Last week marked the one-year anniversary of the Ronin network hack, when the blockchain that powers the NFT-based Axie Infinity video game was exploited for a record-shattering $625 million. That attack – which U.S. authorities traced to North Korea’s Lazarus hacker group – remains the biggest-ever hack of a blockchain network in terms of value stolen.

Now, almost exactly a year to the day after the Ronin hack made mainstream headlines, Sky Mavis, the company behind Axie Infinity, says it is overhauling Ronin’s core systems to make the network more decentralized and less susceptible to the kinds of single points of failure that doomed it last year. Along with the upgrade, Sky Mavis says it has partnered with other game development studios to build out the Axie-universe and expand Ronin to new blockchain-based video games.

A year on from the attack, “I think we see the incident as a badge of honor,” Sky Mavis co-founder Jeff Zirlin told CoinDesk. “We've seen so many projects crumble under adversity this year, so we're really proud to be here and to be building.”

New year, new Ronin

Axie Infinity was among the first breakout “play-to-earn” web3 games, allowing players to earn crypto and trade in-game items via blockchain. According to Sky Mavis, the game has earned $1.3 billion in revenue since it launched in 2018.

Axie Infinity initially lived on Ethereum, but the chain’s relatively high fees and sluggishness presented challenges to Axie's growth and accessibility. These issues were the initial impetus behind Ronin – a faster, cheaper “sidechain” that can swap assets with Ethereum but has its own app ecosystem and security apparatus.

Ronin’s upgrade will change the consensus mechanism used to operate the network – transitioning the chain from “proof-of-authority” to “delegated proof-of-stake.”

Under the old system, the Ronin network was secured by a small group of entities hand-picked by Sky Mavis. The small group tasked with securing Ronin in its early days is partially to blame for leaving it vulnerable to attack last year.

The new system will allow users to “stake” some of Ronin’s RON tokens to earn interest and help curate the set of validators that operate the network. “Now, anyone with a minimum of 250k RON can become a validator and take part in block production,” Sky Mavis said in a statement. “At the same time, any RON holder can stake their tokens and participate in validator selection.”

RON was trading at $1.12 at press time, according to CoinGecko, meaning one would need a minimum of over $250,000 to be eligible to become a validator.

Ronin’s place in the Ethereum scaling race

The Ronin upgrade comes as a new class of Ethereum scaling chains, called Layer 2 rollups, are aiming to solve some of the same goals that the gaming-focused Ronin chain initially set out to achieve: lower fees and quicker transactions. Some of these chains specifically target gaming as a potential use case.

These networks have systems, moreover, that will eventually allow them to borrow Ethereum’s native security – meaning they won’t rely on the sort of cross-chain bridge technology that was targeted in last year’s Ronin hack.

Read more: Ronin Attack Shows Cross-Chain Crypto Is a ‘Bridge’ Too Far

Ronin’s builders say it will be a while until a game as large as Axie Infinity would be able to safely shift to one of these more cutting-edge scaling chains, however. “They're the innovators when it comes to doing the work that will get us to a more decentralized and scalable future,” said Zirlin. “But there's still work to be done. It's not a solved problem.”

Zirlin noted that Sky Mavis worked to reimburse users of last year’s hack (albeit a few months later, at discounted crypto values) and took other technical steps – beyond upgrading Ronin’s consensus mechanism – to prevent similar attacks from taking place in the future. “We've also hardened Sky Mavis's internal security measures, increased the headcount of our security team, and upgraded our on-chain monitoring,” he added.

Moving beyond Axie

Sky Mavis has worked over the past year to expand the Axie ecosystem past its original playing-card-style video game, which has seen a huge hit to its popularity over the past several months. (The game had 400,000 active users in the past 30 days, compared to nearly 3 million users during its 2022 peak, according to ActivePlayer.)

The player decline can be traced, in part, to the wider crypto market crash, which took a pounding on Axie’s in-game economy. But Sky Mavis might also have itself to blame for Axie’s falling user count; while the game has a dedicated fanbase, it has long faced criticism from players who say its once-lucrative “play-to-earn” mechanics masked dull gameplay and an exploitative economic model.

Sky Mavis has worked to improve upon Axie’s core gameplay over the past year with big upgrades and new game modes, but the long-term vision for Ronin always involved expanding beyond the Axie IP.

The new teams building games on Ronin include Tribes Studio, Bali Games, Directive Games, The Machines Arena, and Bowled.io – studios that staff alums of DICE, LucasArts, Square Enix, and Ubisoft among other AAA game-makers.

“Selected partner studios have the opportunity to access Axie IP for their titles or build entirely new games with distinct IP on top of Ronin.” Sky Mavis explained in a statement.

“We're really building out this ecosystem of infinite experiences,” said Zirlin. “With this upgrade to Ronin and the announcement of these game studios, we're showing that we're expanding the Axie universe. We're also now going beyond Axie, to incubating and really becoming this launchpad for the best and most thoughtful web3 gaming experiences.”

