Re-engineering its destiny in the GameFi landscape

Axie Infinity, a blockchain-based game that has popularized the Play-to-Earn game model, is often awe-inspiring and suspicious. The game has created a new type of employment market and has brought rapid profits to game investors.However, its highly volatile in-game crypto (Smooth Love Potion, or SLP), Ronin chain hacking, and the resulting new digital inequality. Pause A threat to its existence. Axie is a form of “extreme entrepreneurship,” and depending on the dynamics of SLP, successes and failures can occur almost overnight.Many predictions have been made make About the collapse and loss of Axie trust Among that player. Can Axie regain its former glory in the winter of cryptocurrencies and the uncertain world economy?

As a game enthusiast myself, I was very intrigued by the future of Axie Infinity and wanted to study and study it. Throughout the first half of 2022, I interviewed more than 12 Axie managers, guild members, and scholars. Analyze the essential issues of the game and assess Axie’s mistakes and possibilities. Axie offers some strategies on how to redesign and move forward with that fate.

Leveling demand for SLP

One mistake Axie made was that there was too much demand for SLP. In order for the SLP demand curve to be smoother, the influx of new players should be stable, but not excessively increased. This may have extended the validity of the game. The cost of acquiring Axies (collectible digital creatures for games that can be used in combat and commerce)-how investors and new players plan their return on investment (ROI) and manage their willingness to hire new scholars. Affect-Stable, but grew slightly over time.

Another mistake is that Axie is dominated by players in low-paying countries. This is because the SLPs earned are very attractive compared to the local standard of living. However, betting on a single player group is too risky. Risk diversification is required. Axie can attract players from medium to high wage countries and focus on the “fun element” of the game with the “earning element” as a bonus. We need to move to a self-playing model where players have a say in the development of the game.

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One of the biggest mistakes was the abuse of Axie Infinity by multi-account players, which boosted the supply of SLP. We’ve heard about single player playing on up to 50 accounts using multiple mobile phones. Axie was too late to address this issue.

Balance the supply of SLP

Another mistake was in Axie’s in-game economics, where players were rewarded with SLP for every battle they won. This has significantly increased the supply of SLP and reduced its value. One strategy to fix this is to introduce more balancing mechanisms to write SLPs. Examples include imposing an SLP penalty on those who lose the battle.

Another problem is that many players don’t cash out the hard-earned SLPs. To prevent oversupply of SLP, a healthy cash-out ratio of SLP is required. Axie keeps the “gas charges” when cashing out SLPs very low, introduces a time-based system to cash out or lose SLPs, and burns more SLPs at Axies breeding costs. Can be set optimally.

The element of uncertainty is important in in-game economics to prevent the game from being abused by the player. Unfortunately, Axie was over-predicting how players would get SLP. Another strategy is to provide a time delay between the breeding and birth of the new Axies, or to add SLP costs to raise the baby Axies.

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Create Axie’s business model

A key factor in Axie Infinity’s business model is the price of SLP, which is influenced by many factors such as SLP supply and demand, Axies supply, cryptographic regulations, cryptographic volatility, and SLP trader behavior. Therefore, SLP prices are partially manageable and partially beyond Axie’s reach.Nansen Estimated Axie’s $ 1.35 billion revenue (May 2021 to May 2022) was primarily due to breeding costs (85%) and market fees (13%). This shows how limited Axie’s income sources are. Axie Infinity needs to find ways to expand its revenue streams beyond breeding and market fees.

We need a more creative business model. To increase the number of new players, Axie needs to innovate and provide a gaming experience that goes beyond the static environment of a small square battle space that is very boring for players. Small monsters may be allowed to wander the world of Lunacia and face the dangers of burning or reducing their supply of SLP (eg, deadly epidemics) and the beasts that eat Axie. Players need to be able to team other players’ Axies and Axies in huge battles with other Axies, like the epic battle of the Mecha Anime series Gundam. This will increase the new demand for SLP. Collaboratively developing a game with an indie developer is essential, but a profit-sharing model is needed for it to work. Axie can also change Pokmon Go’s approach by allowing players to spend money on decorations, avatars, and merchandise to boost their revenue streams.

Some of my informants have suggested that Axie should be allowed to “upgrade burning SLP to powerful Axies,” “grow the AXS market,” and “host a global esports tournament.” did. Esports is one lucrative area where Axie can get a lot of attention.

Another mistake was the recognition of a lack of communication between Axie Infinity developer and publisher Sky Mavis and its community. Many of my informants claimed that Axie’s future plans were cloudy. I was also dissatisfied with the “power play” that SkyMavis’ core team displayed to the Axie Infinity community. This requires cultural tweaking of the Axie ecosystem.

Axie Infinity’s not so dark future

In the midst of the cryptocurrency winter, Axie sold over 325,000 Axies for a total of over 3,500 ETH for about $ 3.9 million. In a real-time experiment in the game with some Axie scholars in June 2022, the time to find an enemy in each battle remained the same, and despite the expectation that most players would leave, many Axie players still It suggests that you are. Axie. However, Axie players and managers are tempted to take part in other compelling play-to-earn games. This is Axie’s new battle, the “Switcher”.

Axie Infinity may not disappear altogether. It will probably reinvent itself and portray the new fate of the rapidly changing GameFi landscape. GameFi remains here as a place to experiment with the Metaverse, blurring the line between fun and work / investment.

This article does not contain any investment advice or recommendations. All investment and transaction movements carry risks and readers need to do their own research when making decisions.

The views, ideas and opinions expressed herein are for the author only and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views or opinions of Cointelegraph or the Hong Kong Polytechnic University or its affiliates.