Comprehensive analysis of Web3 gaming's journey from Axie Infinity to present day challenges. Explores why traditional gaming companies enter Web3, examines structural issues in P2E models, and discusses future potential through AI integration. Features case studies of major players like MapleStory ...

Web3 Gaming: It's Not Over Till It's Over

Web3 Gaming sees renewed interest with a 29.3% sector growth. Axie Infinity and Sandbox price show resilience with reversal patterns and major breakouts ahead.

Is Web3 Gaming Back? Axie Infinity & Sandbox Price Show Massive Weekly Gains - CryptoNewsZ

In a recent development, crypto wallets associated with the defunct crypto exchange FTX and its sister trading firm, Alameda Research, have initiated significant transfers of digital assets to various crypto exchanges,

Crypto wallets from FTX and alameda research move $13.1 million to exchanges

After 4-days of resistance testing, Axie Infinity’s rally appears to have met rejection from the 200DMA, in a move that could spell disaster as AXS price sinks -5.5%. The downside move can be partially explained by a spike in FUD, stemming from a ...

Is Axie Infinity Going to Zero? AXS Price Sinks 5.5% as Viral New Meme Coin Raises $1,000,000 – Next Shiba Inu?

M illions of dollars worth of crypto assets have been moved out of official wallets linked to FTX and its trading firm Alameda in the past 24 hours, according to Spotonchain, as the bankrupt exchange labors under court supervision to salvage value and maximize its token holdings.

FTX, Alameda Wallets Move Millions in Crypto to Exchanges: Spotonchain

SLP is an in-game currency used within the Axie Infinity ecosystem, a play-to-earn blockchain game developed by Sky Mavis. Players earn SLP by participating in various game modes, such as quests, arena battles, and adventure mode. SLP has gained ...

Smooth Love Potion (SLP) Crypto Price Prediction 2023-2031

Axie Infinity Origins has officially launched Season 6, named Mystic Era, offering players an opportunity to compete for a massive prize pool of 13,215 AXS. Over the course of seven days, gamers will engage in intense battles, vying for the top spot on the ...

Exciting Challenges Await in Origins Season 6

The article explains how to protect yourself from the crypto crimes using these essential safety tips while understanding fundamentals of it.

Cryptocurrency-Related Crime Is on The Rise: Protect Yourself With These 6 Tips

Against all odds, GameFi has survived the crypto winter. While token prices may be down across the board as compared to 2021 record-breaking highs, all major GameFi projects are in the same boat with equally low averages.

Top 5 GameFi Tokens AXS, SAND, IMX, DEP & OAS to Watch #BUIDL

The Unibot team told users this morning that any losses due to the Telegram bot's router "will be compensated."

'Your Keys and Wallets Are Safe', Says Telegram Bot Unibot Amid $640k Exploit

Axie Infinity

axie-infinity

The last major success story in blockchain gaming was Axie Infinity in 2021. Since then, no Web3 game has truly captured the market’s attention. For the past four years, the gaming crypto space has struggled to deliver a breakthrough. Now, Taitiko is aiming to change that. Positioned as the next major Web3 gaming contender, Taitiko is set to announce a major strategic milestone that could redefine the industry and revive interest in blockchain gaming. Strategic Partnerships Driving Growth Taitiko’s expansion is driven by powerful collaborations with key players in the blockchain and gaming industries. Partnerships with DEXTools, a leading DeFi analytics platform; Tonstation Games, a prominent developer within the TON ecosystem; SidusPad, a Web3 launchpad meticulously designed by industry-leading gaming experts, including the team behind Sidus Heroes; and Decubate, a Web3 accelerator, exemplify Taitiko’s commitment to creating lasting value. These alliances not only enhance Taitiko’s technological capabilities but also open new avenues for player engagement and ecosystem development. Innovative Product Ecosystem Taitiko’s product lineup is designed to deliver dynamic, competitive experiences to a global audience. At its core is Taitiko ARENA, a fast-paced, skill-based mini-game platform integrated with Telegram, boasting over 100,000 active users. Additionally, Taitiko Party, a multiplayer desktop game for Windows and Mac, is 80% complete, with development ready to resume for a future launch. The next iteration of the Telegram game will introduce real-money competition, further enhancing player engagement. Complementing this ecosystem is the Taitiko ARENA NFT Collection, a set of 1,111 unique NFTs that merge aesthetic appeal with in-game utility, embedded within a year-long storyline enriched by cinematic content. A Vision for the Future Taitiko’s vision extends beyond gaming, aiming to build a sustainable ecosystem that thrives on player engagement rather than token speculation. The company’s business model ensures long-term growth without relying on unsustainable mechanisms. As Taitiko prepares for the launch of its token and a major update to Taitiko ARENA, it is also exploring opportunities in entertainment, collectibles, and even film, reinforcing its position as a pioneer in digital entertainment. With a clear roadmap and a strong foundation, Taitiko is poised to redefine the future of Web3 gaming.Taitiko: 3 years of innovation in Web3 Gaming. About Taitiko Taitiko is a leading Web3 gaming project committed to revolutionizing the gaming industry through innovation, strategic partnerships, and immersive experiences. With a growing user base and a roadmap focused on sustainability and expansion, Taitiko is set to become a cornerstone of the Web3 gaming ecosystem. Media Contact: info@taitiko.comAlex Pei Fresneda<https://www.taitiko.com/ ](https://www.taitiko.com/) <https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial ](https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial) https://t.me/taitiko_official This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here The last major success story in blockchain gaming was Axie Infinity in 2021. Since then, no Web3 game has truly captured the market’s attention. For the past four years, the gaming crypto space has struggled to deliver a breakthrough. Now, Taitiko is aiming to change that. Positioned as the next major Web3 gaming contender, Taitiko is set to announce a major strategic milestone that could redefine the industry and revive interest in blockchain gaming. Strategic Partnerships Driving Growth Taitiko’s expansion is driven by powerful collaborations with key players in the blockchain and gaming industries. Partnerships with DEXTools, a leading DeFi analytics platform; Tonstation Games, a prominent developer within the TON ecosystem; SidusPad, a Web3 launchpad meticulously designed by industry-leading gaming experts, including the team behind Sidus Heroes; and Decubate, a Web3 accelerator, exemplify Taitiko’s commitment to creating lasting value. These alliances not only enhance Taitiko’s technological capabilities but also open new avenues for player engagement and ecosystem development. Innovative Product Ecosystem Innovative Product Ecosystem Taitiko’s product lineup is designed to deliver dynamic, competitive experiences to a global audience. At its core is Taitiko ARENA, a fast-paced, skill-based mini-game platform integrated with Telegram, boasting over 100,000 active users. Additionally, Taitiko Party, a multiplayer desktop game for Windows and Mac, is 80% complete, with development ready to resume for a future launch. The next iteration of the Telegram game will introduce real-money competition, further enhancing player engagement. Complementing this ecosystem is the Taitiko ARENA NFT Collection, a set of 1,111 unique NFTs that merge aesthetic appeal with in-game utility, embedded within a year-long storyline enriched by cinematic content. A Vision for the Future A Vision for the Future Taitiko’s vision extends beyond gaming, aiming to build a sustainable ecosystem that thrives on player engagement rather than token speculation. The company’s business model ensures long-term growth without relying on unsustainable mechanisms. As Taitiko prepares for the launch of its token and a major update to Taitiko ARENA, it is also exploring opportunities in entertainment, collectibles, and even film, reinforcing its position as a pioneer in digital entertainment. With a clear roadmap and a strong foundation, Taitiko is poised to redefine the future of Web3 gaming. Taitiko: 3 years of innovation in Web3 Gaming. Taitiko: 3 years of innovation in Web3 Gaming. Taitiko: 3 years of innovation in Web3 Gaming. About Taitiko About Taitiko Taitiko is a leading Web3 gaming project committed to revolutionizing the gaming industry through innovation, strategic partnerships, and immersive experiences. With a growing user base and a roadmap focused on sustainability and expansion, Taitiko is set to become a cornerstone of the Web3 gaming ecosystem. Media Contact: info@taitiko.comAlex Pei Fresneda<https://www.taitiko.com/ ](https://www.taitiko.com/) info@taitiko.com Alex Pei Fresneda <https://www.taitiko.com/ ](https://www.taitiko.com/) info@taitiko.com info@taitiko.com <https://www.taitiko.com/ ](https://www.taitiko.com/) <https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial ](https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial) <https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial ](https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial) <https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial ](https://x.com/TaitikoOfficial) https://t.me/taitiko_official https://t.me/taitiko_official https://t.me/taitiko_official https://t.me/taitiko_official This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here here here

From Axie Infinity To Taitiko: The Blockchain Game Poised To Lead The Next Bull Run

Axie Infinity-dən Taitiko-ya: Blockchain Oyunu Növbəti Bull Run-a rəhbərlik etməyə hazırlaşır

De Axie Infinity a Taitiko: el juego blockchain preparado para liderar el próximo rally alcista

