When it comes to investments, spotting trends can be extremely valuable. Especially in crypto, if you can spot the next big trend early enough, it is almost guaranteed that you will make money out of it.

For example, last year, DeFi users and investors were making huge gains farming prominent DeFi tokens, while this year, the hype around NFTs resulted in enormous profits for some knowledgeable NFT traders.

Let me remind you that a year ago, in September, you could buy a Crypto Punk for just over $300. Now the cheapest one is worth more than $300,000.

DeFi Summer → NFT Summer → What’s next?

In my opinion, the next big trend in crypto will be blockchain games, and in this email, I will explain why.

If It Happened Once…

Honestly, I did not take blockchain games seriously until this year. I was not alone in that view. Many still believe that blockchain games provide a worse experience at a higher cost⁠—where is the innovation in that?

What changed my mind was the rise of Axie Infinity. This is a blockchain game that currently has over one million daily active users. The game employs a powerful “play-to-earn” model, where players can earn real money or other rewards by playing the game. It is fascinating how this project gained so much traction so quickly.

It is important to understand that no other popular decentralized application in the space has so many daily active users. Even some crypto exchanges that we are using regularly don’t have that many daily users.

If you look at protocol revenues generated by Axie for the last 90 days, it stands right behind Ethereum. All the other platforms are far behind.

With such impressive growth, it is possible that the fees generated by Axie Infinity will surpass even Ethereum’s.

Protocol Revenues for the last 90 days.

Source: tokenterminal.com

If you think that it is already too late to start playing Axie Infinity, you are wrong. There are still plenty of opportunities for making money there, whether you’re a shrimp or a whale.

The success of Axie Infinity showed that the idea of play-to-earn games could be successful. These games can very quickly create followings and facilitate meaningful economic activity.

A wave of new games is currently trying to replicate this model. It is just the beginning for many of them, so there is no functionality for playing the actual game. However, some games are already selling in-game items and lands. Some allow you to create and start upgrading in-game characters.

We are so early that no one still understands how and when this trend will unfold. However, this is precisely the right time to start exploring this sector.

Being early is what creates life-changing profits in crypto. So let’s make it happen.

Smart Money is Already Moving In

While retail investors are still hesitant to explore blockchain games, blockchain funds are already actively investing in this sector. According to VentureBeat, blockchain gaming companies raised $476M in the first half of 2021.

All of this money will help develop this sector, which will likely lead to the explosion of play-to-earn and other blockchain-based games in the foreseeable future.

Blockchain for gaming has long been thought of as the perfect combination. It solves many problems that the gaming industry encounters, especially when it comes to in-game items. For example, NFTs can enable players to fully control the in-game items that they win or purchase. They can also fuel in-game economies, and bring a host of benefits to the players.

Funds clearly understand what will happen if the world gaming community starts exploring blockchain games. There are over 2.7 billion gamers globally. If just 2% of these people start playing crypto games, this will already be substantial.

With such a large community, the gaming industry could become that game-changing factor that will eventually bring crypto to mainstream adoption.

When this happens, you have to be prepared.

Where to Start?

I highly recommend playing Axie Infinity since this is the top blockchain game at the moment.

Other interesting projects are Star Atlas, Rarity, Illuvium, The Sandbox, Guild of Guardians, Ember Sword, Zed Run, League of Kingdoms, and Town Star.

The list that I provided is not full. There are many more games that can potentially gain traction in the future.

However, if you dive deep enough in the games provided, it will be more than enough to get started.

So, I encourage you to start playing blockchain games. You want to be fully prepared when the gaming sector starts to dominate the minds of crypto inventors.

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Our research team at SIMETRI is also constantly sharing alpha. So feel free to follow me: Alexander Mardar, and my colleagues: Anton Tarasov, Sergey Yakovenko, and Nivesh Rustgi.