Play-to-earn (P2E) games are a new and young phenomenon in the gaming industry, but one that will not stop growing, as it mixes the two things that all people want in their lives; fun and money.  

Most play-to-earn games today reward the player with their in-game token, with its worth decided by the amount of liquidity, or money, in the token. That is why many use non-fungible tokens (NFT) sakes to initially bolster their token, dedicating a portion of their profits to propping it up until players start putting their money into it.   

After that, it’s up to the game developers to develop a well-balanced internal economy that both produces and burns tokens accordingly and provides a fun and compelling experience to keep players coming back for more than just money.  

Fun is still the most significant factor in gameplay. Yes, getting rewarded in cryptocurrency and NFTs is a tremendous additional incentive to play, but it does not excuse a terrible or boring game. Even if some people were so swayed by the promise of “free money” that they do play, they wouldn’t last long as part of your player base, and word of mouth is a powerful way to spread the word on your game. Fun and fair rewards are how you make that happen.   

But That is Where the Similarities End  

Most people who game, at least those above 18, are not hoping to make a career out of play-to-earn games. At least not realistically. Income at the level of the player in the game is nowhere near as high as what would be required for a full-time job. This doesn’t make sense under the current P2E model. Paid incentives are more of a nice little bonus where players either break even with their investments or even get a fantastic bonus, and so the fun will still be the main factor behind a game’s success.   

Having said that, a game that rewards you for playing, assuming it is as fun as its non-blockchain counterparts, will probably rein superior in most players’ minds. 

In third-world countries, where the American dollar is valued at a higher rate compared to the local currency, many have been using play-to-earn games like Axie Infinity to earn what amounts to a decent income. 

The founder of Reddit, Alexis Ohanian, predicts that 90 percent of the gaming market will be Play-to-Earn games within the next five years.  

“90 percent of people will not play a video game unless they are being properly valued for that time,” Ohanian said.  

“In five years, you will actually value your time properly, and instead of being harvested for advertisements or being fleeced for dollars to buy stupid hammers you don’t actually own, you will be playing some on-chain equivalent game that will be just as fun, but you’ll actually earn value, and you will be the harvester.”  

As time progresses, new methods of generating income will no doubt crop up. From adopting a big company’s brand, renting out land, selling digital products, or performing digital services, it will all come with the advent of the Metaverse, whatever form it takes.   

Right now, it is still a very young concept, but one that is naturally gaining traction with an audience that once spent their income on gaming, now able to invest it and their time. 

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When talking about Non-Fungible Tokens – NFTs – many imagine ugly pieces of art sold for millions of real-world dollars. The disruptive and transformative potential uses for NFTs goes far beyond a picture of a Greedy Goat or a Perky Penguin with the promise of riches, passive income, or what have you. What an NFT is fundamentally is a secure method of verification, and that small fact alone makes them game-changers across many industries and everyday life.

NFTs are cryptographic tokens that use blockchain technology to verify their ownership and cannot be replicated. They are used to represent digital and real-world items such as artwork and real estate, allowing these assets to be traded with a slight possibility of fraud. 

Despite the crypto market crash and the NFT market slump that came with it, we are still seeing NFTs make huge strides in the public eye. Let’s take a look at the most common uses for NFTs today and what those applications might look like in the future:

Uses for NFTs in Art

Let’s get the obvious one aside. While most NFTs aren’t known for looking ‘good,’ at least in the traditional sense, they are an excellent way for artists to make a living off of their art and gather a loyal fanbase while they do it. Having the addition of a smart contract attached to a piece of art is an excellent way to add some functionality to an otherwise purely aesthetic. Earning money from initial sales and all royalties that follow from future sales is any artist’s dream come true. 

Of course, they will have to maintain the value of their art through community building, social media, and continued growth to maintain its perceived value, so it’s not exactly what you would call a ‘passive income,’ but then again, what is. 

Even as NFT projects continue to see adoption and traction in 2022, the landscape will inevitably keep changing.

Tokenization of Real-World Items

One of the most common uses of NFTs is as digital representations of real-world items, and in an increasingly digitized world, such a technology is the logical next step. From real-estate listings to musical albums and smart contracts that help manage real world 

The use of NFTs would allow a scalable use of trustless secondary marketplaces across many service industries. 

Digital Identities, Credentials, and Medical Records

Decentralized Identifiers, or DIDs, are some of the most common uses of NFTs. People, organizations, and any other entities can solidify their identities and avoid fraud through their Web 3 dealings through the use of NFTs.  

Digital identifications are at the heart of the future internet, and blockchain-enabled NFTs are the best way to do it. Imagine being able to pay tax, order goods, renew your license and handle subscriptions, and much more, all with one unhackable verification method.

Your medical health life will also be made easier by the advent of NFTs. Doctors can now issue NFT birth certificates upon birth, and that NFT would represent the lifelong identity that they can use for all their medical records. Medical professionals can then access this information whenever needed, such as when retrieving blood type and 

Academia can be among the best uses of NFTs in the real world, with the same applications as medical records, except it would be used during job applications, certification, and proof of attendance in college or school.

A New Dimension for Gaming

Perhaps the most practical use for today’s NFT scene, which is still in its infancy, digital collectibles such as those in “Play-to-Earn Games” like Axie Infinity, are a common use case. NFTs are a perfect fit for the gaming industry. 

With the digital identification model, players can use NFTs to verify their earnings and secure their winnings in video games. 

Since NFT objects in games can have varying degrees of rarity, NFTs make trading in games simpler, which can also raise the value. Due to the absence of an intermediary and the instantaneous nature of blockchain transactions, NFT owners won’t need to worry about frauds and scams. This creates more opportunities than ever before, including the ability to buy weapons or other equipment that has already been tried out by actual users and for both buyers and sellers to benefit.

