Play To Earn Worth
With the Play To Earn gaming concept, the first pick was put in the Metaverse ground, building the foundation and planting the seeds for rewarding the players and monetizing the activities they are engaged in.
A diamond in the rough, blockchain-based play-to-earn games offer players a new way to monetize their skills through the Play To Earn (P2E) monetization model.
Despite being a relatively new gaming domain, Web3 crypto gaming has demonstrated rapid growth over the past few years.
Something’s In the Works
However, we didn’t need to wait much to hear about the new emerging trend and massive crypto earning opportunity that’s talked about in the smoke-filled rooms.
Remember how explosive was Play To Earn last year with Star Atlas, Axie, and Decentraland? Well, now that level of popularity is coming to a brand new niche called Move To Earn game (M2E).
This is a unique crypto billion-dollar fitness opportunity; just like Axie Infinity had its first-mover advantage in Play To Earn, STEPN has a first-mover advantage in the Move To Earn crypto game (M2E) space.
What is M2E (Move To Earn) Crypto Game?
If you could make money by moving, how would that sound? Yes, that’s right, it sounds pretty exciting.
Move-To-Earn suggests getting in shape and earning rewards while doing it, which is great because you’re improving health while earning rewards; how cool is that?
It’s Been Used Before
Though the term M2E (Move To Earn) crypto gaming may be a new buzzword, the concept has been around for years, and it has been a method of gamifying exercise for quite some time.
Using gamification, traditional gaming elements are integrated into non-gaming activities to facilitate their use on a broader scale.
Almost everyone remembers how Nintendo popularized mobile games based on movement with Pokémon GO, right? Earlier on, we also had the Wii console, introducing Wii Sports.
In a way, sports could even be considered a form of M2E (Move To Earn) game since professional athletes earn money through sponsorships, winning competitions, etc. But, it’s probably beyond most of us to play sports professionally, though.
However, Web3 Move To Earn game (M2E) has made it possible for everyone to get paid to move and earn financial rewards as a result of their activity.
Move To Earn vs Play To Earn
In the event that the market is headed toward a “crypto winter” this new Metaverse Fitness-Fi monetization concept, which is moving away from a Play To Earn model, could end up being significantly more beneficial, compared to previous ones.
Fitness-Fi’s economy or Move To Earn monetization model may be more resilient in bear markets as non-crypto players are less sensitive to token prices, and if there is a large enough group of non-crypto players, the inflow of non-crypto players will potentially help to smooth the transition to the next bull market.
Now let’s dive in and find out what STEPN, an NFT move to earn game, has in store for us today.
What is STEPN?
STEPN is Solana blockchain-based gaming and social networking Web 3 app. SOL can be used to buy any STEPN product on its marketplace, but the game itself uses Green Satoshi Tokens (GST), which is what the users will be earning.
STEPN is the first Web3 NFT game in which your goal is to move outdoors from one place to another to progress.
Gaining more tokens and more chances to win valuable items is accomplished by moving around.
With NFT Metaverse Sneakers, you can jog, walk, or run outside to earn tokens, which you can put toward leveling up and enjoy now features like mystery boxes, NFT customization, and minting new Sneakers.
This game requires a lot of physical effort, which is a challenge for many players these days.
Who would’ve imagined that gaming would take more than just fingers on the keyboard to be successful, but here we are.
Who Made STEPN?
Find Satoshi Lab is an Australian fintech studio that created STEPN. They won the 2021 Solana Ignition Hackathon Gaming Track and are part of the DeFi Alliance Gaming Class.
STEPN Introduction
STEPN is a blockchain-powered Move-To-Earn healthcare and fitness application. Users equipped with Web3 NFT STEPN Sneakers can move outdoors to get paid to move, earn tokens and NFT rewards.
STEPN has a built-in wallet, swap, marketplace, and rental system that allow non-crypto users to onboard STEPN.
STEPN also has a dual-token system, a game token – Green Satoshi Token (GST) and a governance token – Green Metaverse Token (GMT).
What is GST?
