A few years back, it felt like blockchain, Web3, and NFTs were about to flip video games upside down. In 2021, you couldn’t escape those buzzwords at any gaming conference, and every article about the industry’s future was hyping “true digital ownership,” “play-to-earn,” and “player-driven economies.” With crypto skyrocketing and token mania in full swing, even the most cautious publishers had to jump in. Fast forward to today, and the Web3 hype has fizzled. Gamers mostly see NFTs as a flop, and developers? They’re treating it like a lesson learned.
Web3’s Flashy but Fleeting Moment
In 2021, the crypto market was on fire — Bitcoin, Ethereum, shiny new tokens, you name it. The vibe was electric, almost giddy. Against that backdrop, “digital ownership” wasn’t just some tech jargon; it felt like the next big thing. We’re already used to owning accounts, skins, subscriptions — so why not own digital stuff for real, backed by blockchain’s seal of uniqueness? That’s where NFTs came in, promising you could truly own a digital item, verified on the blockchain.
That March, artist Beeple sold his digital piece Everydays: The First 5000 Days at Christie’s for a jaw-dropping $69.3 million, a moment that blew crypto into the mainstream. Celebrities piled on — Grimes raked in millions with her NFT collection. Even McDonald’s got in on the action, dropping McRib NFTs for the sandwich’s 40th birthday, proof that “digital ownership” had wormed its way into pop culture.
But regular folks weren’t as sold as the crypto crowd. In 2021, only about 20% of U.S. adults knew what an NFT was; by 2022, that jumped to around 65% — but just 4% actually owned one, and only 15% thought they were worth the cash. It was a weird split: on one hand, wild hype, huge numbers, celebs, and brands; on the other, regular people scratching their heads, thinking, “Why buy a digital file I can just screenshot?”
Source: The Guardian
No shock, then, that the art world started seeing red flags. The NFT market was pulling in billions — digital art alone hit $20 billion or more in 2021 — but the buyer-seller pool stopped growing. Regular users didn’t see the point, and Web3 started feeling less like an economic revolution and more like a speculative bubble. Still, companies kept chasing the trend, and gaming companies were all in.
Web3 in Games: Big Promises, Bigger Messes
Big gaming names dove headfirst into blockchain and NFTs, seeing them as more than just a cash grab — a way to shake up the whole gaming ecosystem. Late 2021, Ubisoft rolled out Quartz: NFT gear and skins called Digits for Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Breakpoint. Each had a unique serial number, lived on the Tezos blockchain, and could be traded outside the game’s usual inventory.
Players were not having it. Forums lit up with snarky comments and total confusion—nobody asked for this. It felt like another monetization stunt wrapped in fancy “ownership” talk. The Quartz reveal video got hammered with over 16,000 dislikes against a few hundred likes, so Ubisoft quietly pulled it offline.
By late 2022, Square Enix dropped Symbiogenesis, a “digital collectible art experience” built entirely on Web3. Picture a virtual world filled with NFT characters you could own, use in the story, or slap on as avatars. They picked Polygon for its cheap fees and fast transactions, later investing in HyperPlay to spread Symbiogenesis and future projects. They hyped a “digital art hunt” on Discord, where special NFT “Member Cards” unlocked extra perks and bonuses.
Other studios and publishers also jumped on the Web3 bandwagon, announcing games or integrations. But not all of these projects made it to release, and many felt like clumsy attempts to slap NFT features onto any game they could. It was especially surprising to see this from industry veterans. For instance, Will Wright, the legendary designer behind The Sims, unveiled VoxVerse, a blockchain-based project. He stressed it wasn’t about peddling NFTs but rather about enabling transactions and social interactions.
Another industry heavyweight, Jon Van Caneghem — known for Might & Magic and Heroes of Might & Magic — teamed up with Digital Insight Games to announce Cloud Castles. This strategic action game, built on Unreal Engine 5, mixed in collectible fantasy creatures and Web3 tech. Players were promised “full ownership” of in-game assets, with the ability to buy, sell, trade, and evolve them through the blockchain.
So, studios eagerly hopped aboard the Web3 train: commercially enticing ideas, big-name brands, and bold promises of a new gaming era. Corporate hype, slick marketing, and major franchises were all in play. But beneath the shiny surface lurked shaky execution, lukewarm player interest, and outright cultural pushback.
First Results: Hype Crashes Hard
When the first Web3 games hit the market, it became clear the promised “ownership revolution” wasn’t living up to the hype. Most projects leaned on a play-to-earn model, where players earned tokens for their activity and could sell them, transforming users from passive consumers into co-owners of digital ecosystems. But this economy relied entirely on a steady stream of new players. Once interest waned, token prices plummeted, and with them, players’ motivation to keep going.
In practice, many of these implementations felt like trendy window dressing hastily slapped onto existing projects. The concept of ownership was often barely tied to the core game design, with NFTs serving as little more than a marketing gimmick for extra monetization. In some cases, the flaws were glaring: the play-to-earn model proved hypersensitive to macroeconomic shifts and new player inflows. Crashing token prices and major hacks eroded both ecosystems and trust.
