The Evolution of the Gaming Industry into the Play-to-Earn Model

Press Release • January 26, 2022

With global cryptocurrency markets in a slump, at least one sector of the digital-asset industry appears to be primarily unscathed: blockchain-based gaming. According to the data tracker DappRadar, 398 active blockchain games are now defined as having at least one functional wallet within the game in the previous 24 hours. It represents a 92 percent gain from a year earlier. Over the last year, the overall number of blockchain games, including dormant ones, has increased by 71% to 1,179.



Gamers will only play games that allow them to earn money in five years, known as play-to-earn games. Alexis Ohanian, the renowned social media site Reddit co-founder, believes this. He feels that more people are looking for ways to be compensated for their valuable time.


Console Gaming


The emergence of gaming consoles such as the Atari was the first significant gaming development. However, the significant technological improvements occurred with the debut of the Sega Dreamcast, the first game console with actual internet capabilities, ushering in a whole new era of gaming.


The original purpose of gaming consoles was to bring friends and families together for a good time. However, with the arrival of internet gaming, gamers worldwide could compete against each other for hours at a time. It will also boost competition and give birth to some of the first esports leagues.


Even with the development of online gaming, this genre still has restrictions. People must still buy consoles and games to participate. Furthermore, some games, such as the Halo franchise, are only compatible with specific platforms, such as Microsoft’s Xbox.


Mobile Gaming


The emergence of smartphones caused a significant decline in the console and PC gaming industries. The ease of using a mobile phone for most of our daily tasks has resulted in the widespread use of mobile phones for gaming. It occurs without the need for a person to sit in front of a television or monitor. It is usually the case with a console or PC.


The explosion of mobile technologies has transformed the industry; by 2021, mobile gaming will account for 52% of the worldwide gaming market. New forms of games, economic structures, and a range of gamers arose due to the revolution.


Even though all of the models listed previously have various variances, they all have one thing in common. They’re all playing for the sheer enjoyment and pleasure they provide to their users. We have just witnessed a new gaming concept that users may not play for the “pleasure” of gaming but for the financial benefits it may provide.


Play-to-earn (P2E) Model


The “play-to-earn” concept is what it sounds like: a model in which users can play and earn tokens or cryptocurrency while doing so. It combines two activities that have propelled humanity since the beginning of time. It encompasses both reward and entertainment; this model has a powerful psychological incentive.

The central premise behind P2E is that as players engage more time and effort in the game, they become part of the in-game economy (tokenomics). Hence, they create value for themselves, other participants in the game ecosystem, and developers. They are compensated for their involvement and playing time with digital assets that can appreciate over time.


It is worth noting that the usage of blockchain technology in such assets has resulted in a scarcity of digital assets in games, which can take the form of NFTs and can represent anything from characters like the kittens in CryptoKitties to cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) or Ether (ETH).


Many Concepts are Adopted From Traditional Games

The blockchain-based gaming industry is still in its early stages, and it is still centered around many concepts coming from traditional gaming.


NBA Top Shot, for example, is building on the “collect and trade model” that has prevailed in baseball cards and other collectibles for decades. Axie Infinity, currently the most famous blockchain-based game, uses the “breed and battle” game model that Pokémon launched in the 1990s.


On the other hand, Block Monsters is building on the concept of playing using various Blockmon characters. This way, users can play, earn, and create an interactive metaverse environment. In the gaming mechanics lies a play-to-earn mechanism where trainers make $MNSTRS by surpassing several milestones.

Another mechanic available in the game is the different types of modifiers. This part explains the most suitable modifiers players can use against all the Blockmons’ moves. Players can also equip their characters with other accessories and items from booster starter packs.


Challenges Within the Gaming Industry


Implementing a play-to-earn model is not that easy. Most industry professionals are humble enough to admit that the P2E crypto-based games will face several challenges before gaining widespread acceptance.

One major challenge for P2E platforms would be eliminating the potential anti-money-laundering risk since users will trade the in-game NFT products against crypto. While developers agree that there would be regulatory constraints, the majority feel that the most severe difficulties will be internal and beyond authorities’ reach.


Another significant challenge would be that the opportunity to earn money via gaming would encourage certain abuses among gamers, destroying the ecosystem. Furthermore, most gaming platforms burn money by investing in pointless upgrades and features that benefit no one but the platform.


The Future of P2E


Despite play-to-earn being a new concept, it has the potential to change more than just gaming. The future of gaming may be safer, more beneficial to players, and more trustworthy with the emergence of P2E platforms such as Block Monsters.


