‘Catizen’ Studio Secures Funding as Telegram Game Hits 25 Million Players

The Open Platform (TOP), a prominent developer in The Open Network (TON) blockchain ecosystem, announced today that it has made a strategic investment in Pluto Studio, the developer behind the rising Telegram-based crypto game, Catizen.

Catizen has seen surging growth alongside other major Telegram crypto games, with Pluto also announcing on Monday that the game has now attracted some 25 million players. Pluto declined to disclose the amount of the investment.

The game is built around simple puzzle matching mechanics, letting players merge and upgrade felines in a cat cafe, all in the hopes of earning a larger share of the upcoming token airdrop. Pluto also announced Monday that it will offer up 43% of the total token supply via an airdrop to players, with the token set to launch on TON.

TOP is the developer behind the popular Wallet bot on Telegram, and also co-built Notcoin, the original Telegram-based crypto game that kick-started the trend earlier this year.

"The Catizen team has launched one of the most successful social games in the Telegram mini apps ecosystem to date. Their innovative approach is setting a new standard for thousands of developers,” said The Open Platform founder and CEO Andrew Rogozov, in a release. He added that “they are shaping the future of gaming on Telegram.”

Pluto Studio aims to expand Catizen into an attention economy hub, continuously releasing more mini-games through its ecosystem platform. This is similar to how Notcoin plans to expand following its May token launch, with Notcoin co-creator Sasha Plotvinov telling Decrypt’s GG that they want to create the “Netflix of social, viral games.”

TOP also announced a separate investment on Monday into Akedo Games, a studio that includes developers who have worked on such games as League of Legends and PUBG Mobile. Akedo Games is working on a virtual pet game for Telegram that will let players collect, nurture, and battle an “AkeDog.”

Editor’s note: This article was written with the assistance of AI. Edited and fact-checked by Andrew Hayward.