BLOCKCHAIN GAMES EXPLAINED FOR ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS

tybdao
7 min readNov 3, 2022

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The Global gaming market is projected to reach $222 billion this year following how blockchain gaming is enjoying mass traction due to its unlimited use cases like play to earn that allows gamers to make money while playing games. Recently, several intriguing games have deluged the market as the concept of the metaverse is gaining massive adoption and popularity. In this article, we present an overview of blockchain games and their relevance in the cryptoverse.

Recently, curiosity about how blockchain technology may revolutionize several businesses has grown. The advent of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) has brought to light the enormous potential of blockchain technology in blockchain gaming, making it the most recent innovation in the sector since it presents players with exciting new prospects.

DEFINING BLOCKCHAIN GAMES

Any online video game that utilizes blockchain technology, such as cryptocurrencies and non-fungible tokens, is referred to as a blockchain game. Blockchain games let players purchase, sell, or trade in-game items with other players, thereby creating a new economy known as GameFi

In contrast to conventional games, blockchain games enable users to earn, gather, and transfer in-platform assets between games and platforms, creating an avenue for players to monetize their experience.

WHAT MAKES BLOCKCHAIN GAMES UNIQUE?

The fundamental difference between blockchain games and conventional games, which depend on centralized server infrastructure, is the intrinsic decentralization enabled by blockchain technology as a decentralized approach, that allows anybody to access the gaming server, is used in blockchain games.

Thanks to the decentralization and transparency of blockchain technology, players may see and study blockchain game histories to improve their performance in future sessions. Also, external factors that favor particular players are eliminated as no one can manipulate the system.

TYPES OF BLOCKCHAIN GAMES

Since the inception of cryptokitties which was the very first blockchain game, a lot of new blockchain games have emerged. Currently, there are various genres of blockchain games, and gamers who prefer a particular model can participate and earn rewards. Hence, the opportunities are limitless. The diverse category of blockchain games include:

  • CARD GAMES:

Card games which are also known as trading card games are typically characterized as blockchain games in which players collect cards (tradable NFTs) for their collections, from which they assemble unique decks and compete against other players.

Typically, players start by buying a starter deck that is prepared for play, but later on, they can buy booster packs that contain random cards or trade with other players to get more cards.

Examples of blockchain games using tradable card include:

In this free-to-play trading card game, players use fantasy cards to engage in epic duels.

Gods Unchained’s GODS token is intended to serve as the game’s primary medium of exchange, supporting the ecosystem that enables players to acquire and trade NFTs.

Players now have additional opportunities to win valuable assets thanks to the introduction of the GODS token, which ushers in a new era of Play to Earn mechanics. With GODS, users may take part in Gods Unchained on a profound basis by buying additional card packs and chests, creating their own NFT cards, and earning staking rewards.

This play-to-win blockchain game, formerly known as Steem Monsters, gives fans of card games a place to fight monsters and gain marketable in-game rewards. Every card in the game is an NFT and has a special quality that makes characters strong and increases their chances of winning. These characteristics include armor, splinter, speed, health, and abilities.

There are many other forms of gaming activities, including missions, rated matches, and tournaments, where players may participate and win rewards every day. At the end of in-game seasons and contests, prizes are awarded (in the form of chests, potions, or dark energy crystals). In addition, daily tasks and competitions provide prizes to players.

  • STRATEGY GAMES:

Strategy games are blockchain games that bank on strategy as the outcome is greatly influenced by the players’ free and frequently independent decision-making abilities, creative thinking, and planning.

In general, the decrease of opposing forces is frequently the objective, and a player must prepare a variety of operations against either one or numerous opponents. Hence, victory is attained via excellent strategy, and luck typically plays a smaller part.

Examples of blockchain-based strategy games include:

In this play-to-earn online blockchain game, players gather, breed, and mint creatures known as Axies before using them in combat. The objective of the game is for gamers to defeat every adversary that their squad of three Axies is up against. Hence, a player must carefully choose which cards to play each round in order to increase their chances of winning.

