Ronin expands lead as top chain for Web3 gaming

Ronin still benefits from the game experiences of Axie Infinity. Mini-tournaments and special games boost Ronin usage. Ronin is also carrying token-based traffic for decentralized trading, boosting the Katana DEX.

The Ronin blockchain is key to reviving the Web3 gaming space, which entered a prolonged crypto winter in 2022. Even after its $600M bridge hack and a recent $12M white-hat exploit, Ronin remains key to the activity of Axie Infinity, but also carries some of the top Web3 games for 2024. The Ronin chain became home to Pixels, Lumiterra and Wild Forest, competing with even more influential chains like Base and Toncoin.

In 2024, Ronin also benefited from the inclusion of DeFi through its Ethereum bridge, adding several high-profile tokens, especially PIXEL. The Ronin chain currently has more than 34% of the volume of daily active users for all chains dedicated to gaming. Ronin is considered the go-to chain for game launches, much like Solana became the chain for meme tokens.

Ronin does not even line up among L2 networks, despite being compatible with Ethereum. The chain now focuses on adding more gaming features, NFTs and live play activities, although it also has a small DeFi hub for the usage of Axie owners and players. The Ronin bridge is starting to absorb USDC stablecoins as well, with the supply of bridged tokens growing to more than $37M.

Ronin locks in $131M in total value, based on the Katana DEX and two smaller lending and payment protocols. Ronin has turned into a fat-fee app, generating $2.56M in monthly fees. Most of the earnings still go to incentivize validators, but some may also choose to share their fee earnings. On active days, Ronin carries more than 2M active daily users, spread into the top games. The Ronin brand is also hiring ambassadors to improve its social media presence during the 2024 bull market.

Ronin Daily Update!@Ronin_Network Leads Gaming Chains with a 34.65% market share of DAA.@AxieInfinity added a total of 2K $AXS to PBB.@playwildforest’s DAA reaches a new ATH of 80.8K (14.2%).@themachinesgame has 2,066 DAA.

A Thread🧵

1/12 pic.twitter.com/Ul4UOTwoyj

— Nathan (@0xxNathan) August 10, 2024

Ronin becomes a high-fee hub with staking rewards

Yield Guild Games became a Ronin validator in March, and aims to redistribute some of its incentives to all owners that staked and held their YGG.

The Ronin chain also logs more than 1.7M daily active users, surpassing even Ethereum and Solana. Ronin is no longer focused only on Axie Infinity, instead connecting to the wider Web3 ecosystem, with new use cases. Ronin now carries games like Wild Forest, which also airdrop meme tokens.

One of the big developments for Ronin is the addition of new apps and tasks, including play-to-airdrop games. Ronin got a boost from adding the Pixels game, which migrated from Ethereum, bringing 725.17K users.

Axie Infinity is still among the top 10 apps on Ronin, recently recovering to above 68K daily active users. Axie Infinity has not returned to its peak of daily active users at more than 600K, but is on an expansion track in the first half of 2024. Axie Infinity NFTs are still important, with rare collectible Axies commanding prices of 0.77 ETH.

Ronin is now listing new, smaller games in their early development stages, with several launches expected in the coming weeks. Games like Lumiterra are also boosting existing infrastructure on the Mavis market, in addition to bringing a higher turnover to RON tokens.

Additionally, more than 212M RON tokens are locked for staking, leaving a much smaller circulating supply. The total RON supply is 1B tokens, with daily unlocks based on a linear schedule. Around 55% of all RON is unlocked. Sky Mavis, the foundation behind Axie Infinity, owns 30% of the RON supply, with 400M RON left for staking rewards and community incentives.

RON competes with L2 tokens and is not considered a gaming asset. Instead, RON serves as a utility token, not as an in-game reward. This ensures some stability for RON, as there is no selling pressure from gamers.

RON traded at $1.54, down from its all-time high in March at above $3.50. Previous expectations for RON was to expand to $12 or more, but the asset stagnated during the 2022 bear market.

Cryptopolitan reporting by Hristina Vasileva