Lineup Games

Lineup Games is a Web3 sports gaming studio building a multi-platform, multi-chain gaming ecosystem. Founded in 2021, the company set out to bring competitive sports titles to blockchain, targeting a mainstream audience that spans casual mobile players and blockchain-native users alike. Its product portfolio centers on two live titles — Striker League, a 6v6 mobile football game, and Gold Striker, a fast-paced mini-game — distributed across Android, iOS, Telegram, and the LINE super-app.

Origins on Solana

Lineup Games entered the market under the name Uncaged Studios, developing a Solana-native turn-based football game called MonkeyLeague. That game paired high-production-value multiplayer gameplay with Solana NFTs and a play-and-earn model built around a native token, MonkeyBucks ($MBS). MonkeyLeague was among a small group of NFT collections selected for OpenSea's beta launch on Solana in April 2022, which served as early validation of the project's NFT quality and community reach.

In July 2022, Uncaged Studios raised $24 million in a Series A funding round led by Griffin Gaming Partners, with participation from Maverick Ventures Israel, Drive by DraftKings, Vgames, and 6th Man Ventures. That capital backed the evolution from a single Solana game into a broader gaming platform. The studio subsequently rebranded as UNKJD, then later as Lineup Games, reflecting a shift toward a multi-game, multi-chain identity.

The $MBS token, originally issued on Solana, was later bridged to Base as the studio expanded its blockchain footprint. Existing $MBS holders are eligible for an airdrop of the forthcoming $LINEUP ecosystem token.

Games and How They Work

Striker League is a competitive 6v6 mobile football game available on iOS and Android. Players build squads, compete in matches, and accumulate in-game rewards. The game supports on-chain asset ownership and token-based incentives, allowing progression to carry real economic value.

Gold Striker is a lighter mini-game built for distribution through messaging super-apps — Telegram and LINE. It is designed for discovery and retention at scale: LINE alone has over 1 billion registered users in Asia, with strongholds in Japan, South Korea, Thailand, and Taiwan. The Telegram version taps a globally distributed user base already accustomed to mini-app ecosystems. Both games are currently live.

Across both titles, the platform uses a Diamond accumulation system. Players earn non-tradable Diamonds through gameplay, missions, referrals, and social campaigns. At the end of each season, Diamonds convert to $LINEUP tokens, connecting engagement with on-chain reward without requiring players to actively manage wallets during play.

Token Economy

The $LINEUP token is the planned ecosystem-wide currency for Lineup Games. It carries a fixed supply of 1 billion tokens, with only 16% entering circulation at launch. The team has stated that contributors were paid in stablecoins rather than pre-launch token allocations, a design choice intended to minimize sell pressure from insiders at the time of the token generation event.

The token launch was originally scheduled for November 30, 2025, but was pushed to Q1 2026. The team cited a "unique opportunity" to improve exchange access, expand ecosystem alignment, and coordinate the launch with the Diamond Claim Event, when accumulated in-game Diamonds convert to tokens for the first time.

Multi-Chain Strategy

Lineup Games launched on Solana and later expanded to Base. In June 2025, the company announced Sui as its default blockchain for all current and future titles, with additional integrations planned for TON (Telegram's native chain) and Kaia (LINE's native chain). The multi-chain approach is driven by distribution logic: by deploying on the native chain of each super-app platform, the studio can offer gasless, near-invisible transactions that do not interrupt gameplay or require users to manage separate wallets or bridge assets.

Sui's composable, nestable NFT standard also enables novel in-game asset behaviors — items that can contain other items, or that evolve based on on-chain state — which the studio has cited as a technical motivation for the integration.

CEO Tal Friedman described the rationale: "By integrating with Sui, we are solving that problem, allowing the blockchain to seamlessly connect to our games and ensure that players are never taken out of the action."

As of the $LINEUP token delay announcement in late 2025, the platform had surpassed 1 million players and recorded over 2 million on-chain transactions across its ecosystem.

Team and Backers

Lineup Games was co-founded by veterans of Playtika and COTI. Playtika is a mobile gaming giant behind titles including Slotomania and World Series of Poker; COTI is a fintech blockchain network. That background gives the team experience in both large-scale mobile game operations and blockchain infrastructure — a combination relevant to the studio's ambition of onboarding mainstream mobile players into Web3 without friction.

Strategic partnerships include PUMA, Meta, AC Milan, and Argentine footballer Paulo Dybala. These collaborations support licensed IP and global user acquisition campaigns, and Puma, Meta, and Sui are listed among the project's backers.

Fit in the Solana Ecosystem

Lineup Games represents an early cohort of Solana-native gaming studios that used the network's low fees and high throughput to build NFT-backed play-and-earn games during 2021–2022. Its MonkeyLeague NFT collection was one of the early Solana projects to reach OpenSea's platform, and the $MBS token was one of the network's early gaming tokens with real secondary market activity.

As the studio has matured, its blockchain footprint has broadened beyond Solana, following the distribution logic of its gaming strategy. Solana remains part of the asset history for $MBS holders and the platform's early community, even as newer titles and the $LINEUP token have been built on other chains. The project is an example of a Solana-born studio that scaled by treating blockchain as infrastructure rather than identity, adapting its chain usage as its distribution strategy evolved.