It's been almost three years since YouTube veteran-combatant Logan Paul first announced his CryptoZoo NFT game, which never materialized in popularity.
Now, a year after promising NFT buyers He would give them the money back.Paul launched an unsecured website for CryptoZoo NFT refunds—and filed a lawsuit against the two co-creators of the now-defunct crypto game project, calling it “disgusting business activity.”
As a Twitter From Paul published Thursday, merchants bought “Base egg” and “Base Animal” CryptoZoo NFTs refund requests can be submitted today until February 8. Paul said he will allocate $2.3 million for NFT refunds.
The refund
“This buyback is my way of doing what you intend to do to play Cryptozoo,” Paul said. “The buyback is not meant to compensate those who gambled on the crypto market and lost. It is important to remember that the Zoo Token was created to support the CryptoZoo game and its players.
According to Paul's latest statement, there will be no refunds for anyone who bought the money. The crypto The Ethereum-based token, ZOO, has been zeroing in on the game for a long time now. Only NFT buyers can see a partial refund of their invested funds.
But if a quick look at the “CryptoZoo Victims” Discord server is any indication, many of the people who bought into Paul's project aren't happy with the proposed resolution.
“I didn't like it when it was revealed and I don't like it now,” wrote one victim of Paul's chargeback.
In particular, the return position does not support it. HTTPSAn important web security feature that provides site encryption and authentication and has been around since 1994 and has been commonplace for at least a decade. Instead, Paul's website redirects to a form that requires the collection of personal information, including names, phone numbers, wallet addresses, and physical addresses, to be considered for repurchase.
Answer dress
“CryptoZoo was hacked by bad actors,” Paul said in the post. “Bad actors who stole money and betrayed our team internally while ruining the game.”
Paul said there was an “extensive investigation” into the CryptoZoo fiasco that included both a blockchain investigation and an internal document review. That prompted him to file a lawsuit on Thursday. Eduardo “Eddie” Ibanez and Jake “Cryptoking” Greenbaum, both of whom participated in the failed project.
In February 2023, a trader bought into the CryptoZoo project They filed a lawsuit. As part of a class-action legal effort against Paul, Ibanez, Greenbaum and two other CryptoZoo affiliates for damages “Carpet Pulling” CryptoZoo Scam.
After trying to ask for lack of jurisdiction last year – and then Inability to mediate Ruling—Paul is now trying to deflect blame by denying the allegations and instead pointing the finger at Ibanez and Greenbaum.
“Disgusting business activity [took place] behind our backs, without our knowledge, and with the intention of deceiving us all,” Paul said in his counterclaim against Ibanez and Greenbaum.
Paul's lawsuit says his role in the project was primarily marketing and promotion, although he made some creative game development decisions, while Greenbaum was responsible for ZOO and Ibanez's tokenomics for the game's development.
According to a public legal response, Paul has denied the charges, including fraud, breach of contract, breach of implied contract, unjust enrichment, negligence, fraud, swindling, fraud and attorney's fees in the case. Other fees and requests.
Secret sale
CryptoZoo's founders were able to exchange ZOO for Binance's BNB token, which Greenbaum claims created a liquidity pool “in secret”—but ZOO's market cap suddenly dropped from $130 million to $26 million as anonymous wallets exited.
“You know how it works in that garbage,” Paul reportedly said in the ZOO liquid pool in May 2023.
Greenbaum blamed the market cap on “bots,” according to the lawsuit, and Ibanez suggested a strategy to manipulate ZOO's futures price. Then Paul proposed to lock the founders, but it seems that he was hurt.
Paul went on to say that Ibanez repeatedly made false promises during the game's development, falsified his credentials, and made nearly $38,000 from Paul's Zoo ads in temporary business and billions more in ZOO sales, totaling an estimated $1.7 million. Filing.
“I cannot comment that the allegations are completely false,” Greenbaum told Decrypt.
The dead game
“I'm very disappointed that the game is not available,” said Paul at CryptoZoo when he confirmed it to fans on Twitter.
It's worth noting that shortly after Paul's first refund promise in early 2023, a lone indie developer built and shipped their own working version of CryptoZoo.A few hours– without the whole crypto part.
But Paul won't finish the game – and he's trying to wash his hands of all the trouble.
“I've personally invested $400,000 and after completion in early 2023 and some additional due diligence, unfortunately, there are a lot of regulatory hurdles that I didn't understand at first and may even delay this buyback. More,” Paul said.
According to former CryptoZoo developer Zach Kelling—who worked under Ibanez—Kelling, Kelling's girlfriend, Paul's manager Jeff Levine, and Ibanez once lived together. Kelling said earlier. Decrypt He and the engineers he hired were not fully paid for the work on the game and thus stopped work on the project.
Decrypt He wanted to call Keeling for an updated opinion. So did Ibanez and Greenbaum.
This article has been updated to include a comment from Greenbaum. Edited by Ryan Ozawa.
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