
Key Takeaways
- GameFi is one of the fastest-growing areas in the crypto market, with teams racing to find ways to build fun and engaging games that use blockchain technology.
- Some crypto games are integrated with the world of decentralised finance (DeFi), explaining the ‘Fi’ in the ‘GameFi’.
- The most popular gaming blockchains are Ronin (RON), Immutable (IMX) and Beam (BEAM).
- Of the nearly 2,500 crypto games that are either live or under development, Illuvium (ILV) is among the most highly anticipated.
- Telegram’s TON blockchain has found traction with tap-to-earn games in 2024, with two notable titles being Notcoin (NOT) and Hamster Kombat.
What Is Crypto Gaming/GameFi?
GameFi is a catch-all term describing games that use blockchain technology as well as the purpose-built blockchains and supporting infrastructure that enable these games. The extent to which crypto games use blockchain technology varies greatly.
Most will use blockchains for aspects related to asset ownership and trading, whereas the core gameplay logic and graphics rendering will run on traditional servers (e.g. Amazon’s AWS).
Heads up
As you learn about crypto gaming, you’ll come across terms such as blockchain-based gaming, web3 gaming and GameFi. For all intents and purposes, these all mean the same thing as crypto gaming.
The GameFi Ecosystem
GameFi is among the fastest-growing sectors in the crypto market. Here are just some of the subsectors that occupy the GameFi sector: onchain games, tap-to-earn (T2E) games, play-to-earn (P2E) games, trading card games (TCGs), role-player games (RPGs), AI-powered games and gaming-specific chains.
Further, almost every general-purpose blockchain—be they L1 or L2 blockchains—has some semblance of a gaming ecosystem. Some of these include Solana, Avalanche and Aptos, which each have pages on their websites dedicated to gaming use cases.
Additionally, other crypto sectors overlap with GameFi. With the ‘Fi’ in GameFi standing for ‘finance’, it’s no surprise to learn that DeFi apps can seamlessly plug into certain crypto games. Further, oracles such as Chainlink are often used in crypto games to ensure verifiable randomness and up-to-date market pricing. (More on Chainlink and gaming.)

The remainder of this report highlights certain components of GameFi sector.
Gaming Chains: Ronin, Immutable & Beam
As the name implies, gaming chains are blockchains optimised to handle transactions related to crypto games. These chains currently house the most robust gaming ecosystems in the crypto market.
Ronin (RON)
Ronin (RON) is a standalone blockchain developed by Sky Mavis, the team behind Axie Infinity, the most popular crypto game to date. Over the years, Ronin has become a thriving ecosystem with a blockchain optimised for near-instant transactions with cheap fees that enable millions of seamless in-game transactions.
And while Axie Infinity is still a relatively popular game with a passionate community, there are now various other games on the Ronin blockchain. Other well-known games include Pixels (PIXEL) and Apeiron (APRS).

Immutable (IMX)
Immutable (IMX) is a gaming-focused protocol that offers cheap fees and fast transactions through two blockchains: Immutable X and Immutable zkEVM. Of these, Immutable zkEVM is much newer, having only rolled out in beta in early 2024. As per the below post by co-founder Robbie Ferguson, the chain is seeing strong initial growth.
Measuring by number of games publicly announced, Immutable is widely considered the most popular gaming blockchains. In the first half of 2024, a total of 61 games announced that they would be launching on Immutable, according to Big Blockchain Games List.
According to a post in December 2023 on X by Framework Venture, a crypto venture firm that is invested in Immutable, the team behind Immutable “claims a major pipeline of more than 200 web3 games already committed to building on the platform.”
Beam (BEAM)
Beam (BEAM) is the newest of these three blockchains and, therefore, has the smallest ecosystem. It went live in late 2023 as the infrastructure vertical of Merit Circle’s multi-faceted approach to web3 gaming. Merit Circle (MC) was among the first so-called gaming guilds and is home to a substantial treasury totalling tens of millions of dollars worth of various cryptocurrencies.
Initially, Beam existed as an Avalanche subnet. However, in December 2023, Merit Circle DAO partnered with Immutable to expand Beam beyond the Avalanche ecosystem, announcing that “Beam will now also launch on Immutable zkEVM, a groundbreaking scaling solution powered by Polygon.”
Individual Games: Illuvium (ILV)
Of the thousands of crypto games, one worth highlighting is Illuvium (ILV). It’s safe to say that Illuvium is one of the most ambitious crypto games to date, with the team driven to deliver a game with high-quality gameplay on par with traditional video games (i.e. AAA games) that take millions of dollars and several years to build.
Under the ‘Illuvium’ name, a trio of games are set to fully launch in 2024. These will be released on Immutable.
Illuvium: Zero is a land mini-game that powers the Illuvium in-game economy.
Illuvium: Overworld is an open-world game where players catch and find Illuvials, creatures with different strengths and weaknesses.
Illuvium: Arena is a competitive auto-battler where players can battle Illuvials and challenge opponents.
Did you know?
As of July 2024, there are 2,472 crypto games, not including the 268 that have been discontinued, as per data aggregator PlayToEarn. There are also 776 gaming cryptocurrencies live on the market.

Telegram’s TON Blockchain & Tap-To-Earn Games
So-called ‘hyper-casual games’—or, in the crypto world, ‘tap-to-earn games’—have had relative success in Telegram’s TON blockchain ecosystem. Two leaders in this emerging category are Notcoin and Hamster Kombat. (These games are sometimes called ‘clicker games’, ‘incremental games’ or ‘hyper-casual games’.)
Notcoin is the Telegram-based game that ignited the ‘tap-to-earn’ mining mechanism in early 2024. An initial mining phase, which ended on April 1, 2024, saw users be able to earn in-game coins by literally tapping their phones (if playing on mobile) or clicking their mice (if playing on desktop). These coins were redeemable for Notcoin’s NOT tokens once it launched. Uniquely, the entire supply of NOT was made available upon launch.
After the launch of NOT, the Notcoin tap-to-earn game has remained relatively popular. Players earn in-game coins, which they can exchange for prizes or cash rewards.
Hamster Kombat launched in the wake of Notcoin’s roaring success. The game lets users earn in-game coins by tapping or clicking a picture of a hamster and completing certain tasks. Unlike Notcoin, Hamster Kombat has a theme in which players assume the persona of a crypto exchange CEO, with the aim of earning enough in-game coins to keep levelling up.
Hamster Kombat’s HMSTR token is scheduled to go live on the TON blockchain in July 2024. As with Notcoin and NOT, players of Hamster Kombat will be able to redeem their in-game coins for HMSTR once it launches.

Hamster Kombat’s roadmap for the second half of 2024 (Source)
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