The NFT investing craze continues to stay hot. In the last quarter, user growth and engagement in crypto-related gaming projects have exceeded other NFT and DeFi applications, according to analytics platform DappRadar. Blockchain gaming investments were valued at $476 million for the first half of 2021; investments in October alone are double that number. Currently, the most common business strategy explored by larger video game publishers is selling collectible NFTs using legacy brand value.
The bellwether for built-from-the-ground-up crypto gaming came earlier this year in the form of the Sky Mavis game, Axie Infinity. Axie Infinity is a “play-to-earn” (P2E) mobile game where players can battle, breed, and trade digital monsters also called Axie. Thanks to the success of Axie Infinity, Sky Mavis raised an additional $152 million in a Series B funding round. Axie’s user growth over the last year is staggering. Since its inception, the game has generated more than $2.4 billion in total transaction volume, making it the most valuable NFT collection to date. For one week in July, the game raked in more revenue at the protocol level than Bitcoin, Ethereum, and most of the top-ranking DeFi projects. In August, it boasted an average of 1.8 million active daily users, at one point reaching $33 million in daily transactions.
“It’d be impossible – unless you’re living under a rock – to not look at [Axie Infinity], take it very seriously, and try to figure out what’s going on,” said Sam Englebardt, Partner at Galaxy Interactive. “If nothing else, what blockchain enables is the greatest, most viral, cost-efficient form of user acquisition, and we see it again and again.”
Not all video game publishers are sold on crypto gaming. In response to the gaming platform Steam’s decision last week to ban all games that feature cryptocurrencies or NFTs, Fortnite creator Epic Games opened its Game Store to the niche intersection so long as they follow the rules. The current approach for how countries want to regulate the crypto sector might be enough to hold back many gaming publishers from, at least publicly, announcing the development of a game like Axie Infinity this year. Still, that makes the present moment the perfect time for VCs to place their bets.
(All information was provided by Yahoo! Finance)
0 comments on “VCs Nearly Doubled Their Bets On Crypto Gaming In October”