This article reviews a project we have been farming along with our thesis. Gaming and Defi are two major categories within the crypto space, JEWEL (Defi Kingdoms) exposes the investor to both areas.
Blockchain Gaming Undervalued
Now if you look at Coingecko you will notice that have added another category like “play to earn”. This new category is called “GameFi” and is a much better name for what many projects are trying to accomplish. Gaming is a massive, international market, aiming to break over 500 Billion dollars in value over the next few years [1]. Even just he mobile gaming market was valued at 98 billion in 2020 [2]. Recently Solana Ventures, in partnership with the FTX exchange, started a 100 million dollar gaming fund for the Solana ecosystem [3]. This partnership includes a third company, Lightspeed Ventures, which has already invested 300 million dollars into the likes of Epic Games, and FTX.
Binance Smart Chain and Animoca Brands are taking a similar approach, launching a 200 million dollar fund focusing on blockchain gaming [4]. Animoca brands is a leader in the space having already launched many blockchain based games, and famous for other multi-platform games, they also acquired indie developer Blowfish Studios. The key player for Animoca, was produced by one of their subsidiaries, Sandbox (SAND). This project alone has taken the meta-verse and gaming by storm and is likely to remain a blue chip in the space. Other important projects include REVV (which we have mentioned before) and F1 Delta time, both racing games.
Tracking the total value of the gaming in the crypto market is challenging, Coingecko is reporting around a 25-billion-dollar market cap. I believe this market is going to explode over the next year or two to a potential 1 trillion-dollar market. That is a 40x from here. I believe this to be true because blockchain gaming and defi combined can provide utility to users that traditional gaming cannot. For instance, Axie Infinity has brought thousands of players out of poverty because of the ecosystem rewards. Some users were even able to purchase property (for the first time in generations) and bring their family out of a vicious cycle of destitution. While this may sound like a joke to some, it is most certainly not a joke for the now millions of users benefitting from the ecosystem.
Enter Defi Kingdoms (JEWEL)
Using the above knowledge, we have several options to get involved. We have mentioned many gaming plays in our articles and watch lists. For those of you who have been reading along you will recall that I am a fan of investing in ecosystems for gaming, not specifically single games. Ecosystems generally present less risk, since not all aspects need to be perfect all at once to provide value to investors or participators. We have been looking at JEWEL for months since we are heavily involved in the Harmony blockchain. A few weeks ago we started diving into JEWEL by taking our Viperswap farms and moving them to the JEWEL farms. In order to participate in this ecosystem, you will need your Metamask ready, and the Harmony chain added. Please check out this [guide] for adding Harmony to Metamask. Harmony (ONE) can be bought outright on Binance.US and Kucoin, you can then send this to your Metamask wallet which has a dual address expressed in Harmony and Ethereum.
From [Defi Kingdoms]: “DeFi Kingdoms is a game, a DEX, a liquidity pool opportunity, a market of rare utility driven NFTs, and it all plays out seamlessly in the incredibly nostalgic form of fantasy pixel art. We’re excited to release the DeFi Kingdom universe to the world. Come join our lovely community!”
JEWEL Yields
There are multiple ways to benefit from Jewel, one is to simple visit the site and swap some ONE tokens for JEWEL. This can then be staked right inside the marketplace for a lower risk yield opportunity. We chose to do participate in the higher risk farming by providing liquidity to the ecosystem. I am currently farming the JEWEL/XYA pair, I felt this was a good combination because they are both Harmony gaming tokens that have full ecosystems and should hopefully trend with each other reducing my impermanent loss.
Making a pair is simple, go to the druid in the marketplace on their website [Defi Kingdoms]. Go to Create Seed and create a pair of the two tokens you wish to farm. I would make sure you create pair that is in the Garden already as to avoid low liquidity issues. For a quick recap on LPs and Defi check out MoC’s article [here]. The trick to creating an LP is that you want equal values of the two tokens you are depositing. For example, a 1,000$ LP into this farm would need 500$ of JEWEL and 500$ of XYA, both of these can be obtained right in the Defi Kingdoms marketplace using their DEX. This Farm is currently yielding 760% APR, meaning a few grand can be incredibly lucrative. What you do with these JEWELs you have farmed is your choice, you can break them up to add to the pool, stake them, or sell them for another token or stable coin. It is important to remember to always leave some ONE tokens in your Metamask for fees, these fees are extremely cheap so even a single ONE token will be enough.
Thesis
For the thesis we are not going to cover every aspect of JEWEL, we want to encourage our readers to use the tools/lessons we have provided to form a thesis independently. Our articles aim to assist in helping navigate defi/crypto and save you time doing your own research. With GALA games recently pumping with its addition to Coinbase we were looking for tokens we believe we move in sympathy. JEWEL, UOS and PYR should move with this market, but not always directly in tandem. One aspect I really like about JEWEL is that they lock part of their tokens, this creates a lot of upward price pressure because only part of the rewards are immediately available. Users who want their tokens right away can Stake the tokens instead of providing liquidity, normal staking unlocks all reward tokens right away.
We like JEWEL because it reminds us of those old, pixelated RPGs we once loved, think Final Fantasy 1-6. When you sign up on Defi Kingdoms you are given an Avatar that interacts with the world. You can purchase heroes for JEWEL and send them on missions to obtain in game items and more JEWEL. These heroes can also be used to garden, mine, fish and more. Each hero has a set of stats that coincide with their abilities in combat, as well as their efficiency in the profession you chose for them. Users can upgrade their characters with gems and meditate to gain stats. Defi Kingdoms has been audited by Solidity.Finance, a reputable blockchain auditing company. The team is full of experienced developers and block chain experts. The roadmap, while long, has been completed in a timely manner with each update.
Defi Kingdoms aims to also release pets, player owned buildings, land sales PVP and more. This is an opportunity to compete with GALA, but within a smaller blockchain that is Harmony, this is where the massive gains are made. I have been building a very Ethereum bullish thesis over this past year. Ethereum appears to slowly be decoupling from BTC, over time they will each have their own price action without regard to each other. Add this to the decoupling of Gaming from the crypto market. We saw this the last major BTC crash with Axie and AXS token, the token went from 3$ to nearly 165$ in a few months, a 55x! BTC had dumped from 65k all the way down to 29,000$ during this massive AXS run. The story is that people will not stop playing games just because BTC drops in price. In fact more users are coming to gaming on a weekly basis all around the world. Gaming, Metaverse, and NFTs are the play if Bitcoin goes into a bear market, these all have utility for users despite BTCs price action. Please remember to stay safe out there, do your own research, none of this is financial advice. Thank you for reading!
[1] https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2021/09/22/2301712/0/en/Gaming-Market-Worth-545-98-Billion-by-2021-2028-Fortune-Business-Insights.html
[4] https://venturebeat.com/2021/12/02/binance-and-animoca-brands-launch-200m-fund-for-crypto-gaming-startups/
