additional stream of revenue will be required to fill the vacuum left behind.

While many mobile games can fail due to intrusive, incessant ad systems, mobile games like Cats and Soup and Kleptocats have managed to incorporate ad-watching in an organic and enjoyable way.

I hope the Realis devs can find a similar solution. The project has so much promise and I'd really like to see it continue to grow in the future.