The year 2021 was a watershed year for NFTs. Although non-fungible tokens have been around for a while, sales grew from just $41 million in 2018 to $11 billion in 2021, reaching nearly 60 times growth in three and a half years.
That said, even compared to 2020, NFT growth in 2021 was overwhelming. In 2020, total NFT sales volume reached $340 million. And with still a month to go, NFT sales volume has already surpassed $11 billion in the third quarter of this year.
One of the factors behind this surge in demand for NFTs is that an increasing number of blockchain companies (and traditional companies) are integrating these non-fungible tokens within their existing business models. For example, 2021 is witnessing the explosive growth of blockchain-based games that are primarily based on NFTs. From Axie Infinity, Splinterlands and Gods Unchained to several new and promising games, all have contributed to the growing dominance of NFTs.
Data from DappRadar indicates that while early NFT sales were driven by collectibles like CryptoKitties, Cryptopunks, and The Bored Ape Yacht Club, among others, NFT games are quickly taking over the market. By the end of 2019, in-game asset NFTs have gained mainstream popularity as active player bases have begun to expand across gaming platforms such as Gods Unchained, Decentraland, and dozens of other dApps.
Since then, blockchain games have single-handedly contributed to the majority of NFT transactions, including in-game collectibles and metaverse assets.
Not only do NFTs ensure 100% ownership of gaming assets, but they also allow players to monetize these assets. Moreover, the gaming industry is one of the fastest growing industries. The fusion of blockchain and games has opened the door to a whole new world of opportunities for both game developers and players. In addition to this growing technology, the metaverse is simultaneously expanding into new horizons. As more and more projects align for the metaverse, the demand for NFT is expected to grow significantly.
That said, let’s take a look at some of the most promising NFT-related projects that will play a crucial role in shaping the future of the NFT market.
First, we would like to discuss a decentralized content sharing platform. Creaton, based on Polygon, aims to provide the infrastructure for creators to easily monetize their content directly without any centralized authority.
Unlike other content sharing platforms, particularly those in the Web2 ecosystem, Creaton gives creators full ownership and control over their content, allowing them to accept paid subscriptions from their fans and engage in various other monetization avenues. Creaton accomplishes this by tokenizing all content in NFT, before storing newly created creations in a decentralized database powered by Arweave and encrypted by the Lit protocol.
Using NFT, smart contracts and Polygon’s speed, interoperability and cost efficiency, Creaton has pioneered the concept of “decentralized and cryptographic” membership. The platform recently completed a successful fundraising round, raising $1.1 million from a group of investors.
Infinity is the next project designed to express the powerful potential of NFTs to a mass audience. As a decentralized, community-driven NFT marketplace, Infinity introduces the unique concept of InfinityDAO, a DAO-controlled NFT marketplace, protocol and treasury that also supports programmable NFTs.
If you’re not already familiar with the trends, experts say programmable NFTs are the future. Ideally, any NFT is programmable, but for now this feature is largely underutilized. Programmable NFTs can offer many operational advantages because they can be “programmed” to adapt and change over time.
