October Gaming Roundup

State of the Market

The total market cap for all gaming-related coins reached $6.29B, up over 20% from September. However, the top-performing tokens saw a slight pullback, with only three making it into the top 100 coins by market cap.The once-popular blockchain game Axie Infinity has had a tough month as their token AXS has been on a downward trend, dropping 28% this month. The combination of a crypto bear market and reduced player earnings (compared to the end of 2021 highs) have been significant contributing factors. It is also worth noting that monthly active players have dropped back down to December 2020 levels. To Axie’s credit, new and improved token mechanics have resulted in the in-game currency SLP remaining relatively stable in price (more than 370M SLP tokens have been burnt).

Vulcan Forged’s PYR saw some nice price action this month, with the token rising 13% (Oct. 25th-27th) before a slight dip and another 25% increase (Oct. 28th-30th). The project initially started as a Web3 game studio but has grown its vision into becoming an all-encompassing gaming ecosystem. The team has been busy building and, in recent months, has made some bullish updates that likely fueled the upwards price action.The project will be supporting the UFC’s upcoming Polaris Pro event and recently made several C-level hires that hail from industry leaders such as EA, Epic, and Activision Blizzard. Updates to Elysium were also announced and provide more structure to the project’s long-term vision. Elysium is Vulcan Forged’s proof-of-authority L1 blockchain, specifically designed for blockchain gaming, that will launch together with a first-party DEX, launchpad, developer tools, and white-label services.

Vulcan Forged has a number of PYR staking incentives that yield LAVA token rewards (LAVA acts as the ecosystem token), which has led to a relatively loyal community of holders. 67% of wallets holding PYR have done so for over three months, a positive sign of long-term commitment despite the token being down 88% from its ATH.Since ETH’s fall in April, PYR has struggled to break through the $5 resistance line. The combination of a strong community and ongoing developments in the Elysium ecosystem could be what PYR needs to break through and continue its climb. As with most altcoins, we will likely have to wait for a sustained ETH bull run before this happens.

It is important to emphasize the fact that the team’s strategy is ambitious. Although they have publicly confirmed that there will be more than 40 projects launching on Elysium soon, it will take much more to attract enough players (and spenders) to sustain the LAVA token rewards that foster holder loyalty.

Top Web3 Games

Despite the number of active wallets interacting with gaming apps falling as much as 20% in October, we ended the month in a decent position. Daily transactions were down 3%, and active wallets dropped 5% from the end of September. These gaming metrics still represent 90% mo