Gala Games: The FarmVille Guy Built a Web3 Empire, Then His Co-Founder Allegedly Stole $130 Million
By BCGamer —
Tags: gala, gala games, galachain
You want drama? Gala Games has drama.
You want actual games that work? Gala has those too.
You want a co-founder lawsuit involving theft allegations, SEC charges, $40 million Puerto Rico mansions, and claims of "corporate waste"? Welcome to Gala Games.
This is the story of how the co-founder of FarmVille built one of the largest blockchain gaming ecosystems in existence, survived his co-founder allegedly making off with $130 million, got hacked for $200 million, burned $600 million in tokens, and then somehow partnered with the White House.
Yeah. That White House.
The Pedigree: This Ain't Anonymous Founders
Let's start with what makes Gala different from 99% of crypto projects: we know exactly who built it.
Eric Schiermeyer co-founded Zynga. You know, the company behind FarmVille, Words with Friends, and basically the entire casual mobile gaming revolution. That game your mom was addicted to in 2010? Eric built the company that made it.
In 2019, Schiermeyer looked at blockchain gaming and thought: "I've done this paradigm shift thing before. Let's do it again."
He partnered with Wright Thurston (more on him later... oh boy, so much more) and Michael McCarthy to found Gala Games with a simple thesis:
Players should own their in-game assets.
Revolutionary? Not really. Executed at scale by someone who actually knows how to build games? That's rare.
The Rise (2019-2021): Actually Building Stuff
While most crypto gaming projects were dropping whitepapers and roadmaps to nowhere, Gala was building.
Town Star launched as their first game – a farming simulator (shocker, right?) with blockchain integration. Players could earn GALA tokens and trade NFT assets.
Then came Spider Tanks, a PvP brawler. Mirandus, an ambitious fantasy MMORPG. Champions Arena, a turn-based RPG. GRIT, a Wild West battle royale. Superior, a co-op roguelite shooter.
By 2021, during the crypto bull run, Gala had:
Multiple playable games (not just promises)
Over 1.3 million monthly active users
50,000+ Founder's Nodes securing the network
Partnerships with The Walking Dead IP, DreamWorks Animation, Snoop Dogg
A $100 million fund with C² Ventures for blockchain gaming
The GALA token went absolutely parabolic. From under $0.001 to a peak of $0.82 – an 800x+ return for early believers.
Things were looking good.
Too good.
The Fall (2022-2023): Everything Breaks
Then 2022 happened.
The crypto winter hit. GALA crashed over 95% from its all-time high. The "play-to-earn" hype collapsed. Players who thought they'd earn life-changing money from farming games... stopped playing.
But the price crash was just the appetizer.
The Lawsuit That Broke the Internet
In August 2023, both co-founders sued each other. On the same day.
Schiermeyer's allegations against Thurston:
Stole 8.6 billion GALA tokens in early 2021
That's more than 100% of the circulating supply at the time
Sold them through a "complex web of obfuscatory transactions" for $130 million
Bought a $40 million house in Puerto Rico with the proceeds
Has a history of founding companies that "ended up in litigation, insolvent, bankrupt, and/or sued by the SEC"
Thurston's countersuit against Schiermeyer:
Operated Gala without input from co-founder
Wasted hundreds of millions in company assets
Created entities in Switzerland and Dubai for personal gain
Seeking $750 million in damages
Oh, and the SEC had already sued Thurston separately for a different company (Green United) that allegedly sold fake crypto mining equipment to investors.
The GALA token dumped 25% on the news.
The $600 Million Token Burn (The Real Reason for V2)
In May 2023, Gala announced they were upgrading to "GALA v2" with "enhanced security features."
What they didn't fully advertise: the V2 upgrade would make the tokens in Thurston-controlled wallets obsolete. It was a strategic move to neutralize the alleged theft.
To show good faith, Gala burned 21 billion tokens worth $637 million from their own reserves. The message to the community: "We're not going to dump on you."
160,000 wallets received V2 tokens 1:1. Coinbase notably refused to facilitate the airdrop without explaining why.
The May 2024 Hack
Because apparently one disaster per year isn't enough, in May 2024 a hacker gained access to a dormant admin account and minted 5 billion GALA tokens worth $200 million.
They managed to sell 600 million tokens for about $22 million in ETH before Gala's blocklist function kicked in.
Then, in a bizarre twist, the attacker returned the $22 million in ETH.
Schiermeyer admitted it was an "internal controls" failure. The President of Blockchain had left the company three days before the hack. Speculation ran wild about whether it was an inside job.
DWF Labs bought $1.2 million in GALA to "stabilize" the price. Gala proposed burning another 5 billion tokens to offset the mint.