Currently, the P2E model is driving the adoption of blockchain in games, and it represents a path of no return for the games industry. As blockchain usage in games evolves, it will likely cover a variety of use cases beyond play-to-earn models. A wide variety of incentives and combinations are made possible by technology.


The exact reasons explain why hundreds of millions of dollars have flowed into blockchain- and NFT-based games in the last four months alone. Investors are providing large amounts of funding to startups, seeking to build teams using experienced developers.


Disclaimer: This article is not intended to be a source of investment, financial, technical, tax, or legal advice. All of this content is for informational purposes only. Readers should do their own research. The Capital is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by reliance on any information mentioned in this article.


Disclaimer: This is not trading or investment advice. The above article is for entertainment and education purposes only. None of the content on Crypto Folds is investment advice nor is it a replacement for advice from a certified financial planner. Please do your own research before purchasing or investing into any cryptocurrency.  
By Press Release December 4, 2025
Secure Legion has announced the public beta release of the world’s first messaging application designed to expose zero metadata . Built entirely without servers, directories, or intermediaries, the platform delivers fully peer-to-peer communication through Tor hidden services ensuring that no third party can observe who is communicating, when, or from where. Unlike conventional messengers, Secure Legion replaces personal identifiers with Solana wallet keypairs , eliminating the need for phone numbers, emails, or any form of personal data. A New Standard for Private Communication Modern encrypted messengers secure message content but still leak metadata social graphs, contact networks, connection timestamps, and communication patterns. Platforms such as Signal, WhatsApp, and Telegram rely on servers that inherently retain traces of user behavior. Secure Legion removes this entire metadata surface through two core innovations: A completely serverless architecture that prevents any entity from storing, relaying, or analyzing message traffic. The Ping-Pong Wake protocol , a novel mechanism that delivers messages only when both parties are simultaneously online and authenticated. Because no server ever queues or registers communication attempts, observers cannot build relationship graphs or infer interaction frequency. Identity Through Solana Wallets Instead of traditional account systems, Secure Legion adopts a self-sovereign identity model : each user’s Solana keypair functions as their cryptographic identity across both messaging and blockchain-related interactions. This model reinforces privacy, reduces attack surfaces, and aligns with emerging ecosystem standards for decentralized identity. Engineered for High-Risk Environments Secure Legion is already being adopted by journalists, activists, and crypto communities operating in heavily restricted regions. The Android client integrates Tor bridges such as Snowflake , obfs4 , and meek , enabling reliable access in environments with deep packet inspection or aggressive censorship. Message delivery follows an authentication-before-delivery process, preventing message-waiting or mailbox-style analysis one of the key vulnerabilities of conventional encrypted messengers. As one Secure Legion engineer summarized: “Signal protects what you say. Secure Legion protects who you talk to.” With no servers, no timestamps, and no retained message queues, communication patterns become indistinguishable to observers. Open Source, Transparent, and Subpoena-Resistant Secure Legion is fully open source under the MIT license. All cryptographic components including XChaCha20-Poly1305 , Ed25519 , and X25519 ECDH are publicly documented and implemented without telemetry, analytics, or background data collection. The architecture is intentionally designed to be non-compliant with surveillance backdoors : “You can’t subpoena a server that doesn’t exist.” Key Features of the Public Beta Android client available at securelegion.org and on GitHub Fully peer-to-peer messaging via Tor hidden services StrongBox-backed encryption on supported devices Text and voice messaging Built-in Tor bridges for censorship resistance This beta release arrives amid growing global pressure on encrypted communications from the EU’s Chat Control proposal to the UK Online Safety Act and the US EARN IT Act. Secure Legion’s serverless architecture makes such mandates technically impossible to implement. Context in the Privacy Ecosystem Secure Legion responds to an issue long overlooked by mainstream encrypted platforms: metadata surveillance . Metadata exposes behavioral patterns, personal networks, movements, and relationships even when message content is encrypted. Compared to existing alternatives: - Session still relies on service nodes; Secure Legion removes intermediaries entirely. - Briar exposes certain network patterns; Secure Legion eliminates visible trails and peer graphs. - Signal reveals communication metadata to its servers; Secure Legion reveals nothing. The result is a platform that implements true metadata-free messaging by design a direction recently emphasized by leaders such as Vitalik Buterin in calls for permissionless accounts and privacy-preserving communication systems. About Secure Legion Secure Legion is a peer-to-peer, serverless messaging project developed by privacy engineers committed to eliminating metadata surveillance. The platform is non-commercial, open source, and designed around censorship resistance and cryptographic transparency. A formal security audit is underway. Upcoming roadmap items include group messaging, expanded privacy modes, and a desktop client. Follow the project and join the community: Official website | X (Twitter) | GitHub 
