Gaming (GameFi) market performance
among other sectors in 2024
After significant growth at the end of 2024, GameFi market cap, at the moment of writing this article, dropped to $15.4 Billion (calculated for 715 assets in this category by CoinGecko). However, despite the Gaming’s expansion in 2024, challenges such as declining investment and sustainability issues in tokenomics remained pressing concerns.
Source: CoinGecko
The CoinGecko’s criteria for this sector is quite broad, hence the presence of meme coins like Floki and PEPE in it as well. Other portals like Messari put stricter criteria against this group of assets where the main activity is gaming, narrowing the Gaming and Metaverse sector to 649 coins with $9.53B of total market cap (https://messari.io).
Undisputed industry leaders
We indicated the top10 gaming tokens at the start of our recording (March, 1) and at the end of the 2024 research period (December, 31).
IMX (Immutable ), GALA (GALA), BEAM (Beam), SAND (The Sandbox), AXS (Axie Infinity) are our Golden 5 as they hold their top5 positions among gaming tokens in CoinGecko ranking, with a special resurgence of SAND in November after a gradual decline in the first three quarters.
Top 5 March 2024
Position 1-5
Top 5 December 2024
Ranked right behind Golden 5, MANA (Decentraland), ILV (Illuvium ) and PRIME (Echelon Prime), hold their positions in top10 GameFi during the whole 2024. The top10 ranking welcomes newcomers at the end of 2024: NOTCOIN (Notcoin ) and WILD (Wilder World).
Top 6-10 March 2024
Position 6-10
Top 6-10 Dec. 2024
Market Capitalization vs Trading Volume of Top 10 Gaming Tokens
Axie Infinity (AXS) saw a drop in general CoinGecko ranking (-47 positions) and lost significant market cap. Beam (BEAM) and Decentraland (MANA) also experienced a market cap decline and fell over 35 positions. Echelon Prime (PRIME) had a market cap increase, but its rank remained unchanged. GALA (GALA) had a modest increase in market cap, but still dropped in ranking. The decline of gaming tokens in CoinGecko’s overall ranking was due to the growth of other sectors at the end of the year, such as AI, RWA and Meme.
Market Cap vs Trading Volume
“Golden 5” (Position 1-5)
Market Cap vs Trading Volume
“Silver Gainers” (Position 6-10)
Two notable tokens entered the top 10 GameFi by the end of the year:
Other gaming tokens grew faster, outpacing Pixel and Victoria in market cap, making these tokens out of top 10, but still in good positions.
Noteworthy The Sandbox (SAND) experienced a strong rally in mid-November, with a huge 32.67% market cap surge and massive trading volume (+460.88%) surges on November 17. The trend of play-to-earn models and asset tokenization in gaming has likely increased the demand for SAND.
Trading Volume vs Market Cap – key correlations
We took the 10 top ranked gaming coins in 2024 and looked at how their market capitalization and trading volume changed over the year, checked the correlation between these metrics and the coincidence of their market performance with overall GameFi industry trends. Tokens with higher correlation between volume and market cap tend to experience organic growth driven by demand. Tokens with lower or negative correlation might be experiencing whale-driven movements, sell-offs, or artificial trading spikes.
A higher correlation suggests that trading activity is closely linked to its valuation, indicating consistent investor engagement and liquidity movement.
Notcoin (NOT) has the best correlation of ~0.65 (moderately strong positive correlation) and a fairly strong link between trading volume and market cap, making it a liquid token with strong market participation. This means that as Notcoin’s market cap increases, trading volume tends to rise as well, and vice versa. Investors and traders should watch volume trends closely, as they may provide early signals of price movements.
GALA, The Sandbox, Decentraland and Wilder World show moderate to strong positive correlation (~0.52–0.56), indicating that their market cap and trading volume tend to move together, likely reflecting active investor interest.
Axie Infinity and Immutable have weaker correlations (~0.24–0.35), suggesting that market cap changes don’t always align with volume shifts, possibly due to speculative trading or external influences.
Illuvium with lower correlations (under 0) could indicate inconsistent liquidity or price movements driven by external market factors rather than organic trading activity.
BEAM (0.41 correlation) has moderate relationship between Market Cap and Trading Volume, indicating some link between valuation and liquidity but with periods of independent movement. Echelon Prime (0.43 correlation) – slightly stronger correlation than BEAM, but still moderate, meaning its trading activity somewhat follows market cap trends but is also influenced by external factors.
