NEAR token has been marching steadily upwards to a new all-time high of US$16.37, the most recent rally on December 22 after NEAR announced it was partnering with leading blockchain protocol Terra Money.
Terra is an open-source decentralised network and the TerraUSD (UST) stablecoin is pegged 1:1 to the US dollar, making it an attractive medium of exchange for the DeFi space.
More Collaborations to Come
The integration of UST on NEAR “will be a big step towards growing the Near and Aurora ecosystem”, according to Aiden Knox, founder of NearPad and Rose. âIâm excited to be working closely with the Terra team to not only bring UST to NearPad and Rose, but also for the deeper integrations and collaborative projects this partnership enables.â
This has indeed been bullish news for NEAR as investors have rushed in. By Christmas Eve, NEAR trading volume had spiked to US$1,475,397,417 as the price rallied to a high of $16.15 on December 27. After a week of healthy consolidation, the NEAR chart is as green as a Christmas tree – its impressive price action has seen the token increase 1060.5 percent in value over the past 12 months.
NearPad aims to be the leading gateway for the DeFi ecosystem on Aurora – an Ethereum Layer-2 built on top of NEAR blockchain. NearPad consists of a DEX AMM, launchpad, and incubator project Rose – a liquidity protocol on Aurora. NearPad offers a product suite to nurture and grow the DeFi ecosystem.
A single non-fungible token (NFT) from the Mutant Serum collection by the Bored Ape Chemistry Club has changed hands for almost US$6 million.
Serum #69, one of 10,000 in the series to be airdropped to all Bored Apes collectors, was purchased on OpenSea for a record 1542.069 ETH (US$5.8 million) on January 2 by @Deepak Thapliyal, an avid Ape collector and CEO of blockchain tech startup Chain.
Deepak took to Twitter to explain himself and his reasoning behind such an expensive investment:
Why did I spend over $5.8M (1,542.069 #ETH) for the art?
The level of creativity from Yuga Labs (creators of Bored Apes) is pure genius. The Bored Apes Yacht Club roadmap outlined that Bored Apes would be followed by another collection after all BAYC NFTs had been sold. Mutant Apes was always part of the project’s vision. The release of Serums adds an extra layer of uniqueness and generates further excitement among collectors within the Apes community.
Of 10,000 Serums already airdropped, there are only eight Mega Mutant Serums, making Serum #69 extremely rare. Serums are designed for a one-use mutation of a Bored Ape. Applying the mutating feature on the MAYC website, the Serum NFT merges with the Bored Ape NFT to create a new Mutated Ape character with combined features. Yuga Labs has ingeniously invented a way to add a scarcity model that goes beyond the original Bored Ape mint.
BAYC is a phenomenon that has transformed the way the world sees digital art and NFTs, and has had a huge impact on the rise in popularity of the entire NFT space. Even rapper Eminem has one!
Whatâs the point of owning an NFT (non-fungible token) if you canât show it off to everyone you know? Korean technology giant Samsung Electronics understands this and is here to help by introducing three TV models incorporating an NFT explorer and marketplace aggregator â a platform that allows owners to browse, purchase, and display their favourite art.
Samsung Brings Blockchain to Your Smart TV
The past couple of months has seen an unprecedented explosion in the NFT market, and the need for tech companies to get on board has become all the more important. Samsung is leading the charge in this respect by introducing a new âNFT Aggregation Platformâ, designed for three of its 2022 TV models.
According to Samsung:
In 2022, Samsung is introducing the worldâs first TV screen-based NFT explorer and marketplace aggregator, a groundbreaking platform that lets you browse, purchase, and display your favourite art – all in one place.
Samsung Electronics announcement
Watch TV, Buy NFTs
The platform, which will be available on Samsungâs MicroLed, Neo QLED, and The Frame models, will allow users to browse and buy NFTs directly from the TVs. The new platform pulls in NFTs from different marketplaces so users can preview the art and see who created it, along with all relevant blockchain metadata.
Promotion for Samsung’s upcoming NFT TV platform. Source: Samsung
For users who already own NFTs, the platform can be used to showcase their prized possessions. Samsung has also introduced its âSmart Calibrationâ technology that automatically adjusts the TVâs setting to match the original specifications, to ensure the image is rendered as optimally as the creator intended.
