Burn the tokens, keep the loot: Play-to-own games come next

Opinion by: Tobin Kuo, laminitis and CEO astatine Seraph

The play-to-earn (P2E) exemplary has mostly collapsed, which promised a aboriginal successful which anyone could grind integer golden and currency retired for real-world income.

Funding for Web3 games dropped much than 70% successful Q1 2025, large projects person unopen down, and subordinate engagement is declining astatine a staggering rate. 

The situation present exposes a cardinal mistake — rewarding play with volatile tokens turns each subordinate into a speculator and each spot enactment into a marketplace risk. 

It tethered amusive to fiat and viability to an ever-growing influx of caller users consenting to bargain in. As soon arsenic token prices stalled, the full operation unraveled. Given this caller reality, the manufacture indispensable pivot to a exemplary that prioritizes plus inferior and semipermanent engagement: play-to-own (P2O).

Speculation was ne'er a game

Critics whitethorn importune that P2E tin inactive empower emerging markets oregon assertion that token incentives are indispensable to subordinate growth. Still, the information tells a antithetic communicative — and truthful bash the marketplace outcomes.

The P2E exemplary was built connected token inflation, successful which developers minted coins arsenic rewards for in-game activity, hoping accrued information would sorb the selling pressure.

Sure, it worked temporarily; idiosyncratic counts grew and token prices rose. But exits accelerated erstwhile the terms momentum stopped. A caller study showed that April 2025 had the lowest regular progressive wallets of the year: conscionable 4.8 million, a 10% driblet from the period before.

This isn’t a impermanent correction; it’s a structural failure. Late adopters entering a mature P2E crippled often find reduced payouts, making information little attractive. As they leave, liquidity dries up, token values driblet and developers suffer a cardinal gross stream. This rhythm continues until some the subordinate basal and task treasury are depleted.

No accepted online crippled expects users to dainty in-game currencies similar fiscal assets. When they do, the acquisition becomes susceptible to volatility that astir players neither privation nor understand.

Ownership, not income, creates demand

P2O offers a amended way guardant by decoupling gameplay from token emissions. Instead of flooding the system with rewards, P2O treats integer items — skins, weapons, avatars — arsenic fixed-supply assets players tin commercialized connected secondary markets. These items are collectibles with provable scarcity and worth derived from in-game inferior and aesthetic appeal.

Recent forecasts enactment this direction. The NFT gaming assemblage is projected to turn astatine astir 25% compound yearly maturation complaint (CAGR) done 2034, with request driven by ownership alternatively than speculation. In accepted games, players already delegate worth to uncommon integer goods — blockchain simply makes that worth portable and verifiable.

Related: How Web3 tin alteration gaming without changing however gamers play

To beryllium successful, P2O demands beardown plan choices. Developers indispensable make engaging games wherever ownership is meaningful. Cosmetic items, onshore plots and upgrade components should beryllium released successful constricted quantities, with cautiously calibrated descend mechanics to power proviso implicit time. This avoids the ostentation problems that plagued P2E.

Critics reason that resale markets invitation profiteering, but the rebuttal is two-fold. First, secondary trading is steadfast erstwhile it mirrors carnal collectibles, wherever prices fluctuate but are anchored to perceived taste oregon aesthetic worth, not scheduled token emissions. Secondly, a well-designed descend mechanic that removes assets from circulation and stabilizes proviso is required. 

Ownership does not adjacent imperishable inflation. Instead, it demands progressive stewardship.

Skeptics person besides pointed to staggering nonaccomplishment rates successful Web3 gaming, arsenic implicit 90% of announced blockchain titles are already defunct. This includes figures similar gaming concern (GameFi) projects dropping 95% from their all-time highs (ATHs) and lasting little than fractional a twelvemonth earlier fizzling out.

The existent marketplace for Web3 gaming done the P2E exemplary is bleak astatine best, with astir casualties sharing the aforesaid flaw of promising currency extraction archetypal and gameplay later. 

Where tokens led, amusive lagged, and players noticed. The fistful of survivors that shifted to fixed-supply assets and beardown descend loops amusement wallet enactment trending upward adjacent amid the broader backing drought seen passim the industry. 

Design rules for a P2O economy

P2E promised a gyration but lone delivered a short-lived boom. Many of its most-hyped projects person faded, and adjacent immoderate survivors are pivoting toward fixed-supply economies and deeper gameplay loops. These changes admit that the halfway P2E mechanic — earn-to-sell — is unsustainable astatine scale.

Projects that cling to emission-based reward models volition apt look continued contraction, particularly arsenic idiosyncratic maturation slows and superior becomes much cautious. In contrast, games that physique economies astir ownership, not extraction, whitethorn upwind the existent backing wintertime — and travel retired stronger.

The blockchain gaming assemblage doesn’t request much incentives. It needs amended games and amended economies. That begins by burning the token drip exemplary and gathering systems players privation to beryllium portion of agelong aft the output is gone.

Opinion by: Tobin Kuo, laminitis and CEO astatine Seraph.

This nonfiction is for wide accusation purposes and is not intended to beryllium and should not beryllium taken arsenic ineligible oregon concern advice. The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed present are the author’s unsocial and bash not needfully bespeak oregon correspond the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.