Even though the market has experienced a hard time, blockchain gaming continues to prove its viability. Projects showing resilience are emerging as leaders in the field.
Axie Infinity’s pet-themed trading Blockchain game, AXS, rose to prominence during the 2019 economic downturns. However, its numbers have continued to plummet over the weekend. Active users contracted to just 60k. According to a Twitter thread (TWTR), the number of active users has fallen to below 60,000. covering Axie’s market shift, these numbers are in stark comparison to the 3 million player high at Axie’s impressive peak.
Axie’s revenue has also decreased from $17 million/week to $11,000/week, and only 10 new Axie holders are joining the community per day. The mint to burn ratio has also hit a critical point, with the Axie “breeding” market suffering as a result.
The world’s most popular gaming Dapp Splinterlands (SPS) continues to recruit hundreds of new users every day. It is generating steady revenue and growing its user base while others Web 3.0 projects such as Axie are struggling. It continues to see active gamers, which range from 250k to 450k per day. Splinterlands keeps updating key features of the platform and releasing new updates every week. This has helped them secure their place at the top of blockchain gaming and set their sights to rival the mainstream gaming sector. Splinterlands has a daily average of hundreds of thousand users. It sees 10-12M battles per day, and is able to process 3M-5M transactions each day. Their recent node sale saw them sell their initial tranche of 2000 node licences in just 11 minutes. They have also sent or burned over 35 million Splintershards to their DAO.
Splinterlands has emerged as an obvious winner in the gaming industry, even though Web 3.0 is currently being tested.
Splinterlands CEO Jesse “Aggroed” Reich said that alongside their commitment to an engrossing game and thriving community, deflationary mechanisms and an organic economy based on the needs, wants, and input of its players has always been at the core of the platform.
These deliberate, built-in strengths have seen Splinterlands successfully navigate the storms of the cryptocurrency space–now, multiple times.
“We believe in decentralized gaming. It’s the future,” he said. “Splinterlands is playing a critical role in bringing this future about, showing in real-time how the challenges of the field can be overcome and how an incredible game can be enhanced and constantly improved by the possibilities of Web 3.0.”
“From the start,” he continued, “We have had in mind a lot of these economic elements that are now playing out: card pack deflation, differentiation between battle ranks, strategic staking, and node purchases available to anyone who wants to build the future of gaming with us. And we are seeing that these strategies, alongside our consistent player onboarding, are working, even through a devastating bear market.”
The economic questions surrounding decentralized gaming require thoughtful consideration as the challenges are worked out in a volatile industry–not so different from the Web 2.0 revolution of prior years–and Splinterlands seems to be offering this needed development both for its own game and on behalf of the whole new frontier of the GameFi industry.
Many elements of what Splinterlands does right are notable.
For players there is always a draw. GameFi has a solid and compelling strategy. The storyline, graphics, soundtrack, and storyline are all captivating. Spiel.
The economic aspect is the most important. As they improve their strategic skills, players will discover they can continue to make a living and have many opportunities to win.
Like Axie, but without a similar economic downturn, the Splinterlands extended community has developed ample “guild” and scholarship systems via their buzzing Discord channel, available for players of all levels and economic contributions. These guilds can be made up of groups or accounts of members of the community that are able to manage large sums of assets. The assets are then delegated out for use by the members (known as “scholars”), who have the opportunity to play and earn at the higher levels. These groups benefit all directly involved, as well as the entire game’s economic ecosystem.
Many guilds currently recruit scholars. New users are welcome to join these groups and share their plans for progressing in Splinterlands.
The protection of a violent bear market is not provided by guilds. Axie’s abundant guilds, which contributed significantly to their explosive success in 2020, have not been able to sustain the platform through the cryptocurrency market’s recent decline. However, paired with the extended network of mechanisms ordered toward a game’s longevity, guilds prove a powerful and consistent means of inspiring enthusiasm in new users and ongoing commitment to the game in its players of all levels.
Splinterlands also took care of card release, keeping the market from being overcrowded and creating effective deflationary mechanisms. When compared to the launch price, cards in previous sell-out collections are still of equal value today.
Splinterlands also continually offers tournament awards and weekly prizes, and recently announced the split between its “Modern” and “Wild” battle formats, allowing for a more even match between players of different levels of skill and card ownership, as well as the resultant doubled available earnings for all players as the reward pools were doubled in size.
Splinterlands has also seen GameFi capitalists flock to it at an increasing rate. This is bringing more continuous value to the platform. With the game’s elaborate staking system and detailed roadmap, investor confidence is steady and growing.
Organizations can get involved with Splinterlands in a variety of ways, such as purchasing card packs or, more recently, nodes. These cards are often available for purchase with Dark Energy Crystals (DEC), which can be as low as $4 per card.
Investors are seeing Splinterlands as a Web 3.0 opportunity, even though the market continues to pressure weaker projects. Balthazar was supported by Side Door Ventures and was seen earlier this year streaming $1 million USD worth of Splinterlands assets.
There is a constant battle in the crypto space, and blockchain fundamentals are crucial to our survival.
But in spite of the “Wild West” that is blockchain technological development, Splinterlands is proving itself as the de facto leader of GameFi, succeeding in the midst of a sea of downturn and setting the stage for Web 3.0’s place in the gaming industry for years to come.
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