Weekly App Insights: GameFi Sector Sees Broad Gains, and These Mini-Games Are Rising with the Trend
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Weekly App Insights: GameFi Sector Sees Broad Gains, and These Mini-Games Are Rising with the Trend
Unlike big productions with 3A-level budgets, they share one common characteristic: lightweight, quick results, and easy to spread.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsWritten by: TechFlow
What applications are worth paying attention to this past week?
Amid the broad rally in the GameFi sector, tokens from various legacy gaming projects have seen a strong rebound. As attention returns to blockchain games, some new mini-games and entertainment-related NFTs have quickly generated buzz and momentum.
Unlike large-scale 3A productions, these share a common trait: lightweight design, rapid impact, and high virality.
Below are three recent projects worth checking out.
1. draw.tech: Drawing, hide-and-seek, and speculation
draw.tech is a mobile game fully built on blockchain (Base), launched by Small Brain Games on November 1, 2023. The price of each tile fluctuates based on demand, increasing as more artists color them. The pricing mechanism uses linear VRGDA (Variable Rate Gradual Dutch Auction). The frontend charges a 6.23% fee, while the protocol layer collects no fees.
A portion of the transaction fees collected by the frontend is returned to colorers. Regardless of tile price, all tiles generate equal reward payouts. Rather than simply coloring tiles, players are effectively buying revenue-sharing rights to those tiles. Thus, the gameplay resembles "on-chain hide-and-seek," where the main goal is protecting your colored tiles for as long as possible to maximize fee-sharing revenue.
Following Friend.tech’s massive success, the Base chain has gained significant attention. To date, its official Twitter account has attracted over 100,000 views, helping raise awareness of blockchain-based gaming.
However, despite widespread interest, early users haven’t seen substantial profits, while latecomers face high entry costs. Additionally, the game still has room for improvement in terms of entertainment value and playability. This serves as a reminder that even blockchain games must balance economic incentives with user experience to sustain player engagement.
Nonetheless, support from the Friend.tech team and potential investment from Paradigm could act as catalysts, opening new opportunities for the game.
2. The Grapes: Strong IP, floor price surges rapidly
Grapes is a cross-media, family-friendly entertainment IP created and launched by VIKER, a team backed by Animoca Brands. These IP's NFTs were minted during the bear market in May 2023 at 0.039 ETH, and today their floor price exceeds 1 ETH.
The strength of the team behind it is also noteworthy. Ben Cusack previously led Square Enix’s mobile studio, successfully launching hit titles such as Lara Croft, Final Fantasy, Championship Manager, and Space Invaders. Dan Beasley played a key role in bringing prominent online influencers and TV brands into mobile gaming for the first time, including collaborations with Sony Pictures on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” “Mr. Bean,” KSI, and Logan Paul.
At the time of writing, Grape NFT prices have risen from 0.5 ETH last week to 1.4 ETH. The announcement of Grapes’ $GRAPE token airdrop program has directly fueled its short-term appreciation. Players can participate in the token airdrop and IDO by acquiring a Grape NFT or completing in-game challenges, providing fresh momentum for future value growth.
3. Pixel: Leveraging Axie’s resources, can an old game get a second wind?
Pixels, a pixel-art farming mini-game, is led by Animoca Brands and PKO Investments, with participation from OpenSea, Untapped Capital, and Leonis Capital. Though not a new release this year, Pixel stands out due to its rich gameplay and mature ecosystem. Launched in 2022, its simple mechanics make it accessible even to gaming novices, enabling broad appeal.
In September this year, Pixels decided to migrate from Polygon to Ronin. With strong support from the Ronin team, and promotion through Axie’s existing KOL network—including English and Spanish communities—the game has become one of Ronin’s flagship projects.
From the moment you enter the game, you’re guided into its core mechanic—farming. This provides immediate short-term feedback: players earn experience points by planting and harvesting crops, improve skill proficiency by crafting items, and receive token rewards ($BERRY) by selling crops. In other words, players can farm $BERRY tokens completely for free.
Additionally, Pixel plans to launch its governance token $PIXELS in Q4 this year, offering players greater participation and decision-making power. When the first token $BERRY was released, it was distributed via airdrop to the first 20K player addresses, fueling anticipation around the upcoming $PIXELS token. (Details link)
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