Surprise! Gaming Is the Most Likely Candidate to Onboard People to Web3

August 16, 2022 World iGaming & Gambling

Depending on who you ask, blockchain gaming is either the next big thing in Web3 or a detestable trend that companies should avoid indulging.

The space is divided, and taking an objective temperature on the matter can be challenging. Minecraft banned NFTs from their iconic title, GameStop opened an NFT marketplace, the WAX blockchain has become a hub for Web3 gaming, and Axie Infinity is doing its best to bounce back from a comically painful $615-million hack that took place earlier this year. Even two of the most popular NFT-based games, Decentraland, and The Sandbox, struggle to break 1,000 active monthly users.

Regardless of how any person or organization feels about blockchain-based games, however, they’ll likely impact the industry’s future significantly. The changes NFTs will bring to the industry, in the long run, remain to be seen. But we can take some educated guesses.

The future of blockchain gaming
To better understand the state of the blockchain gaming space, nft now spoke to Şekip Gökalp, the Core Strategist of the Web3 gaming startup Infinite Arcade. The startup produces a meta layer that introduces metaverse dynamics like NFT ownership into existing game titles, and they work with gaming studios to make their existing titles more profitable.

Gökalp is also the CEO and co-founder of the mobile games publishing platform Coda, which launched Infinite Arcade in February after dedicating nearly all of its resources to preparing for the future of blockchain gaming. The Coda platform has become so popular that it hosts over 15,000 mobile game developers.

“We started a soul search,” Gökalp said of the company’s recent pivot to blockchain gaming. “We tried to understand: what is our role in a very late-stage mobile gaming market where there is little room for disruption and innovation left?”

The answer? Honing in on Web3. Gökalp dabbled in Bitcoin in 2014 after being introduced to crypto by friends and later began investing in early-stage Web3 tech startups in 2016 after selling an ad tech company he had successfully built. In 2021, when Axie Infinity and The Sandbox made waves in the gaming space, he felt eager to get as close as possible. “At some point, I realized I was spending as much time exploring these games for fun as I was running a company,” Gökalp said. “That’s what led to Infinite Arcade.”