I'm heavily invested into axie (5 figures), happy to answer any questions.
Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
51–60 of 147 posts
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#52> Axie, which is loosely based on the Pokemon franchise, rewards players with tokens for winning battles and completing quests.
So I looked for a gameplay video on YT, and it looks very much like a typical free-to-play mobile game. I'm guessing the difference is that you can exchange the in-game currency for actual money? Not sure why you'd need a blockchain if that's the case...
Also, are these games actually fun? Or are people playing just for the money?
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#53> Andreessen Horowitz’s cryptocurrency fund made one of its largest investments to date in Sky Mavis, leading a $152m financing that valued the company at $3bn. > Sky Mavis, which takes a 4.5 per cent cut of transactions within the game, has made about $1.2bn of revenues I mean, say what you want about this being a scam, ponzi scheme, etc. That is some real cash. I saw this game popping up on Twitch a few months ago…
There's 20 search results on this page at this moment for ponzi. HN missed the boat hard on this and there's a lot of sour grapes.
Technical folks have left the marketing chavs alone and they've taken a concept and made it something that we hate. We hate it so much we can't see its potential.
If a bunch of people put their money into a constrained system and the price goes up that doesn't automatically make it a ponzi scheme.
Edit: 28 search results now
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#54I wonder if, in the future, a significant portion of the population will have a full time job playing one of these crypto games. They'll be paid based on their in-game social achievements, which will include things like "cares for the (virtual) environment", "demonstrates commitment to diversity", "encourages others to follow health mandates", "uses de-escalation techniques in conflicts." New mission types and achiev…
This is impossible because the money has to come from somewhere. The 1% aren't going to pay people to play games.
If I understand the current trajectory of society, it will come in the form of taxes on people who work more traditional jobs.
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is impossible because the money has to come from somewhere. The 1% aren't going to pay people to play games.
Organized sports disagrees.
Sports don't employ a significant portion of the population. Gaming will definitely be "big" in the future but it can't be huge.
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#56> Andreessen Horowitz’s cryptocurrency fund made one of its largest investments to date in Sky Mavis, leading a $152m financing that valued the company at $3bn. > Sky Mavis, which takes a 4.5 per cent cut of transactions within the game, has made about $1.2bn of revenues I mean, say what you want about this being a scam, ponzi scheme, etc. That is some real cash. I saw this game popping up on Twitch a few months ago…
> To write off this activity as a scam or criminal seems to be missing a bigger picture that we don't quite understand yet.
The linked article is literally about the meltdown of the game's unsustainable economy, so maybe the critics understood it better than you're suggesting.
The entire Axie Infinity economic model only worked with an ever-increasing number of new players entering the economy. As player growth slows, the model breaks down.
This is why people are comparing it to an MLM or other scheme that only works as long as you continue to find more and more people to pull into the system.
The money must come from somewhere. If old players are cashing out money put in by new players, the game is up as soon as the supply of new players dries up.
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#57> Andreessen Horowitz’s cryptocurrency fund made one of its largest investments to date in Sky Mavis, leading a $152m financing that valued the company at $3bn. > Sky Mavis, which takes a 4.5 per cent cut of transactions within the game, has made about $1.2bn of revenues I mean, say what you want about this being a scam, ponzi scheme, etc. That is some real cash. I saw this game popping up on Twitch a few months ago…
This is such a Hackernews take "I thought it was gambling and immoral, but now that it has made billions there might be a point".
It can still be gambling and/or a Ponzi schemes.
Adding obfuscation over methods to tap into greed and gambling euphoria does not technical innovation make. Cryptocurrency already attracts people who like to gamble and want to get rich quickly, so this is just docking onto a natural pipeline of marks to deploy their scheme.
I have nothing but disgust for these types of games, even without the block chain veneer. No hate against the players and we know prohibition doesn't work so not calling for a ban, but at least I can contribute a small bit of social stigma against those that profit by hijacking their customers reward functions like this.
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#58> Andreessen Horowitz’s cryptocurrency fund made one of its largest investments to date in Sky Mavis, leading a $152m financing that valued the company at $3bn. > Sky Mavis, which takes a 4.5 per cent cut of transactions within the game, has made about $1.2bn of revenues I mean, say what you want about this being a scam, ponzi scheme, etc. That is some real cash. I saw this game popping up on Twitch a few months ago…
> It really makes me reconsider the group-think on hacker news. This is pretty bad when it comes to crypto topics. A lot of the crypto ecosystem is toxic and gross. Schemes, scams, marketing fluff, and meme bro attitudes galore. BUT, if you can bear to pay attention and cut through the noise, there are some pretty incredible innovations occurring in crypto, gaming, and defi. HN is very dismissive on these topics. It…
> HN is very dismissive on these topics.
In general, when ever crypto topics come up, the pro-crypto side tends to do a pretty terrible job of establishing that there are "some pretty incredible innovations occurring in crypto, gaming, and defi."
Perhaps you could list some and change our minds?
I just saw on Twitter how some one is minting NFTs using the art of a deceased artist and their family is scrambling to figure out how to stop it. There are a lot of shitty things happening in this space.
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#59Every time I hear about this I am reminded of this strategy game I once played in ~2008. It was a strategy game and it promised to pay you money if you were able to capture certain territory. I cannot for the life of me remember it's name though, anyone recall something like this?
Re: Crypto’s hottest game is facing an economic maelstrom
#60I've been playing with https://euphoria.money which is a 'fork' of OHM on the Harmony block chain. It brings back memories of high-yield investment programs (HYIP), which are a type of Ponzi scheme. I don't want to accuse them of anything, but it's a little "if it's feels too good to be true, then it probably is" So much of the DeFI yield farming comes across somewhere between Ponzi scheme and the insanity that prece…
It seems like we are really going fast towards game regulation based on what I saw. Gambling with real fake money for teens in a game designed to be basically a pokemon clone with all ways to keep users engaged? It may not be a ponzi scheme, but if it keeps growing, we will hear about it as a new panic in US.
I’ve been seeing a lot of ads recently for mobile games with cash or crypto payouts.