Things That Make a P2E Game Profitable Long-Term (and Worth Playing)

This is about establishing freedom for yourself. This is about being your own boss. This is about laziness and all the potential it has to be. When I say “this”, I mean everything we do here, everything we talk about. Fundamentally, the goal here is to escape the corporate work slave mind and enter one of freedom -- the lazy mindset.

Now that said, we do cover the basis on what this “mindset” is. I mean, heck just last week we were talking about “the light side” of lazy, and how laziness can actually be a good thing. But every once in a while I like to dig back to the roots of what this blog/podcast was originally all about and that is of course online money-making.

Making money from the couch is what we do here. We’re lazy procrastin8rs and it's within our mantra to find the easy way to do things, including but not limited to earning an income.  Gone are the days where you gotta follow the typical corporate work structure. Gone are the days where you gotta grind your ass off 9 to 5. Gone are the days where you got a boss screaming down your neck.
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Anyway, specifically what we’re going to get into here is Play-to-Earn games. That’s right, getting paid to play video games. Not write about them. Not stream content about them. Simply. Just. Play.

That’s it!

Now that may sound just too good enough to be true, but I assure you, it is quite the profit potential, coming from a lazy dude of course and not some financial advisor.

But anyway, I do believe the Play-toEarn model is the direction that the gaming industry is headed in the future.

Heck, just recently GameStop partnered with Immutable, and plans to launch their own NFT marketplace. Immutable is the team behind the NFT-based card game called Gods Unchained, which I’ll probably have a full review of…later…not now, but eventually. I’ll get it done damnit!

That's HUGE news though. With a big company like GameStop jumping on board, it shows that NFTs, that is Non-Fungible Tokens, assets are slowly growing bigger and bigger, as in more and more accepted and mainstream.

GameStop is really making a smart move here and diverting away from the traditional brick n’ mortar video game store we know them as and really embracing their presence in NFT technology and the metaverse.

But it’s not just GameStop alone in the void. Other big grand names like Nike and Adidas have created their own fashion-based NFTs.

And this is really just the beginning.

​​The NFT space is just in its infant stage right now and it’s only going to keep growing and maturing.

It’s in your best interest to start doing your own research, to learn about these Play to Earn games and NFT marketplaces, because I’m telling you, that’s where the future is headed.

Now I want to point out that I did write  a whole blog article, as well as recorded an entire podcast episode dedicated to a play to earn platform called “Level-Up Gaming”, which was a website where you could earn “LVLUP” tokens, a real cryptocurrency built on the Binance Smart Chain by playing online games, like their Pac-Man clone called Pacotto.

Unfortunately, the company recently announced on their Telegram that the website will be closing, due to lack of funds in the rewards pool.

Makes sense. I mean, you can’t design your business around giving free tokens away. That’s just not a sustainable or even practical business plan.

Why am I telling you this? Well, I just want to make it clear that a “play-to-earn” game is NO guarantee that you’ll make money.  There’s ALWAYS a risk involved and you could quite possibly end up losing.

Another reason I bring Level Up gaming up is because one of the reasons I don’t like to cover *specific* programs is due to the very nature of online money-making; programs tend to close their doors faster than you can say “but I didn’t even get to make a profit.” Seriously, it’s just the way this industry works. Even though this blockchain technology is new, the basic premise remains the same. Nothing guaranteed and there’s always a risk involved.

I mean most start ups, online or not, wind up bankrupt and out of business within the first two years.

But oftentimes because of this rather “ghosting” nature of online money-making programs, I end up putting in a lot of time creating content about it, only to watch it soon disappear shortly after.

Another example is PerkTV, which was an app that paid you for watching videos. They had a whole “Perk” debit card and everything. It was totally legit! That company shut down though.

See, you when I share with you an online money making website or app, you have to keep in mind that it’s nothing permanent. Ya, you can’t rely on that website or app always being around to provide you income.

You have to KNOW how to search for good profitable programs ON YOUR OWN. And that’s really what I want you to be able to do and take away from this. You know, I want you to be your own dude and abide, so to speak.

But listen,  it seems you guys like when I do reviews on specific programs, so I will continue to do so as we move forward

Like I said though, I’ll cover Gods Unchained and maybe a few others in the future.

I’m just letting you know up front that because of the nature of this industry (online money-making), some of my content becomes “stale” in a sense and sort of just…irrelevant.