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Last week, the once-wildly popular web3 game Axie Infinity announced it will be available for download on Apple’s App Store, signaling that perhaps the powerful tech giant is warming to the idea of allowing blockchain-based mobile games to operate on its iPhone.

Now Stepn, a blockchain-powered fitness app that incentivizes users with crypto rewards, has announced arguably even bigger news. The Australia-based company said its users will now be able to buy and sell Stepn’s digital assets without being forced to exit the app and use an external marketplace.

“It is a very, very big step,” said Stepn’s Chief Operating Officer Sh.iti Manghani during an interview with The Block. “Nothing like this has been done before. Internally we’re saying this is the biggest thing happening in crypto and not that many people know about it.”

Stepn also announced a new integration which will allow users to purchase digital assets using traditional debit and credit cards linked to Apple Pay.

Historically Apple’s App Store policies regarding the buying and selling of in-game assets have been considered hostile by some companies. One of Apple’s most controversial stances has been requiring app developers to share 30% of transaction revenues; a particularly costly requirement for blockchain-based applications that want to allow for the trading of digital assets, which in some cases can fetch hundreds, thousands, if not millions, of dollars.

Stepn outdoes Axie Infinity

Stepn, which has been downloaded millions of times, is an app that allows people to first buy digital sneaker NFTs and then earn token rewards by “walking, jogging or running.” Each pair of NFT shoes have unique characteristics which influence how users are able to earn rewards. In order for iPhone users to purchase the sneaker NFTs they will need to purchase in-app credits they can then exchange for the digital assets. The NFT sneakers can also be bought or sold for cryptocurrency on Stepn’s marketplace. Stepn said that all of this will be possible on the iPhone without having to exit the app. Iphone users will be able to access the company's marketplace while still inside Stepn's smartphone app, it said. This represents a marked shift from the deal Sky Mavis inked with Apple for Axie Infinity. With the Axie Infinity app currently running on iPhones in a limited number of countries, there are no in-app links to the game's NFT marketplace; there isn't even a mention of the marketplace in the app, a company spokesperson said. "Due to Apple's policies, Axie Infinity: Origins does not contain direct links or explicit references to the marketplace within the app at this time," the spokesperson said by email. "Sky Mavis uses other platforms such as Discord and email marketing to educate the community on how to integrate the NFT marketplace into the gameplay experience on the Apple app build."

Growing user numbers

While Stepn has been downloaded millions of times, Manghani acknowledged the app’s monthly active user numbers have been declining, recently falling to about 500,000, she said. Manghani and her team are hoping the Apple integration will help add users. Toward the end of last year, Stepn said it had amassed nearly five million registered users who had walked or ran nearly 70 million miles.

The Stepn executive also said that while paying Apple 30% fee of all in-app transactions is far from ideal, the opportunity to attract new users from the Apple ecosystem is too attractive to pass up. That said, striking the deal was arduous, she added.

“Working collaboratively with Apple has been one of the best things that has happened to our app,” said Manghani. “[But] for every acceptance we’ve gotten many, many rejections as well. There have been many sleepless nights … It has taken us months.”

Stepn was founded in 2021 by Satoshi Labs. Past investors include Sequoia Capital India, Alameda Research and Santiago Santos, a former ParaFi Capital partner.

#stepn #crypto2023 #axieinfinity

here is a chart showing Axie Infinity's price prediction for 2023-2030, along with an explanation of the different factors that could affect the price:

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Axie Infinity price prediction chart The chart shows that the price of AXS is expected to range between $4.42 and $6.62 in 2023, with an average price of $5.52. In 2024, the price is expected to range between $10.95 and $16.43, with an average price of $13.69. By 2025, the price is expected to range between $13.69 and $20.54, with an average price of $17.11. And by 2030, the price is expected to range between $57.81 and $71.86, with an average price of $64.83.

There are a number of factors that could affect the price of AXS in the coming years, including:

The growth of the Axie Infinity ecosystem. The more people who play the game and use the Axie Infinity blockchain, the higher the demand for AXS will be.

The price of Ethereum. AXS is an ERC-20 token, so its price is directly affected by the price of Ethereum.

The overall cryptocurrency market. The price of AXS is also affected by the overall cryptocurrency market. If the cryptocurrency market is bullish, then AXS is likely to rise in price.

Overall, the price prediction for AXS is bullish. The game is growing in popularity, and the Axie Infinity blockchain is becoming more widely adopted. As a result, the demand for AXS is expected to increase in the coming years, which could lead to a significant increase in the price.

Here are some additional things to keep in mind when considering AXS as an investment:

Axie Infinity is a relatively new project, so there is still some risk involved.

The price of AXS has been volatile in the past, so it is important to be prepared for price swings.

Before investing in AXS, it is important to do your own research and understand the risks involved.

#axieinfinity #prediction