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Naavik
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Venture capital is shifting its focus away from web3 infrastructure and towards artificial intelligence.
This monthly market update for June 2023 analyzes trends in web3 gaming, focusing on Unique Active Wallets (UAWs), secondary market NFT transaction volumes, and fundraising activities. The report indicates a general downward trend across many web3 gaming metrics, though with some areas of resilience and potential future growth. Data for UAWs is sourced from DappRadar, while transaction volume data comes from Cryptoslam, covering various blockchains including Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, and Polygon.
Unique Active Wallets remained largely stable in June, experiencing a slight decline of 2.4%. Casual games showed increases, while transaction-heavy games saw declines. Notably, Axie Infinity dropped out of the top 10 UAW games for the first time, with a nearly 12% decrease. Conversely, Iskra rebounded by 77%, and DeFi Kingdoms saw an impressive nearly 600% gain due to game revamps and optimization. Secondary market transaction volume for NFTs decreased by 4.6% overall, primarily driven by a 44% decline in Bitcoin NFT volumes as initial enthusiasm waned. Ethereum rebounded by 13.5% to $404 million, largely due to non-gaming NFTs, while Immutable experienced a 6.75% loss. Gods Unchained achieved its highest-ever monthly secondary market transaction volume at $23 million, attributed to meta shifts, UI revamps, and its launch on the Epic Games Store.
Fundraising in web3 gaming continued its downward trajectory, with a 41% month-over-month drop in June, following a 22% drop in May. Despite this, some web3 game studios like Mythical Games ($37 million) and Pixion ($5.5 million) secured investments. HyperPlay, a web3 game launcher, also raised $12 million. The report notes a slow but building momentum for web3 games on mobile platforms, the Epic Games Store, and in Asian markets, particularly Japan and South Korea, which are seen as potential areas for growth in 2023. However, the overall outlook for significant upswings in funding back to 2022 levels is considered unlikely due to broader tech funding decreases and a shift in VC focus towards AI.
Naavik · 2026
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