Year of the ZABAL - Day 236
Season 1 ends this week. Three battles, six finalists, 500 USDC, and the artist final is tonight.
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Season 1 of ZABAL Gamez ends this week.
Three months ago this was an open build event with nothing in it. 31 projects came in from 15 people across three tracks. Six of them are left, and starting tonight they go head to head until there are three champions.
Nobody was assigned a track. They entered, they shipped, and they beat everyone else in their lane to get here.
The three battles
Artist final - Monday 24 August n3m vs dee-13
Creator final - Thursday 27 August presdency.eth vs uniquebeing404
Both run inside a one-hour Space. The Space opens at 5:00 PM EDT, the battle runs from 5:15 to 5:45, and the winner is called before we close out.
That is 10:00 PM BST in the UK, 11:00 PM CEST in Europe, 11:00 PM CAT in Zambia, and 10:00 PM WAT in Nigeria.
Builder final - Saturday 29 August, noon EDT, through Sunday 30 August, noon EDT jdwalka vs ghostmintops
This one is not thirty minutes. It is 24 hours. We open with a Space on what each of them built this season, then the clock starts and they build in the open, posting progress as they go. The last hour is the finale, live, where both share what they made. That is the last battle of Season 1.
Watch every one of them at https://zabalgamez.com/live
How a battle is decided
Three signals. Two of three wins.
The open poll. Anyone can vote. No wallet needed.
The charts. Live trading volume on the battle.
The judges. Independent scoring of the work itself.
Why three and not one: a poll on its own is a popularity contest. A market on its own belongs to whoever has the most money. Judges on their own are one room deciding for everyone. Each covers the others' blind spot, and no single one can hand somebody a win.
Where the battles run
We are running them on WaveWarZ. Two artists go head to head, the community decides, and the result settles on its own. It has been running since 2025 and has completed 1,289 battles. We did not build it for our finals. We are running ours on it.
Trading a battle is how you back somebody with more than a vote. You trade while it is live, and that volume is one of the three signals. The artist earns 1% of every trade on their battle, paid automatically, win or lose. Backing them pays them directly.
How the 500 USDC splits
100 USDC to each track champion
50 USDC to each runner-up
50 USDC to whichever of the six pulls the highest trading volume across their WaveWarZ battle
Every finalist is paid. Winning pays double. Drawing a crowd pays on top of both.
Four ways to back a finalist
Cheapest first.
Vote in the open poll. No wallet, no cost.
Show up in the Space and be loud.
Trade their battle. It moves the charts and pays them 1%.
Share their work before the clock starts.
All four count. Two of them are two of the three signals.
The season is already on the record
35 recordings are live right now. Every workshop, every fireside, transcribed and kept, free to anyone who wants to watch the whole season tonight: https://zabalgamez.com/recordings
All 31 projects from all 15 people are on the board: https://zabalgamez.com/submissions
The six finalists and the full schedule: https://zabalgamez.com/august
One thing tonight
The artist final is tonight at 5:00 PM EDT. If you do exactly one thing after reading this, put it in your calendar and turn up. The poll costs nothing and it is one of the three things that decides it.
Insert Coin.
- BetterCallZaal on behalf of the ZABAL Team
The full thread on the finals, the format and the prize split.