NFT Games – Should You Play and Are They Worth It?

NFTs and Games: Are They a Perfect Match?

The combination of these two can be considered a perfect match. In all the earlier models of online gaming, every item that was acquired/purchased could only be utilized in that game. Plus, these can only be taken advantage of using only one account.

If the gamer’s account was disabled, was hacked and stolen, etc. all money spent on items would disappear. So, everything they acquired would go to waste and the gamer can’t do anything about it.

This is a common reality among a lot of people and it’s something they’ve come to accept. It continues to happen since there’s no available alternative – that’s until NFTs started appearing, which changed everything.

By making in-game items NFTs, a lot of players will get to control and own their purchases, earnings, and crafts. This is more than just proving that their character’s weapons/accessories are rare. It also means that these can be purchased/sold on secondary markets, moved to multiple games, and more.

But what’s best about this is that the player can hold on to the value they put into these items.

In-game NFTs

With NFTs present in games, these will provide users another way to generate income via playing NFT games. Instead of earning fungible ERC-20 tokens like SLPs from Axie Infinity, you’ll get NFTs representing collectible items. This form of gameplay is the classic way of generating income through NFT games.

The worth of each item will vary based on their rarity, cosmetics, or utilities based in the game.

Let’s use CryptoKitties as an example: it’s a game that only relies on the concept of collecting in-game NFTs. There’s no way to continuously play the game and earn steady without the aspect of chance.

For the newer NFT games, these provide a combination of both in-game and play-to-earn NFTs.

Why is NFT Gaming Becoming Popular?

We can’t deny that the play-to-earn concept is a growing phenomenon in the gaming environment. It’s where players of NFT games get rewards from within the game, which later on can be converted to cash. Yes, real money.

This type of cryptocurrency has been around for a couple of years. But despite that, it only reached great heights during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is due to the subsequent lockdowns which rendered millions of people jobless.

Although this is the case, these people are mostly open to earning additional funds via gaming.

COVID-19 and the Gaming Market

Because of the pandemic’s impact, it affected the gaming market as well. That’s because millions of people ended up getting stuck at home, so they tend to play more games for entertainment.

One survey from March 2020 showed that gamers in the US spent around 45% more time playing during the quarantine.

The console and PC markets have lagged behind mobile. It’s because the latter globally dominated more than 50% of all internet traffic for the first time. This was during the first quarter of 2021.

While this is happening, a new kind of gameplay has been slowly moving into the market with great success. This is NFT gaming.

What Makes NFT and Blockchain Gaming so Spectacular?

It’s the trifecta effect that NFT and blockchain gaming brings which make them both spectacular. Traditionally, blockchain-based games do two specific things: one is that it lets players relax and have fun. The other is it’s fast becoming a source of income for players.

So now, player investors are adding more blockchain games into their basket of assets and portfolios. To put it simply, blockchain gamers are turning into investors of their favorite games. From there, they curate then acquire unique in-game assets that they will later sell to acquire huge profits.

The whole idea of playing then earning is exceptionally enticing, hence, why NFT gaming has become a huge success.

Should You Play NFT Games

With more NFT games appearing, players need to start getting into these before their prices go high. Currently, Axie Infinity is still considered quite expensive. Yet with more new titles coming out, these might be more affordable to get into.

Here are some of the up-and-coming NFT games to watch out for:

Guild of Guardians

This is a fantasy-themed RPG where players will build a team to complete dungeon quests and earn resources. Like with other games, collecting resources allows crafting of in-game items which of course, can be profitable.

Just remember that the game will heavily focus on establishing communities or guilds.

Guild of Guardians is still in development and the founder NFTs are now on sale. A soft launch is set for the second quarter of 2022.

Gold Fever

This one is a jungle-themed RPG where players can select a character who will try and outplay others. Players will aim for a chance to mine gold that takes the form of Gold Fever’s native token, NGL.

Players will also focus on collecting unique NFT items such as clothes, various supplies, and weapons.

Benefits of NFT Gaming

Although a lot of NFTs utilize the ERC-721 token standard, NFTs are frequent on other networks like TRON, EOS, and NEO.

Let’s take a look at the different NFT gaming benefits that gamers can take advantage of.

The Chance to Attract Venture Capital

Smart investors can see the huge potential for profiting in the blockchain and cryptocurrency sectors. And today, gaming is considered a brand-new way to effectively sell products and services. With this, the blockchain game solution might just become the next Tencent.

To get the attention of venture capitalists, owners and game developers aim to enter the bandwagon of blockchain-based gaming. It’s also analyzed that venture capital funds investing in blockchain-based solutions will bring in more investments soon. These investments are assumed to be over $52 billion between 2021 and 2022.

Ownership

Classic in-game purchases are considered non-transferable, one-time investments that stay locked in one gaming world. Compared to NFTs, using these in gaming environments will allow players full ownership of their game assets. This is compared to regular games where the game developers own such.

Via blockchain technology, gamers will be able to save in-game purchases then opt to sell them to other players. Or, they can also transfer these to other games that are supported.

Provable Scarcity

For most collectors, they value authenticity, uniqueness, and rarity. So, the scarcity of in-game NFT purchases can be proven via the immutable records in an NFTs fundamental blockchain network. This assigned public ledger certifies the uniqueness and number of each NFT, as well as the history of its ownership.

Interoperability

Classic online games are present on centralized servers. So, the in-game assets are all present within proprietary systems that do not connect with others.

Compared to decentralized games, these exist on independent blockchains that function as a back-end framework for other games that are interconnected. As a result, game assets that are defined by NFTs can be made to be interoperable across various environments.

For example, two games created on the Ethereum network can support similar in-game assets. These include armor, vehicles, or even all the characters available.

Immutability

When a classic online game shuts down, gamers usually lose all their in-game purchases. But since NFTs exist independently and stay on the blockchain itself, it’s a different story.

As such, in-game purchases can be bought then sold no matter what happens to the game. And, newer games can be designed to easily plug into current blockchain protocols.

Moreover, blockchain-enabled game assets can’t be copied or tampered with. It’s all due to the permanent data that each NFT produces once they’re issued.