Among the impressive specs offered by the platform, the application will feature an âintuitive, integrated platform for discovering, purchasing and trading digital artworkâ, which allows users to trade NFTs on set.
Already associated with a range of use cases from real estate to microfinance and even drone racing, the Algorand blockchain has now been enlisted to combat urban air pollution.
PlanetWatch, the world’s first decentralised indoor and outdoor air quality monitoring network built on Algorand, has selected the US city of Miami to host its system of pollution sensors.
US Project Follows Successful European Rollout
In what is the first such deployment in a major US location, the Miami project follows the successful rollout of PlanetWatch’s technology in several European cities and builds on commitments made as part of the Floridan city’s “Miami Forever Climate Ready” initiative.
These commitments flow from last month’s UN Climate Change Conference (COP26), held in Glasgow in the wake of the World Health Organization updating its Global Air Quality guidelines.
Productivity losses and deterioration in the quality of life caused by air pollution are estimated to cost the world economy 50 trillion euros per year. Various technologies and pollution control strategies are available to reduce air pollution. pic.twitter.com/aTFciRat75
Almost Half of Americans Live in Polluted Environments
The selection of Miami as the location for the first US PlanetWatch project makes sense as recent evidence suggests more than 40 percent of Americans live in places with unhealthy levels of ozone or particle pollution, most often heavily urbanised environments.
Backed by blockchain VC firm Borderless Capital’s US$10 million PLANETS fund, so-called “PlanetWatchers” will host air-quality sensors to collect green data for transcription onto the Algorand blockchain. Contributors will receive PLANETS tokens as compensation, with collected information used to identify pollution hotspots and provide a database of environmental analytics to protect the future health of Miami’s population.
“It is hugely exciting that innovators like PlanetWatch and Algorand are coming [to Miami] to implement major sustainable technology in the US,” commented crypto-friendly Miami Mayor Francis Suarez. “Algorand is a carbon-negative blockchain, and the data from this project will play a crucial role in our climate adaptation efforts, as well as our ambitions to make Miami an epicentre for digital capital markets.”
For his part, PlanetWatch CEO Claudio Parrinello confirmed Miami as the France-based environmental tech startup’s first large-scale project in the US.
PlanetWatch is built on the contribution of individuals, and the people of Miami will play an invaluable role in expanding an air quality database that will help protect the health of our people and our planet.
Claudio Parrinello, CEO, PlanetWatch
Algorand’s Australian Connection
In early 2021, Blockchain Australia Solutions also partnered up with Algorand to enhance applications from quality assurance to eco-friendly housing.
Ethereum sidechain project Polygon (MATIC) could well have lost all of its MATIC tokens, worth US$24 billion, after it discovered a âsevereâ bug that had gone unnoticed for some time. To offset the enormous loss, the Polygon network underwent a hard fork to save the project.
‘Critical’ Vulnerability Found in Polygon’s PoS Genesis Contract
The hard fork proceeded after a âcriticalâ vulnerability was found in Polygonâs proof-of-stake genesis contract, which would have allowed attackers to steal 9.2 billion MATIC tokens. The total supply of MATIC is 10 billion, and any vulnerability would have put 9.2 billion of those tokens at risk, a potentially devastating loss.
The problem was reported on the bug bounty platform Immunefi by a white hat hacker known as Leon Spacewalker. Following the discovery of the bug, Immunefi informed the team at Polygon, after which they confirmed it.
All you need to know about the recent Polygon network update. â A security partner discovered a vulnerability â Fix was immediately introduced â Validators upgraded the network â No material harm to the protocol/end-users â White hats were paid a bounty https://t.co/oyDkvohg33
However, Polygon did not come out entirely unscathed. Before the upgrade on the mainnet could be completed, an unknown black hat hacker stole 801,601 MATIC, worth about US$1.6 million.
The team at Polygon reported: âDespite our best efforts, a malicious hacker was able to use the exploit to steal 801,601 MATIC before the network upgrade took effect.â
Co-founder Conceded Pre-existing Vulnerability
Although Polygon did not release details regarding the incident until December 29, chatter on social media had emerged mid-month about the network zero-warning hard fork. During that time, Polygon co-founder Mihailo Bjelic did concede that a vulnerability existed and that the team would subsequently release details of the problem.