Axie Infinitystä Taitikoon: Blockchain-peli valmis johtamaan seuraavaa härkäjuoksua

Da Axie Infinity a Taitiko: il gioco Blockchain pronto a guidare la prossima corsa al rialzo

מ-Axie Infinity ועד Taitiko: משחק הבלוקצ'יין מוכן להוביל את ריצת השור הבאה

Axie Infinity から Taitiko まで: 次の強気相場をリードするブロックチェーン ゲーム

Axie Infinity-ден Taitiko-ға дейін: Blockchain ойыны келесі бұқа жүгірісіне жетекшілік етеді

Од Axie Infinity до Taitiko: Играта со блокчејн подготвена да ја води следната трка со бикови

Од Акие Инфинитија до Таитикоа: Блоцкцхаин игра спремна да предводи следећу трку бикова

Kutoka Axie Infinity Hadi Taitiko: Mchezo wa Blockchain Uko Tayari Kuongoza Mbio Ijayo ya Fahali

ካብ ኣክሲ ኢንፊኒቲ ናብ ታይቲኮ: ጸወታ ብሎክቸይን ንዝቕጽል ጉያ ብዕራይ ክመርሕ ተዳልዩ ኣሎ።

Axie Infinity'dan Taitikogacha: Blockchain o'yini navbatdagi Bull Runni boshqarishga tayyor

SEC v. Binance Court Filing, retrieved on June 5, 2023 is part of . You can jump to any part in this filing . This is part 52 of 69. HackerNoon’s Legal PDF Series here FACTS VIII. THE CRYPTO ASSETS TRADED ON THE BINANCE.COM PLATFORM AND BINANCE.US PLATFORM INCLUDE ASSETS THAT WERE OFFERED AND SOLD AS SECURITIES. I. AXS 486. Axie Infinity Shards (“AXS”) are ethereum tokens that are native to the Axie Infinity (“Axie”) game, a blockchain game that allows players to interact in a virtual world through digital pets called “Axies.” 487. Axie was created by Sky Mavis PTE LTD (Sky Mavis) and launched in 2018. The Sky Mavis team has 40 full-time employees, which include CEO Trung Nguyen and COO Aleksander Leonard Larsen, who are part of the founding team responsible for key decisions regarding Axie, such as product development, marketing, digital design, and software engineering. 488. Players of the Axie game can earn AXS for successfully playing the Axie game and can use AXS to make in-game purchases. AXS can also be staked through Axie. The total AXS token supply is 270 million with over 100 million in circulation. 489. In 2020, Sky Mavis raised about $864,000 in a purportedly private sale of AXS tokens to “strategic investors.” That same year, Sky Mavis conducted a public sale of AXS, resulting in the distribution of 29.7 million AXS tokens, raising $2.9 million for Axie. The AXS tokens sold to “strategic investors” were offered at a 20 percent discount to those sold in the public offering, and were subject to a quarterly unlocking schedule over a two-year period. 490. AXS has been available for buying, selling, and trading on the Binance.com Platform since October 2020, and the Binance.US Platform since November 2021. 491. The information Sky Mavis publicly disseminated has led AXS holders, including those who have purchased AXS since August 2021, reasonably to view AXS as an investment in and to expect to profit from Sky Mavis’s efforts to grow the Axie protocol, which, in turn, would increase demand for and value of AXS. 492. For example, Sky Mavis explained publicly that funds raised in the AXS 2020 offerings were pooled and used to develop and improve the Axie platform. An October 26, 2020 article explains that the “team has used funds raised according to the allocations below: 85% [d]evelopmental expenses; 10% [a]dministrative costs; 5% [b]usiness development and marketing.” 493. Also, on November 19, 2020, the Axie Twitter account stated: “Today, we’re proud to share more info on the $AXS strategic sale! The participants will help open amazing new doors. The capital will help us scale the team so we can better deliver on the gameplay and feature updates you’re all patiently waiting for!” To keep the Sky Mavis team “incentivized to keep building after a successful token sale,” 21 percent of the total AXS tokens—56.7 million AXS—were issued to these individuals, which will be gradually unlocked over a 4.5 year period to ensure that “the team, community and investors have aligned incentives.” 494. An Axie whitepaper further explained that the Sky Mavis team will use its experience and efforts to develop and grow the Axie game. For example, it lists the Axie founding team, their roles, and background experience and touts that “we’ve established a core team to lead product development and oversee most decisions related to the progress of the game. This allows us to build and iterate quickly towards product-market fit.” 495. At the time of the initial sale of AXS, the Axie platform was not complete, and while several features of the platform have been implemented since 2020, others are still in the development phase today. Further, the whitepaper explicitly set growth goals in terms of daily average users of Axie Infinity and average weekly growth rates, that if “not met by the end of 2023, Sky Mavis will lead the formation of a steering committee or similar vehicle to discuss a path forward.” Continue Reading . Here About HackerNoon Legal PDF Series: We bring you the most important technical and insightful public domain court case filings. This court case 1:23-cv-01599 retrieved on September 6, 2023, from is part of the public domain. The court-created documents are works of the federal government, and under copyright law, are automatically placed in the public domain and may be shared without legal restriction. docdroid.net

Binance Faces SEC Probe for Unregistered Axie Infinity Shard Transactions

It’s a brutal NFT winter. Yet, you wouldn’t know it from the lit Discord of Axie Infinity’s first social club. It’s an NFT club all about Axies that have a special attribute. They’re big yaks. Today, we sit down in async fashion with Zakariah Wain. He’s the creator of this buzzed-about NFT club in the Axieverse: . The Big Yak Axie Club And we’re going to be fielding big questions, like what is a Big Yak. Michael: Hi Zak, thanks for joining us today. Before we dive into Big Yaks, can you let us know a little bit about yourself? Zak: I am the founder of the BigYak Axie Club (BYAC), and I joined Axie Infinity in November of 2021. I’m a single parent, student of microbiology and immunology, just turned 30 x.x, have a variety of interests from art to science, and enjoy meeting and helping people! Michael: What are Big Yaks? Zak: BigYaks are a unique body type in Axie Infinity. They are the final body type evolution which came from breeding a wetdog and sumo. If you haven’t seen one, they are large floofy(fluffy) potato creatures with two braids that you just want to hug! They get their fur and braids from the wetdog body type, and their size from the sumo body type. Michael: What is the Big Yak Axie Club? Zak: The BigYak Axie Club is a community of BigYak, collector, and Axie Infinity enthusiasts. Contrary to the name, we encompass all Axie types! Michael: What is special about Yaks, and Big Yaks particularly, that drew you to this kind of NFT? Zak: What I found special about BigYaks is their floofiness, and braids. While sometimes mistaken for wetdogs, they really stood out to me on the marketplace. I saw normals, curlys, spikys, fuzzys, wetdogs, and sumos, none of them had the character and feeling that I saw in BigYaks. In sum, I just related and identified with BigYaks Real life yaks are pretty cool as well, they are just as floofy and get their fur braided!! Michael: Can you describe when you had the idea to set up the Big Yaks Axie Club? And what the driving motivation was to actually make this happen? Zak: The idea came after the Banning incident in the econ channel of the Axie Infinity discord server. The larger community was struggling with FUD at the time, and it was hard to just find conversation with enthusiasts. Many people began to Direct message (DM) me about creating a space for this to occur, considering I had the attention of the broader community. Finally, I said screw it, LFG. Michael: Have there been any really big moments in your life that led you to go on the path of setting up the Big Yak Axie Club? Zak: I wouldn’t say outside of Axie there have been big moments, just an accumulation of small events and aggregation of knowledge that assisted in creating the BYAC culture. Inside the Axie universe, yes! It was a whole epic centered around BigYaks: I got banned from the Axie Discord for breaking a tagging rule (DO NOT DO IT), the discord held a memorial service for me getting banned, and in the end Jihoz bought his first BigYak and got me unbanned. That moment really set the trajectory for me to create the BYAC. (Note: Jihoz is Jeffrey Zirlin, co-founder of Axie Infinity) Michael: What are your guiding principles as a community manager in NFT? Zak: My guiding principles aren’t anything super special: involve everyone you can, be transparent, be kind, lift community members up, and have fun! Michael: Do you have any advice for others who want to start their own NFT community? Zak: Don’t do it for the money, do it because you like being around and helping people, do it because you want to try and learn new things. You can build a community around anything, but strong ones thrive on good ideals, values, memes, and fun! Michael: For those who don't know, Axie Con was the first large-scale in-person gathering of the entire Axie Infinity Community, September 7th-10th, 2022 in Barcelona, Spain. Michael: Would you describe your experience at Axie Con, from the registration party to the most memorable moments for you? Zak: My experience at AxieCon was absolutely amazing! I started meeting fellow Lunacians before the registration party and immediately felt community/family vibes. From the registration party all the way to the end was completely uplifting, the team delivered epic progress updates, everyone felt like they’ve known each other for eons, tons of love, ambition, collaboration, and straight up unity! I didn’t want it to end. Michael: I've seen there's a BYAC DAO, but I don't understand it. Can you give us some insights into how the DAO works or is going to work? Zak: Yes! The DAO isn’t typical, it’s strictly a discord channel taking the DAO/Democratic principles and trying to incorporate the concept as best as possible. Ultimately, when making big decisions I want the community to have input. The way I’ve structured it is being able to create a proposal, turn it into a thread for discussion, and vote through reactions. Anyone in the community can make a proposal if they want too. Michael: Will there be a Big Yak game, and if so, are there any details you can share about it? Zak: We have quite a few ideas around BigYak video games. Firstly, we wanted to create a Tamagotchi style game, something simple but fun. Secondly, we wanted to create a VR game that allows you to play with your Axies and one day grow into old-school Harvest Moon mechanics. Michael: For the VR game, how far along in the development are you? Zak: Not far, it's still in a concept development like stage. Michael: Got it! Keep us updated. Michael: Moving on to another topic, what's been your hardest moment in the Axie Infinity Community? Zak: My hardest moment in the Axie Infinity community isn’t one you’d expect. It was the realization that I can’t build all the things I want too, there isn’t enough time, and if I could, it would affect the quality of my projects. Michael: Is there a time someone really had your back in the community or helped you out that made an impression? Zak: So many people to mention, but, definitely my best friend Quang! Michael: In your journey in Axie and NFTs, if you could go back and do one thing differently, what would it be? Zak: If I could go back to the beginning, when I entered Axie, NFT’s, and web3, I wouldn’t view Axie and NFT’s as a vehicle for income generation. Instead, I’d change the mindset towards thinking and learning about the future and the potential Axie, NFT’s, and web3 will impact the world. Then start learning coding so I could participate more in the movement! Michael: What's next for BYAC, and what are you really excited about? Zak: The grand question! The next thing for the BYAC is to scale by extending past its singular niche. Which is why I’m really excited to full launch the Lunacian Society! A society that includes all Axie bodytypes under a decentralized umbrella, and opens the door to new roleplay, events, and lore building opportunities. There are a few other things, too. However, you’re going to have to wait and see! That’s all we have time for today. Thank you Zak for joining us! Til next time crypto explorers, stay vigilant! Featured Photo Credit: Camping with a BigYak: Art made by @createdby_mono, courtesy of Zakariah Wain Disclosure: I am a holder of SLP, AXS, Axie NFTs and some RON tokens. These tokens are part of the Axie Infinity economic ecosystem, and some are discussed in this article. I’m also a social participant in the Big Yak Axie Club Discord. My participation in the club did not influence this interview. This interview was conducted in an async fashion across Discord and email. Note: Three questions about the funding and Sky Mavis' involvement in the club were omitted that Zakariah was not at liberty to comment on.