I promise you that as of writing or as of publishing, the programs I talk about *are* actually paying. That may not always be the case, but I’m not gonna write about something that’s NOT paying. So yeah, while some things I wrote about (in the past) are not paying any more, they were in fact paying at some point.

Now I got you thinking. All these points I made about how programs of online money-making close all the time, so the question that may pop up in your head is

Is NFT gaming something sustainable? Or is it just a waste of time?

Well to that I say, the time you enjoy wasting is NOT wasted time! Haha

But seriously. I do believe that NFT games do hold potential for a lot of profit.

Is every single “play-to-earn” game going to make you bank? 

No…of course not!

In fact, MOST games in the play-to-earn space are going to be utter shit. MOST of them are going to stop running within a few months. That’s just how it is.

I mean it’s just like how most of the games on the Google Play store or Apple store absolutely suck.

Anyway, that all said, I put together a short list of things to look out for that I personally think will allow a play-to-earn game to “make it”, that is remain profitable for players (and not just the developers) for a long sustainable amount of time.

And without further ado, let’s dive…right into it!

1. A Fun/Addicting Game Loop

First and foremost, is the game actually fun to play? Like is it something you’d be playing even IF there wasn’t any sort  play-to-earn incentive?

A P2E game that is gonna stick around must be, in my humble opinion, actually fucking fun to play. It’s gotta have that “one more” feeling to it. 

Just one more level, one more match, one more battle! Aaaand next thing you know it’s 3 in the goddamn morning. Something like that, ya know.

It’s gotta have this sort of loop or cycle of gameplay that keeps you wanting MORE, that keeps you coming back. 

Maybe it's getting a higher score, maybe it’s finding more rare loot. Whatever it is, it’s gotta keep you hooked on playing the game just for the sake of playing it, rewards aside. The in-game achievements should be enough incentive alone to keep playing.

It’s gotta be something that can steal away hours of your time, without you even thinking about it.

Addictive elements is what you want, almost like you need your “fix” to play it.

A lot of these P2E games aren’t really fun games. Like…at all!

I mean, there’s so many of these “clicker” play to earn games that don’t really offer much gameplay beyond clicking a button once a day to earn your reward and c’mon what is THAT?

That’s not a game people are going to want to play beyond the incentive of getting paid to play it.

A successful P2E game is going to be, well a GAME, something that’s actually freaking entertaining to play. None of these boring clickity mclick games are going to last very long.

Entertainment should be the top priority P2E developers should aim to create and you, as a potential P2E investor and player should should aim to find.

One thing I see developers doing, like Azur Game,  is taking an already proven good game loop formula and building in on the Metaverse. They took their game Axes, which already had thousands of players daily and are now building “Axes Metaverse”, which is essentially the exact same game but with NFTs.

I’m all for developers taking games that are fun and throwing them on the blockchain. It may seem lazy. But I’m all about that. No sense in re-inventing the wheel.

If a game is fun, it’ll be fun with NFTs and other P2E elements.

I think we’re gonna see more and more developers taking already well-established games and putting them on the blockchain and it’ something to look out for.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an Angry Birds metaverse/p2 game. God, that game is everywhere! There’s even Angry Birds  bath bombs, toothpaste, and hand sanitizer. I kid you not
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2. A Strong in-Game Economy
While second on the list, this is probably equally as important as having fun gameplay.

It doesn’t matter how fun the game is if the economy of the game is ripped to shreds.

Developers are beginning to realize that they can’t just be “game-makers” and programmers, they have to be economists.

One of Level-Ups downfalls for example, while the games they made definitely had a “fun factor” -- you really can’t say Pac Man is boring -- they were minting new coins, but not really offering a reason to spend or otherwise burn the token.

There needs to be some sort of “burn mechanic” in a solid P2E game, where players are incentivized to spend their crypto token on in-game assets.

I look at (non P2E) games like RuneScape and World of Warcraft.

MMORPGs like these  are notorious for having well running in-game economies. They have real supply and demand, like an actual real world economy. Releasing a new boss increases the price of potions and food so people could survive and take down the boss

 In fact, one of my first experiences “market trading” was flipping items on the Grand Exchange in RunesScape.