GSTs are minted daily by users through moving and leasing their NFT Sneakers and are burned daily by them to upgrade and mint new NFT Sneakers.
What is GMT?
A percentage of tax is taken when users trade, lease, or mint NFT Sneakers in the STEPN app. These taxes go to the STEPN Treasury. GMT is the Governance Token of STEPN, and players stake GMT to vote on how STEPN distributes its Treasury profit.
GMT is the native governance token of STEPN and has the following use cases:
- Governance: Stake to participate in governance, the longer the locking period, the higher the voting power.
- Staking reward: GMT stakers can vote to decide the distribution of staking rewards.
- Accrual of protocol revenue: GMT is burned to access in-app features, such as sneaker upgrades and minting of new sneakers.
STEPN features currently include:
- Mobile application: STEPN is live on iOS App Store and Google Play store (Restricted to certain countries).
- Sneaker NFT: Every sneaker has different types, qualities, attributes, and gem sockets. Users can burn tokens to level up and customize sneakers.
- Move and Earn: Users equipped with sneakers NFT can move outdoors and earn tokens. There are multi-layers anti-cheating mechanics to prevent exploitation.
- Rental system: Users can rent a sneaker for free, move and earn and then split the earnings with the sneaker owner.
- In-app NFT marketplace: Users can trade their NFTs on the marketplace.
- In-app swap: Users can swap their token earnings to other forms of cryptocurrencies.
- In-app decentralized wallet: Users can deposit and send cryptocurrencies to the wallet to fund their spending accounts.
Project Key Highlights
- Seamless Crypto experience: STEPN builds a full ecosystem vertical including in-app wallet, swap, and marketplace so that the app is intuitive to use.
- Onboarding non-crypto users: Rental system enables non-crypto users to try for free and once they have saved up enough tokens, they can buy a sneaker NFT and start their crypto journey.
- Friendly to all fitness levels: Different types of sneakers are designed for different fitness levels, users can choose to walk, jog or run to earn tokens.
- Carbon Neutrality: Governance voting decides how much profit STEPN will donate for the cause of Carbon Neutrality.
- Available on iOS/Android: Users can download STEPN from iOS AppStore and Google Play Store.
- Fast-growing & Crypto native: Supported by the community, STEPN has reached around 21k DAU and 66k MAU in less than two months of Public Beta.
Existing Products
- Solo Mode (move & earn): By simply pressing the START button, users can start to move and earn token rewards with a small chance to receive a Mystery Box that contains Gems NFT.
- Sneakers and Gems NFT: Sneaker NFT can be leveled up by burning tokens. Users can add attribute points and Gems NFT to the sneaker in order to boost its performance.
- Minting & Shoebox: By putting two sneakers NFT together and burning some tokens, users can mint one Shoebox, or on rare occasions, two/three Shoeboxes at the cost of one. Opening the shoebox will give the user one random sneaker NFT.
- NFT Marketplace: Users can trade their sneaker NFT, Shoeboxes, Gems, and Achievement Badges on the marketplace. Users can also rent sneakers here for free.
- Decentralized Wallet & Swap: Users can buy cryptocurrencies through a portal to Binance; swap tokens to other cryptocurrencies and send/deposit tokens/NFTs.
STEPN Tokenomics
Token Name: GMT
Token Type: Solana SPL
Total Token Supply: 6,000,000,000 GMT
Private Sale Allocation: 978,000,000 GMT
Private Sale Token Price: ~ 0.005 USD / GMT
Private Sale Amount Raised: ~ 5,000,000 USD
Binance Launchpad Sale Allocation: 420,000,000 GMT
Binance Launchpad Sale Price: 0.010 USD / GMT
Binance Launchpad Amount to be Raised:4,200,000 USD
Initial Circ. Supply When Listed on Binance: 600,000,000 GMT (10.00%)
STEPN Token allocation
Private Sale: 16.30% of the total token supply
Binance Launchpad Sale: 7.00% of the total token supply
Team: 14.20% of the total token supply
Advisors: 2.50% of the total token supply
Ecosystem/ Treasury: 30.00% of the total token supply
Move and Earn: 30.00% of the total token supply
Public Beta Phase IV
1/ STEPN PUBLIC BETA Phase IV starts today (Part A). Find out more👇 pic.twitter.com/3IRfVRUVi0
— STEPN | Public Beta Phase IV (@Stepnofficial) May 1, 2022
STEPN Earning
To start earning, you need sneakers, but you needn’t spend a dime to get started. Actually, all of the app’s features are free for first-time users.
