Web3 game dev Uncharted has announced it is shutting down both the company and its flagship game Fishing Frenzy, after concluding it could not find a viable path forward.
The game was the first permissionless game to launch on Ronin in April 2025.
“It saddens me to share this but we have decided to shut down Uncharted and Fishing Frenzy,” said Uncharted co-founder Derek Lau on X. “I’m proud of our team and how we have operated, but ultimately we could not prove product-market fit.”
Fishing Frenzy’s servers will close on 25th June 2026 at 2am UTC. Until then, the game will remain playable, but USDC packages are no longer available, while the Ronin-based FISH token has been made spend-only and untradable. Players can still use FISH in-game until shutdown, but it can no longer be traded or transferred.
In its shutdown notice, the Uncharted team said that despite its best efforts, it was unable to prove its thesis on crypto gaming or find “product-market-business fit”. Over the past year, the team tested multiple directions and audiences, but the results did not provide enough conviction that there was a viable business ahead.
“My sincere and deep thanks for everyone who has supported us — investors, partners, community members,” Lau added. “You made the journey a lot more enjoyable and I’m sorry we couldn’t deliver.”
As part of the shutdown process, Uncharted is attempting to return remaining value to its community. All USDC from the FISH/USDC liquidity pool will be withdrawn and redistributed to players and stakers based on Karma scores. The snapshot was taken on Monday 15th June 2026, meaning activity after that point will not increase a user’s payout.
Each player’s share will be calculated proportionally, based on their Karma score as a share of the total Karma at the time of the snapshot. There is no minimum threshold, so all users with more than zero Karma will receive a payout. USDC will be sent via airdrop to the Ronin wallet linked to each account.
In addition, all non-diving USDC spending since the launch of Chapter 3 on 14th May will be refunded automatically. Proof of Distribution rewards will also be distributed by Sky Mavis directly to the Fishing Frenzy community, again based on Karma scores.
Uncharted has also open-sourced its Karma score dataset, allowing other teams and partners to use it if they want to reward Fishing Frenzy players in the future. The team said it would pass the snapshot to partner projects and ask them to honor any commitments made to top Karma users.
Once the servers close, players will lose access to server-side items including fish collections, pets, boat skins and fossils. Uncharted said it will keep a record of these assets in case the game ever returns, although it added there are currently no plans for a new project and that Uncharted itself will be shutting down.
The Fishing Frenzy Discord will remain open for at least 30 days after the final USDC payout, with the team available to answer questions. The website will stay online but will no longer be actively managed, while the project’s X account will remain available at least until the payout process is complete.