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A new report from DappRadar and the Blockchain Game Alliance confirms that blockchain gaming is defying the bear market with $300 million raised in July and more than one million daily Unique Active Wallets (UAWs). Blockchain games represents almost 60% of crypto industry’s usage, and with $857 million in transactions last month.
The amount of gaming-related transactions is also significantly larger than any other market area, with a current total of $807 million, a 6% increase from June and a 41% increase from the previous year. The second-closest sector, DeFi with $51 million, shows a decline of 33% month-over-month and 61% down from the previous year.
GameFi overtakes DeFi
Alien Worlds, one of the most played blockchain games with 205,285 average daily UAWs, an increase of 8% from June, featured in this week’s DappDays, a five day educational event organized by DappRadar. Activities included supporting articles, videos, quizzes and over £10,000 in giveaways, as well as a daily AMA featuring five gaming and metaverse dapps.
Also taking part in DappDays was Axie Infinity which is still bouncing back from the effects of the Ronin’s bridge hack. Axie’s chain activity has decreased by 6% from June and by 65% from the previous year. Despite this the Origin mobile version published in June, is making the game more accessible to a larger audience, while land staking is now live and promises to get the ecosystem back on track.
Out of the gaming protocols Wax accounts for 42% of the gaming activity. In terms of trajectory, Hive, the second largest gaming blockchain home to Splinterlands, saw its activity increase reaching an average of 148,414 UAWs, an 8% increase month-over-month (MoM). Similarly, the average number of daily UAWs on the Binance Smart Chain increased by 2% from last month. Solana continues to expand, with a 38% increase MoM, while Flow saw record growth this month, gaining 921% with 17,595 average daily UAW.
The Web3 resistance
Despite progress, Web3 continues to face resistance from traditional gaming players, with the headlines in late July captured by news that Mojang, the developers of Minecraft, announcing that the game will prevent blockchain on game servers run independently by fans and developers, as well prohibit the usage of Minecraft graphics in NFT projects. What contradicts the new Minecraft restrictions is that Microsoft launched its own official Minecraft-themed NFTs in February 2021.
Opposition to NFTs in gaming is not confirmed to developers. “When Ubisoft announced the Ubisoft Quartz platform for its NFTs named Digits, the public harshly criticized it. When the rumor began to circulate that Grand Theft Auto 6 could incorporate a Bitcoin incentive program, fans were extremely unhappy. Therefore, it seems likely that Mojang and Microsoft are wary about NFTs because they care so much about Minecraft gamers,” the report suggested.
The cut
The virtual worlds of the metaverse had a down month with an 8% decrease in trading volume at $32 million; Yuga Lab’s Otherdeeds (virtual land in their Otherside metaverse) surpassed $1 billion in sales volume, the fastest collection to do that.
Nonetheless, Otherside’s trading volume is down by 5% MoM, and the average UAW decreased by 7.69% during the previous 30 days. Similarly, leading metaverse platforms Decentraland and The Sandbox witnessed a monthly decline of 29% and 21%, respectively. Both platforms each had a total trading volume of about $2 million.