Take Ember Sword, a much-hyped Web3 MMORPG that launched in early access in December 2024 — by May 2025, its servers shut down due to financial instability. Axie Infinity saw its in-game token crash after the broader crypto market tanked, and a March 2022 hack of the Ronin bridge network led to the theft of hundreds of millions of dollars, dealing a brutal blow to the reputation of play-to-earn games. As a result, some developers dialed back the play-to-earn hype in their marketing, pivoting to more restrained systems where earning was a side effect, not the main draw.
Will Wright’s VoxVerse is still languishing in development hell, with barely any news trickling out. Jon Van Caneghem’s Cloud Castles is in a similar boat — its developer website is technically still up, but public updates are nowhere to be found. Even Square Enix gave up on Symbiogenesis: the game got its final content season in July 2025 but failed to hook either players or their wallets.
Not every company learned from the fading NFT craze, though. Yes, we’re talking about Ubisoft again. Their Web3 experiments in Ghost Recon: Breakpoint were a disaster: they minted around 2,256 exclusive items, but only 15 sold in the first two weeks. Yet Ubisoft kept pushing their philosophy: players aren’t just consumers — they’re ecosystem participants, digital asset owners, full-fledged players in the game’s economy. They rolled out slogans like, “You own a piece of the game and leave your mark on its history.”
To the wider audience, NFT games became a shorthand for greed and mistrust. Forums and social media overflowed with sarcastic jabs: “Nobody asked for this,” “NFTs are the worst thing to hit gaming since lootboxes.” The reputational damage was so severe that major companies quietly dropped the word “blockchain” from their press releases.
VoxVerse
Where We’re at Now
By mid-2025, Web3 gaming’s still around — but it’s no mainstream hit. Analysts say a few million wallets are active: about 4.9 million unique ones were engaging with blockchain games daily in May 2025, even as market share and investments shrink. It’s a far cry from the explosive growth hyped in 2021–2022; the scene’s gone niche. Money’s tight, too. Web3 gaming projects pulled in just over $91 million in Q1 2025 — down 71% from Q4 2024 and 68% from a year ago. Deals are quieter now: less flash, more grants, and infrastructure bets.
With the hype dying down, developers have dropped the hard sell on NFTs and blockchain as a “game-changer.” Now it’s all about “blockchain as infrastructure” — tracking ownership, making trades transparent, or moving assets across platforms. Some make Web3 optional, hide it in menus, or weave it in so smoothly you barely notice. Illuvium, for example, still lets you collect creatures and items, but they’ve ditched NFT talk in marketing, admitting it’s just part of the game’s economy, not a get-rich-quick scheme.
Big Time, an ARPG from Big Time Studios, does something similar: items are technically tokens, but to players, they’re just cool rewards. After a 2025 update, they scrubbed NFT mentions from their Steam page, focusing on crafting and trading. Fans noticed and liked it: the game finally feels like a game, not a crypto wallet.
Might & Magic Fates
Big publishers are tiptoeing back in, but they’re playing it smart. Ubisoft teamed up with Immutable for Might & Magic: Fates, a mobile card strategy game for iOS and Android. Some cards can be traded on Immutable Marketplace, but they’re clear: “Gameplay first, not tokenization.” It’s a sign of the times — Ubisoft’s basically saying their Quartz days were a misfire, and now they’re sneaking blockchain in quietly.
Krafton, the PUBG folks, launched Overdare in 2025 — a Roblox-style sandbox built on the Settlus network with Naver Z. Blockchain’s used for tracking creator rights and doling out rewards, not as a status symbol but as a tool for a fair economy. This “creator economy on blockchain” is one of the few spots where Web3 actually solves real problems.
Looking forward, the outlook’s cautiously upbeat. Analysts predict Web3 gaming could grow from ~$37.55 billion in 2025 to ~$182.98 billion by 2034, with a roughly 19% CAGR. Gala Games, Mythical Games (Blankos Block Party), and Sky Mavis (Axie Infinity) are still building, striking partnerships, and adding fiat payments to make it easier to jump in. Their socials hit a common note: “Players shouldn’t care it’s Web3 — they should just have fun.” It’s a sign that many think Web3 games could carve out a real place someday, but it’s gonna be a slow, twisty road.
Axie Infinity
Web3 gaming’s story isn’t about crashing and burning — it’s about an industry growing up. The tech that promised to set players free hit the same snags as old-school game dev: monetization, trust, and making stuff people actually enjoy. The NFT craze proved you can’t build a game around “making bank” — you’ve got to build it around why someone would want to play in the first place.
Right now, Web3 gaming lives in its own little world, a niche for enthusiasts and investors. Maybe one day a game will come along and show digital ownership’s worth it. Until then, it’s a reminder: no token can beat the thrill of a damn good game.
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