Gaming guilds are an exciting prospect, and are among the most impressive business models in the space. Crucially, guilds could, we believe, go on to thrive irrespective of market conditions.
Let’s look at the recent success of Yield Guild Games, and then dive into 5 other emerging guilds which could be set to follow in its footsteps.
TL;DR:
- YGG breaks record guild scholarship numbers.
- SLP price is down but adoption of Axie Infinity remains strong.
- Five alternatives to YGG that could be next in line to success.
Yield Guild Games (YGG), the decentralized community of play-to-earn (P2E) games and gamers, has just announced that it hit a new milestone for its Axie Infinity guild, reaching over 20k scholars in February, an increase of over 21% since January, and over 8,000% since February 2021.
It’s an incredible statistic, but let’s take a step back.
What is a guild?
Still not sure what a gaming guild actually is? In simple terms, they facilitate the borrowing of NFTs and other blockchain assets needed to play P2E games, without players having to buy any themselves. They came into existence due to the high entry cost of some P2E games. Take Axie Infinity, for example: Users need a minimum of three Axies (native NFTs) in order to begin playing. For the average user wanting to jump into the game, this may be beyond their reach. Enter the gaming guild, bridging the divide between asset owners and eager players, the ‘scholars’, who can mutually benefit from this arrangement. For developers, the introduction of guilds meant the ability to gain greater exposure for their product. In return for these benefits, the guild gets a percentage of the earnings the scholar makes whilst using the NFTs.
Yield Guild Games and Axie Infinity
In February alone, the scholars of the Axie Infinity guild on YGG farmed over 26 million Smooth Love Potion (SLP) tokens, the native Axie Infinity token – more than double the level achieved in January. And even though the price of SLP has declined from its all-time high of approximately $0.40, now down to $0.018, demand for scholarships has remained level. And it is not only Axie Infinity scholarships that are being handed out.
YGG, as well as many other guilds, are forming an expanding number of new partnerships with P2E developers, and as a result, players have more variety. More variety is what drives more players to the platform, as well as keeping the existing ones interested.
So, now we wonder: During a sideways/bear trend, will players exit these guilds and lose interest due to the falling prices of their native tokens? If so, what happens to the players who stick around? In short, they will have less competition, thereby making more tokens at a lower price. And guess what happens to their portfolios when the bull market resumes?
Explosive gains.
Influencers like Alex Becker and EllioTrades, and our very own Hustle, have all suggested that play-to-earn gaming could ultimately decouple from the wider crypto markets. And guilds could be a driving force.
After all, gamers gonna game.
Scholars gonna scholar.
And NFT owners gonna lend.
With that said, let’s take a look at some of the top gaming guilds that could go on to defy market conditions, just like YGG.
Rainmaker Games
Rainmaker Games (RAIN) are on a mission to build one of the largest global P2E platforms and in turn, the largest P2E data powerhouse. They aim to be a central hub and launchpad for game developers, as well as provide guilds with an abundance of data to help them grow.
Their other goals include being a free platform for users to play P2E games, the perfect place for games to launch and drop tokens, as well as the best place to find verified and reputable guilds.
RAIN is currently at a 77% discount since its all-time high from January 3rd, 2022, and 7% higher than its all-time low of January 24th, 2022.
Stats
Current price $0.3202
Marketcap $9,612,950
All-time high $1.37
All-time low $0.293705
GuildFi
GuildFi (GF) has a unique approach to bringing together the wider gaming community and creating a one-stop hub for the players, guilds, games and investors. They aim to do so by providing easy entry, accessible training, and many services that will in turn form a cross-chain platform, usable across the metaverse.
They have the backing of some of the biggest names in the space, including Animoca Brands, Pantera Capital, Coinbase Ventures and Alameda Research.
GF is currently at a 63.7% discount since its all-time high on December 4th, 2021, and only 4.1% higher than its all-time low of January 24th, 2022.
Stats
Current price $1.46
Marketcap $63,426,728
All-time high $4.06
All-time low $1.42
3. Avocado
Avocado Guild’s (AVG) core operating platform is Axie Infinity, and it provides free accounts for the game via its Axie Infinity Scholarship Program. Its backers and investors include Animoca Brands, QCP Sorteria, Three Arrows Capital, HASHED, Binance Smart Chain’s $1 Growth Fund, Solana, Polygon Studios and many more.
Their aim is to on-board the millions of players to the P2E ecosystem by building scalable solutions and game management systems for the entire industry.
AVG is currently at a 77.4% discount since its all-time high from January 3rd, 2022, and 12.1% higher than its all-time low on February 26th, 2022.
Stats
Current price $0.607615
Marketcap $13,826,924
All-time high $2.69
All-time low $0.542996
Good Games Guild
Good Games Guild (GGG) is a gaming hub that aims to create the largest virtual world economy, and sponsor millions of P2E gamers, whilst investing in play-to-earn games along with in-game assets, and building tools that will enhance the future of gaming and the metaverse.
GGG is currently at a 93.1% discount since its all-time high of November 25th, 2021, and it printed its all-time low of $1.16 today, March 8th, 2022.
Stats
Current price $1.16
All-time high $16.86
All-time low $1.16
Merit Circle
Merit Circle (MC) seeks to maximize the yield that their gamers can earn through P2E games via their decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). Initially they focused only on Axie Infinity, and were known as Axie 420, but after rebranding, they are now focused on creating a more diverse gaming ecosystem for themselves and their users through the Merit Circle DAO, which manages funds to be allocated amongst players and in turn maximizes their yield.
MC is currently at a 82.4% discount since its all-time high of December 2nd, 2021, and is 9.4% higher than its all-time low of $1.88 on January 24th, 2022.
Stats
Current Price $2.13
Marketcap $140m
All-time high $11.70
All-time low $1.88
Banter’s take
There’s no doubt about it: Guilds are here to stay. They are needed by the players who can’t overcome the barrier to entry of certain P2E games, but also by the actual games in order to reach more users. If you believe that gaming guilds are inevitable, these projects could be worth following closely: for now, at least, they all have remarkably low marketcaps which seem at odds with the fundamentals!