The STEPN app is extremely easy to use. Players with no Blockchain or game experience can easily navigate in the app. Players need to walk, jog or run outdoors to earn GST Tokens, which are burned to level up Sneakers and mint new ones.
Once players reach the top level, they can start earning GMT, which is the Governance Token.
The game’s treasury is governed by DAO, with the game’s profit distribution voted by Governance Token holders. STEPN sneakers will start filling up the “get paid to move earn meter” as soon as you purchase them and commit to the program.
But, there is a game mechanic feature called Time Gating.
Time Gating Feature
Using the app has a daily cap on how much you can run, meaning there is a limit to the amount of money you can earn. The component in STEPN is called Energy and you get a small amount of it every day for free, along with some from your sneakers.
25% of your Energy replenishes automatically every 6 hours.
You can have a certain amount of Energy a day with high-quality sneakers, but there is a cap. That is an amount entailing you can run 100 minutes each day.
You can continue to run even after your Energy has run out, but the “get paid to move earning meter” will stop until the next day. There’s also a speed meter that you need to keep up with in order to stay earning.
This is one of the most challenging aspects of the game that requires you to be in optimal shape on every run.
Genesis NFT Common Shoebox
Join the Monday Twitter Discussion Space with @Barndog_Solana .
— STEPN | Public Beta Phase IV (@Stepnofficial) May 2, 2022
Make sure to follow us on twitter. Like, retweet and comment below to get the chance to win a Genesis NFT Common Shoebox.#STEPN #Web3 https://t.co/KGYhkzRWwG
Where to Buy STEPN NFT Sneakers?
You can buy STEPN sneakers from STEPN’s in-app Marketplace. Alternatively, you can trade NFT Sneakers at Magic Eden.
STEPN Web3
STEPN is a Move To Earn game app that rewards users for moving outdoors. To earn tokens, users purchase a digital sneaker from its NFT marketplace and walk, run, or jog outdoors.
STEPN has designed a powerful app that incentivizes daily use and encourages healthy habit-building by matching real-world activity to digital gameplay & achievements.
By doing this, STEPN has attracted a uniquely fitness-oriented audience to the Metaverse web3 world.
Running enthusiasts aren’t the only ones who are interested in getting paid to move: anyone who enjoys being outside on foot is intrigued by the idea of getting rewarded for exercising. This effectively renders web3 adoption appealing to a much wider audience than before.
Improving one’s health while earning crypto is a strong incentive.
To make things even easier for non-crypto natives, STEPN has plans to roll out a rental platform soon.
New users will be able to rent NFT sneakers from existing users without even needing to have a wallet or much knowledge about the crypto space. This does multiple things:
1) It reduces barriers of affordability for those who don’t have the spare funds to buy a sneaker yet. It then allows them to build up the capital slowly and eventually get a sneaker of their own.
2) As new users get situated with the platform, it allows them to get used to the platform, without feeling pressured, and use the STEPN framework to understand how web3 transactions work.
For example, they can understand that setting up their wallet would allow them to buy an NFT sneaker in the future.
3) Perhaps most brilliantly, this also endows new users with a “pseudo-mentor” of sorts.
Similar to how guilds in Axie Infinity help educate, fund, and mentor new players, users who rent their sneakers out effectively become “mini-guilds” that can help their renters — and are likewise compensated for their time through profits from their rentals.
This creates a strong, social ecosystem where users can interact with each other, sharing profits and creating value and community.
Why Move To Earn?
Building on the proven success of the play-to-earn Metaverse games, Move To earn apps like STEPN are gamifying fitness to motivate millions to get moving and improve their health.
