Lucra, the leading social competition platform, today announced a strategic investment in CRWN, the Poland-based mobile games studio — the first strategic investment of its kind for Lucra. As part of the agreement, Lucra CEO Dylan Robbins will join the CRWN Board of Directors. Together, the two companies are launching Lucra Arcade, a new product layer that adds a library of 90-second skill-based mini games to Lucra's competition platform, available now as a standalone consumer app on the App Store and as an embeddable white-label offering within partner apps.
The investment reflects a deliberate expansion of Lucra's platform strategy. Lucra Arcade gives any brand — across in-person entertainment, digital media, streaming, fitness, sports leagues, and beyond — a turnkey way to add real-money and free-to-play competitive gaming to their user experience. In the standalone Lucra Arcade consumer app, players can compete today for cash or rewards redeemable at leading entertainment and hospitality partners. The product also includes a white-label configuration, in which partners are able to embed the full game library directly into their own apps, branded within their own experience and connected to Lucra's existing competition and wallet infrastructure.
CRWN builds skill-based mobile games purpose-designed for real-money and free-to-play competitive mechanics. Each game plays out in roughly 90 seconds — competitive enough to drive daily engagement, short enough to fit into any moment. The studio's track record speaks for itself: CRWN recorded over five million total plays last year, with the average player logging over 15 game sessions per month and 20 minutes of play time per session. On average, players spend $50 or more per month on the platform, and over 70% of players are paying participants — a conversion rate that reflects both the quality of the product and the proven strength of real-money mechanics as a retention driver. [1] That proven playbook is now part of the Lucra platform.
Lucra Arcade also meaningfully expands the company's addressable market. The mini games format removes the category boundaries that have historically defined where competition infrastructure gets deployed. A golf venue, a media company, a fitness app, and a streaming platform all share the same underlying challenge: turning passive audiences into engaged, loyal, returning users. Lucra Arcade is built to solve that problem wherever it exists — not just at the venues and operators that anchor Lucra's existing partner network, but across the full spectrum of digital and physical environments where brands compete for attention and engagement every day.
"This is the most significant product expansion in Lucra's history, and CRWN is the right partner to build it with," said Dylan Robbins, CEO of Lucra. "Lucra Arcade is the most versatile product we've ever brought to market. CRWN built games that are fast, skill-based, and genuinely compelling in a real-money environment — and that works everywhere. A golf venue wants to keep guests engaged between visits. A media company wants to turn passive viewers into active participants. A fitness app wants a daily reason for users to open it. The underlying problem is the same, and Lucra Arcade solves it for all of them. Any brand that wants to transform their audience into a competing, rewarding, loyal community now has a turnkey way to do it."
For Lucra's existing partner network, the consumer app serves as both an immediate loyalty tool and the foundation for the white-label integration to follow. As Lucra Arcade establishes its player base and reward redemption patterns, partners can embed the full product directly within their own apps — no separate download required. Rewards and wallet infrastructure connect automatically to Lucra's existing SDK, meaning partners already on the platform can extend into mini games without rebuilding anything.
"We spent years proving that 90-second, skill-based games can drive the kind of daily engagement that larger platforms spend millions trying to manufacture. What Lucra brings is the piece we couldn't build alone — a distribution network and reward system that makes winning mean something beyond the screen," said Piotr Zwierzyk, co-founder of CRWN.
"Whether a player beats a challenge and redeems a reward at their favorite venue, or competes inside a media platform they use every day, that becomes a habit. Lucra's investment and infrastructure give us the reach to take what we've proven at scale and build something the market has never seen before," added Patryk Gałach, co-founder of CRWN.
Speaking together, both CRWN co-founders stated, "We would also like to thank Professor Paweł Pietrasieński, Head of the Polish Investment and Trade Agency's Silicon Valley office, who encouraged us to pursue this opportunity."
"Lucra Arcade changes the scope of what this company can do," said Jordan Haburcak, Chief Strategy Officer of Lucra. "We built the best-in-class competition infrastructure for in-person venues and apps, and now we have a content engine — a library of proven, high-converting mini games — that makes that infrastructure valuable to an entirely new universe of partners. Every brand that has ever wanted to add competitive gaming to their product but didn't have the games, the compliance, the payments, or the rewards network now has all of it in a single SDK. That is a fundamentally different conversation than we were having twelve months ago, and it opens doors across every category we have been working toward."
Download Lucra Arcade on the Apple App Store and start competing today.
Note
- All figures are anonymized and aggregated across all games and users.
About Lucra
Lucra is a plug-and-play SDK that integrates into apps or websites, enabling peer-to-peer competitions with real-money or rewards. It handles compliance, payments, fraud prevention, and settlement out of the box, so partners can instantly offer gamified experiences without building or managing complex infrastructure themselves. Top entertainment, hospitality, and consumer brands, including Five Iron Golf, Puttshack, Backyard Sports, ChessKings, TouchTunes, and more, use Lucra's white-label technology to power tournaments and challenges, build loyalty, and drive new revenue. Learn more at playlucra.com.
About Lucra Arcade
Lucra Arcade is a library of fast-format, skill-based mini games built for real-money and free-to-play competition — available as a standalone consumer app on the App Store and as an embeddable white-label offering within partner apps. Powered by Lucra's competition and compliance infrastructure, the platform handles all matchmaking, payments, fraud prevention, identity verification, and instant settlement out of the box. Each game plays out in roughly 90 seconds across three modes: PvP cash matches, tournament leaderboard play, and free-to-play practice. Winnings are delivered instantly and redeemable as cash or rewards from brand partners. For partners, the full game library embeds directly into existing apps and websites with minimal technical lift, connecting seamlessly to Lucra's wallet and rewards infrastructure. Download Lucra Arcade on the Apple App Store or learn more at lucrasports.com/arcade.
About CRWN
CRWN, formerly Reality Unit, is a Poland-based mobile games studio specializing in skill-based, real-money competitive gaming. The studio builds fast-format mini games engineered for engagement, combining competitive mechanics with real-money and free-to-play infrastructure to create experiences that reward skill and keep players coming back. CRWN's games have been deployed across leading digital gaming platforms, driving measurable engagement and retention for partners at scale. Learn more at crwn.games.
Disclaimer
This press release is for informational purposes only and contains forward-looking statements subject to risks; real-money skill gaming via Lucra Arcade is subject to age and location restrictions, is legally permitted only in certain jurisdictions, and past historical performance data is no guarantee of future results.
Media Contact
Lindsay Linhart
Brand Strategist, Lucra
lindsay@lucrasports.com