The community shrugged and moved on. This is crypto, after all.
The Resurrection (2024-2025): GalaChain and the White House
Despite everything – the lawsuits, the hack, the 98% price crash – Gala kept building.
GalaChain Goes Live
In January 2024, GalaChain launched. This is Gala's own Layer-1 blockchain, built on Hyperledger Fabric.
The pitch:
Fixed transaction costs (1 GALA per transaction)
Sub-second finality
Designed specifically for gaming and entertainment
No more Ethereum gas fee nightmares
By 2025, GalaChain is running 21+ games, Gala Music, and Gala Film.
When Neon Machine (developers of Shrapnel) migrated from Avalanche to GalaChain, it signaled that real studios were taking the infrastructure seriously.
The China Bridge
In July 2025, GalaChain became the first foreign blockchain to integrate with China's state-backed Trusted Copyright Chain (TCC).
This means Gala can legally bridge NFTs between international markets and China – a massive market that's been essentially closed to Western crypto gaming.
Every transfer requires GALA as gas. If even a fraction of China's gaming population uses this bridge... do the math.
The White House Easter Egg Hunt
In April 2025, Gala became the first crypto gaming company to partner with the White House.
For the annual Easter Egg Roll, they built a blockchain-based Easter egg hunt game. Families could collect virtual eggs as NFTs without needing a crypto wallet or understanding blockchain.
Results:
The White House tweeted about it. This is real mainstream adoption, not theoretical "mass adoption someday."
The Current State (2026)
Let's be real about where things stand.
The Good:
21+ live games across multiple genres
1.3 million monthly active users
350+ employees (a real company, not a Discord group)
GalaChain running smoothly with low fees
Partnerships with DreamWorks, AMC, NBCUniversal, LG Electronics, Snoop Dogg
First Web3 streaming app on LG Smart TVs (120 million devices)
China market access through TCC bridge
White House validation
$19.5 million invested in Shrapnel (Neon Machine)
SDK 2.0 released for developers
The Concerning:
Token still down 98% from ATH
Lawsuit with Thurston ongoing
P2E economics shifted – not life-changing income anymore
Mirandus still not fully launched (announced years ago)
Internal security failures happened
The Honest Take: Gala has more working products than 99% of Web3 gaming companies. The games exist. The blockchain works. The partnerships are real.
But they've also had more drama than a reality TV show. A co-founder allegedly stole $130 million. They got hacked. The lawsuits are ongoing.
The question isn't "is Gala legitimate?" – it clearly is. The question is whether the ecosystem can grow faster than the drama.
The Games (What You Can Actually Play)
Let me run through the actual portfolio, because Gala's library is surprisingly deep:
GameGenreStatusTown Star (Common Ground World)Farming SimLiveSpider TanksPvP BrawlerLiveChampions ArenaTurn-based RPGLiveSuperiorCo-op RogueliteLiveGRITBattle RoyalePlaytestMirandusFantasy MMORPGDevelopmentThe Walking Dead: EmpiresSurvivalLiveDragon StrikePuzzle RPGLiveLegends RebornCard GameLiveLast ExpeditionFPSDevelopmentMeow MatchCasualLive
This isn't vaporware. You can download and play most of these right now.
Are they all AAA quality? No. Are they playable games with actual player bases? Yes.
The Investment Thesis
Here's how I see it:
Bull Case:
Zynga co-founder knows gaming
Massive partnership network (White House, LG, DreamWorks)
Own blockchain with unique China access
21+ games means multiple shots on goal
Infrastructure play, not just one game
Music and Film verticals expanding use cases
If Web3 gaming has a "next cycle," Gala is positioned
Bear Case:
98% down from ATH – might never recover
Founder drama ongoing
Security track record is shaky
P2E model is dead/dying
Competition from established game studios entering Web3
Token emissions still flowing
My Take: Gala is what happens when actual gaming industry veterans try to build Web3 gaming infrastructure. It's messy, it's dramatic, but it's real.
They have more games, more users, more partnerships, and more infrastructure than almost anyone else in the space. Whether that translates to long-term value depends on execution and whether blockchain gaming as a category finds product-market fit.
If you're betting on Web3 entertainment becoming a thing – not just gaming, but music and film too – Gala is one of the most comprehensive ecosystems that exists.
If you think blockchain gaming is a dead end, none of this matters.
The Bottom Line
Gala Games is the cockroach of Web3 gaming. It's survived:
And it's still here, still shipping, still partnering with the White House.
That's either incredibly bullish or a sign that this industry has no standards.
Probably both.
Not financial advice. The author may hold positions in projects discussed. Always DYOR. If your co-founder steals $130 million and you keep building anyway, you're either insane or dedicated. Gala appears to be both.