M2E Potential
With the tailwinds of two massive industries, fitness and crypto, the potential impact of the move-to-earn industry is tremendous — the power behind these trends can best be understood through four types of positive feedback loops.
Incentivizing users
By promising crypto rewards, STEPN adds stronger incentives for users to make healthy choices. While you might know that going outside to walk or jog is good for you, that might not be enough motivation to overcome your inertia. With the added promise of earning tokens, STEPN gives an extra nudge that can tip the scales, the final push that people need to get out the door.
Gamifying fitness
Through its in-game rewards, level-ups, customized sneakers, daily energy allowances, and more, STEPN is essentially gamifying movement.
Gamified fitness is a powerful and proven way to make fitness addicting and “trick” people into developing healthy habits that stick.
In fact, many experts argue that gamified fitness, when engineered well, is actually the future of fitness. Connected fitness is already trending in this direction, with startups like Ergatta, Aviron, Zwift, and Playpulse raising millions. Further, researchers have proven that gamifying physical activity results in positive changes that can improve patients’ health long-term.
Proof-of-workout
A term coined by Julian Lehr, signaling-as-a-service is a phenomenon that has manifested itself powerfully in the recent NFT craze.
Companies in the signaling-as-a-service space offer social capital and “clout” to consumers. Users who buy a hyped NFT, for example, often buy it in order to signal to others that they can afford the NFT, or that they’re well-connected enough to have been in-the-know about the project.
This phenomenon has also made its way to the fitness landscape in the form of proof-of-workout. Perhaps the most well-known example of this is Strava, whose content allows runners and cyclists to post a visual snapshot of their workout, encouraging even more interaction and engagement beyond simple performance analytics.
Notably, move-to-earn games built on the blockchain combine the power of both of these budding trends. By offering NFTs — and making sure to design tokenomics in a way that bolsters their long-term value — STEPN sneakers are becoming status signals in and of themselves. Already, sneakers on the in-app marketplace are selling for thousands of dollars.
Storing Achievements
There’s also an emotional element behind the sneakers. While it’s relatively straightforward to repair and level up STEPN sneakers, it’s certainly not an easy or fast process. It can take users weeks to months to get to certain levels.
Thus, not only are high-level sneakers a financial status signal, they’re also a powerful proof-of-workout signal, an asset that holds weeks to months of data. A single snapshot speaks volumes about the dedication and sweat that the owner has had to put in to get his sneakers to that level. This means that fitness enthusiasts can now store their achievements on the blockchain forever.
Real-world impact
This is where STEPN really shines in the web3 space — using web3 to get people out of web3 and into the real world.
A common critique of Web3 projects is that many don’t deliver real-world utility.
But what’s setting STEPN apart is that its value proposition isn’t constrained to the web3 world. On top of earning tokens and learning about web3, users are saying that they feel better and look better, all while developing healthy long-term habits of moving outside.
Already, the STEPN Discord is seeing hundreds of success stories and fitness transformations. Some users are saying that they haven’t worked out in over a decade, and are now moving outside 7 days a week.
With powerful network effects, STEPN’s circle of influence is going parabolic.
The app has been on the market for less than half a year, launching in public beta in December 2021. Since then, the app has been growing exponentially.
What’s coming for STEPN in the road ahead? Some speculate that the app, growing at its current pace, could become the next Axie Infinity — or even bigger. Its product appeals to an audience that goes beyond just web3 and combines the power of both fitness and crypto.
Conclusion
Acting as a bridge between the crypto and non-crypto market, STEPN has the potential to usher in a huge population of runners and walkers into the web3 world who can get paid to move while improving the health of millions of people around the world.
Disclaimer: The information provided on this page does not constitute investment advice, financial advice, trading advice, or any other sort of advice and it should not be treated as such. This content is the opinion of a third party, and this site does not recommend that any specific cryptocurrency should be bought, sold, or held, or that any crypto investment should be made. The Crypto market is high-risk, with high-risk and unproven projects. Readers should do their own research and consult a professional financial advisor before making any investment decisions.
