> it's unclear whether they made any money from downloads or if it was just an elaborate joke
The top review on Japan app store (translation by yours truly):
"recently work had been so busy that I was starting to get depressed. That's when uuddenly I wanted to eat taraba-kani (red king crab), but in my wallet was 50yen and not a Noguchi (the person on the 10,000JPY bill). I sighed and fiddled around with my phone...and that's when I discovered this app. At firsti thought this app would just be about gazing at crabs, but before I knew it my fingers had tapped the install button and I had opened the app. What a wonder! My fingers wouldn't stop using the crabs and before I knew it it was morning. As I was getting ready to go to work the crab at the top right of the screen spoke out to me, "work isn't worth it, you should quit." Tears flowed from my eyes. "That's right... I had tried hard enough." That day I resigned from my job. Today I'm living happily with 32 crabs. My house smells a little fishy but I'm having a pretty fun time now. Aah, I want to eat King crab..."
https://apps.apple.com/jp/app/crabhome/id1551908729?l=en
Looks like the app is now called crab home.