In Search of Big Yaks: A Metaverse Sit Down With the Creator of Axie Infinity's Hottest Social Club

This is the official HackerNoon wiki for Axie Infinity. As part of our , this living wiki displays on . If you’d like to suggest edits to our official Axie Infinity wiki, please submit them in the comment field below, a real human editor will read and review your suggestions for accuracy and publication. coin price pages Axie Infinity crypto price page Axie Infinity is an online video game based on The game was developed by a Vietnamese studio known as Sky Mavis. The game is known for its in-game economy which uses based on the .  The native cryptocurrency for the game is called the Non Fungible Tokens (NFTs). cryptocurrency Ethereum blockchain Smooth Love Potion(SLP). The Axie Infinity game works on a model. Players of the game collect and mint NFTs that represent digital pets known as . The players can earn by progressing through the game and collecting the in-game awards after they pay the initial fees required to start. The pets can breed, and fight each other within the game. The players are charged a fee whenever they want to exchange Axies on the game marketplace. play-to-earn Axies History The development of Axie Infinity began in 2017. It was led by the founder and CEO Nguyen Thanh Trung with Jeffrey Zirlin, Andy Ho, and Aleksander Larsen. The team released Axie Infinity’s first battle system in October 2018 and developed the game’s real-time card battle system in March 2019. Sky Mavis launched the Ronin Wallet in February 2021 which sped up transactions and reduced gas fees for users who played the game. Biggest Claims to Fame Players can in theory earn an income through playing the game. Axie Infinity is one of the only that have managed to get a worldwide economy of gamers. The players get rewarded with SLPs whenever they play and win an in-game battle. If a player wins enough of these battles, they may be able to earn enough to make a living from the profit they make from winning a game. blockchain-based games Some of the Axies are collectibles. Axie Infinity has created mystic axies that are rare within the game, making them digital collectibles. This is a tried and true model with tradable cards of baseball players and collectible Pokemon cards in the market going for high prices. A company known as Delphi Digital spent $162,000 on five Axies as an NFT investment in September 2020. Axie Infinity has a roadmap of goals and achievements they want to achieve. This helps in the creation of milestones and creation of a timeline for growth. From the developmental milestones Axie Infinity has put on itself, users can easily see whether Axie Infinity is growing at the rate it had promised to be and if not, they can pull out their investment. Biggest Criticism Most of the players in the game are from the Philippines. They have to rent out characters in order to play since the cost of buying up the characters is high. They end up working as low-wage workers as they rent the characters from those who have Axies and progress in the game on the owner’s behalf in exchange for little to none of the awards that come from progressing with the game. This has been likened to colonialism as those who can afford the game are typically in the United States and Europe. The game model is very similar to gambling. A user pays the initial fee to buy into the game and then earns money by playing a game. The game will not be easy to navigate or win, which could be fun in a normal game but ends up being frustrating for those who want to play but also want to earn back the money they used to buy in. The game model also allows a user to think that by upgrading their character for more money, they can improve their chances of winning, which is the same formula that works in gambling. The game is overly reliant on new players coming into the game. The initial cost of getting into the game is higher than the amount of currency the game gets from players as they play the game. It is more likely for players to cash in on the money they get than for them to spend it as they proceed with the game. This is not a stable business model at all because the number of people coming into the game will reduce after some time and they will need the people already playing the game to put their money into the game to maintain the financial ecosystem of the game. Team Nguyen Thanh Trung is one of the founders of Axie Infinity. He was one of the investors of crypto kitties before he began working on his own game. He combined elements of Cryptokitties with elements from Pokemon and Neopets. This is the official HackerNoon wiki for Axie Infinity. As part of our , this living wiki displays on . If you’d like to suggest edits to our official Axie Infinity wiki, please submit them in the comment field below, a real human editor will read and review your suggestions for accuracy and publication. coin price pages Axie Infinity crypto price page

