Hamster Kombat's highly anticipated HMSTR token launch sparked over $1.2 billion in trading within 24 hours, putting The Open Network under immense pressure from distributing a massive airdrop to potentially 100 million players.

Hamster Kombat, a popular Telegram game, finally released its HMSTR token on Thursday on The Open Network (TON). Despite player complaints about airdrops being too little, the token experienced substantial trading activity on its debut day.

HMSTR Token Hits $1.2 Billion in Trading

According to data from CoinGecko early Friday, HMSTR had a 24-hour trading volume of over $1.2 billion, placing it in the top tier of cryptocurrencies in terms of trading value, right after Binance Coin (BNB), Dogecoin (DOGE), and XRP.

The token's price has dropped 18% in the past 24 hours, bringing its market worth to around $430 million, and it is presently trading at $0.0067. That landed it in the top 200 currencies in terms of market cap, but it's still well behind Notcoin, the original game that launched the Telegram tap-to-earn trend earlier this year, with a market cap of $970 million.

Concerns Over TON Network Stability

Aside from the token's pricing and allocation amount, another major concern surrounding the Hamster Kombat airdrop was whether or not The Open Network could manage the burden of distributing the token to a possible 100 million players.

This question arose in late August when the network experienced two consecutive shutdowns, effectively ceasing block production as a result of the overwhelming demand for DOGS airdrop claims. The announcement of the airdrop and token launch date for Hamster Kombat occurred between the bursts of downtime.

TON's Resilience in the Face of Massive Airdrops

Even earlier this month, TON Core developers expressed concern that airdrops for games such as Catizen and Hamster Kombat would cause additional disruptions to the network.

The TON Core development team said in an interview with Decrypt that the airdrop for Hamster Kombat was the "largest-ever airdrop in crypto's history."

"This massive surge in traffic has caused some third-party services to experience overloads, but TON network has generally remained stable, with blocks continually produced without interruption and network fees remaining fixed," according to them, indicating "TON is probably the only blockchain that can withstand events of this magnitude."

Airdrop Puts TON's Capabilities to the Test

"TON is making history," according to them, "and we’re proud to be supporting a network which empowers communities, attempts the unprecedented, and offers users highly engaging projects."