Disclaimer: This post was written from my personal perspective as a crypto founder. Nothing should be construed as financial advice. この投稿の日本語版については、ここをクリックしてください。

GM Frens,

Every game worth playing throws challenging moments your way—because overcoming them is what makes success in the end feel legendary. The sweetest loot always drops after the toughest battles. Right now, blockchain gaming is undeniably in a tough spot, but that's exactly why we're choosing this moment to limit break our efforts. Sorry it's been a while between blog posts, but today we're finally ready to reveal why Season 2 of Farm Frens will elevate our shared journey together to new heights.

However, before diving into the exciting updates, I want to first acknowledge some important realities because transparency with our community deeply matters to us. Given the recent closures of many blockchain games, we understand why some of our Frens might share similar worries about our project:

Thankfully, we have so far avoided a similar fate, but truth be told it hasn’t been easy. In the past few months, our company was able to successfully close a modest bridge round of funding to bring on a key strategic partner, but we also had to part ways with several teammates and cut salaries (e.g., my own) in order to maximize our runway and potential shots on goal. As Amihan’s founder, I have always refused to put my or our company’s own interests above that of our community’s, and will continue to do so.

We would never rug our Frens.

Though the above news is not entirely positive, I am sharing it anyway because I want our community to know how much our team believes in what we are doing and that we are doubling down with conviction. This is what our space needs now more than ever before because unfortunately belief and trust are at all time lows in crypto today as disappointment after disappointment have compounded from years of grifts and scams.

In 2021, we founded our company Amihan, beginning our journey into Web3, with an ambitious vision to equalize opportunity for all through play and a goal to onboard continents, not just countries, to crypto. Since then, despite whatever difficulties that have come our way, we have remained steadfast in pursuing our original noble cause because we ultimately believe that the only way to sustain long-lasting success is by uplifting our true Frens and reinforcing a strong community.

Now our team continues to push forward with development, more fervently than ever before, because we know our game is good, and Season 2 will be even better. So today I would like to reveal some exciting updates of what we have planned for the next evolution of Farm Frens.

Season 2 = Globally Rewarding Play

Global Focus

In my last blog post, I shared that our team’s main focus for Season 2 would be to relaunch Farm Frens on LINE, especially catering to the Japanese and Asian market. After receiving a ton of feedback from our players telling us they wish they could play without having to download and install a new messenger app they have never used before, our team has decided to ship Season 2 as a web game first.

Please note that this does NOT mean that we are giving up on LINE or the Japanese market. We still have grand plans for Farm Frens there! However, in order to not alienate our existing (and potential new) Frens who do not use LINE, we are investing additional time to develop a more accessible version of Farm Frens playable directly in browsers from all four corners of the world.

Real-Money Rewards

Previously, we had also communicated that Farm Frens Season 2’s focus would be primarily for Web2 gamers. However, so far this year the economy and markets have been stormy, so we know many of our Frens might be feeling like they are in a tough spot financially. True Frens help their Frens in need, so we are taking special care with the tokenomics design of Season 2. While Farm Frens’ inaugural Telegram season was a play-to-airdrop campaign, Season 2 will integrate tokenized rewards directly into the game and will incorporate various ways for our Frens to play and earn in real time.

This is also one of the major reasons why we decided to also develop a web version of Farm Frens for Season 2 instead of being exclusive to LINE. By rolling out our own proprietary client, we can be in full control of what we can or cannot do without being beholden by another platform’s policies or fees. We want to max out the real-money rewards we give back to our Frens without fear of being deplatformed.

Fun for Everyone

However, in order for any blockchain game to sustainably give out rewards over the long term, it still needs to consistently attract new Web2 players. Otherwise, the economy collapses unto itself quickly, as so many of the shallower “Ponzi” games do in Web3.

To avoid this fate, our team is taking extra care in making drastic improvements to Farm Frens’ core gameplay and metagame. We have been working incredibly hard to make Season 2 a play-and-earn game, and not just a play-to-earn game. The distinction is subtle, but significant: the former gives more players (like Web2 normies) intrinsically motivating reasons to try our game and spend, whereas the latter exists only as a gamified vehicle of yet another financial pump-and-dump play on retail.

To concept, design, and develop compelling interactive experiences for Web2 players requires experience and time. For Season 1, Farm Frens on Telegram was competing against tap-to-earn mini-apps like Notcoin and Hamster Kombat. For Season 2 to succeed, we needed to raise a higher bar for quality and player experience.

This is why we are adding not one, not two, but THREE new mini-games to Farm Frens for Season 2. Over the last few months, we’ve done extensive prototyping and playtesting internally to “find the fun” with each of these mini-games, and we cannot wait to see how our Frens will react to these new additions to our world.

However, as veteran Web2 game developers, we also were honest with ourselves enough to know that Farm Frens needed a lot more than just snackable mini-games. To keep players coming back month after month, it was vital for the game to have robust progression systems, so this also has been a major focus for our team during this phase of development. One of the new features we are excited to publicly announce today is Parks. With new Park spaces, players will be able to collect various types of furniture and trinkets to decorate and customize their farm to their liking!

Heads Down, Chins Up

With all the above new things that we are trying to fit into Farm Frens, without a magic time machine, unfortunately what that means is that that we will have to push our Season 2 launch date from Q2 to Q3. We know that this may upset some of our Frens, but our goal is not to hurriedly rush out a minimum viable product that flops upon arrival, but rather take time to craft a minimum lovable game that reignites our community’s trust and confidence in our project.

Quality is worth the wait, and we do not believe a few extra months will make a material difference in overall market conditions as the current macroeconomic uncertainty (e.g., tariffs) will likely stay unresolved for some time.

Finally, I’d like to remind our Frens that we have a leaner team now. Internally, this has actually helped us streamline our development process to be more efficient as decision-making is no longer slowed by “too many cooks in the kitchen.”

However, this also means that we have less cooks in the kitchen. As founder, I, for example, have to be more hands-on with the product and focus on production over publishing. Similarly, it’s much more important for our artists to produce game art over meme content. Now more than ever before our team has to be heads down and focus on the one priority that truly matters: shipping the best version of Farm Frens as fast as we can.

What this means is that, between now and Season 2’s new Q3 launch window, our Frens should expect our public communications cadence to be more infrequent in the interim. Of course, this does not mean that we will go on a complete hiatus or blackout, but for instance our social media post cadence will likely slow to twice per week instead of five. I will also do my best to try and publish blog posts when I can, but please do not expect a regular cadence as I am already personally doubling my workload by assuming the role of producer for the team.

As producer, though, I also have the wonderful pleasure to playtest and see the daily progress we make on our internal build, and please trust me when I say that, as a lifelong gamer, I personally could not be more excited for the next evolution of Farm Frens. What I teased above in this post is only a fraction of what we actually have in store for our Frens, and I cannot wait to reveal what else we have been busy cooking for Season 2 (and beyond!) when the time is right.

Thank you, Frens, and stay tuned for future announcements!