According to a recent study by blockchain gaming group Game7: About 50 cryptocurrency games Development ceased in 2023. But the new data Large blockchain game List Author Jon Jordan is also writing. BlockchainGamer.biz, This means that the number of closed or suspended cryptocurrency games is actually much higher.
In fact, it’s well over three times Game7’s initial figure.
What we discovered in the Big Blockchain Game List 248 cryptocurrency games Discontinued or disabled in the first half of 2023; 162 have been discontinued Second half of last year. This means that about 410 blockchain games went dark last year, accounting for more than 30% of the 1,322 games that appeared on that list.
The most common reason for marking a game as “discontinued” is a long period of time without updates or activity. That means the game has been radio-silent on all social media channels and websites for months.
Other games like Blankos Block Party Gran Saga: UnlimitedThe Harvest, Pixelcraft, Lost Archive Plus, Oath of Peak, and Arcane Magic have been marked as “canceled” because they have publicly announced the cessation of development, usually due to market conditions, lack of funding, or both. Reason for closure.
In the case of Blancos Block Party, the Mythical Games team Quietly announced the end of desktop gaming. December, a year and a half after the heat wave Epic Games Store launch. now, NFL Rivals The developers are planning a Blankos Mobile game instead.
Some blockchain games were marked as discontinued because they deleted their accounts altogether and disappeared. And some have abandoned blockchain plans to become cryptocurrency-free games. Neopet Metaverse and immortal game. Neopets CEO Dominic Law previously said: decryption Because most fans have abandoned cryptocurrency. just don’t careThe Immortal team said they switched the game off blockchain due to “serious cheating.”
George Ishichos, a key Game7 contributor, was reached out for comment. decryption In the report, the group sent a message that it did not consider projects “stalled” after a long period of inactivity on social media. Instead, Ishichos suggested that some “dormant” games may be “silent in the early stages of their development journey or between market cycles.”
Which blockchain has suffered the most losses? According to Large list of blockchain games, Binance’s BNB chain has the most games closed in 2023. Polygon Games also accounted for a significant number of discontinued games, as well as the Ethereum mainnet and Solana. 9 games scheduled for the second half of 2023 Sui It is known to have been discontinued.
The chains with the most games gone or disabled are sorted in proportion to their relative size as a whole. Previous report from Game7 Polygon and BNB are the top two chains with the most games, with Ethereum’s mainnet in third and Solana in fourth.
However, it is worth noting that this new data is not completely comprehensive. A significant portion of games that end in 2023 have been marked as “unknown” or “other” with respect to their respective blockchains. Prior decryption Studies have shown that this is a common problem. This is because many blockchain games do not clearly state which chain they are using on their social media accounts, websites, white papers, or other relevant documents.
And for games in the early stages of development, it’s possible that some of the currently discontinued titles will be marked as “unknown” since there isn’t much blockchain-based data to interpret when the team hasn’t released an NFT collection or token. We didn’t choose a blockchain to build on before it was shut down.
Considering the relatively small market size in 2023, the number of abandoned or canceled blockchain gaming projects was significant, but the abandonment rate was around 30%, consistent with the wider gaming industry. According to the 2023 report: 43% of mobile games (non-cryptocurrency) 83% of mobile games “fail” within 3 years.
The broader gaming industry has also had a difficult year, with game cancellations, studio closures and mass layoffs. There will be approximately 10,500 layoffs in the gaming industry in 2023. game files Newsletter.
and 2024 wasn’t off to a good start Which one. Minecraft Legends We just stopped development updates, and Twitch, Unity, Discord, and Archiact have already laid off thousands of employees. The economic and strategic challenges facing the gaming industry over the past year aren’t slowing down anytime soon.
Editor: Andrew Hayward
Editor’s note: This article was updated after publication to include comments from Game7 on its own data.