Axie Infinity $AXS Wiki: Coin History, Techstack, and Crypto News

For a year, the Axie Infinity community has waited with bated breath. Sometimes, abject terror, for the release of a new game, Axie: Origins. It's a brand new Axie Infinity Game, not an incremental upgrade. All crypto rewards have been moved over from the original game, "Classic" to the new one, Origins. This is a super important detail for the newcomer, as a huge draw of Axie Infinity is Play-to-Earn. That means a lot of the community is playing the game to earn Crypto. So, some people have a lot to gain--and lose--as the new game is released. Will it be a cosmic shift in blockchain gaming? The expected arrival has brought hope, upheavals, and blood in the water. And launch day of Season 1 starts today. I'm going to give a rundown of what this might mean for Blockchain gaming. The implications for Axie Infinity, and the crypto gaming winter. All from the perspective of a player with skin in the game. A Small Digital Pet Game's Early Origins Years ago, a small group of developers . They came up with the idea to create their own game. met online playing Crypto Kitties This small crew built the game, and called it "Axie Infinity". It was heavily inspired by Pokemon. They launched it in 2018 without much fanfare. In December of 2019, a cosmic shift came. At the time named Small Love Potion (now Smooth). The developers turned an in-game token into a cryptocurrency. A community member quickly listed it on Uniswap and created a liquidity pool. Then, the world changed. A cute game with lovely fighting digital pets became a way where you could earn actual money. Who would have thought this would develop into a multi-billion dollar economy? So, a group of gamers, devs, and entrepreneurs met online and started playing a cat breeding game. Then, this very small group made their own game quickly. During the pandemic of 2020, there was a perfect storm. After releasing an ERC-20 token you could earn while inside your house playing the game, the world shut down. Micro economies developed around Axie Infinity during this fledgling period. People realized they could earn money playing the game. This was especially appealing in The Philippines. The in-game currency went a lot farther there. Lockdowns were also more strict than in other parts of the world. All from home during rolling lockdowns. Enter 2021: The Crypto Melt Up In November of 2020, Sky Mavis released the AXS token, at a list price of ten cents, with a $200 cap on what people could buy. Now, with two tokens, the game was positioned to launch off into the stratosphere. If, say, Bitcoin and Crypto suddenly went mainstream. Months later, Crypto did, with a combination of unexpected factors. Like tweets from Elon Musk about Dogecoin. Axie Infinity's micro-economy suddenly blew up into a macroeconomy. . There were hypergrowth events. Billions of dollars of value were traded on their in-game marketplace DAU (Daily Active Users) suddenly launched into the stratosphere (millions). The way the tokenomics of the in-game currency SLP works sent the value soaring. SLP is used to breed new axies. What happened was a hyper growth of new entrants put buying and burning pressure on SLP. Demand for axies so people could play quickly sent the price from around 3.5 cents to 39.97 cents, all in a manner of weeks in the Summer of 2021. But that actually looks tame compared to the summer before, when the price rocketed from just over .3 cents to over 19 cents in just around seven days. At the time, this extreme growth didn't just fuel people making money playing the game. It created a sub-economy of everything from Axie tech service providers. Axie influencers, profitable gaming guilds, and even near-overnight millionaires. So what does Axie Infinity: Origins have to do with blood in the water? The small group of developers saw their lives change overnight. A recent interview highlights perhaps just how much. Een Mercado, a lead for one of the largest Axie Guilds YGG, was interviewing Jihoz, a co-founder, at AxieCon. Jihoz is currently likely a large stakeholder, being rewarded in what may be millions of dollars worth of AXS for bringing the game to fruition. Interview: Een: How much is your biggest loss in crypto in one day? Jihoz: Well, a lot. But there was one day in March of 2020 where I felt like I lost like sixty percent of my money. And I was living in my parent's basement at the time and I felt like I was never going to be able to move out. I was never going to be able to get married. So, yeah. Een: Buy you got married? Jihoz: It happens! Yeah! Now I'm married. (Credit: Transcript of ) Video from Een Mercado's Streamer Page This kind of exchange is a startling reminder of how very fast Axie's rise happened. The fallout--making millionaires--also ended up leaving other investors with potentially large losses. Around November and December of 2021, a change in the language around Axie happened. The devs started to try to prepare the community and warn them that a new game was coming. To an outsider, this might not sound so alarming. Yet the thing was, during those times, there were long periods where each individual Axie NFT was very expensive. Just to buy one mediocre Axie (as in, not amazing at the game), it could be upwards of $200. To investors who had just sunk money into buying teams, these were alarming times. The uncertainty around the new game's launch may have led to investor and player defection. Especially because the new game's impending release seemed to go on and on, and no one was clear when it would actually be here. This defection in turn hurt the price of the crypto you earn while playing, which in turn led to more players leaving. Viewing some of those exchanges on Twitter at the time was interesting. I both understood the complex game the developers were playing. Trying to fix unsustainable elements of the game that relied on new players coming in. While creating a new game (the one launching today, more on that soon), that had more of an appeal than earning. They wanted it to be fun. However, disagreements between the community and the devs got personal. Large influencers who came up in part through talking about Axie basically left. A recent Twitter exchange shows some of the turmoil and the personal impact: I had to re-create this using the google cache because it had been deleted. But basically, on Monday, an account called "The Axie Intern" with the handle @jihoz_intern, tweeted this. Pictured in the meme are three large influencers, some of who came to prominence with Axie, who seem to have left. The caption read: "Just intern things..." CryptoKing_NFT, who was tagged, responded with: I'm bringing this up because as an outsider, you may not be aware of all the upheavals in the community. Or that they weren't only financial. They got personal. SLP's value dipped. Some guilds completely dissolved basically overnight. Many guild owners complained bitterly that their guild members just walked away. Without a word, ghosting them. It wasn't just that they lost the players who gave them a return on their investment. It hurt on a personal level that these people they'd worked with left without a word, or it seems, a glance back. "So long, Manager." So, is this the devs’ fault? No one really knows. As a game participant, I do want to say one observation. There were times with my guild manager (just before he quit) that we discussed investing in other games for our guild to play. The funny thing is, despite his complaints, there weren't any other viable games I could find. I did my own search. I came across many games promising to be the next Axie. In the end, most or all crumbled, and fast. Some functioned more like Ponzi schemes. Axie Infinity does have an actual game. It has hundreds of thousands of active players, and a dev team that seems to care about the project. There were also painful moments on Twitter where community members expressed rage. And directed it at co-founders. A huge complaint was the devs not taking their suggestions to fix the SLP price. But reading the suggestions, many of them would have led to a short-term pump in token value. Yet been bad for the long-term ecosystem. So, the devs weren't in any kind of easy position. They seemed to be making decisions based on what they viewed as the health of the community. Whether those choices pan out, I think we may know fairly soon. What do the devs say? I reached out to Sky Mavis for a comment about what Season 1 means for Axie and the community. Philip La, Game Product Lead who joined Sky Mavis this year (from a high-profile position at Pokemon Go), replied: "The launch of Axie Infinity Origins Season 1 is a huge milestone for Sky Mavis and our community. Sky Mavis collaborated with the community to make numerous major updates and improvements over the past months. Season 1 is in a great position and is esports ready, as shown at AxieCon. We implemented an entirely new NFT Runes/Charms system, iterated until 1st/2nd turn win rates were even, and made thousands of balancing adjustments. I am super excited for players to enjoy the challenge of trying to reach the top of the Leaderboard for the glory, exclusive cosmetics, and over $1. 5M in AXS rewards.” So today, Season 1 of Origins is Launching: What's On the Line? Everything. Everything is on the line. This has been the game the developers have been nurturing for years. Sky Mavis has been teasing out the release for just under a year. There are over a million dollars on the line in season 1 in AXS rewards. They beta-tested the game since before April 2022. They've likely spent millions of dollars on development. As opposed to Axie Infinity: Classic, they were well funded, had as much time as they wanted, and probably a much larger and more experienced dev team. And they've been hyping up one aspect: they want it to be fun. What to look for? One huge question is current community involvement. The upheaval around the change is over. It's changed. Axie Infinity: Origins is a brand new game with totally new dynamics. All crypto rewards are gone from the OG game classic (at least for now) and can only be earned in Origins. Axies who were useful before in the arena may be much, much less useful now. They call this the "meta". New Axies may be super powerful now. Instead of the seismic shift in the meta which just occurred, changes will likely be incremental for the foreseeable future. Things will likely shift back to standard nerfs and buffs (standard changes to card balancing to prevent a single Axie or team combo from becoming overly powerful) on the off-seasons. Or, at regular intervals. So, are community members who may have bailed going to come back? That may depend on the value of the tokens--or how fun the game is. The second question is if new participants will find the game--and if so, what will draw them? In Axie Classic, a huge amount of the appeal was earn. As a player, I actually found that fun at the time. When you would win a match and earn 70 cents worth of Crypto in three minutes, there was a genuine endorphin rush. I believe that game was actually fun, in part for that reason. But will Axie Infinity: Origins, be fun outside of earn? That's one very important thing to watch. As the game (in Season 1, not as a beta or “Season 0”) launches this week, I'm excited to see if new players come in to play just for the fun of it. Unlike Classic, there are now free starter axies, that you can use to play the game, but that won't earn you any crypto. So, from the standpoint of a player, this is a potentially exciting moment. Day 1, Season 1 of the reboot. What does it mean for Crypto gaming? Axie Infinity has been the OG Play-to-Earn game. Whatever happens with the Origins release. Whether it's a stunning success. Or it doesn't take off beyond pro-players after the leaderboard rewards. Or somewhere in-between, it's going to impact every single element of Crypto gaming. There's also an x-factor. On the , there's a huge moment listed for 2022. It is "Mainstream release of Axie Infinity on iOS/Android". Axie Infinity Roadmap This event has been closely watched by community participants. Currently, you can download Axie Infinity as an APK. But it's not in the Google Play Store or App Store. Up until now, most or all player growth and downloads have come from word of mouth and been organic. When Sky Mavis actually does release the game on the app store, it's a big deal. Why? They would also be able to reliably acquire users through mobile download campaigns. In this way, they could potentially scale the game in ways currently unimaginable. The real question is though, and it's what makes this moment so stunning--is the new game sticky? As in, once people start playing, do they come back for more and join the community? Or, was Axie Classic, which has a proven track record of player retention, the real magic? Right now, we don't know. But I can tell you who is going to be able to tell us. The players. I'll be keeping a close eye to see what they say! Until next time friends, stay vigilant! Photo Credit: Axie Infinity: Origins Official Media Kit

