The popularity of NFT (Non-Fungible Tokens) is exploding. According to DappRadar, the trading volume for NFTs hit $10.67B in Q3, 2021, up by 704% compared to the previous quarter. One of the main drivers behind the steady rise in the industry has been the NFT games category, particularly play-and-earn.
With play and earn, the gamers can monetise their playing through buying/selling in-game NFTs or completing objectives in exchange for rewards in cryptocurrency. Currently, the NFT games offer everything from virtual game land, game characters, game add-on, and much more.
The NFT games are still in the experimental stage, but some projects have found success already combining NFTs and gaming.
Starbots – A robot battle game
Meet Starbots, a robot battle NFT game on Solana where players can strategically assemble their robots to win battles, conquer new lands, and a complete new mission.
Recently, Starbots raised $2.4M funding for its robot battle NFT Game from notable names like Impossible Finance, Defi Alliance, Solar Eco Fund, Parsiq, OKEx Blockdream Ventures, TomoChain, Game Studio, LuaVentures, Kyber Network, Solscan, Kyros Ventures, BigCoin Capital, Good Game Guilds, TK Ventures, Quadhorn Guild, Real Deal Guild, and others.
“Starbots is extremely hyped to be receiving such great support from all the big names within the crypto space. Together, we look forward to changing the perception of a playable game on Solana, proving that it’s possible to be having a play-to-earn game with attractive gameplay & incentives.” – Kien Vuong, CEO of Starbots.
Inspired by Battlebots
Inspired by Battlebots, Starbots creates an auto-battlebot game on the Solana blockchain, where users are able to constantly grind for new robot parts and switch them out continuously for in-game battles.
It was started as one of the 10 projects in the first DeFi Alliance’s Gaming Cohort, however, it has gained some attention in a very short span in the crypto-game community.
Starbots board
Starbots features a high-impact advisory board which includes Bored Elon, the founder of MetaMars; Calvin Chu, the core builder at Impossible Finance; William Robinson, core Contributor of DeFi Alliance, and Long Vuong, the founder of TomoChain.
Calvin Chu from Impossible Finance shared: “Impossible is excited to support Starbots in its journey to create more upgradeable NFTs and give play to earn another level of customizability!”
Starbots is now looking towards its $BOT Triple IDO event which will be held in January 2022.
“Starbots has a compelling game loop that was born for both web3’s affordances and constraints. The team of veteran gamewrights rekindles the magic of childhood through robot smashing.” – William Robinson, Core Contributor of DeFi Alliance.
Blockchain-based gaming
In the past few months, many blockchain-based play-to-earn games have stroked the interest of investors.
For instance, MonkeyBall, another play-to-earn gaming platform raised $3M funding in October last year from several VC firms and angel investors. MonkeyBall is a football game featuring a human-sized monkey.
With each victory, players get rewarded with Solana tokens. This token can be moved to exchanges and sold for other tokens including bitcoin, ethereum, among others.
Many other games, including Genopets ($8.3M), and Axie Infinity ($152M) have secured massive funding. According to a report, the Axie Infinity is one of the top revenue-generating protocols in crypto with more than $850M in revenue generated from in-game transactions over the last 12 months.
Games to try this 2022!
If you are keen on getting your hands dirty with NFT’s Play-to-earn games, you should check out the list below:
- Battle of Guardians
- RaceFI
- Rainmaker
- Polygonum
- Galaxy Fight club
- MOBOX
- Mines of Dalarnia
- Illuvium