By Press Release December 1, 2025
SuperIntent , the AI-powered DeFi platform, has launched its Alpha App and Mission Airdrop Point System following a seed round that pushed its fully diluted valuation to US$25 million. As stablecoin continue to heat up and bring crypto further into the mainstream in 2025, the XY Finance team, which has been backed by industry leaders such as Circle and Lemniscap, announced its rebrand in Q2 2025 as SuperIntent, opening an early waitlist that has since attracted over 100,000 users. After piloting in APAC in September, SuperIntent is now launching globally, with over 200,000 users sign-ups to date.  Simplifying DeFi for Smarter, Accessible Yield SuperIntent aims to make DeFi investing simpler, more accessible, and even a source of passive income. As DeFi shifts from meme-driven speculation to stronger fundamentals such as sustainable buybacks, the rise of fixed-rate yield products, and more structured arbitrage and market-neutral strategies, yield opportunities are becoming richer and more stable but also more fragmented. This creates a clear need for a smarter, unified solution. “For most users, DeFi still feels like wandering without a guide. People expect the same seamless experience they get from traditional wealth management,” the team added. “With recent breakthroughs in AI, we can finally deliver a real co-pilot that understands user intent, optimizes yield, and executes safe strategies across chains with a single tap.” In its Alpha App, SuperIntent’s Earn feature unifies top protocols into a single interface with one-click rewards, so users can allocate funds in one tap and never miss their yield, including both native yield and reward tokens. Cross-Sector Investors Signal Confidence in SuperIntent’s Direction SuperIntent team has long been active in DeFi and specialized in cross-chain infrastructure. It was among the earliest supporters of Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol (CCTP) and recently joined the Circle Alliance Program. Investor interest began to build earlier this year amid the rise of the AI narrative and growing adoption of chain abstraction technologies. Momentum increased after the rebrand and Circle’s IPO, together with clearer stablecoin regulation in key markets including the United States and Asia. In this seed round, participation came from existing backers and Web3-native funds as well as a wave of traditional finance and software investors. These developments collectively reinforced investor confidence in the sector’s long-term potential for sustainable yield products, positioning SuperIntent at the forefront of the emerging intersection between AI and DeFi. Global Expansion and the Shift Toward Steadier DeFi Investing SuperIntent App integrates multiple DeFi yield sources into a seamless user interface that helps users grow their assets steadily and avoid market volatility. While the U.S. remains a major market, strong early traction has also come from Southeast Asian countries, where many gig and informal workers have irregular income and remain underserved by traditional financial institutions. DeFi offers a viable alternative for yield generation and financial inclusion. “Simply holding assets or actively trading is no longer the only way to participate in crypto. Since the October 10 crypto crash, where many perp users were hit hard and several overly complex vault products suffered heavy losses recently, SuperIntent’s user base has grown significantly, reflecting a clear shift toward more risk-aware, stable yield-focused strategies. SuperIntent is exactly where it needs to be, helping users put their idle crypto to work through a more sustainable and stable approach.” Looking ahead, SuperIntent plans to expand protocol coverage, roll out an AI-driven personalized yield sniper notification, and add automated features such as auto-rebalancing and DCA (Dollar-Cost Averaging) to deliver a more end-to-end investment experience and help users grow their assets automatically. By combining AI-driven intelligence with a user-centric design, SuperIntent aims to redefine how people interact with DeFi, turning complexity into simplicity and making intelligent investing accessible to everyone. About SuperIntent SuperIntent is a crypto AI app that simplifies on-chain earning strategies. Built on a multi-agent framework with rich yield sources, SuperIntent helps users discover alpha, manage risk, and grow their assets with ease. SuperIntent App SuperIntent Mission Point System Official Website SuperIntent Social Media
By Press Release November 28, 2025
