Samsung Mobile’s game partner launches a play-to-earn platform combining metaverse and esports

Samsung Mobile’s long-term game partner, Emoji Games, launches Pocket Arena, the mobile-first Play-to-Earn nonfungible token (NFT) games portal and platform that converges esports and metaverse.

This Swiss-based mobile game company sold over 1.5 billion games in 55 countries as Samsung Mobile’s Try-n-Play sole game pre-install provider, having been in the legacy traditional mobile game industry since 2005. Also, the team is a veteran brand game provider, partnered with big brands such as BMW, Sberbank, Kia, Samsung, KFC, etc., for their games.

Pocket Arena, since its first beta launch in July 2021 has been on an upward trajectory ever since the introduction of their flagship NFT game, Castle Defense. Daily, over 6,000 unique users play Castle Defense with approximately 300 to 500 daily new user sign-ups purely through word of mouth and networking. Five thousand NFT Castles have been sold out already with huge competition and the higher-priced Castles with a maximum price cap of EUR500 ($577.70) are actively being traded at the P2P Castle Market.

This appeal has led to rapid traction for Pocket Arena, with the average session duration per user sitting at 40 minutes per day. Nearly 20,000 users visit the game daily, with a 45% retention rate and 78% adoption on mobile devices.

Strong Esports players are in demand and the good ones are hard to find with NFT castle sponsors offering an extra premium to ‘grind’ (increase the value of castles). Those who are not able to find good players can have fun playing the game by themselves.

There is also a “land” feature coming soon to the Castle Defense ecosystem where castle owners can earn passive XP from the land they capture via battles and decorate their land with NFT items like flags and other structures. In addition, castle owners can also defend their land from peer attacks or attack peers to acquire lands.

he Esports ecosystem has evolved post-COVID-19. Now anyone, from anywhere in the world can become an esports player. They even can make a living out of it, especially when it comes to blockchain games, thereby making the profession of being a professional esports player more realistic than ever.

As lucrative as blockchain games may seem, there are still not many high quality and playable mobile blockchain games available on the market. The three key things to look at when evaluating a blockchain game are tokenomics, blockchain tech, and game quality. Blockchain game developers should work towards striking a balance between these three factors. How many live blockchain games in the market satisfy all three elements?

The metaverse is interesting but it can be limiting if it does not have esports and its elements as described above. One could argue that esports battles are much more fascinating for gamers, as seen in Castle Defense, which sold out 5,000 NFT Castles. Castle owners can participate in peer-to-peer battles to acquire virtual lands in Luzern, Switzerland.