Social integration is at the heart of everything we do today. Whether it’s going to clubs, hanging out with friends, or surfing the internet, everyone is one way or the other, trying to fit in into a diaspora. Somewhere, they can belong and grow together.

In this era, where we co-exist with our digital selves, we try to fit in through bits; an unimaginable fast stream of ‘ONs’ and OFFs.’ Whether it's brands, consumers, or companies, everyone understands the importance of connecting through these pulses of electricity.

Rightfully so, Satoshi Nakamoto changed the world through a digital document titled, ‘Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System,’ which initiated the digitization of physical money and introduced a new economic model and currency based on those unimaginably fast series of ‘ONs’ and ‘OFFs,’ called Bitcoin.

The evolution of physical money to exist as a 256-bit hexadecimal code, called Cryptocurrencies, on a distributed ledger soon led to the evolution of everything in traditional finance. After a couple of years, we were able to see lending, borrowing, and other financial services and products centered around this 256-bit hexadecimal code.

From having over 2 billion people unbanked, there was a decentralized banking and economic system that welcomed them with open arms without any legislation, barriers, or hassles.

Cryptocurrencies evolved perceptions and the traditional way of doing things. From being a digital alternative to cash to becoming a programmable contract with the ability to tokenize anything physical or digital with .

Smart contracts ushered in a new era of how we use cryptocurrencies and revolutionized the world through programmable contracts, introducing new apps, new functionalities, and new use cases for cryptocurrencies.

One of those use cases was Non-fungible tokens or NFTs. As the name suggests, NFTs are unique, non-fungible, tokens that exist on a distributed ledger on a peer-to-peer network. They have all the properties of a cryptocurrency, except they can’t be divided and exchanged for something of equal value.

Cryptocurrencies may have shaken the financial world with their digital peer-to-peer cash system; however, NFTs, on the other hand, brought in a craze that changed how brands, games, mainstream media, and everyone in the world used the internet.

Web 3.0 and NFTs

Today, the world is using NFTs as a means to transition into a new type of internet called Web 3.0, where our digital selves and physical selves unite. By introducing digital ownership where users can own digital things or digital representations of physical things, NFTs revolutionized the world.

Concerts, Metaverses, Games, and Brands have all started preparing for Web 3.0 by connecting with their consumers in a deeper way, incentivized by rewards, exclusivity, and perks.

NFTs are redefining social integration by tokenizing experiences, rewarding participation, creating exclusivity, and introducing digital ownership. One great example of this can be taken from The Sandbox’s Alpha Season 3, where users were united by different events, competitions, and more, under one ecosystem.

The NFT Craze: What Web 3.0 Will Look Like In The Future

NFTs were introduced to the world through digital collectibles of pixelated cats called Crypto Kitties. Crypto Kitties were very similar to Tamagotchis, rather they lived on the blockchain and everyone in the world could see who owned what. Crypto Kitties tokenized the familiar Tamagotchi experience that everyone in the 90s experienced.

Players cared for their Crypto Kitties, bred them, fed them, and watched them grow. While Brands may have been late to the party, digital art projects like Crypto Punks and Beeple were quick to utilize the technology for digital art.

Seeing astronomical numbers in sales, led the digital art projects to saturate the market; flushing out projects that focused on social integration and the future of Web 3.0.

However, despite the noise, we were able to see projects like The Sandbox, Decentraland, Axie Infinity, and Animoca brands establish a presence in the space, while digital art went through the roof.

At the height of the NFT craze, the digital art sector projected almost $1 billion in sales, as per Nonfungible.com.

In contrast to digital art, blockchain games and Play to Earn (P2E) games easily crossed the billion-dollar mark in sales.

Comparatively, Web 3.0 games have been better at generating sales and connecting with consumers, and for good reason. Games have been at the forefront of social integration for millions of teens, young adults, and millennials.

Three generations have been exposed to the world of video games. While video games may get a bad rep from boomers, everyone is playing them. Games like Fortnite, League of Legends, Apex Legends, and Call of Duty have successfully maintained millions of daily players from the 18-24 demographic. Comparatively, Minecraft and Roblox have also projected millions of daily users.

Games are going to be what connects us in the future.

The NFT Craze introduced us to some amazing Play to Earn (P2E) games and showcased what Web 3.0 can achieve. The Web 3.0 gaming space is an infinitely large, interoperable ecosystem, where players could easily jump from game to game, without having to be committed to one game. Gamers were able to create value out of their experiences and their progression.

And the proof is in the numbers.

Games - The future of Web 3.0

Digital Art NFTs Sales have significantly dropped in the bear market in contrast to Play-to-Earn Game NFTs. Games have maintained their numbers throughout the bear market. Last month, blockchain games reported $4 million in sales in contrast to $2 million by the digital art sector. The Gaming sector generated twice as much as the digital art sector.

The Web 3.0 gaming sector is representative of what social integration will look like in the future once Web 3.0 goes mainstream. We’re seeing a lot of brands, games, tech giants, and industry veterans transitioning into Web 3.0. Nissan just announced digital NFTs for an upcoming game, and Microsoft poured millions of dollars into a Korean game development studio this week.

Besides that, we’re seeing fashion brands like Gucci establishing brand experiences in the metaverse. The fashion house wanted to help newer users adopt Web 3.0 while learning about its heritage.

A Dynamic Ecosystem

While the gaming sector attracts institutional adoption, one should look into the fundamentals of what makes Gaming the center of Web 3.0. Variables like mainstream adoption, social and networking events, and reward mechanisms play equally important roles.

However, what stands out in most games is the ability to be dynamic. Animoca Brands is one of the successful brands in the Web 3.0 space that has been able to generate an interoperable dynamic ecosystem of games, where players can play any type of game. If you’re a motorhead, you can play any game from the REVV ecosystem, if you’re someone who likes playing open-world games, you can play The Sandbox, and if you’re someone who wants to play educational games, you can play TinyTap.

While Animoca Brand may have a very vast ecosystem of games, it cannot be dynamic. Moreover, these ecosystems are still disconnected, despite being under one umbrella. Animoca Brands has some of my favorite games. ‘MotoGP: Ignition’ is a game that I am very fond of. However, ‘MotoGP: Ignition’ is part of the REVV Ecosystem, and doesn’t allow me to interoperate with The Sandbox metaverse.

The future of Web 3.0 needs a shared space that dynamically grows with its users, piques users’ interests, and maintains steady growth under one platform. One interesting project that does that is MetaBlaze.

is a play-to-earn ecosystem of games that dynamically grows its ecosystem of games with time. To facilitate the next generation of social integration, the gaming platform is focused on creating a unified space for people to hang out, play games, and make new friends.

MetaBlaze aims to unite people with a constantly expanding ecosystem of interoperable P2E games that generates utility for users and captures users’ interest with fun-to-play games.

Besides MetaBlaze, another very successful project that unites people under one ecosystem is Gala Games. Gala Games is undoubtedly an industry veteran in the blockchain gaming space and one of the few projects that have broken into mainstream adoption by publishing games on Steam and Epic Games. Besides games, Gala Games is also actively making collaborations with other projects to promote an open economy and space for social integration.

Conclusion

Everyone is striving for social integration, as they find unique niches and things to meet other like-minded people. Whether it’s through video games, TV shows, or social media, we have digitized over socialization. With the digitization of money through cryptocurrencies and the possible digitization of everything through NFTs, our next stop is Web 3.0. And right now, Blockchain games are at the heart of Web 3.0.