Star Atlas developer ATMTA, in partnership with Solana wallet Solflare, has officially launched the first chapter for Season 1 of Holosim, giving everyone an opportunity to play to earn for free.

What Is Holosim?

Holosim is a free to play online space strategy game set within the Star Atlas universe. Essentially, it offers the same core gameplay as SAGE Labs, with the main difference being that Holosim is completely free and does not require connecting a crypto wallet to start playing, making it accessible to a wider gaming audience. This also means that it doesn’t require players to spend on NFTs, allowing anyone interested in SAGE Labs to get a feel for the game and its mechanics without any financial risk by playing this simplified F2P version.

The game went live in a public test phase in early June 2025 and lets players choose one of three factions to compete to be the first to deliver all Faction Infrastructure Contracts (FICs) to Starbases located within their faction’s territory. Each faction has unique missions, exclusive resources, and specialized ships. The FICs are crafted at Starbases using a variety of resources, which differ depending on the chosen faction. These contracts were introduced late last year to simplify earning $ATLAS in SAGE Labs.

For those who have wanted to try SAGE Labs but hesitated to invest or rent fleets beforehand, Holosim offers an opportunity to manage fleets, complete quests, and engage in a player-driven economy at no cost. This free to play version is currently live in public test phase and accessible via web browsers at holosim.staratlas.com. Upon entering the game, players are greeted by a personal AI assistant who guides them through the setup, including choosing a name and faction to create their character.

What’s New in Holosim Season 1, Chapter 1?

Chapter 1 of Season 1 introduces the ability to play to earn USDC, $SOL and more rewards for free in Holosim. There is $35k in seasonal prizes powered by Solflare, and there are 2 ways in which you can earn a portion of the reward pool: complete the Completionist Bundle and climb to the top 1500 spots on the leaderboard.

The Completionist Bundle is a welcome package awarded to the first 1000 players that successfully complete the game’s questline. If you manage to qualify, you will be rewarded with this introductory bundle that is said to include a VZUS solos, a Solflare VZUS solos ship skin, and 0.02 $SOL per player.

You don’t have to stop there though, as you have plenty of time to try and reach the top 1500 leaderboard spots in order to win USDC, $SOL and possibly more goodies. Here is how rewards are distributed:

  • 1st: 300 USDC + Armstrong IMP Tap + 5x Platinum 5 Crew Pack + 0.02 $SOL
  • 2nd: 200 USDC + Armstrong IMP Tip + 3x Platinum 5 Crew Pack + 0.02 $SOL 
  • 3rd: 150 USDC + Calico Scud + 2x Platinum 5 Crew Pack + 0.02 $SOL
  • 4th-10th: 100 USDC each + Calico Maxhog + Gold 5 Crew Pack + 0.02 $SOL
  • 11th-50th: 50 USDC each + VZUS solos + Silver 5 Crew Pack + 0.02 $SOL
  • 51st-500th: 5 USDC each + Silver 1 Crew Pack + 0.02 $SOL
  • 501st-1500th: 1 USDC + 0.02 $SOL

Here’s how you can climb the leaderboard.

How to Play to Earn in Star Atlas Holosim Season 1

The first chapter of Holosim Season 1 is live from August 20 to September 24, and anyone can start to play to earn in this Star Atlas game by heading to the game's official website linked in the X announcement. This is a browser-based free to play title, and once you open the game’s website, a personal AI will greet you and give you some general info about the game.

Choose your name and create your character by picking one of 3 factions to start your journey: MUD (humans), ONI (multi-species), or Ustur (sentient robots). The faction you side with will influence which missions you have access to, as well which exclusive resources and specialized ships you can collect.

To climb the seasonal leaderboard, you need to earn XP.

With your character created, you can start completing tutorial quests to earn various rewards, including XP. There are various quests you can complete, with each offering varying amounts of XP. Next to tutorial tasks, there are daily missions, storyline quests, social tasks, and expertise-based quests where you might have to mine a specific number of ore to prove yourself as a miner or sell contracts to take on the merchant role.

By simply actively playing the game and accumulating as much XP as you can before September 24, you stand a chance of ranking in the top 1500 players on the Chapter 1 leaderboard. If you enjoy complex strategy games and would like to play one in a sci-fi setting with crypto rewards as the cherry on top, then you may very well enjoy playing Holosim for free. Make sure to connect your Solana wallet using the linking option found in the dropdown menu of the gear button at the top part of the screen. A wallet needs to be linked in order to be eligible for seasonal rewards.

About Star Atlas

Star Atlas is a Solana-powered gaming ecosystem combining high-fidelity gaming, decentralized governance, and a player-driven economy. Set in the year 2620, it features a vast sci-fi universe where 3 competing factions vie for control, resources, and influence across star systems, planets, and space stations.

This ecosystem is currently comprised of 3 games: Star Atlas, SAGE Labs, and Holosim. The flagship in-development title is Star Atlas, a third-person MMORPG built using Unreal Engine 5, delivering AAA-quality visuals and real-world ownership of in-game assets as players choose their desired profession and earn rewards through gameplay thanks to their contributions to their factions.

Core to Star Atlas is its NFT ecosystem, that enables web3 gamers to fully own a range of digital assets that include spaceships, land parcels, equipment, modules, and unique crew members, which can be seamlessly traded on the ecosystem's own Galactic Marketplace. These NFTs have direct utility within gameplay and influence economic productivity, moving beyond purely collectible value.

Earlier this month, ATMTA announced a custom SVM (Solana Virtual Machine) Layer 1 blockchain called Zink. Star Atlas is transitioning its underlying game logic to this network in order to improve scalability, transaction speed, and streamlined identity management via privacy-focused zProfiles.