Bjelic wrote at the time: âWe are now investing much more on security and weâre making an effort to improve security practices across all Polygon projects.â
When asked why the project waited until this week to disclose information regarding the bug, the core development team explained its âsilent patchesâ policy:
All in all, the team struck the best possible balance between openness and doing what’s best for the community, partners and the broader ecosystem in handling this extremely urgent and sensitive issue. But you can be the judge of that.
Polygon core development team statement
Polygon Records Exponential Growth
Polygon is undergoing a period of growth and mass adoption, and is evolving and adapting along with it. The scaling solution has seen an increasing number of decentralisation applications (dApps) running on the network. Data has also revealed that Polygon is growing at a rate two times faster than Ethereum at a comparable time in its history.
A new project called Animal Concerts is building a virtual touring company to host virtual live music events in the Metaverse. Through the project, artists can earn up to 50 percent of revenues from both ticket and NFT sales.
It’s time for the next generation of concertgoers and fans to deck out your home theatre, get a VR headset and watch your favourite artists from the comfort of your lounge.
Experience The New Era of Immersive VR Concerts From The Comfort of Your Home đď¸ đś đ
The Animal’s Metaverse will include online concerts, virtual merchandise in the form of digital collectible NFTs, and a community of superfans. Bringing together all aspects of a real-world live event, Animal Concerts will be the hub for delivering online immersive virtual reality experiences for fans like nothing they’ve encountered before. Founder Colin Fitzpatrick says the goal is to become the âNetflix of live streaming concertsâ.
With 360-degree cameras on stage, you can use a VR headset to get an immersive experience – like you are dancing on stage with your favourite bands, from your living room anywhere in the world. We want to enable you to enjoy the concert with friends by seeing their avatars.
Colin Fitzpatrick, founder, Animal Concerts
The platform will use cutting-edge technology, setting up multiple 360-degree cameras on stage to feed high-quality footage and audio directly into punters’ VR headsets. Click here to read the full roadmap of features outlined in the Animal Concerts Whitepaper.
A-List Artists to Promote the Metaverse
Animal Concerts will leverage the online fan reach of the A-list artists it promotes by contracting them to help market and push the brand of the platform. “No other crypto will have this many celebrities onboard, promoting us on social media,” its website boasts. “Propelled by these celebs, we will achieve the biggest social following of any cryptocurrency.”
Restrictions on travel and gathering in numbers over the past two years of the pandemic has decimated the revenues of artists who rely on live performance to generate income. Album sales have also been in sharp decline as streaming services continue to replace traditional methods of music consumption.
Round Up Your ANIMAL token
$ANIMAL will be the native token for Animal Concerts. Holding the Animal token will allow users:
payment for concert tickets, NFTs and other merchandise on the Animal Concerts marketplace;
tiered rewards for early investors;
governance, voting and fan interaction, free tickets, limited-edition merch and early access to unique materials and collectibles;
discounts for fans purchasing tickets with the ANIMAL token over platforms such as Ticketmaster, etc;
participation in online communities of loyal fans; and
creation of art, gaming and music NFTs.
At Last, a Serious Challenge to Spotify
Major streaming service Spotify, however, has been criticised for undercutting musicians’ revenues and has upset the industry with its unfavourable artist royalties distribution model. Animal Concerts is set to change this, allowing performers to earn 50 percent of revenues from both ticket and NFT sales. By benefiting the artists directly, Animal Concerts provides a massive incentive for celebrities to entice their fans into the metaverse.
Aiming to launch upwards of 20 virtual reality concerts in 2022 along with NFT collectibles, Animal Concerts has announced a lineup of artists that includes Adele, Arctic Monkeys, Beastie Boys, Backstreet Boys, Bruno Mars, Drake, Ellie Goulding, Fatboy Slim, Frank Ocean, Gwen Stefani, the Killers, Kings of Leon, Miley Cyrus and more.
Teaming up with some of the biggest players in the metaverse, Animal Concerts has partnered with 3D virtual world platform Decentraland, NFT and gaming giant Enjin, and blockchain payment company Circle, among others.
Participate in the IDO
Animal Concerts will be launching on PolkaBridge on January 18. To participate, fill out the registration form for Animal Concerts before January 17 and be sure to have ETH in your wallet:
As a precursor to the Animal Concerts model, in October the US financial services company Republic announced the launch of âRepublic Musicâ, an investment product offering âan entirely new way to create, produce and share royalties from musicâ.