Enabling cross-platform compatibility for NFT Game players are more motivated to continue playing a game if they already own characters or objects inside it, thanks to NFTs, which provide game devs with another chance to grow their brand and generate income.

Uses for NFTs Supply Chains

Many goods and items, particularly those in the food sector, have a problem when it comes to verifying their provenance, the contents within the packaging, and the source of supply. NFTs may be tied to a product via the blockchain, giving it a tamper-proof NFT identity.

Businesses can also find many convenient uses for NFTs for tracking their items from production through shipment and delivery way down the pipeline. Customers can then see what they are paying for, and the supply chain of a business is kept transparent.

In Conclusion

New and exciting creations such as NFTs are still young and volatile technologies, and no doubt, tremendous and turbulent changes are coming down the road. Once something is created. However, it cannot be uncreated or forgotten. NFTs have seen such a significant adoption in such a short time that we can rest assured they are not going anywhere.

We will continue to see more uses for NFTs expand and evolve to reach the lives of everyday individuals going about their business. NFTs holds the potential to make various services easier to use, and make more transactions transparent, especially when it comes to tangible ownership of the real estate, artwork, ideas, concepts, and the like.

More advancement in this area is expected in the upcoming years at a rate that will transform everyday life for the common person.

Inside Telecom provides you with an extensive list of content covering all aspects of the tech industry. Keep an eye on our Technology, Metaverse, and Blockchain sections to stay informed and up-to-date with our daily articles.

Is this it? Are we seeing the downfall of NFTs? Is the craze over? Can teenagers go back to working part-time instead of netting fortunes flipping Devious Ducks and Greedy Gorillas? Can the world return to normal, please? Well, the answer is a little bit more nuanced than a simple yes or no, but mostly, no, NFTs are here for a while. There will be major changes ahead.

One can easily conclude that NFTs are coming to an end seeing the most recent news of the plummet in NFT sales compared to previous years, and many can understandably celebrate the end of a trend that flooded every corner of the internet for over 18 months. The conclusion may be a little off. NFTs are a young market, and it is too early to tell where it will go. A few dips in sales here and there don’t mean much in the long term, but what we do know is that the “craze” period is practically over.

The alluring and magical effect of a great new technology that promises to free the world from poverty and liberate the masses from the oppression of the banking sector is done.

Investors, creators, flippers, enthusiasts, and artists are all more aware of what the NFT market is all about. People know what to look for and what to avoid, what works and what doesn’t, what to buy, and what to ignore.

NFTs Will Live on, But in What Form?

It would be unrealistic to expect the craze surrounding digital art with supposed utilities that do not stand the test of time to keep gaining momentum and investment.

Given that those involved in the NFT markets are more aware of the game now, we will likely see fewer small silly projects moving into the limelight and more serious efforts that are run like businesses.

The use of NFTs, however, goes far beyond Angry Avocados, Bored Apes, Tricky Tigers, or what have you. They are tokens, after all, with verifiable and unchangeable data that can be invaluable for any and all transactions, monetary or otherwise.

Unalterable data secured through decentralized cryptographic ledgers called blockchains means that one day you yourself will benefit from using your identity as an NFT. You will be able to transfer your medical data from one hospital to another without hassle or without reassessment. You will be able to buy and sell on a vast digital network without fear of hacking. You will be able to verify your ownership of physical goods without the need for a centralized authority – theoretically, at least. Again, it is still a young and developing market.

The disappearance of projects akin to Cool Cats and Crypto Punks does not spell the downfall of NFTs. In fact, it may very well mean the beginning of their rise.

Fundamentally, the verification of ownership bears immense opportunity now and in the future. In an increasingly complex digital world, with or without a so-called ‘Metaverse,’ NFTs are tools that will become indispensable.

Digital Identification, or DIDs, will one day be the norm. They could one day replace IDs, Passports, birth certificates, medical records, and more. NFTs are the basis for this aspect of digital transformation. One day you will be able to walk into a store, pick up an item, and put it in your backpack.

Analysis

One can argue that calling the NFT bubble a bubble is using the wrong analogy. Bubbles pop, but the craze surrounding NFTs exploded like the Big Bang and then slowed down over time as it found its footing and gained some clarity and form.

Yes, people pumped obscene amounts of money into projects that they themselves did not understand, and yes, many undeserving money-grubbing goblins ran off with immense profits and delivered no value, but that is what happens when we are swept up by the hype.

Now that all the junk is burned away and the hype has subsided, and while it may seem like the downfall of NFTs, we are actually seeing more projects and initiatives using NFTs exactly the way they were meant to be used;

• Exclusive membership
• Medical records and identification
• Asset tokenization
• Ticketing and reward programs
• Intellectual property and patents
• Art and patronage

As far as the current form of NFTs we see today, we will probably see more quality than quantity. The projects that will make millions won’t be those with ambitious promises and wacky artwork alone, which is easy to put together and release in a few days, if not less.

While all the best NFT projects have and are being run like startups, with teams of developer marketers, artists, writers, and so on, the last two years have been fraught with degenerate money grabbers, scammers, get-rich-quick schemes, and half-baked efforts. Those are some of the reasons that most NFT projects fail, not unlike most startups and businesses.

We will see fewer projects overall as the promise of easy money fades, but the projects that do come up will be serious endeavors with real plans, real utility, and real ownership of something valuable.  

Summary

The downfall of NFTs has not yet come. In a global reception, it is tough to come to a solid conclusion, and it is a time when the old skin sheds and the new skin shines. We are witnessing a period where the NFT market is fizzling down to the fundamentals and where NFT enthusiasts know the game better than they did over two years ago. The NFT market is going through a transformation that just happens to be coinciding with one of the biggest market crashes of the decade. Down, but not out.