Each battle makes a player’s allies a little bit stronger. Player-versus-player (PvP) and player-versus-environment (PvE) modes of the game, which pit users against each other and artificial intelligent (AI) foes, respectively, are both made seamless for players to compete with stronger Axies.

This is regarded as one of the earliest blockchain games with massive multiplayer online strategy in the world. All the land plots in a game along with tokenizable materials, skins, and many other game assets are non-fungible tokens.

Gamers establish kingdoms, farm resources, battle monsters in Player versus Environment mode, and compete with other kingdoms or alliances in Player versus player mode. Gamers may also march their forces to hunt different creatures that live on the land and work on resource farms to acquire precious materials including food, timber, stone, money, and rare crystals.

BLOCKCHAIN GAME ECONOMICS

BLOCKCHAIN GAME REVENUE MODEL:

Blockchain games provide users with many ways to earn or purchase gaming tokens. People can profit from these tokens by purchasing them early and anticipating that a large number of players would enter the game once they have purchased the tokens. Some blockchain games make money through advertising or the selling of in-game products like weaponry, skins, or even virtual territories. The producers then motivate users to spend more time playing the blockchain game by rewarding them with cryptocurrency or NFTs for task completion. These missions are usually basic chores that require you to engage within the game, including killing a particular number of opponents or gathering a certain quantity of resources.

PLAY TO EARN MODEL

Blockchain games compensate gamers for participating, as opposed to conventional games, where players must pay to enter and progress through the game. Blockchain games enable gamers to take part in the chance to win in-game items in the form of digital assets (fungible and non-fungible) by accomplishing in-game challenges such as completing daily missions and winning fights. Hence, as a gamer keeps playing, their odds of gathering more assets rise, as does their possibility of raising the worth of those assets. These items can then be sold for cryptocurrencies or conventional cash. Play-to-earn models have evolved as a result of the convergence of blockchain technology with gaming.

NFT BASED GAMING :

To store in-game items and tokens, cryptocurrency uses a distributed ledger based on blockchain technology. A non-fungible token (NFT) may be created within the game using this process, and its owners will enjoy all ownership benefits. Because gamers possess NFTs instead of game publishers, they can sell them for digital currencies and fiat currency on open NFT marketplaces. This removes the possibility of in-game asset theft. All in-game purchases are secured by the blockchain, and gamers get more autonomy over their gameplay experience.

THE FUTURE OF BLOCKCHAIN GAMING

Blockchain games require speed and scalability hence blockchain game developers are on the lookout for more efficient blockchains to build on. Due to its TPS efficiency and scalability, the Aptos Network is raising a lot of eyebrows.

Aptos is a Layer-1 blockchain that is both secure and scalable. Aptos has the highest transaction per second (TPS) and the fastest time to finality when compared with other Layer-1 blockchains. Aptos positions itself as the heir of Diem’s legacy, a stablecoin created by Meta. Aptos is committed to extending its ecosystem and provides grants to developers and projects who are interested in building on the Aptos Network.

To date, over 100 projects have been developed on the Aptos blockchain, with use cases ranging from DeFi to NFT to blockchain games.

One of the key gaming projects on Aptos is The Aptos Game, which claims to be the first Play To Earn and Free To Play game built on the Aptos Blockchain. Beside Aptos Game, more projects are excited to build on Aptos, chief among them is Pontem Network is dedicated to developing professional products from Defi to gaming on the Aptos Blockchain.

Pontem is a product studio committed to building and growing the Aptos Ecosystem and the MOVE language. Pontem is currently preparing an NFT program for its ambassadors and with Pontem’s upcoming Move VM implementation for Solidity, migrating Aptos dApps to other chains will be possible and the possibilities of cross-chain gaming in the nearest future will increase.

As we anticipate the advancement of the metaverse and other blockchain-based technologies and networks, it is safe to say that the future for blockchain-based gaming includes Cross-Chain functionalities and Pontem is leading the charge on cross-chain gaming.

For more updates, visit pontem.network

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