GameFi market trends in 2024
Gaming tokens show some independent movements, especially during spikes caused by industry-specific announcements (e.g., game partnerships, NFT launches). However, major market-wide drops still align closely with BTC movements, proving that GameFi is not completely detached from Bitcoin trends. Bullish phases in BTC fuel gaming token rallies, but bearish sentiment spreads faster in the gaming sector, leading to steeper declines.
Market Capitalization 2024 – Gaming vs BTC
The graph shows the total market capitalization of gaming tokens that reached $10M of market cap, compared with BTC performance. The group represents 69.83% of today’s total Metaverse and Gaming Tokens Market Cap by Messari.
Notable Spikes (Gaming Market Cap Increases)
Play-to-Earn as the biggest sub-sector in GameFi
After a period of stagnation, GameFi made a strong comeback in the end of 2024, driven mostly by Play-to-Airdrop (P2A) models (with 50.9% of GameFi market share) and the increased adoption of blockchain gaming chains. Tap-to-earn (popular form of P2A) games like Notcoin and Hamster Kombat gained millions of users, highlighting the potential for mass adoption through simple, engaging mechanics.
However, the sustainability of these models was questioned, as many players flocked to games primarily for token rewards rather than long-term engagement. While P2A mechanics helped attract users, the challenge of retaining them post-airdrop became evident, leading some projects to struggle once their airdrop campaigns ended. According to CoinGecko, Hamster Kombat saw the market cap decline of -54.21% in 2024, dropping from $419.7M to $192.1M. (CoinGecko). The token fell from #174 to #386 (a significant -212 rank change), indicating a sharp loss in market position. High trading volume volatility suggests inconsistent market interest and potential speculative trading.
Emergence of Telegram-Based Games
Telegram appeared as a hotspot for casual blockchain games enabling seamless access for millions of users. The Open Network (TON) blockchain became a leading platform for on-chain gaming integrated with Telegram and emerged as a game-changer for GameFi in 2024. This trend highlights the power of social and messaging platforms in fostering viral gaming experiences. By lowering entry barriers and integrating gaming with familiar communication tools, Telegram-based games are driving greater engagement and accelerating token adoption within the blockchain ecosystem.
Notcoin reportedly exploded in popularity by mid-2024, leveraging Telegram’s 900 million+ user base for viral adoption. Hamster Kombat, Telegram-based tap-to-earn game, rapidly gained immense popularity. Launched in March 2024 (with HMSTR first listing in September), quickly surpassed Notcoin at the beginning, reaching 300 million players total in August! (DappRadar Games Report – 2024 Overview). Both games reward users for tapping a gold coin.
But the 2024 market performance of Hamster Kombat (HMSTR) and Notcoin (NOT) presented contrasting outcomes, highlighting divergent market trends for these tokens. Notcoin (NOT) demonstrated resilience and stability, maintaining a stronger market position despite market fluctuations. Hamster Kombat (HMSTR) struggled significantly, with sharp declines in both market cap and rank, signaling reduced investor confidence at the end of 2024.
Web2 Gaming Giants Enter Web3
Despite challenges, blockchain gaming saw major Web2 players such as Ubisoft and Amazon venture into Web3. These companies explored NFT integration, blockchain-based economies, and decentralized gaming models to bridge the gap between traditional gaming and the emerging Web3 ecosystem.
At the same time, blockchain gaming projects focused on simplifying onboarding for traditional gamers, reducing friction in wallet creation, and enhancing user-friendly interfaces. This effort aimed to attract a broader audience beyond crypto-native players.
New Gaming Chains Take the Spotlight
Blockchain gaming boasting a 421% increase in daily unique active wallets (dUAW) since January 2024, reaching 7.4 million (DappRadar Games Report – 2024 Overview). The growth was supported by the rise of new gaming-focused chains that aimed to solve the long-standing issues of scalability and high transaction fees. Games accounted for 31.1% of approved dapps on DappRadar. New Chains like opBNB, Matchain, and Xterio Chain introduced innovative solutions to reduce gas fees and improve game performance. As highlighted in 2024 Dapp Report:
Among the biggest gaming chains could not miss Ronin with its 807k unique active wallets ( +2.83% increase YoY) and Polygon with its 301k unique active wallets ( +316% increase YoY). With the highest % increase in activity we can highlight Linea, Oasys, Base, and WEMIX3.0 and the biggest increase in transaction count: WAX, Aptos, opBNB, and Solana.
Meanwhile, Ethereum’s Dencun upgrade revolutionized Layer-2 scaling, reducing transaction costs by 99% and enabling over 80% of transactions to shift to Ethereum L2s. This upgrade significantly enhanced the gaming experience by making in-game transactions faster and more cost-effective.
