"Gaming NFTs are so back", but are they?
GC ALPHA 11
Disclaimer: None of this information should be taken as financial advice. DYOR + I will hold some of the assets that are spoken of in this newsletter.
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(P2A) EVENTS & SOCIALFI
RAGNAROK: MONSTER WORLD CBT
Today Ragnarok: Monster World (RMW) launched its Closed Beta Test. The event will run from today, the 19th, until the 25th.
All users can participate in this event (only a few countries will be excluded) by downloading the game through TestFlight or the Google Play Store
Players will be able to participate in 6 different events during the CBT:
Daily events: Log in daily to receive off-chain rewards (these rewards will be wiped after the event)
ROMW NFT holders: Holders of these types of NFTs receive additional off-chain Ragmons.
Using these resources they can strategize for future NFT claiming and merging. Genesis Tamer holders receive the highest number of Ragmons
Consecutive Login Event: Log in for 3 days in a row to receive an off-chain Mythical Box after the official game release
Real Tamers Event: Connect your Google Account and Ronin wallet to participate in Missions for extra NFT and raffle ticket rewards
Discord Event: Share your strategies on the #Game-Winning Strategy Channel on Discord to have the chance to win an NFT
Share your Gameplay Event: Take a screenshot while you’re playing, share the results on X, and submit the link via Google Forms to have the chance to win an NFT
FABLEBORNE S2
Fableborne S2 is also starting today (on the 19th), with a new Hero, Survival Seige and PvP Events, a new boss, 50 new campaign levels, and 2 more defense units
During the event, players will be able to collect Essence again:
Bronze Essence: rewarded through daily bronze quests (partner communities will receive a bonus multiplier)
Silver Essence: won’t be rewarded this season, but retains its value
Gold Essence: will be rewarded through the two-week P2A event by participating in the new competitions within the app:
Seige Survival runs from Aug 20 - 26th
Kingdom Clash runs from Aug 26 - 29th
During both events, only the top 10,000 players will receive Gold Essence
Primordial Essence: will only be rewarded to NFT holders
Additionally, Fableborne recently introduced the “Forge”:
A player initiative where your contributions to the ecosystem get rewarded (e.g. content, fan art, game assets, etc.)
This initiative is going live with the P2A S2 launch
IMMORTAL RISING2
Immortal Rising 2’s launch pre-registration is now open. With the release of this event, they also started their P2A campaign:
You can now connect to their website, and start earning ORB when completing simple social quests
In a later stage, gameplay and feedback missions, community events, and quiz-related tasks will be added to the platform to earn more ORB
Note: new missions will continue to be added and the rewards for completing missions might decrease with time (being early = rewarded)
ORB gives you access to Immortal Tokens (IMT). IMT is used for in-game transactions, resources, governance, and staking (TGE is scheduled for Q4 ‘24)
Furthermore, ORB allows you to unlock WLs, participate in giveaways, and more at key milestones (TGE, launch, etc.)
Other than IMT, there are two in-game currencies:
Starlight: awarded as in-game rewards and used to create NFTs or converted to Stardust (also rewarded through staking)
Starlight can also be converted into IMT at a specific rate
Stardust: an in-game currency used for character growth and crafting U-grade items (rewarded through competitive gameplay content)
FLASH EVENTS
Forgotten Runiverse is returning with a Public Event, starting Aug 26th
Gangster Arena 4: Rampage is launching this week, with a bunch of new features
SA Worlds’s Great Escape is live, rewarding $1.7M in SAE tokens
CARV and Binance launched the Binance Web3 Wallet event with 1M CARV and 30K USDC in prizes
SKALE released the SKALE Swell initiative, complete quests on the chain, climb the leaderboard, and win prizes
Ultiverse DAO announced its Game Summer event is coming soon
The Lost Glitches Open Beta is now live, which is part of the XAI Vanguard Genesis Quests
MARKET TALK
ARE (GAMING) NFTS BACK?
If you spent a little bit of time on your TL last week, you probably saw a post or two about “NFTs being back”. Imo we’re far from being back yet, but we are seeing some sort of sentiment shift. Let me explain:
Firstly, let’s provide some perspective on the NFT market:
Peak sales volume overall: $6B+ in January 2022
Peak sales volume 2023: $1.7B+ in December
Peak sales volume 2024 (so far): $1.6B+ in March
Sales volume July 2024: $427M
And if you look at the trend in volume for this year (pictured above), you can see a steep decline in MoM sales volume since the start of this year
Secondly, this shift seems to be caused by the meme coin trenches being cooked, traders are simply looking for the next play to make their money.
But they don’t see that NFTs are not that profitable as of now (-$20M overall trade profit last month)
Thirdly, the period of Q2 ‘21 until Q1 ‘22 was a period where we saw a large amount of retail (so new capital) coming in. The # of new entrants into NFTs is much lower this cycle (# of new buyers didn’t increase)
On a more positive note, we’re seeing some new gaming NFT launches (e.g. GOAT, Moonfrost, Shadow War) and existing collections (e.g. Super Champs) do pretty well. Although, we are far from the “2021 NFT gains”
Overall, it’s good to see a shift in sentiment, but what I am seeing is sentiment > volume. Only, when the capital rotation from memes to NFTs becomes more apparent, I will change my stance from carefully positive to bullish
WHAT IS SERVERFI (EDUCATIONAL)
Metacene is introducing the new concept of ServerFI, coined by Pavun Shetty a researcher/student from Yale University (S/O to 1mpal, pointing me to this resource)
In simple terms the paper addresses the issues of the overproduction of in-game assets and tokens, leading to market saturation, devaluation, and decreased player engagement.
Without effective regulation and sustained incentives, Web3 games will struggle to maintain long-term value and player interest
So, the idea of ServerFi is proposed as a solution to tackle these problems, concluding that:
The ServerFi mechanism (the Privatization through Asset Synthesis = creating new NFT assets from fragments or resources) promotes long-term player engagement and sustainability.
It does so by introducing randomness and opportunities for social mobility (moving among the in-game hierarchy ladder) and allowing both top players and newcomers to continuously benefit
On the other hand, the existing model of continuous rewards for high-retention players initially boosts engagement but leads to player stratification (player grouping based on in-game power, wealth, etc.), disengagement of lower-tier players, and challenges in maintaining long-term value growth, creating barriers for new entrants
Note: This content is a bit technical and educational, and was my best attempt to summarize the findings of the paper with the help of ChatGPT.
The question remains whether this is just a marketing gimmick by Metecane or they are onto something
ON THE RISE
PlaysOut is a mini-game SDK platform
They’re partnered with Tencent and are planning to bring 1000s of WeChat games to Telegram
Fried Chicken Labs revealed that they’re working on Takedown Legends
A mobile top-down shooter with MOBA mechanics
Castile says: “something big is cooking”
Seeing lots of volume for the collection this month could be something token-related