Anichess has issued an action required notice to its players, asking everyone to claim their M8 from both staking pools by Sunday, September 13, 2026 at 23:59 UTC. The studio confirmed the deadline as it completes its move to Base, telling players to bring all their M8 with them.

Both staking pools are covered by the notice, so a player holding M8 across more than one position needs to claim from each rather than assuming a single action covers everything.

The Chain Move Behind the Deadline

The migration closes a split that has run for most of a year. Anichess originally launched on Base in April 2025. When the CHECK token launched in November 2025, M8 accrual shifted to Abstract so that staking and claims sat together there, while liquidity and trading stayed on Base through Aerodrome Finance.

That left players bridging between two networks to manage a single game's economy, which is exactly the kind of friction that costs a project participation from people who are not comfortable moving assets across chains.

Returning everything to Base consolidates the two halves. Staking, claims, liquidity, and trading all end up on the same network, and the bridging step disappears.

An opt in process ran ahead of this deadline, closing on September 7, 2026 at 23:59 UTC. Players confirmed participation through an in game migration banner or the same option on the game's homepage, checking a box and saving changes in under a minute.

What M8 Actually Is

M8 is not a token that can be bought, which is the detail that makes the claim deadline matter. It functions as the onchain points layer of Anichess, and there are only two ways to accumulate it.

The first is playing. Completing 15 Standard matches in a week earns M8, with the reward scaled by a player's rating class. The second is staking CHECK, which generates M8 passively alongside the token position.

M8 then converts into entry tickets for Checkmate Arena, where 50 players compete each week for a minimum of 500 CHECK each. That makes M8 the bridge between regular play and the competitive reward layer rather than a standalone collectible.

Because it cannot be purchased, anyone leaving M8 unclaimed is leaving behind something that took either match time or staked capital to produce, and cannot simply be replaced by buying more.

Inside Anichess

Anichess is a free to play strategy, logic, and PvP title that adds magical spells as a layer on top of standard chess. It was founded by Animoca Brands and is operated in partnership with Chess.com, which gives it a distribution channel most web3 titles do not have access to.

The core design keeps chess intact while introducing spells that alter what pieces can do, creating a variant that experienced players can read quickly but that rewards learning a new layer. The game runs on Android, iOS, and Windows with NFT support.

CHECK is the ecosystem token, capped at 1 billion tokens with 59.38 percent allocated to ecosystem growth and player rewards. It covers tournament entry, staking that generates M8, in game purchases, and governance. The token listed on Coinbase on April 2, 2026.

Seasonal play drives the competitive calendar. Season 8 launched with a 700,000 CHECK prize pool alongside new features, and Checkmate Arena runs weekly on top of that with its own 500 CHECK minimum per qualifying player.

The project took third place for Best Strategy Game at the Blockchain Game Awards 2025 and currently sits at rank number 74 on PlayToEarn with a score of 614, up 6.04 percent.

Claims close Sunday at 23:59 UTC, and both pools need to be handled separately.