Axie Infinity's New Game Is Launching: An Insider's Perspective

Update on August 31st, 2022, 6:45 PM: At 6:20 PM, August 31st, 2022, Axie Infinity co-founder Jeff Zirlin, aka, Jiho, made an official comment that the mystery wallet is the Binance Ronin Gateway Contract, meaning, according to Zirlin, that it is part of the official infrastructure of Axie Infinity. Original story below: What if one wallet was holding half the token supply of one of the biggest crypto gaming economies in the world? I have some news for you. That’s not a catchy headline. It's a developing story. In this article, I’m going to be taking you along for the ride as I investigate the mysterious 22,000,000,100 Smooth Love Potion (SLP) wallet. Key Points: Axie Infinity is one of the largest crypto games in the world. Players earn a crypto token called SLP by playing. It appears one wallet has been accumulating billions of SLP. This wallet controls over half the total supply of in-game token SLP. There are just over 43 Billion SLP in circulation. This mysterious whale wallet has over 22 Billion SLP as of writing. The wallet doesn’t appear to be a Sky Mavis wallet (creator of Axie Infinity). Sky Mavis has made no comment when inquiries were made. This whale could exert control over the in-game economy if it wanted to. Thousands of people’s livelihoods are linked to this token. This article traces my efforts to locate the source of the whale. It’s an ordinary Thursday morning. I wake up unnaturally early, grab my phone and start scrolling Twitter. Then, something stops me. Jiho, AKA Jeffrey Zirlin, growth lead of Axie Infinity is Tweeting about Axie Economics (you don’t need to read or understand the tweet): When a user tweet replies: I stop in my tracks. What? One wallet is holding half the supply of Smooth Love Potion (SLP)? No ordinary Thursday anymore. My first thoughts are, that this must be above board. That it’s the wallet Sky Mavis uses to mint and distribute SLP to players. I’m soon proven wrong, and the mystery deepens. I log onto the and find the wallet in the user’s tweet reply: Ronin Block Explorer ronin:030e37ddd7df1b43db172b23916d523f1599c6cb. Going forward, I’ll refer to this mystery wallet as “ ”. Whale AX Indeed, Whale AX is holding 22 Billion, one hundred Smooth Love Potion. That’s about half the total supply of the token. A token whose economics influences many thousands of gamers. I want to spit out my coffee when I dig a bit deeper. Deeper down the Axieverse hole. I dive into the block explorer. I'm wondering if these tokens were minted into the wallet by Sky Mavis. Sky Mavis is the company that makes Axie Infinity and distributes SLP. It seems, they’re not. What makes the mystery deeper is where the tokens seem to be coming from . Binance Normally, coins coming from Binance are purchased on the exchange. Or held there in a custodial wallet. Billions of SLP coins have been sent from the Ronin Binance Wallet into Whale AX's anonymous wallet. This strikes me as odd. Did Whale AX spend hundreds of millions of dollars buying SLP? Or, did this mysterious entity already have access to the tokens and was storing them on Binance? Perhaps, something else is happening. Examples of these massive transactions I’m pasting transaction screenshots to show what I mean. Let’s say the Whale AX transaction above of 5,968,600,115 was a purchase (in theory). Based on the opening price of SLP on November 1st, 2021 (the day of the transfer) of 7.1827 cents ( ), someone would have spent about $428,706,640.46 to buy those coins on that day. according to Yahoo Finance Something doesn’t seem to add up. Did a whale really spend that much on SLP in November? For reference, at the current price (as of writing) of approximately $ , that same purchase would buy over 107,295,061,488 SLP: over twice the entire max supply of all SLP. 0.003989 USD per SLP And just to explain: every single SLP was minted by a player playing the game, and at this point, it’s actually quite difficult to mint SLP. Just for fun, I did some napkin calculations, and in my experience, it’s realistic that an average player with a half-decent team could win about 30 SLP per day playing the game. This is based on the difficulty to mint in the last season of gameplay. So, that amount of SLP (107 billion) would take one player 3.576 billion years to mint, if they didn’t take any days off. Now, that was just one transaction, that accounts for a little under six billion coins in November. The wallet currently holds almost four times as much as that one transaction. So, what is this wallet?? I initially figured this wallet was part of some system Axie Infinity had to automatically distribute SLP to players who earned it. However, this doesn't seem to be true. If that were the case, there would be tens of thousands if not millions of transactions. This wallet has a mere 3 pages of them. Most of them . whale-sized Then, I saw “Binance” as the sender or recipient for many transactions. So I thought, this must be Binance’s wallet. It did strike me as a little odd that they had half the supply of SLP. I looked through the transactions. No, I was wrong again. Whale AX’s wallet doesn’t seem to be Binance’s wallet. Whale AX seems to be getting SLP as transfers from Binance’s wallet. So, the wallet doesn’t appear to be related to distributing SLP as an official Sky Mavis tool. And it doesn’t appear to be owned by Binance. So what’s going on here? Why is someone moving these huge amounts of SLP from Binance to a wallet on Axie Infinity’s Ronin Chain? That’s the 22 Billion SLP Question. I ran through options of what this might be. It could potentially be Sky Mavis. For some reason, moving huge amounts of their own currency back and forth from Binance. But why? I thought, hey, is this possibly the community treasury? I checked and it doesn’t seem to be. I found the community treasury wallet address in this official newsletter from Axie Infinity: . https://axie.substack.com/p/community And it’s not Whale AX’s wallet. Up until now, unless I missed something, Whale AX’s wallet has been flying mostly under the radar. The Scary Part The boogie man in the closet is if this isn’t Sky Mavis, Binance, or a responsible investor in Sky Mavis. What if it’s an independent whale? That would be much more confusing, and much more problematic. But why? Thousands of people’s livelihoods depend on (or have depended on) Axie Infinity. The main token earned by playing this game is SLP. If one rogue whale owned half the supply of SLP, they could manipulate the price or even crash it. For example, any token price is naturally controlled by supply or demand. Let’s say due to natural market conditions the token price should rise. There’s a supply crunch or demand goes up. Or both and it should shoot up meteorically high, allowing stakeholders who have been in a long HODL to cash out tendies. A whale with such massive holdings could slowly flood the market with more SLP. As supply is crunched, it could replace supply. Or as demand goes up, it could increase supply. Making the price stay flat instead of going up. All while cashing out huge profits. This kind of potential action could influence many thousands of people's lives. People who can’t afford that. So what does all this mean? It means we don’t know whose wallet this is or what it is being used for. Why they’re buying or being transferred so much SLP and AXS. And finally, what they plan to do with it. Research I did. The first thing after seeing the tweet was to go to the ronin block explorer and find this wallet. The original tweet was a screenshot without the full address. So I searched by asset, which organizes wallets by their holdings. It was easy to find Whale AX’s wallet as the first one. For reference, the second largest wallet has 5,121,563,949 SLP and is listed as the [Deprecated] (sic) Ronin Gateway as of writing. It looks to be an official Sky Mavis or Axie Infinity Wallet. Then, I copied the wallet address and googled it, but didn’t come up with anything I could make sense of. So I searched the wallet address on Twitter. Only about 7 tweets came up. It was mostly community participants asking Sky Mavis staff what this wallet was. I couldn’t find any replies. I then tweeted at a known crypto sleuth, whose work I had admired in the past, asking what they made of this wallet. I haven’t heard back yet. I then looked for a press contact for Sky Mavis, and couldn’t find one. Since I couldn’t find a press email, I tweeted at them: Sky Mavis, Axie Infinity, and the COO who seems nice. I haven’t heard anything back yet. I also sent one of their staff a DM on Twitter, but I didn’t get a reply yet. I emailed Binance’s PR email address. I briefly explained the investigative piece I was working on. Then asked if they had any insights (disclosure: I trade crypto using Binance.US). As of writing, they have not returned a comment. Diving deeper into Whale AX Now, there’s another option of what’s going on here. It would completely explain these transactions, and also likely be 100% above the board. Binance . There’s also the possibility that these transactions are not purchases or independent holdings. But that they are internal transactions between Binance and Sky Mavis. Or, they might be Sky Mavis transactions that don’t include Binance. But again, regular internal company workings. owns a sizable amount of Sky Mavis Then there’s another theory of what’s happening which may be possible. And it would make sense that Sky Mavis wouldn’t want to disclose. . Players deposit SLP on Binance, cash out, and then Sky Mavis buys the coins back. I need to repeat, that this is a theory, not a statement of what is actually happening. It’s possible that these could be coin buybacks In this scenario, it would support the SLP price or prevent it from a total collapse. Afterward, they then would send the SLP back to their wallet on the Ronin Blockchain. This would account for the large transfers. More questions tho Not only is the wallet holding SLP, but it’s holding large amounts of other coins too. One that raises eyebrows is the amount of AXS it’s holding. Not only is it holding 4,672,754 AXS as of writing, but it also appears to be staking millions of them. And . claiming hundreds of thousands AXS as staking rewards at a time This means that over the course of a year Whale AX will have the opportunity to earn huge volumes of AXS. Likely worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars depending on the token price. This was a recent AXS staking claim by Whale AX. But there are also other large claims, like this 737,550.4 AXS claim on May 2nd. The complete list of Whale AX’s 178 (by my count) transactions runs 3 pages on the explorer. Most appear to be of truly massive scale. There are a few that make you wonder. Like a transaction consisting of , worth at the time under $10. 777 SLP on May 16th, 2022 The above screenshot shows Whale AX staking two million more AXS. These transactions are all public and may be viewed by anyone at the block explorer. Here’s a link to that transaction: . https://explorer.roninchain.com/tx/0x63ae85ff115285757485b9c4cbb34e1543c15a2ce9557998de10314cbacc341b So, is this Sky Mavis’ AXS stash? If so, is this where the AXS that’s being used for season leaderboard rewards and prizes is created? My guess is probably not, but the amount of AXS held raises many more questions than it answers. The less interesting holdings, but worth noting, are 1,747 WETH worth $2,969,551 as of writing, and .26 USDC. This is all the information I have at press time. All information presented in my investigation is publicly available to the best of my knowledge. I will update this as soon as, or if, further significant developments are made. If you uncover any data that may offer clues or see any errors I made, or tweet at me (@michaelbenko). email Thanks for tuning in. Til next time crypto explorers, stay vigilant! Photo Credit for Featured Image: Clint Patterson Via Unsplash. Disclaimer: I am a holder of SLP, AXS, Axie NFTs and some RON tokens. These tokens are part of the Axie Infinity economic ecosystem, and some are discussed in this article. None of these holdings influenced my reporting of this ongoing mystery. Disclaimer 2: I in the past applied to be a creator in Axie Infinity’s content creator program, and never heard back. That didn’t influence this article, and I have no contact within Sky Mavis or form of communication with the company.