In an earlier challenge to the dominance of Spotify, Audius, a music streaming platform based on the Ethereum and Solana blockchains, partnered with popular Chinese video-sharing and social media app TikTok to create TikTok Sounds. Within 24 hours of the August announcement, the $AUDIO token’s price spiked over 200 percent.
Blockchain is set to influence gaming in a big way throughout 2022 and beyond, and one of those lesser known players is the WAX blockchain. Home to some of the most interesting blockchain based card strategy games, WAX appears to be a silent growing in stature.
DAOs, decentralised autonomous organisations that provide self-enforcing open-source protocols, are helping WAX games do this. DAOs bring native tokens and smart contracts that allow the network to remain transparent.
WAX is a purpose-built blockchain and protocol token designed to make e-commerce transactions faster, easier, and safer for all participants. Offering a lot of potential for those who enjoy P2E and also the wider industry of traditional gamers.
To help you out, weâve compiled a list of what we think are the Best 10 WAX blockchain games using DAOs.
StarShip – a Binance Smart Chain project and a game.
Seeking to bridge the gap between blockchain and business, StarShip may be the NFT-orientated outer-space PokĂŠmon game for you. StarShip is both a Binance Smart Chain project and a crypto game. The main token for this project is $STARSHIP; however, within the game you can mine $KYANITE, which is where the P2E aspect takes place.
Within this NFT game, itâs all about locating and customising the best starship you can get your hands on. If you wish, you can put your tokens toward a pack of NFT cards. These cards allow you to optimise your starships via NFT stacking in local space stations.
If you are more of a mobile gamer, fancying apps such as Candy Crush or Clash of Clans, Clash Dome could be more your style. The phone-app-style games within WAXâs Clash Dome can be gambled on to earn. With the gameâs main token being $WAX, most of the mini-games available are pay-to-enter, allowing the tokens to pool for a winner-takes-all outcome.
While these games are typically played by a large group of players, you can play quick 1v1 games instead. $WAX isnât the only available token; players may also obtain $LUDIO, which can be traded on the exchange or used for in-game powerups.
Alien Worlds – the game dominating the WAX blockchain.
If youâre looking to opt for one of the big-name games running on the WAX blockchain, Alien Worlds is your giant. The NFT metaverse strategy game has seen staggering growth since its original release in mid-2021. Offering NFTs with utility, a Binance-listed token ($TRILIUM), and planet DAOs, Alien Worlds is another space-situated game with some unique features such as earning NFTs by playing the ‘play to earn’ game.
One such feature is the opportunity to âteleportâ your $TRILIUM (TLM). Once you connect to MetaMask you can teleport from the Binance Smart Chain to WAX or Ethereum, allowing you more room to move with your earnings. Connection to the metaverse permits you to find a group of explorers â from there, the prospects available are vast.
Currently, Taco is another project that is split in half, with a utility side and a gaming side. While the utility aspect of the project is up and running, much of the game is still in development. The Taco app allows users to earn and trade $TACO tokens at the best market price. It also permits you to transfer $WAX and your tokens to other accounts without fees. Interestingly, you can also find a music player on Taco for your enjoyment.
Taco Universe â the game side â is still in development and aiming to arrive soon on the Apple and Google Play stores. With phase one being the launch and two the landing, you can look forward to creating worlds that feature little taco ingredients.
Farmers World – your typical farming game combined with NFTs.
Another P2E, Farmers World is one of the first farming games to land on the WAX blockchain. Some of the elements featured within the game include mining, construction, cultivation, reproduction, and wild animals.
The gameâs NFT marketplace allows players to purchase farm animals, tools, associations, and farm buildings. These are all unique features that contribute to a successful agribusiness lifestyle. Farmers World is rapidly increasing in popularity as this is a game genre that seems to be tried and tested. Adding NFTs and elements of crypto only further intrigues players.
Another collectible card game, Splinterlands is the next game to rival the success of Alien Worlds in terms of sheer popularity among gamers. The game has been in circulation since 2018, but it is only now growing into its boots. If you are a fan of Magic the Gathering or simply enjoy the format of collecting cards and battling with them, Splinterlands might appeal to you.
