Axie Infinity Review
Axie Infinity is a virtual world built on the blockchain, full of fierce, adorable pets called Axies.
These Axies can be battled, collected, and even used to earn cryptocurrencies with real value because of the play to earn system. Axie isn’t just one game, but an entire universe of games where you can play with Axie NFTs.
At first glance Axie might seem similar to Pokemon, Tamogochi, or even Animal Crossing; but the key difference is that the markets for in-game resources are open and controlled by players, allowing them to profit of what they generate in the game.
Axie Infinity is absolutely blowing up and this review will help you decide if it is an NFT game you should be playing.
- Pokemon inspired universe where players can battle, collect, raise and build
- Play to earn system has created a new income stream for gamers
- Available as application for Windows, Mac, Android and iOS
Axie Infinity Pros & Cons
Pros
Play to earn system
Available for desktop and mobile
Battle, collect, raise, and build within an expansive universe
Arguably the most successful NFT-based video game in history
Potential to earn a legitimate amount of crypto
Cons
Has become quite expensive to play for newcomers
Have to buy 3 Axies to play game
Ethereum and Axie Infinity are only accepted payment method
Commission on sales on marketplace
How to Buy Axie Infinity NFTs
The easiest way to buy Axie Infinity NFTs is through the Axie Infinity Marketplace, where you can buy Axies, Land, Items or bundles. You can connect to the marketplace with a Ronin chrome extension wallet, or by linking your Ronin wallet to a Meta Mask account, you will then create an account with an email and password connected to that web wallet.
Once you have successfully linked your wallet to the Axie Infinity Marketplace you will need to either load it with ETH or AXS in order to buy any of the NFTs for sale on the marketplace. In order to play the game, you have to own at least 3 Axies, meaning that you have to buy to play and start earning.
History of Axie Infinity
Axie Infinity was created by Sky Mavis and was inspired by Pokemon. Many of the team members met while playing another popular NFT game called CryptoKitties. Axie’s creators identified and set out to remedy a fundamental flaw in the Web2 gaming model, because the value generated in games like Fortnite only goes to the creators. In-game assets were merely rented from the platform, not owned by users or freely tradeable. These assets could be easily be wiped if an account were banned. This hamstrung the potential value embedded in virtual worlds and dis-empowered users.
Axie hands the keys of the virtual world to the users, allowing them to modify the digital topography and maintain full sovereignty over their mathematically scarce assets with their play to earn structure. It has quickly become extremely popular in developing nations like the Philippines, Argentina, and Venezuela. In some of these places, the economic opportunities present in the Axie Universe exceed those available in the real world.
Advantages of Axie Infinity
Apart from being accessible through both mobile and desktop applications, the biggest advantage of Axie Infinity is its play-to-earn system.
This system rewards users who are consistently playing the game with both Axie Infinity Shards and Smooth Love Potion digital assets. Users can either use these assets to further their own game or sell them on secondary markets in and essentially earn income for playing the game. This has become extremely lucrative in third-world countries like the Philippines, where almost a third of the user base comes from.
Disadvantages of Axie Infinity
The main disadvantages of Axie Infinity are all related to costs. First of all, you have to have 3 Axies in order to play the game, which when the game was first released would probably only have cost you around $100 total, but currently the cheapest one you can buy is over $150 USD, meaning unless you are willing to spend at a minimum over $500 USD, you will not be able to play the game. This is a huge deterrent for newly interested players.
The other disadvantage is that the only payment method accepted for Axies is ETH or AXS and all transactions take place on the Ethereum blockchain, meaning a fairly big environmental impact for all the transactions done on the Marketplace. It also means users who are unfamiliar with using a web wallet will probably be deterred from playing as well. It should also be noted that when you sell something on the marketplace the Axie Infinity team takes a nearly 5% fee.
Can you make money on Axie Infinity?
You can earn crypto assets in the form of Axie Infinity Shards and Sooth Love Potion by playing Axie Infinity, essentially earning you money for playing a game. In addition, the market for Axies has become lucrative enough that you can breed and sell them to make money. It should be noted that the profit margin you would make has shrunk as costs of both AXS and Axies themselves are much higher than when the game first started, meaning early adopters have the best chance to make money.
The price of an Axie varies depending on the breed, how much it has been bred, its attributes and a variety of other factors. You can only buy them on the Axie Infinity Marketplace, where currently the cheapest Axie for sale is over 0.05ETH, or about $160 USD at current Ethereum prices. Considering you need three Axies to play the game, you will probably be spending over $600 USD worth of ETH for just an average team.
Of course this is entirely dependent on the current price of Ethereum so this will change over time.
Axie Infinity Shards (AXS) are an ERC-20 governance token for the Axie Infinity Universe. AXS holders will be able to claim rewards if they stake their tokens (coming soon), play the game, and participate in key governance votes. Players will also be able to earn $AXS when they play various games within the Axie Infinity Universe and through user-generated content initiatives.
You can buy Axie Infinity Shards (AXS) on many top exchanges including: Binance, Kraken, Coinbase, Uniswap, and Crypto.com Exchange. It should be noted that most of the supply of AXS (29%) is to be released to stakers and that 21% will be released to the Sky Mavis development team.
Small Love Potion (SLP) are an ERC 20 token that are used to breed Axies; they are not the Axie Infinity governance token (AXS).
Smooth Love Potion (SLP) tokens can be earned as rewards by Axie Infinity players through battle or adventure mode. SLP are tokens that can be used to breed new digital pets, up to seven times, with increasing costs of SLP per round of breeding. SLP was formerly known as Small Love Potion before the token upgrade to the Ronin blockchain.