Mysterious Axie Infinity Whale Holds 22 Billion Smooth Love Potion (SLP)

La misteriosa ballena Axie Infinity tiene una poción de amor suave de 22 mil millones (SLP)

La mystérieuse baleine Axie Infinity contient 22 milliards de philtre d'amour doux (SLP)

मिस्टीरियस एक्सी इन्फिनिटी व्हेल में 22 बिलियन स्मूथ लव पोशन (एसएलपी) है

ミステリアスなアクシー インフィニティ クジラが 220 億個のスムース ラブ ポーション (SLP) を保有

Misteriosa Axie Infinity Whale detém 22 bilhões de Smooth Love Potion (SLP)

Cá voi vô cực Axie bí ẩn chứa 22 tỷ lọ thuốc tình yêu mịn (SLP)

神秘Axie Infinity Whale持有220亿顺滑爱情药水（SLP）

Photo Credit: Lorenzo Herrera Via Unsplash. Hey Hackers! I’m Michael Benko and I’m the Chief Marketing Officer of Improv Jam and gaming blogger at www.michaelbenko.com. First of all, a huge thank you to the HackerNoon community and staff for nominating me for a 2022 Noonies award! I’ve been nominated in the gaming category so please do check out these award pages and vote: HackerNoon Contributor of the Year: Metaverse HackerNoon Contributor of the Year: Games 1. What product/feature/project did you get nominated for? I wrote an analysis of Axie Infinity’s in-game economy, , and it was nominated for two Noonies. https://hackernoon.com/what-everyone-is-missing-about-axie-infinitys-economic-storm 2. Why did you design or develop it the way that you did? I had been reading analyses of the game’s economy, and from what I read, there were certain dynamics of the way the game Axie Infinity’s in-game economy worked that I didn’t think the analysts seemed to fully understand. There were basic parts of it that they definitely did. So the article was a humble attempt at voicing those dynamics from the perspective of a gaming guild participant. 3. What was the process like? It was frightening! The blank page in front of you :) But overall, it was a really good experience, as I continued the process, I felt more confident as what I wrote actually seemed to make sense to other people. 4. Were you expecting the nomination? Not at all, it came as a total and very pleasant surprise. I was on the way back from a family member’s wedding, in the car on the drive from Boston to Portland (I wasn’t driving, don’t worry) and I received the email. I was really surprised, and so pleasantly so! I’m a creator, and I know how easy it is to put out work after work, and never, ever have anyone acknowledge it. So for someone to have nominated me was a really big deal for me personally. I just really enjoyed the process and that I did work and it received a really nice result. Whether or not I win the Noonie, I’m honestly just thrilled to have been nominated. 5. What do you think made it successful? I believe it was a personal experience. I wasn’t writing about something in theory. I did a deep dive into a kind of obscure gaming economy that not many people do, or really should, be expected to understand past the basics. And I guess that made it fun, and my personal experience in the game really informed what I was writing. 6. If you could design the perfect project, what would it be? It would be a self-aware computer that ran on nanobots, that you could inject into your body and would be powered by your body heat. It would be able to speak to you, and it would be ultra-intelligent and also programmed to genuinely have your best interest at heart. Anytime, it could tell you what you should do in a given situation to absolutely master it, whether that’s what to do on any given day, or help you learn skiing in a nanosecond to get out of a bind. It would also be a great conversationalist, who you could have deep conversations with at any time, and if you wanted to, you could close your eyes and it would take you on awesome virtual adventures that could fit thousands of years into seconds. It could never break, or be lost. 7. What technologies in the games industry are most exciting? Decentralization. A million times over, decentralization. I believe that true innovation will be when everyone has the tools to create and can go off and do something amazing, potentially using APIs of pre-existing games to build in their universes--or create their own. Imagine if anyone could build a Pokemon game, and Game Freak had to compete with that--with the fans. What kind of amazing worlds would come out of that? 8. What is a major issue in the games industry that needs to be addressed? Scams. 1000%, scams. I say that specifically looking at the crypto gaming industry. For a while, I was looking for new NFT games to see if I could find some to be early on, and I keep going through chart after chart of tokens that launched, went super high, and then crashed super low (this was before the broader crash). I’m not saying that these were all scams, but I bet some of them were. I think for a healthier decentralized gaming ecosystem to develop, this needs to be addressed--I just don’t know how yet. Hopefully, there will be better community-created resources that help tackle this and can be go-to spaces to vet projects and enhance player safety for existing ones. 9. Is there something that you would like to shout-out? The person who suggested I write the article in the first place. That sent me on a really cool adventure. Thanks for being there for me. Then, friends + family. I just can’t say this enough. It’s rare for people to have your back, so I’m appreciative of the friends and family who do. Can I thank the editors and the HackerNoon staff and shout them out too? 10. How can gaming writers on HackerNoon set themselves apart from the mainstream gaming publications such as IGN and Gamespot? I think by covering the things that haven’t gone mainstream yet. The tech that’s around the corner, and in development now, which hasn’t been adopted yet by a wide audience. For me, this includes Blockchain in gaming, which there’s a ton of blowback for in some big gaming publications. As someone who’s loved video games most of my life (starting with NES), I’m really really sympathetic to gaming publications that don’t like Blockchain gaming as a trend. I look at pure gaming publications, and I think where it’s really good is they’re all about having fun, which I love. But I think that in the 20s, we’ll see Blockchain games develop as their own niche within gaming. So right now, some large gaming and non-gaming magazines might not love Blockchain gaming, and that’s okay, but in the future, there could be a situation when a Blockchain game comes out that’s so amazing, it’s just really hard for them to give it heat. Or some of their staff love it. Or, honestly, and I think this is likely--that NFTs are so much a part of so many games, we reach a point where it would be weird if you couldn’t own your in-game assets. Even if it’s not called an “NFT”, it would be hard to have ownership of it without Blockchain technology. Ownership which means you can do what you want like trading it or selling it. 11. Please give us the links to all your relevant social media profiles so we can use them to promote this interview! (Twitter and LinkedIn would be a huge plus) So most of the creating I do is here: . My Twitter is www.twitter.com/MichaelBenko, and my Linkedin is . And, can I throw this here? My website is www.michaelbenko.com. https://www.facebook.com/heymichaelbenko https://www.linkedin.com/in/himichaelbenko About HackerNoon’s 2022 Noonie Awards The annual Noonie Awards celebrate the best and brightest of the tech industry, bringing together all who are making the Internet and the world of tech what it is today. Please be sure to , nominate, and vote for the people and companies who you think are making the biggest impact on the tech industry today. check out our award categories The 2022 Noonies are sponsored by: , and . Thank you so much to these sponsors who are helping us celebrate the accomplishments of all our nominees. BingX .tech