Splinterlands is a colourful game combining âmayhem and magicâ. Not only this, but the developers have found a way to combine digital and traditional gameplay, with three available game methods: physical games, digital games, and Splinterlands. There truly are multiple opportunities within this project.
Sonyâs Funimation has teamed up with WAX to present NFTs for the anime franchise of Robotech. Originating as a science-fiction series, Robotech has enough of a fanbase to garner interest in the concept of purchasing NFTs based on the show.
In collectible card format, these NFTs are ranked by rarity. With categories such as build, base, bronze, silver and gold, youâll know exactly whether your purchase is worth its money. Combining cards increases their power level. The WAX blockchain works to ensure that your cards are 100 percent authentic, meaning they cannot be duplicated or changed.
WAX Arena – battle your collection against other players.
Described as enabling users to “collect NFTs, raise power points, and earn WAX”, WAX Arena offers three distinct game modes for you to explore. When beginning the game, you have the option to choose one of four distinct races and create a character that can be linked to your WAX cloud wallet. Much like many of the other game formats in this list, the main objective of WAX Arena is battling against other players with your collection of cards.
The game modes available include player vs player, challenge mode, and player vs environment. The WAX Arena cards feature aesthetic illustrations; the higher your cardâs rarity, the more power your character will receive.
Green Rabbit seeks to offer an exciting new experience to the industry of NFT gaming. The Green Rabbit developers claim that the game has been developed with “integrity and ethics” and caters to the industry’s collectors. The Green Rabbit story begins in Nanotopia, and if game lore is of interest, you can find a lengthy dissection on the website.
Within the game, you can get access to chests classed from common to mythic. Inside these chests, players can find the game token $SHELLINIUM, which can be put towards your rabbit. The game also offers concepts such as ANIMA-armour, which you can craft with your tokens.
Train of the Century – trains combine with time travel.
If youâre a train enthusiast, then out of all the WAX blockchain games available this one could be your go-to. Train of the Century presents the opportunity for you to become a railroader â a time-travelling entrepreneur. This means that you can play in any period, providing it has trains.
The cards available are NFT trains of the century. Using the games token, $TOCIEN, you can collect, build, and rule the rails. The game also allows you to purchase commodity cards – the freight that your train can haul – providing the commodity is compatible. For more information about how the game operates, there’s a beta gameplay guide on the website.
Conclusion
We’ve seen NFT avatar meme projects surge in popularity through 2021 and we could see this surge transition into the gaming industry. WAX is providing the next steps towards building this new enterprise of blockchain-based games with low transaction fees and high throughput.
An added layer of ownership and governance will be provided by games adopting DAOs which allow the token holders to have a big part in the organisations, providing an ecosystem that is designed for the players.
Currently, the WAX blockchain is processing more than 80 percent of in-game transactions across all blockchains. With many of the games on this blockchain being play-to-earn (P2E), WAX is ideal for the gamer looking to monetise their time while having fun.
Yet WAX isnât the only blockchain bringing cryptocurrency and NFTs to gaming. Alongside the metaverse projects and the THETA projects, the future of gaming is looking bright and experimental.
Bent Finance immediately called for investors to withdraw their pool funds and announced it had disabled the reward claims while the attack was being investigated, adding it would “make this right” and confirming it would recover all stolen funds from the Bent curve pool:
We recommend you withdraw from the protocol until further notice. We are not going anywhere and will recover from this one way or another.
Bent Finance tweet
Bent Hires White Hats to Decipher Exploit
Bent hired the services of two white-hat hackers to help uncover the details of the exploit. Crypto fraud investigator Joe McGill confirmed that approximately 440 ETH (US$1.75 million at the time of writing) was stolen by the hackers. Full details of the attack are explained on the Bent Finance medium.
DeFi is still in the teething stages of development and attacks such as these are common and frequent. Just two weeks ago DeFi protocol BadgerDAO suffered a similar attack, losing US$120 million in funds.
As our gift to you, we’ve now created a guide to five Xmas NFT projects launching this Christmas, most incorporating a charity angle.
1. Santa Apes Christmas Club
Have a simian Christmas with Santa Apes, and help a needy family while you’re at it.
