5 Play to earn games for your portfolio

T

he year 2022 looks set to be the year when play to earn projects will become the hot topic in crypto.  The combination of gaming, NFTs and financial rewards looks set to generate some amazing returns for adventurous investors.

In this guide:

What is play to earn?

2021 was the year that NFTs rose to prominence and greater public awareness.  Artworks selling for several millions dollars hit the headlines as invested rushed to cash in on the craze.  On the back of the massive NFT growth has come play to earn (also referred to as GameFi).  This new area of the crypto industry embraces NFTs, traditional gaming and the possibility of earning from participating.

Play to earn projects typically have their own utility token which players must purchase in order to participate in the game.  Players can then be rewarded with further tokens by participating in games.  A commonality in these projects is the buying and selling of NFTs (such as in-game characters) which can be bought and sold using the project token.  Some projects operate yield farms in which users can earn further tokens by providing token pairs of liquidity in order to facilitate exchanges.

Below are some of our favourite projects that look set to experience high growth in 2022.

DeFi Kingdoms

The developers of DeFi Kingdoms have succeeded in combining a pixel art game (a 16-bit look and feel) with a decentralised exchange, liquidity pools and NFT marketplace.  At the time of writing the platform has locked liquidity exceeding $1 billion dollars .

The game operates on the lesson known Harmony blockchain.  Harmony is a layer two blockchain that seeks to solve the scalability problems inherent in Ethereum.  In order to get started with the game, you must first obtain some Harmony tokens which can then be converted into the game native JEWEL token.

The game is centres around the marketplace, bank and garden.   Tokens are swapped and liquidity provider tokens are created in the marketplace, the bank is used to stake JEWEL and the garden is used to add your liquidity provider tokens in pools to earn yield.  The yields are particularly impressed with returns of 400% possible by staking a combination of Harmony (ONE) and DeFi Kingdoms (JEWEL) tokens.

When it comes to harvesting rewards earned from the yield farms, parts of the rewards remain locked and can be obtained at a later date.  This serves the purpose of avoiding users dumping JEWEL tokens too soon and harming the token price.

JEWEL tokens can be used to purchase characters in the game (referred to as heroes) in order to complete the missions.  Since some of these heroes are now quite expensive, it is possible to rent heroes from other players (earning the owners a return).  The heroes are a good example of NFTs.

DeFi Kingdoms is a very promising project with a new iteration called Crystal Vale due to go live in Q1 2022.

Axie Infinity

Axie Infinity has become one of the most popular play to earn projects, ranking inside the top 40 most popular crypto currencies.  The game operates as a trading and battling experience with similarities to Pokemon and Tamagotchi.  Players can trade, raise, breed, collect and battle token-based creations reffered to as Axies.

Associated with the game is the Axie Infinity token (AXS).  The token has a maximum supply of 270 million units of which more than 60 millions are in circulation.  A limiting factor of the eco-system is the use of the Ethereum network with both slow and expensive transactions.

Launched in March 2018, the game has since grown to over two million active daily users.

Forest Knight

This turn-based strategy mobile game launched back in October 2019, initially on the Enjin network but has since moved to the Polygon blockchain.  The goal of the game to locate and defeat the Skeleton Lord by fighting wraiths, ghouls and electro-dragons.  Players can build their own team of heroes from different realms.

Powering the game is the KNIGHT token that was officially launched on the 22nd September 2021.  It can be used for:

- Pet evolution on the blockchain

- Player vs player tournament entries

- Bounties in guild wars

- Building staking

- Merging and upgrading of NFTs

- Trading in the marketplace

The game also operates a free-to-play model in which no deposits or subscriptions are required but NFTs and tokens can still be earned.

The game has grown at a positive rate – the 25,000 daily milestone was achieved in September 2021 – today there are nearly 100,000 daily users.

Plant vs Undead

Observant readers may immediately spot the singularities between Plant vs Undead and Plants vs Zombies.  This NFT focused game borrows aspects that made the aforementioned franchise so successful.

In Plants vs Undead the objective is to create an army of plants in gardens as a means of killing the undead monsters.  Plants can be spread across a field in any formation in order to attack the undead as they continue crossing the playing field.

The native currency operated by the game are known as PVU tokens – these are transferred on the Binance Smart Chain.  Seeds and plants can be purchased from the marketplace using this token.  There is no upfront requirement to purchase PVU tokens – the game can be enjoyed by playing for free and earning the tokens.  Indeed the game has gained significant transaction in the Philippines where individuals have been earning a living by earning the PVU tokens.

The present version of Plant vs Undead allows players to experiment with farming – that is planting, watering and collecting what are referred to as “Light energy resources”.

Plants vs Undead has great promise and looks to become a significant GameFi project in 2022.

Thetan Arena

Thetan Arena is described as an online multiplayer arena battle game.  NFTs are used to give players rights over game characters and in-game items.

Associated with the game are two tokens – THC and THG. Players can earn Thetan Coins (THC) during game play with the option to spend these tokens on NFTs.  Thetan Gem (THG) takes of the role of a governance token but can also be used to upgrade the capabilities of characters in the game.

There are four different modes of play for the game:

- In battle royale (solo or duo) the winner is the last player standing.

- In the super star mode the winner is the player that captures the flag.

- Tower siege where you must charge towards your enemy and set your super robot on them before they do the same.

- Death match in which teams of four vs four play off with the victor being the team that achieves the most kills.

Officially launched on 27th November 2021, Thetan Arena accumulated 3 million registered users in the first 7 days with over 6 million registered users at the time of writing.

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