The gaming industry has been experiencing a meteoric rise as a result of technological advancement. According to Statista, 2024 ended with the gaming market generating revenues of approximately $455 billion. A similar report by Statista estimates that the market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7.25% between 2025 and 2029.
Well, for such an industry to expand at such a rate, it must be assimilating trending technologies and the latest innovations. In this case, we’ll be focusing on crypto.
Gamers’ inclination to own crypto
If you look around carefully, you’ll realize that at least one out of three people is a gamer. According to a report by Priori Data, at least 3.3 billion across the globe interact with games, whether through smartphones, consoles, PC’s or other devices. Now, in 2020, nearly 41.9 million of these gamers owned crypto. A similar report by DappRadar shows that blockchain gaming has reached new levels, with at least 4.2 million daily active users in August 2024.
Additionally, millennials comprise the biggest crypto owners among gamers. Interestingly, out of these millennials, 55% of them own crypto, compared to only 5% of the total global millennial population. This just shows that gamers are more aligned to purchasing cryptocurrencies than any other group of people. If Bitcoin price today drops or rises, the gaming community will certainly feel the impact at a massive rate.
When it comes to platform preference, the gaming population with an affinity for crypto mostly prefers mobile gaming. Statistics show that the highest revenue (40%) of crypto gaming comes from mobile gaming. The one that follows is console gaming, which has 28% revenue, followed by PC, tablet, and browser PC games.
Why do gamers prefer crypto?
The information we have above shows us the lines by which gaming and crypto intersect. But now, the real question remains: why do gamers prefer cryptocurrencies?
Ease of trade
A study done on 1000 video gamers in the US by Worldwide Asset eXchange realized that almost 75% of the games wish they could exchange their virtual goods or skins into a currency that they could use to trade in other platforms. In the same study, WAX found out that even though 87% of the surveyed gamers had not used crypto, 80% were willing to start using them to make transactions within the games. The good thing about cryptocurrencies is that they are exchangeable and can be traded anywhere across the world.
Cryptocurrencies have removed hurdles and intermediaries, making it seamless and hassle-free for players to finish their exchanges. Also, the fact that crypto is borderless makes it easy to do away with the security and exchange rate issues that face traditional mainstream cross-border trade and payments. Here, players don’t even have to give out their player identity and personal details.
Secure and transparent transactions
Another thing that pulls gamers to crypto is secure and transparent transactions. If you have spent some money online (for any purpose), then you can agree that at some point, you might get worried about your transactions. With the high rate of cybercrime like phishing in recent days, you want to be sure that the platform you are using to transact is highly secure. In fact, an analysis by Akamai reported that for the period between January 2023 and June 2024, DDoS attacks had increased by 94% in the gaming industry.
For competitive gaming, you are always playing with strangers, as it adds to the thrill. However, you still want to know that your financial information is safe, considering you do not know the type of people you are playing against. Since crypto uses blockchain technology, both in-game and external transactions are carried out in an immutable distributed ledger. The transparency of the transactions helps to create trust among players and eventually discourage fraud.
The fees issue
Cryptocurrencies do not have any hidden fees or maintenance charges like traditional money transfer methods such as bank transfers and cards. Because of this, crypto transactions are cheaper. Many banks charge an upward fee when it comes to international wire transfers, which ranges anywhere between 2% and 8%. On the other hand, Bitcoin transactions mostly incur a 1.25% fee, while Ethereum fees might go up to 0.5%. When you look at the two types of transactions, you can see why gamers choose crypto.
Play-to-earn economies
Blockchain gaming has been on the rise, and one of its aspects of it is play-to-earn, which is popular with games like Axie Infinity. This type of game blends entertainment with financial speculations amidst the hype of virtual worlds. Actually, many investors see this economy as one way to introduce people to cryptocurrency.
In the game Axie Infinity, users buy virtual blobs with different attributes as NFTs. Players then use these pets to play in various battles where if one wins, they get paid. The value of these pets is dependent on their rarity, and the good thing is that you can trade them with other players. According to Jarindr Thitadilaka, in an interview with Reuters, Axie Infinity is not just a game; it is a whole ecosystem.
Other games like Axie Infinity include:
- Star Atlas
- Gods Unchained
- The Sandbox
- Illuvium
- Big Time
- My Neighbor
It is clear that the intersection between crypto and gaming is a match made in heaven. As virtual gaming continues to increase in popularity, the need for crypto goes up because of global access, secure transactions and lower fees. The bond between these two worlds will continue to grow even as blockchain technology continues to take on new territories.