Axie Infinity And The Future Of Blockchain Games

Here we are at another stomach-churning moment for Cryptopians. The swan dive in the price of Bitcoin and Ethereum, , the consolidation of the NFT market… Even my beloved Axie Infinity Shards ( ) are down by more than a factor of seven from their peak.  All this carnage is generating a lot of attention. the $40B sudden evaporation of Luna hard hit by a crypto heist What are the Fundamentals? I’m an Axie Infinity guild owner, so I’m taking it upon myself to explain the fundamentals that have been missing in every single analysis that I’ve read: SLP is created through playing the game, it can be sold on the open market, or burned to create more Axie pets. Currently, almost no one is burning SLP, and no one is buying Axies, leading to a seemingly catastrophic drop in the token’s value. But is this the end, or is it something else that everyone is missing? Let me explain, starting with… What is Axie Infinity? Axie Infinity is a game that allows players to through competitive play and then use it to build their empire. The game is similar to CryptoKitties, but with a few key differences. The biggest difference is that in Axie Infinity the players are not just buying and selling virtual cats. earn their own cryptocurrency Instead, they are battling to earn their own cryptocurrency (“Smooth Love Potion,” SLP, won and minted after winning battles). Then, use it to build an empire of players who use the digital pets you create by breeding (burning SLP and another token called AXS) to play, battle, and win. The Mistake Many Analysts are Making Suddenly, Google reveals the world to be flooded with analysts and commentators, including those writing for influential gaming and crypto publications. They are, like the fable in Lunacia Chicken Axie, shouting that the sky is falling on Lunacia (the land that contains Axie). The critics point to a declining player base and the plummeting price of the token as proof that Play to Earn (we've actually started to call it "Play and Earn," but that's an article for another day) "doesn't work." As a guild owner, I can't help but cringe when I read these articles. Not because I'm worried that Axie Infinity is over (it has the word INFINITY in the title, come on!). I find the lack of understanding that these analysts have for the underlying reasons for the current decline cringeworthy. Lunacia’s Upgrade Since the beginning of Axie Infinity, Lunacians have been playing the same game, with the same fundamental rules, which has been incrementally upgraded. Like Pokemon, your combination of Axies must be strategically balanced, with the four-card combination per Axie being vital to a winning team. And the cards of the three Axies that play together must complement each other. Because there's a huge upgrade coming out, called Version 3, or Origin, (expected imminently, for the last 5 months or so), the players haven't known which team and card combinations will work after the upgrade. Markets hate bad news. But they hate uncertainty worse. This has Caused a Decline in the Axie Economy The issue is that people aren't using SLP (the token you earn) to breed Axies, because the new upgrade will actually, basically, be a completely new game with new cards and brand new dynamics. From the gameplay I’ve seen so far, the new game is likely a significant upgrade from the legacy game. Yet… some of the legacy Axie teams are going to be useless going forward.  The economist Schumpeter called this sort of progress “creative destruction.” We don’t know which ones won’t be effective moving forward. We won’t know until the moment of the Big Reveal. For this reason, the accumulation of SLP has been ever-increasing, without the usual mechanism (burning it to breed) to decrease the supply. Stakeholders are waiting for the new game to come out to breed. Additionally, very few are buying Axies. Who wants to buy a digital battling pet that might not be a competitive player going forward? This has caused SLP’s value to plummet. Meanwhile, the scholars (players who borrow your teams to play and earn and remit some of their earnings back to the owner) have been defecting as the price of SLP declines. Origin’s Release and the Start of a New Axie Infinity Adventure However painful this transition has been, I still believe a new game, and a large upgrade will be beneficial to the long-term health of the Axie economy. This is so despite how bitter the last five months have been. Once the new game comes out, guilds who have been waiting for final card balancing and new technical dynamics such as rune charms can rebalance their teams, and finally, start buying and breeding Axies again as they’ll have a better idea of their use moving forward. Currently, purchases have fallen to near zero, as you would almost be gambling by purchasing Axie teams now. But What's the Point of SLP? Finally, almost but not entirely unrelated, let’s look at the journalists who are dancing around spreading salt on the ground while saying "AHA! Play to earn doesn't work! SLP's value is under a cent. THIS PROVES IT." Journalists, and other humans, I have some bad news for you. All currency (crypto or not) -is basically useless in its pure form (although you can use it to make fire, origami, and to write on). SLP and other currencies minted through blockchain are no different, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and all 18,465 cryptos out here. No, SLP has no intrinsic value. It's not even a physical coin, but like other cryptocurrencies, a marker of an input and output. So, how do we assess the fundamental value? By the underlying assets. What are the Underlying Assets of SLP? It is the players, who are (for the first time, and it matters) owning the game they play, who furnish the underlying value. It’s the developers, who were the first to show the world the true potential of crypto gaming. Finally, the game and network itself, including the coming upgrades. That’s where the value lies. But the Players Will Just Keep Minting More SLP True. Hopefully, the recent adjustments will bring more balance when that happens. We’re still early in crypto, and while the community starts to build out new games that can be used in part to spend or burn SLP, it may bring balance to the economy and stability. This is the first play to earn experiment, and while others are taking apparent glee in decrying it doesn’t work, I’m excited for the community making it work. I don’t want to get too much into boring technicals, but one important thing to point out is for most of Axie, almost any player with three Axies, even not great ones, could basically collect 75 free SLP per day, which the developers took away recently. With this new adjustment, it’s about 75% harder to mint SLP, and from a community participant, I suspect this will actually balance the mint to burn ratio a lot on its own, although it was very painful for the community at the same time. One day, we may be able to take our earnings out and actually spend them. . Or the grocery store, which will add balance to an entirely new degree. And I’m excited for that. At places like GameStop Note: This isn’t investment advice. I’m a guild owner and thus I have a stake in the Axie Economy and the tokens discussed in this article. At the same time, that didn’t affect this analysis—I wrote this piece to point out something that was missing from the viewpoint of analysts writing about the game from the outside without a player’s understanding of the economy. Do your own research, and don’t invest money you can’t afford to lose. The last few weeks have been gutting for the crypto market as a whole, and even with strong fundamentals, there are no guarantees in crypto. Origin is out in an Alpha test phase with no crypto rewards, without final balancing, and there’s currently no consensus on which teams will work when it’s given an official release. When I say Origin isn’t out yet, I am specifically saying the official game release with full dynamics, crypto rewards, and card balancing patches that players and guild owners could use to make informed financial decisions when buying new teams.

What Everyone Is Missing About Axie Infinity’s Economic Storm

is a well-known play-to-earn NFT blockchain-based game in which users may earn money through gameplay and contributing to the ecosystem. Inspired in part by the successful Pokémon video game series, the game allows users to pit creatures called Axies against one another in combat. Gamers may also capture and raise monster pets, as well as construct land-based kingdoms for them as they progress through the game. Axie Infinity ($AXS) Axie Infinity is undoubtedly one of the most popular games in the blockchain industry. Founded by Vietnamese game developer Sky Mavis, the game completed a $7.5 million investment round in May 2021, with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and billionaire Mark Cuban as investors. According to Bloomberg, between April and August 2021, the number of daily active users on Axie Infinity increased from 30,000 to 1 million. Furthermore, from April 2018 to July 1st, 2021, Sky Mavis earned $21 million through Axie Infinity; by the end of August that year, that figure had increased by more than 2,200 percent to $485 million. Despite its spectacular ascent to global recognition, Axie Infinity has suffered a severe drop in daily revenue and public interest since its all-time high of $165 USD in November 2021. Let's take a look at some challenges faced by Axie in the last months to better comprehend the unraveling of one of the most popular blockchain games. Accusations of Digital Exploitation One of the major difficulties in Axie Infinity is the unreasonably high barrier to entry. Although Axie Infinity is free to download, players must start with at least three Axies, each of which costs at least US$29. For some, this might be an incredibly expensive initial expenditure, deterring them from ever beginning the game in the first place. Because of the high initial investment, there are active Discord and Telegram groups where potential players are always looking for sponsors to help them get their foot in the door. Unfortunately, before aiding players, sponsors occasionally make unacceptable requirements. For example, Axie Infinity was forced to to claims of sponsors asking nude images from gamers in order to be offered an Axie. respond Other contentious practices emerged, such as the "Scholarship" practice, in which players lacking initial capital (identified as "Scholars") borrowed Axies from "Managers" in exchange for a considerable amount of in-game revenue. In certain circumstances, the ratio between Scholar and Manager was as high as 50:50. The practice was highly common in the Philippines, where it was well-known that individuals quit their jobs to play Axie professionally with its high returns. Many scholarship "guilds" were founded during Axie's peak in 2021, with some having over 3,000 participants playing numerous games for their Managers. These Managers have even gone so far as to threaten to revoke people's scholarships if they do not perform to their expectations. Given that the average income for a Filipino worker is only US$3,218, critics have compared Axie Infinity's business model to "digital serfdom," or modern exploitation in the digital domain. Sky Mavis Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Aleksander Leonard Larsen compared Axie Infinity to a digital nation, implying that criminals exist in any civilization, in reaction to charges of questionable activities by some Axie Infinity players. The COO acknowledged that the problem is an internal concern for the company and that the platform has so far banned "several thousand" accounts. Decrease in Revenue Since its peak in November 2021, Axie Infinity's income has been declining. According to a Token Terminal graphic, Axie Infinity started October with $6 million in daily earnings. Revenue increased over $10 million between October 4th and early December, but that has also decreased to about $2 million. In fact, Axie hasn't surpassed $2 million since mid-December, with the number reaching as low as $21,000 on March 30th. According to a recent , Axie Infinity’s revenue fell 40% in September alone. report Ronin Network Hack The most significant challenge Axie has experienced in its four-year lifetime is a US$625 million hack that occurred on March 23, 2022. Hackers attacked Sky Mavis' Ronin Network validator nodes and Axie DAO validators, which are used to power the game, according to an official Substack . As a consequence, the hackers were able to escape with 25.5 million USDC and 173,600 Ether (ETH). In two transactions, the unknown hackers emptied cash from the Ronin bridge. article Ronin added that the chain now has nine validator nodes to prevent illegitimate transactions and that any withdrawals or deposits require five validatory signatures to be recognized. Ronin allowed Sky Mavis to sign transactions in November to assist with the strong demand from new Axie players. Although this only lasted until December, and the attacker was able to access Sky Mavis systems and get a signature from the Axie DAO validator using Ronin's gas-free RPC node. By doing so, the hacker gained validation access to this highly centralized network, gaining control of the majority of nodes and consequently decision-making authority. Chainalysis, a blockchain analytics firm, is presently assisting Sky Mavis in tracking down the stolen funds, which are still in the hacker's wallet. Ronin further stated that all partners are currently working to guarantee that users do not lose any money. Other steps are also being taken to prevent additional loss. For example, withdrawal or deposit recognition now takes eight signatures rather than five. In addition to Binance deactivating their bridge to and from Ronin, there is a temporary halt on the Ronin Bridge. The Katana DEX was also suspended immediately. Unfortunately, none of this has prevented the price of their AXS token from plummeting by 25% since the attack. Is this the end for Axie Infinity? Despite these inherent difficulties, numerous members of the gaming world feel Axie Infinity has a promising future. Some experts believe that the platform's large and growing population can only mean long-term success. Axie Infinity has grown in popularity and boosted AXS token values to the point where many people feel there is no suitable rival. The current hack, on the other hand, has the potential to quickly change public opinion. Although Axie's income has been steadily declining since late last year, the decrease has been considerably more precipitous in March 2022. According to Token Terminal statistics, Axie earned $184,500 on March 1st, down from $2.1 million on January 19th. On March 25th, revenue was less than $10,000. Several competitors, like Crypto Kitties and Decentraland, had failed to compete with Axie Infinity initially. However, now is the opportunity for these alternative play-to-earn ecosystems to take advantage of Axie's unsatisfied users. Popular options can take advantage of Axie Infinity's current downtime to remodel or launch new products, making the features appealing enough for Axie users to switch. In fact, players may be content with the idea of keeping and utilizing accounts across most of these popular play-to-earn games. With all of the commotion in the GameFi world right now, it could be a good moment for new games to be released, or at the very least to quench gamers' appetites. Security improvements, more gaming possibilities, more accessible play-to-earn solutions, and immersive games that can compete with Axie Infinity are all possible options. If rivals provide little to no financial barriers to entry, Axie Infinity may have a difficult time getting back on its feet once the Ronin bridge is opened.