The Role of AI in Gaming
2024 saw AI becoming a dominant force in blockchain gaming, improving both game creation and player experience. AI-powered tools streamlined the development process, allowing for:
The integration of AI in blockchain gaming was further amplified by AI-driven game economies, where AI agents managed in-game assets and facilitated decentralized decision-making.
NFTs in Gaming
The integration of NFTs into gaming (e.g. land in The Sandbox, creatures in Axie) continues to reshape the industry, with trading volumes reflecting growing user interest. Guild of Guardians emerged as a dominant force, leading NFT transactions following its global launch. Additionally, Immutable surpassed Ethereum, reaching an impressive $330 million in NFT trading volume (2024 Dapp Industry Report). This shift underscores the increasing role of specialized blockchain networks in gaming. The performance of specific NFT collections and platforms plays a crucial role in determining the demand and valuation of gaming-related tokens, making NFT-driven economies a central aspect of blockchain gaming’s future.
Notable Drops (Gaming Market Cap Decreases)
The Fall of the Metaverse and Declining Investments
Despite the success of blockchain gaming, the metaverse sector suffered a sharp 80% decline in trading volume compared to 2023 (2024 Dapp Industry Report). Once considered the future of gaming, many metaverse projects struggled with user retention due to a lack of engaging gameplay and utility-driven experiences.
Although VCs like e.g. Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) raised $600 million for gaming investments in April 2024, DappRadar indicated that investment in blockchain gaming dropped by 38% year-over-year, reaching its lowest point since 2020. Investors became more cautious, favoring projects with sustainable economic models and strong community engagement over those fueled purely by speculation.
Token Capitalization vs Market Trend
Now let’s have a look at the market capitalization for each token with the total market cap of the broader gaming sector as a benchmark. Total Market Capitalization of gaming tokens that reached $10M market cap, dropped from $17.25B (March, 1st) to $14.24B (Dec., 31st), which means -17.44% decline. Let’s analyze how the top10 gaming tokens performed.
Immutable (IMX), GALA (GALA), Axie Infinity (AXS), and Decentraland (MANA) move in close sync with the overall gaming sector, making them reliable indicators of market health. However, AXS has struggled, underperforming compared to its peers. These are the least volatile tokens (more stable price movements).
But The Sandbox (SAND), Notcoin (NOT), Wilder World (WILD), and Echelon Prime (PRIME) have shown strong independent performance, outpacing the market. However, SAND, NOT, and WILD exhibit extreme volatility, making them high-risk, high-reward assets.
PRIME outperformed the market, showing higher relative gains. The token showed periods of decoupling from the total market cap, indicating independent demand surges. Echelon Prime stands out as a potential hidden gem, with solid returns despite its lower correlation with broader trends.
Beam (BEAM) and Illuvium (ILV) sit in the mid-tier of the market, but ILV is one of the weakest performers, failing to capitalize on the sector’s growth.
The total market cap of the biggest GameFi projects (market cap>$10M) faced a -17.44% decline between March and December 2024, signaling a challenging year for the gaming industry.
Major tokens like Decentraland (-27.84%) and Axie Infinity (-25.77%) struggled, reflecting declining user interest and shifting industry trends. However, some projects outperformed the market downturn, including Echelon Prime (+31.86%), GALA (+6.06%), Notcoin (+8.53%), and Wilder World (+96.81%), showing resilience and growth potential.
Illuvium (-60.85% ) experienced one of the steepest drops in 2024, losing more than half of its market capitalization. This could indicate a major decline in player adoption, reduced investor confidence, or challenges in the game’s ecosystem development. The drop is far greater than the GameFi market average of -19.40%, suggesting ILV struggled significantly compared to its peers. Immutable (-47.90%) also saw a sharp decline, shedding nearly half its market cap by the end of 2024. Despite being a leading Layer 2 scaling solution for Web3 gaming, IMX’s downturn could reflect slower-than-expected adoption, economic challenges, or reduced demand for gaming-focused blockchain solutions.
Rank Performance
How did Top Gaming tokens perform in general CoinGecko Ranking in 2024? Let’s find out.
Echelon Prime and Wilder World were among the strongest gainers, signaling fresh investor interest. Only Wilder World (WILD) improved its general market cap rank in 2024, moving from rank 417 to 346—an improvement of 71 places. This aligns with its +96.8% market cap growth, making it one of the few gaming tokens that gained market strength despite the overall decline in the GameFi sector.
P2E models (Axie) and metaverse projects (Decentraland, The Sandbox) were hit the hardest, reflecting changing user interest. Axie Infinity (AXS) dropped from Rank #74 to #121 (-47 places), and Decentraland (MANA): Dropped from Rank #81 to #127 (-46 places). The Sandbox (SAND): Dropped from Rank #69 to #95 (-26 places).
