Perhaps there is a law that says utopias are always as strange as the time in which they were raised. And since we’re known to be in a rather peculiar era, to put it politely, our vision of the future has also been much more grounded. Anyway, one of the most recent ones goes like this: soon we will make money easily. Thanks to the blockchain, of course. Small pixel monsters are the greatest benefit in this economic system.
In the video game Axi Infinity It is all about digital pets called Axies, which look like a cross between a cat and a window, or a sheep and a snake. You can breed, breed and train them to finally allow the creatures to compete against each other in a contemporary version of cockfighting so that the stronger person wins. This principle is reminiscent of Pokemon or even the ancient Tamagotchi. During the gameplay, you earn a cryptocurrency called Small Love Potion by winning battles or selling animals, which you can either hoard or exchange for representative money on suitable trading platforms.
The game uses a technology called NFT, with which digital files can be uniquely assigned and identified. So each axis only exists once. In the spring of 2021, there was already a moderate boom of NFTs in the art world, and the principle is the same, only that it’s not in doubt that digital outdoor artworks at Christie’s or Sotheby’s sell for millions, but nice video game monsters.
The ‘pay to win’ business model is now followed by the ‘play to win’ model
A whole series of fairy tales: more than 600,000 players spend time on the platform every day, a total turnover of more than $150 million, growth has exceeded all scales for months, the most expensive pixel animal, a purple bubble with a unicorn and an orange creepy tail, the owner turned More than 500,000 euros. “You can imagine Axie as a country with a real economic system,” says development studio Sky Mavis. You probably don’t do it under these days. Even in the cryptocurrency world, which is not entirely poor in paranoia, no one is sure if this is a good idea.
What’s really new, above all else, is the idea that players create some kind of value themselves. After all, electronic money created in this way has more real value than the much-touted Bitcoin, which exists only for itself. So far, most gaming apps always say “pay to win”. A common business model states that users have to pay huge amounts of money in order to have any chance of success. Now Play to Win – Play to Win.
Perhaps in a world where automation is increasingly destroying low-skill jobs, this is the closest possible approximation to universal basic income. One part of humanity raises digital animals, which then sells them to the other part, which already has enough capital.
Rumor has it that a number of people in Southeast Asia quit their usual jobs in order to play the game full time. It is said that a small four-figure sum can be easily won when an eight-hour day is played. That might not sound like much by local standards. In countries such as the Philippines or Vietnam, where Axie Infinity is particularly popular, it can be used to support the family.