Is This the End for Axie Infinity? The Rise and Fall of the P2E Blockchain Game

Staking has never been easier in the Axie Infinity Ecosystem. With the launch of the Axie Ronin Sidechain, you can now stake your tokens with the utmost ease. This post would guide you through the , , and . process involved possible risks APR or profits that are to be expected For this guide, I'm gonna be using the AXS - Axie Infinity governance token as an example, it is also the main token used for breeding Axies along with SLP. This is supposed to be a complete guide for those who play Axie infinity and are conversant with its terms but also for those complete beginners with no previous knowledge about staking or Axie Tokens, Because it only takes a few easy steps AND everyone can gain rewards from the thriving community of Axie Infinity. With that in mind, let's begin. Why? Before giving you the staking process, I had like to explain the following terms, so you can have a complete grasp of what you are doing, the possible risk involved, the profits APR, etc, regardless of your expertise in the blockchain gaming space. Staking; Staking is a Crypto term that is used to mean, committing your tokens or coins in a decentralized exchange (DEX) in order to provide liquidity, verify blockchain transactions, AND be rewarded for doing so. There are several reasons for staking tokens, the most popular being to provide liquidity for a certain token and to solidify blockchain transactions. Understanding the second reason to stake requires an understanding of a term called Proof-Of-Stake(I'll be explaining next) which is integrated into many blockchains today (Solana, Cardona, Avalanche, etc) Therefore, , i.e, locking your funds for a period of time and when that date arrives, you have received a percentage of AXS as profit.(Yes, AXS is the rewards in our case) you are gonna be staking AXS APR (Annual Percentage Rate); An easy way to understand APR is to think of it as a calculation of your profits for (1) the number of tokens you stake, (2) the total amount of users staking, and (3) the period you are staking for. This calculation can/should be used if you don't know what the APR of say a lending platform, staking, or Liquidity Pool is, but in most cases, the APR is shown to all users and it becomes easier to determine your profits that way. As such, I'm gonna give you a simple example; Profits = APR * Number of Years *when you know the APR and since APR is calculated yearly Say for an 100% APR return, I'm staking $1000 on a certain Defi platform; what would be my profits by the end of 12 months which I'm locking away for? Chel's Profit = 100 * 1 = 100% Therefore, 100% of 1000 = $1000 I earn a profit of $1000, and by the year's end , I own exactly $2000 or thereabouts. But what if the period of locking is less than a year?, then you can divide the number of months by 12. Proof of Stake; Proof of Stake is a consensus(agreement) in which most blockchains are built upon that works by creating new blocks (linking up to previous blocks) by using the stakes of users in a blockchain to validate block mining and secure the network. It's an alternative mechanism to Proof of Work(which is more competitive); it is also less energy-intensive, more secure, and has a decentralized approach because all stakers have a random chance of being selected as the next validator on the blockchain (even though differences in the amount staked is greatly taken into account). Therefore, you can see why it is necessary for blockchain to have stakes and in return, rewards them for staking in relation to their stake amounts, simple as that. Staking AXS on Ronin; Preparation Guide You can start the process of staking AXS by certainly having some AXS in store, either on your Ronin Wallet or by first Buying AXS directly. Go to your Ronin Wallet Extension and log in there STEP 1: [If you don't have a ronin wallet, you've got to create one] You can create a Ronin wallet by first downloading the extension from . After Adding to Browser, complete the entire wallet creation process and save your seed phrase - The seed phrase is what you can use to retrieve your wallet in case you forgot your password. It is Important STEP 1(b): Chrome Web Store here VERY Your Balance should be empty of some AXS, so you need to buy some first. Buying AXS through Binance is about the easiest way to do so. You can learn how to AND OR proceed with this guide if those two are settled. STEP 1(c): Create a Binance account Deposit Funds This is where I tell you - If you already have A Ronin Wallet and AXS stored, simply move to "Actual Staking Process". In Binance, with some USDT balance available, go to , and in the search box - . You can then purchase any amount of AXS as you see fit; if you are just venturing into staking, it might be better to purchase a couple, between $20 - $30(so as to meet the minimum withdrawal amount). STEP 2: Trade -> Advanced type AXS and then click on the pair - AXS/USDT Now that you have AXS coins in your Binance balance, you need to transfer them to your Ronin Wallet. This process is very easy and just requires your Ronin Wallet Address. STEP 3: In Binance, . Click on the Withdraw Button; make sure the tab says Crypto and Not Fiat, before searching for AXS in the search box. STEP 3(b): Go to Wallet -> Fiat/Spot Balance Now go over to your Ronin Wallet Extension and copy the address by clicking the little copy icon. Paste that in the field that says Address in Binance. In the network option, you can notice that you are unable to select any; all of it is greyed out. One little step would fix this. STEP 4: One important step before you can safely enter your preferred network (which should be RON) is to slightly edit the address you just pasted. You can do that by changing the prefix [ronin:] to [0x]. STEP 4(b): For Example, , To send some AXS successfully from Binance, I'm gonna change it to: . With that settled, change the network to RON, write the amount of AXS you want to send over in the amount field, then Withdraw. My address is: ronin:c5ca26db858061495b933faff5af43f4d4f0acce 0xc5ca26db858061495b933faff5af43f4d4f0acce Now before moving on to the next process, Verify that the tokens are dropped in your wallet. If all steps were followed correctly, they should arrive in 2 - 5mins Staking AXS on Ronin; Actual Staking To start the Staking process, go to STEP 1: stake.axieinfinity.com Login here so that your Ronin Balance can be reflected, do so by clicking the "Connect to Ronin Wallet" Button and verify the transaction through your ronin wallet popup STEP 2: Use the "stake" button, then select the desired AXS amount – press "stake" again, and approve the transaction via your Ronin wallet that pops up. STEP 3: Your AXS are now staked. You can use the staking dashboard to see your rewards live, as well as the current APR, which is changing over time. STEP 4: Accordingly, after these steps are completed, you can calculate your expected profits (distributed as AXS) using the formula above, or you can use this dynamic website to do the work. The APR is a close live update of Axie Staking APR, and you can choose amongst varying spans of time. Have fun in stakingrewards here That brings us to the end of this guide on AXS staking; I hope it has been very easy to understand, especially for those just getting into the space (because I mean, you gotta start from somewhere) and making sure you can secure your Ronin Wallet by keeping your Password and Seed Phrase offline, then we can all benefit from these kinds of rewards. NOTE; The APR on AXS Staking decreases over time - As more AXS tokens are staked in fact. But currently, the returns are still pretty high and a great valuable return but this is not necessarily financial advice. Thanks for reading, Chel_ [The author owns or manages investments in the following assets covered in this article: AXS, RON, USDT] Also Published Here

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