Axie Infinity, the most popular Play-to-earn game, is experiencing a resurgence. User engagement had crashed after the $600 million hack in late March this year. NFT sales have increased by 205% recently due to the improvements to the ecosystem and the game. User engagement and game downloads have also increased.
What is Axie Infinity?
Axie Infinity was launched in March 2018. It is an Ethereum-based play-to-earn game. Unique collectible creatures feature in its game universe. You collect, battle, breed, and build kingdoms for your “Axies” in the game. You can also buy, sell, earn, and trade resources through gameplay in its in-game economy.
Its integration with the Ethereum blockchain is what sets it apart from other similar games. You can own the Axies you collect through gameplay as virtual assets due to this integration with the Ethereum blockchain. Players who dedicate their time and effort to improving their skills are highly rewarded in the game.
Axie Infinity is player-owned and player-driven. Players can create their own experiences as they can access all art assets and data within the game. Active users rank Axie Infinity as the number one Ethereum-based game.
The next step in Axie Infinity’s journey
The next step in Axie Infinity’s ever-expanding universe is Land staking. An opportunity for more experience and rewards was developed when land plots were made available within the game. Landowners can stake their land to earn rewards in the form of Axie Infinity tokens, AXS.
There are more features to come. Axie plans to add more gameplay-centric conditions to claim rewards in the future. These new features will lead to more engagement between the user and the game.
Axie Infinity has allocated 337,500 AXS per month as staking rewards as of release. There are five types of land in the game. Each land type has a different reward rate as mentioned below
The Ronin Bridge
An Ethereum sidechain was built for the game called “Ronin Bridge”. It allows users to transfer their virtual assets between the game and the Ethereum network. This sidechain experienced a damaging hack, draining over $600 million in tokens in late March.
Sky Mavis — the company behind Axie Infinity — has reimbursed its users with 25.5 million USDC and 117,600 ETH to fix the damage caused by the hack. Also, the Ronin Bridge has gone through three rounds of audits and is now back online.
The update of smart contract limits is the key change to the bridge design. Validators can now set daily withdrawal limits as well as a sign-off system for all withdrawals.
All withdrawals under $1 million are in tier 1. 70% of validators need to sign off in tier 1. Amounts greater than $1 million are in tier 2 and it requires 90% of validators to sign off. Lastly, tier 3 is for amounts over $10 million and it requires 90% of validators to sign off, as well as a transaction fee and a seven-day holding period.
Tokenomics of Axie Infinity
AXS and SLP are the two primary tokens of the game.
- Axie Infinity Shards (AXS): This is used as a governance token in the Axie universe. It is an ERC-20 token that is earned through staking and gameplay. It lets players participate in and vote on important governance decisions. There is a reward pool in the form of a community treasury in the game. Inflows from all Axie NFT marketplace trades and AXS used to breed Axies are sent to the treasury.
- Smooth Love Potion (SLP): This is used as a utility token in the Axie universe and is primarily used to breed Axies as well as AXS. You can earn SLP by playing against others in the arena.
AXS has a max supply of 270 million tokens and a market cap of $1.1 billion. In November 2021, it hit an all-time high of $165.37. It has been experiencing a steady decline through 2022. AXS is trading at $18 per token as of writing.
Conclusion
Axie Infinity is still the most popular Ethereum game today. It has bounced back remarkably well after suffering a devastating hack to its sidechain. Sky Mavis has shown a strong commitment to the future of Axie and its ecosystem by reimbursing the lost money and making the changes to the system. Due to the recent developments and changes, Axie Infinity will continue to be popular among users.
