Crypto games like CryptoKitties and Ether-based collectibles have made a monumental impact on crypto trading. These NFTs can be traded for other assets and more importantly, serve as an investment. There’s been a growing trend in the gaming industry to incorporate cryptos into their gameplay which has led to exponential growth of transactions for these types of items. Experts are starting to take note though: will this trend continue?
Axie Infinity is a blockchain-based game that allows players to buy and sell virtual items. In 2021, Axie Infinity accounted for 67% of all the transactions in blockchain-based games. Read more in detail here: nft sales.
According to a recent analysis by NonFungible, in the previous year, players of the monster-battle nonfungible tokens (NFTs) game Axie Infinity exchanged about $3.5 billion worth of NFTs. In 2021, the value represents roughly two-thirds of all NFTs exchanged in the whole blockchain gaming industry.
NBA Top Shot, a sports highlights marketplace, came in second with $827 million and Loot, a community gaming platform, came in third with roughly $242 million.
The game, which was created by Vietnamese video game developer Sky Mavis in 2018, features Axies, which players collect and use to complete daily quests, duel other players, and much more.
Each Axie is a non-fungible token (NFT) created on the Ethereum network. Completing various activities with Axies awards users with Smooth Love Potions (SLP), which can be sold for cash on cryptocurrency exchanges, providing a steady source of revenue.
In all, Axie Infinity was responsible for 19% of the expected $17 billion in nonfungible token transactions in 2021. Last November, Axie Infinity gained a lot of traction, especially among gamers in developing countries, where playing Axie Infinity could earn you more money than working minimum wage jobs.
Despite this, several players have complained to the developers that their revenues have plummeted as a result of SLP’s 67.5 percent price drop in 2021. The decrease in price may be ascribed to increased token inflation as a result of more people joining and playing this game.
Axie Infinity has around 2.7 million monthly players at the time of writing, up from only 1 million in March 2021. However, the circulating quantity of SLP has increased from 541.7 million to 5.13 billion since July.
In all, 20,986,532 NFTs were acquired and sold by blockchain gaming fans in the last year, totaling $5.18 billion. A total of 112 blockchain games and 1.88 million active wallets were also found. The statistics accounted for 2.18 percent of the global gaming market in 2021, according to the NonFungible research.