CDG Project has announced that its ERC-20 utility token, CDG, will be listed on BitMart Exchange beginning December 1st. The listing marks the project’s first entry into major centralized markets following its recent appearance on CoinMarketCap and CoinGecko.  The CDG token powers a decentralized network built from user-owned hardware devices that function as a distributed data center. This is an important feature for AI, cloud, VPN, gaming, and edge workloads. Thousands of CDG Devices operate as a resource layer. In short, the devices supply computation and bandwidth while earning CDG from the network’s emission treasury. Token Utility and Network Economics CDG is an ERC-20 utility token that powers the device network. Every day, device owners make CDG. Businesses can use the network for AI inference, cloud microservices, gaming workloads, and encrypted VPN routing. The token economy is based on long-term sustainability, fixed emissions, and usefulness in the real world. Integration with Codego’s IBAN and card infrastructure provides an additional layer for future payment and service models. Here are the key token metrics: Total supply: 10,000,000,000 CDG Standard: ERC-20 (18 decimals) Type: Utility token Emission: 200 CDG per active device per day Furthermore, here is more information in terms of token distribution: 70% Treasury 5% Team 5% Marketing 5% Operations 5-10% Liquidity & Partners A Decentralized Datacenter Powered by Consumer Hardware The project introduces a hardware ecosystem where each device contributes GPU and compute resources to the CDG network. In return, every active device receives a daily allocation of CDG, forming a predictable and transparent emission model. Two devices form the core of the network: CDG Power Home and CDG Home. The first has the following features: Daily Get CDG: 200 CDG Device price: €10,000 Activation cost: 40,000 CDG Power consumption: 30W CDG Home can be summarized by the following points: Daily Get CDG: 50 CDG Device price: €2,500 Activation cost: 10,000 CDG Power consumption: 10W Both devices are designed for low energy use and quiet operation. This mechanism allows homes and offices to participate in the network without technical setup. About CDG CDG is an ERC-20 utility token designed to power a decentralized data center formed by user-operated CDG Devices. Codego Group is working on the project. This team aims to offer scalable compute, cloud, and network services through a distributed hardware layer that everyday people own. The BitMart listing makes the CDG ecosystem more accessible, meaning more people can take part in the device-powered datacenter model. The network keeps getting bigger as more devices are turned on and added to the global infrastructure. The project’s official website and the links below allow anyone to join this project at its current stage. CoinMarketCap | CoinGecko
By Press Release November 21, 2025
HelloTrade, a new blockchain-powered trading platform founded by former BlackRock crypto directors Wyatt Raich and Kevin Tang, announced that it has closed a $4.6M seed round led by Dragonfly Capital. The round came together in under a week, reflecting strong conviction in the size of the market opportunity and the team’s track record building category-defining products. At BlackRock, Kevin and Wyatt launched the firm’s spot Bitcoin ETF, the fastest ETF in history to reach $100B in assets. For decades, access to the world’s capital markets and leveraged equity trading has been constrained by geography, high capital requirements, complex derivatives, and legacy brokerage systems. These barriers have made obtaining directional exposure and leverage to global equities challenging for retail and professional investors. HelloTrade aims to change that. Built on MegaETH, the platform will let users everywhere gain leveraged exposure to stocks, ETFs, commodities, and crypto. The app is designed for everyday investors with a mobile first experience, removing the usual points of friction that come with crypto trading. There is no wallet setup, no gas payments, and no technical jargon. Users simply open the app and trade with the speed of a traditional brokerage platform, enabled by MegaETH’s ability to process more than one hundred thousand transactions per second. “Trading stocks with leverage shouldn’t be gated by geography or account minimums,” said co-founder Kevin Tang. “We’ve now seen how crypto derivatives transformed access to digital assets. HelloTrade applies that same ethos to traditional equities, making it possible for investors around the world to participate in the world’s most dynamic markets”. The company is supported by a strong group of advisors, including Arthur Hayes (Maelstrom), Josh Lim (FalconX), David C. (LeadBlock Partners & LeadBlock Bitpanda Ventures), Larry Florio (Ethena), and Andrew Saunders (Amazon). “While leading the engineering team for BlackRock’s Digital Assets Lab, I had the privilege of building IBIT, ETHA, and BUIDL, some of the largest cryptoasset products in the world. That experience highlighted a tremendous opportunity to bring the same trust, discipline, and institutional standards we upheld at BlackRock to the rest of the world and build something truly transformative with HelloTrade,” said co-founder Wyatt Raich, and prior head of digital assets engineering at BlackRock. Kevin and Wyatt first crossed paths at BlackRock as foundational team members in the firm’s digital assets division. Despite their different backgrounds-Kevin as a financial services veteran with over 12-years experience, and Wyatt coming from a career in AI and robotics at Lockheed Martin-the two shared a conviction that blockchain technology could transform capital markets and investing. HelloTrade is expected to launch in the form of a mobile app across both iOS and Android. For early access, a waitlist is currently live at hello.trade . For press inquiries, please contact: Press Contact: press@hello.trade 
Show More
paper_plane

NEVER MISS AN ARTICLE!

Sign up and stay up-to-date about what's happening at our site.