Breathing New Life Into the Gaming Metaverse With Play-To-Earn Platforms and Rentable NFTs
Mobile and PC games that use Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT) are experiencing a wave of new interest among players. At the same time, there’s also a growing number of play-to-earn games launching alongside the traditional gaming market, which has been stagnating in terms of innovation. In fact, there are more than 1,600 games now available built using blockchain technologies, and the number keeps increasing.
According to the latest BGA Blockchain Game Report by DappRadar, the play-to-earn model and the popularity of NFTs are the two most significant contributors to the ever-growing blockchain market. Almost half of the 1.54 million crypto wallets in existence or 754,000 addresses are used for blockchain games. There’s no doubt that many new users are coming into the NFT space. In the competitive gaming sector, how can developers take advantage of this growth and attract new players? Is there any way for them to stand out from the saturated market?
With all of the NFT games available, interested players need to carefully choose which games to play, as there is significantly more upfront cost associated with play-to-earn games. Unfortunately, not a lot of players have that capacity. Take Axie Infinity for example, where it required $1065 just to form a decent team of Axies and start playing. To solve this challenge, a system that allows for rentable NFTs can drastically lower those high cost barriers.
IQ Protocol is a NFT lending and borrowing protocol that allows game developers to attract more players to their platform by offering rentable NFTs. Players won’t need to shed a substantial amount of capital to permanently buy assets and take the risk of investing considerable time into a play-to-earn game.
By issuing rentable NFTs, game developers will be able to give more players a chance to test out the game before investing a substantial amount upfront. For players who cannot afford to buy assets right away, the rentable NFT model provides a beneficial solution to lower barriers to entry. If players can “try” the game before they invest, play-to-earn games can attract more users, thus increasing revenue and active users.
It also benefits existing players who aren’t playing the game at the moment. Instead of letting their assets stay idle, owners can lend their NFTs and earn passive income. Interest is generated by other players who pay a fee to borrow the NFTs for a specified time.
Unlike most lending and borrowing models, IQ Protocol is risk-free for the lender. It also does not require hefty collateral to borrow. How is this possible? The underlying smart contracts of IQ Protocol ensure that at the specified expiry time of the rented assets, the original asset is always returned to the lender. Borrowers cannot run away or forcibly keep their assets, if they do not pay the required borrow fees. This gives a clear peace of mind to lenders, who can be assured that they will receive their assets back. Don’t forget, they also earn passive earnings on top. This is truly a win-win model for the play-to-earn and NFT ecosystem.
Game developers can incorporate the rentable NFTs generated by IQ Protocol to automate the lending, borrowing and payout mechanisms. Similar to the money lego concept of DeFi, these rentable NFTs can be further utilized in more complex borrowing and lending scenarios that can take GameFi to new heights.
This will also attract investors or those who have no interest in playing but want to expand their investments in the space. They simply lend their NFTs to active players, and they can earn passive income risk-free. IQ Protocol benefits all stakeholders in the gaming model: new players, existing players, NFT owners, investors as well as game developers.
Furthermore, these rentable NFTs can be accepted by other games, metaverses, and marketplaces to make play-to-earn more expansive. With IQ Protocol, developers have more flexibility in how NFTs can be used to benefit in-game mechanics. It allows more freedom for a fun player experience, as well as third-party marketplace support, and much more that is not possible with traditional games. By leveraging this flexibility, developers of play-to-earn games now have strong incentives to offer. With a solid foundation in place to empower these new possibilities, play-to-earn can become the new normal in the global gaming sector.