I think once a P2E game comes that has such a well-built in-game economy like our old MMORPG ancestors, it’s really gonna fill the pockets of players. Illuvium is a project I’m looking at,and it’s a full 3D open world Pokemon inspired MMORG.

An economy works extremely well with trading card games. I mean the whole nature of the game is buying, selling, and trading your way to the top and creating a powerful deck. That’s why I think we’re gonna see something like the aforementioned Gods Unchained really hit the top in these P2E games. Already, some of the rare cards are selling for thousands of dollars worth in their native token “GODS”.

There has to be items or collectibles that players want to get. There has to be loot in some fashion that’s only obtainable by “burning” or spending your crypto in the game. That’s what’s really going to set a P2E game above the rest.

Are players trading items in the game? And if so, are they incentivized to use the in-house currency/crypto to get it?

BombCrypto is another P2E I talked about, where the only thing you can do with their in-house/native token is mint new heroes. That’s not enough to flesh out a full economy.

Players only want to cash out their earnings as quickly as possible. The result? Well BCOIN (the native BombCrypto currency) plummeted from $7 to just about 50 cents as of writing.

Now the developers (of BombCrypto) do plan on adding a new story mode, cosmetics, and skill resets as burn mechanics to encourage players to spend their token in the game instead of just sell what they earn on the crypto market. They also greatly reduced the rewards.

Like I said, developers are coming to the hard realization that they have to be real economists and fight with supply and demand. Having players mint new tokens without incentive to spend them isn’t sustainable in the long-term. 

There has to be a reason to keep the token IN THE GAME.

The key is to keep players trading the game currency within the game itself rather than on the market, kind of like how people trade gp for items on RuneScape.

My tokens that I acquire should offer me benefits or resources or some sort of loot within the game itself and not just be an asset to immediately sell on the market.

This does sort of tie in with the “fun factor” too because after all, if the game is fun enough, people are going to want to keep playing. And if they want to keep playing, well that means the community is likely to stick around and unlock game features or assets with their coin, instead of just cashing out and going.
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3. A Compelling Competitive Scene

Another P2E win element we’re going to look at today is competition. Head to Head!

Competition is really the heart and blood of what determines the longevity of a game -- any game, and not just P2E.

This is why games like Street Fighter, Star Craft, and Counter Strike can maintain a strong playerbase for so long - the competition is fierce!

There should be a feeling of wanting to outsmart, outwit, and outplay your opponent. Players should be rewarded for being amongst the top of them all.

A PVP match, or tournament should offer reward pools based on their performance. Obviously, the higher rankings would equate to higher rewards.

Gods Unchained does this with their weekly weekend tournaments, giving cards and GODS as rewards based on your rank as well as amount of “wins” you achieve throughout the weekend (up to 25).

Heroes & Empires also offers their native HE token based on your ranking in the PVP colosseum.

Incentivizing players to compete is both a smart and efficient way to shell out rewards. It makes players want to climb their way to the top so they can earn the highest rewards, and that of course involves becoming skilled and knowledgeable about the game mechanics.

Competition keeps players invested in the game, both with their time and money, in short

4. A Sense of Progression/Achievement

Finally, the last element to look for in a P2E project is good ole fashioned progression. Leveling up, unlocking new abilities, earning cool and powerful loot. 

There should be some feeling of “my character is getting better” or “my account is getting stronger.”

I’d say that progression in the baseline for maintaining players long term. I mean this can even sort of tie in with competition, as maybe that sense of progression comes from earning a higher rank.

Either way, there must be some form of forward motion within the game design. Games that are just sort of “one n’ done” aren’t going to last in my opinion.

There has to be some sort of goal or ultimate achievement for players to achieve - max level, top rank, etc. in order for there to be long term sustainability of a given game.

Without that, without levels or ranks or collectibles to gather,  players will get bored of the game quite easily.

We talked about game loop earlier. Well one of the driving factors *behind* a game loop is to motivate players to reach a certain point of achievement.



Wrapping Up:

Each of these factors alone aren’t enough to call a game a solid investment. It’s each of them, combined, that creates a synergy of “goodness”.

At the end of the day, really the only question you need to ask yourself when choosing whether or not to invest in a P2E game is, would I play this?

Because if you wouldn’t play it, without the incentive of payment that is, then who else is really gonna?

Anyway, game on my friends and until next time…

Stay classy, stay sexy, stay awesome and take it real easy,



N8
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