As a Layer-2 solution for Web3 gaming, Immutable faced market struggles despite its strong technology. IMX dropped from Rank #24 to #60 (-36 places).
GALA remains relatively resilient, suggesting its diversified gaming ecosystem is helping maintain investor confidence. Although GALA held up better than most, it still declined – dropped from Rank #71 to #89 (-18 places).
Whiskers represent the highest and lowest ranks recorded March,1 – December, 31 2024.
Blue boxes show the spread between the first (in most cases 1.03.2024) and last (in most cases 31.12.2024) recorded ranks. Red dots mark the last recorded rank for each token.
Interpretation:
If a token was very volatile, its whiskers would be much longer than its box. If a token’s first and last rank are close together, but it had large fluctuations in between, the box will be short but the whiskers long.
Rank Volatility:
Gaming Tokens on Uniswap V3
One of the most popular liquidity metrics is TVL (Total Value Locked). But liquidity positions, far from the current price, increase TVL but have no practical importance. That’s why we have introduced a new metric named Concentration Level. It shows the share of TVL concentrated within a +/-5% range around the market price. By looking at this metric, we can quickly tell if the liquidity of the token is being managed in an efficient way.
A significant share of TVL concentrated around the current price (high Concentration Level) demonstrates the effective utilization of a token treasury. However, it is difficult to manage, as it requires frequent adjustments to the changing market and sophistication, not exposing yourself to impermanent loss. A low Concentration Level may signal one of two problems:
While the first situation still provides investors good trading conditions, it indicates suboptimal use of the token’s treasury. The second problem is more serious, as it is usually related to high slippage and, with time, leads to a lack of investors’ confidence in the token and a decline in volumes.
This chart shows the four liquidity efficiency quadrants with metrics recorded by our systems on Uniswap V3 on January 28, 2025 for gaming tokens with market cap>$10M. That provides a clear overview of how gaming tokens are positioned in terms of liquidity on Uniswap V3, based on their Total Value Locked (recorded in +-50% range) around the current market price (TVL) and Concentration Level (%), which means how much liquidity is pooled within +-5% from the market price which reflect the market depth and influence slippage.
High TVL + High Concentration (Deep Liquidity, Efficient Distribution)
AXS, BEAM, KARRAT, SAND
Trading Implications: Best for large traders looking for minimal slippage and high liquidity stability.
High TVL + Low Concentration (Deep Liquidity, Inefficient Distribution)
DMT, ILV
Trading Implications: Good liquidity, but traders should check order book depth to avoid unexpected slippage.
Low TVL + Low Concentration (Low Liquidity, Inefficient Distribution)
CAH, GSWIFT, PIRATE, PYR
Trading Implications: Very high slippage risk—best to avoid large trades in these pools.
Low TVL + High Concentration (Low Liquidity, Efficient Distribution)
MANA, PRIME
Trading Implications: Liquidity is stable but limited, meaning traders should watch for potential liquidity shifts or sudden volatility.
What Lies Ahead for Blockchain Gaming?
As reported by DappRadar in the most recent publication, the January 2025 opened with robust growth, as on-chain gaming activity tripled year-over-year, climbing to 7.3 million daily Unique Active Wallets (UAW). Despite this impressive surge, activity saw a 10% dip from December 2024, hinting at a natural post-holiday cooldown following the peak of year-end engagement. Every gamer asks the most important question – “Wen bull run?”
The crypto market did not explode after Donald Trump’s presidential kick-off as expected. Moreover, the biggest gaming tokens like Immutable or Sandbox dropped significantly since Trump’s inauguration. Despite market fluctuations, blockchain gaming remains a dominant force in Web3, accounting for 26-29% of overall blockchain activity. The success of Ethereum L2s and gaming-focused blockchains like opBNB highlights the importance of low-cost, high-speed transactions for gaming adoption.
Following DappRadar, January 2025 started with $16 million in total investments in gaming – a huge contrast to December’s $222 million. While total investment is down, funding is now focused on high-quality projects rather than speculative ventures.The transition of major gaming companies into blockchain gaming signals long-term adoption potential.
As we move into 2025, the blockchain gaming sector is set to evolve further, with AI-powered innovations, sustainable GameFi models, and enhanced user experiences with emerging new possibilities like Pay-to-Earn based gaming.
Key Challenges Faced by GameFi Projects
Despite advancements, many GameFi projects faced hurdles that impacted their success:
For blockchain gaming to maintain its momentum, developers need to prioritize sustainable economic models, security enhancements, and high-quality gameplay.
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