Santa Apes Christmas Club is a unique collection of 10,000 NFTs minted on the Ethereum blockchain and available for purchase on OpenSea. Santa Apes offers users unique utility, including 25 days of Christmas giveaways, raffles, access to a second secret collection, and a whitelist of future partnered projects. Five percent of mint sales and 10 percent of royalties from the project will be donated to families in need for Christmas using Fidelity Charity.
2. Santaâs Reindeers
A percentage of the Santa’s Reindeers mint will aid Mexican orphanages and shelters.
Santaâs Reindeers are a collection of 999 reindeers that all live on the Solana network. The project was created with the goal of innovation in the NFT realm and to give holders utility beyond the digital world. That said, the project will donate a percentage of the mint to orphanages and shelters in Mexico in an effort to help those in need have a better Christmas.
3. Solana Santa Business (SSB)
Children’s organisations around the globe will benefit from 10 percent of the SSB mint.
For those users who missed Solana Money Business, creators have brought you SSB. The project, built atop Solana, is a collection of 3,333 Santa generative NFTs with Christmas NFT gifts, a play-to-earn game, and charities inbuilt. NFTs all consist of 200 unique traits. The project will also donate 10 percent of the mint to childrenâs organisations around the globe.
4. Crypto Clans of Santas (CCoS)
Christmas combat with Crypto Clans of Santas.
A turn-based combat video game on the Cardano blockchain, CCoS can be played on any internet browser with two to four players (1vs1, 2vs2, or 1vs1vs1vs). Users compose a team of five fighters in the form of NFTs they retain in their Cardano wallets. Players can have as many fighters as they want, but can only use five in a fight unless they have an NFT boost which enables players to use more. Extra fighters can also be hired should the player not have enough.
5. Snowman Army
The uniquely hand-drawn Snowman Army figures.
Snowman Army is a collection of 100 Snowman NFTs which all reside on the Ethereum blockchain and are available for purchase on OpenSea. All NFTs are hand-drawn and not generated.
A report published by the blockchain game alliance (BGA) shows that non-fungible token (NFT) games generated billions in revenue in the third quarter and generally saw remarkable growth throughout the year.
According to the report, the third quarter of 2021 was dominated by NFT gaming, with 2.5 million Unique Active Wallets (UAWs) connected to blockchain dApps on average “making blockchain games responsible for half of all blockchain usage”.
Will the traditional gaming industry use blockchain in 2022? With @blockchaingmg, author at @BCGbiz
With the surge in NFT games, the sector accumulated US$2.32 billion in revenue between July and September, representing 22 percent of total NFT trading volume industry-wide for that period.
The report also cited DappRadarâs data showing a 6,566 percent increase in daily UAWs interacting with game-related smart contracts, rising from 23,100 in Q3 2020 to 1.54 million daily in Q3 2021. However, UAW numbers do not translate to unique users, since a single individual might use multiple wallets to interact with a single dApp.
The Metaverse Raking in Digital Dollars
The metaverse has drawn much attention since a few major names in the tech industry mentioned they were dipping their toes in. The industry was also fuelled by virtual land sales that hit US$42.6 million and are continuing to grow; the market cap for virtual world dApps reached a new all-time high, surpassing US$4.6 billion at the end of November.
VCs forked out $4B in blockchain games & infrastructure this year.
Blockchain gaming has firmly established itself as the industryâs darling. With the consumer growth participating in blockchain games, dApp and gaming trends will come together into something even bigger and potentially all-encompassing: the metaverse.
Dragos Dunica, co-founder, DappRadar
Recently, venture capital firm Galaxy Interactive raised US$325 million to focus on gaming startups and interactive technology. The spark of interest hasn’t just been for investors, but also the general public. As the year moved on there was a noticeable increase in web searches for the terms “metaverse” and “play-to-earn”.
Online mentions of metaverse, play-to-earn and NFT. Source Meltwater
The Issue with NFT Games
According to those working in the industry, many of the current challenges faced in the industry are caused by:
regulatory uncertainty;
the need for user education;
technology limitations;
poor user experience; and
gameplay quality (or lack of).
The majority of respondents (52 per cent) stated that regulatory uncertainty was their biggest concern and the industryâs most significant challenge, since in-game assets – if not structured properly – can be treated as securities under some laws and could cause unwanted complications.
