Playing your favorite game and being financially rewarded for doing so successfully is the kind of scenario that would have sounded like an impossible dream a generation ago, at least outside the confines of the casino. Yet that is the rationale behind Play to Earn (P2E). The crypto gaming niche shows every sign of emerging from the periphery into the mainstream in 2023.
Crypto games have existed for as long as crypto. But aside from the occasional and brief craze such as Cryptokitties, they have struggled to inspire a sustainable following. Here, we look at some P2E games that might just be heralding the most significant transformation in gaming since the smartphone revolution.
Battle Infinity
Making novel technology fly doesn’t mean reinventing the wheel. We just mentioned the smartphone revolution. The first mobile games were nothing way out – in fact, they were classic crowd-pleasers. Battle Infinity has nothing to do with blowing away the opposition de la CS:GO. In fact, it is a good old-fashioned sports competition. Players take one another on at basketball, soccer, and cricket, battling for position in the Battle Infinity leagues. The great thing about Battle Infinity is that it has so much potential for expansion into other areas.
Pegaxy
Virtual horse racing is a tried and tested form of virtual sport. It even replaced the real thing with live TV coverage on no less an institution than the BBC when the UK’s most famous horse race, the Grand National, was canceled in 2020. Having said that, the software used for the Virtual Grand National looks prehistoric alongside Pegaxy. The sounds and graphics are out of this world. Oh, and did we mention the horses can fly? If any game deserves to bring P2E into the mainstream, it is Pegaxy.
Roulette
Granted, you can visit any crypto casino guide and find a dozen or more online casino sites where you can wager your Bitcoin or Ethereum on a game of roulette. Having said that, metaverse roulette is an emerging phenomenon in its own right. The best-known is Tominoya’s roulette, which certainly takes the notion of a virtual casino to a new level. The social side alone makes it worth a look as you chat with other players at the bar before taking on the Devil’s Wheel. As Humphrey Bogart said, have you tried 22 tonight?
Thetan Arena
Possibly the most hyped P2E of the year is this free-to-play MOBA, the brainchild of Singapore-based Wolffun game studio. It spent much of 2022 leading the blockchain gaming charts in terms of downloads. The gameplay is standard MOBA fare, and there are four distinct game modes, none of which take long to grasp. The most successful players walk away with rewards in the form of Thetan virtual currency.
These are just a few of the P2E games that we might just look back on as pioneers of a new era in gaming. Other titles worth looking out for include Illuvium, Axie Infinity, Nine Chronicles, and Etherman.
