I already made a prediction post on both Hive & LeoFinance.io last week (See Post Here) and promised a follow up post with more predictions of platforms that I'm actually using. Here is what I expect for Splinterlands in 2021.
I still see great potential in the game as the core is designed well and everything works smoothly with smart economics behind all of it. The main complaint I still have is that it currently all falls short to be an actual game that real gamers enjoy since the pay2win balance issues are too extreme and the initial user experience is still far from optimal. This shows in the chart of average daily users which has not gone up for a long time. Right now, half of the players are likely bots playing and for every new player that comes in, another one leaves. At least that is what it looks like
Most marketing that was done aimed toward 'crypto investors' and 'whales' as those are the ones the team earned most from and a lot of effort is being put in making sure the prices stay up which so far is working. Overpowered cards like Yodin Zaku and others were printed to incentivize players to buy in on the untamed pre-sale. The DICE set came out which burns DEC, a trading pair on Uniswap was introduced giving out a lot of rewards and now causing the rate DEC is printed to have increased. Land Sale was done, the Collection Power system was put in place basically putting players behind a pay-wall while the League Rankings system fractured the player base making it so that you often get matched up by way stronger or way weaker opponents depending on what league you choose to advance to.
The overall marketcap of cards has gone up over the year but the graph doesn't necessarily mean card values have gone up equally as new cards are being printed every day in the form of reward cards and packs that are being opened up. (also some are burned being converted into DEC).
Looking at the DEC value which is pegged at 1000 DEC for 1$ Purchasing Power in the shop, it ranged between 0.346$ and 1.1$. Not many new people coming on board combined with some of the biggest whales getting out caused bot DEC and cards to go out at a big discount during the year. The introduction of the DICE set made it so that a lot of DEC got burned, while the Land pre-sale and the Uniswap Liquidity pool took a lot of the DEC supply out of circulation for now. The rate at which DEC is not being produced has been increased in order to give incentives for DEC holders to keep it in there.
Right now the price is back below the peg around 0.76$ for 1000 DEC.
2020 Conclusion
There certainly has been a lot of development in the game with the team working hard to move things forward in 2021. Splinterlands currently is the #1 crypto game which on its own is a nice achievement especially looking at how it all started years back. I can't help but feel that things have gone downhill the 2nd part of 2020 making it way more of a pay2win & play2earn experience instead of just a fun game where you are able to potentially earn something as a bonus.
1. The Team Will Continue to Work Hard.
I have no doubt that the team will continue to develop bringing new things to the game like the land expansion, getting into partnerships with other crypto projects, find new ways to keep card & DEC values up. If anything, following all the development around the game, is quite fun and I'm looking forward to everything that is about to come in 2021 regardless if it's good or bad.
2. Players Can Earn Good Money from the Game in 2021.
2020 allowed players to earn good rewards consistently by playing the game and I do believe this will be the same in 2021 even when coming in as a new player without being willing to invest much into it. You will have to play it smart though and many that come in will likely end at a loss or give up at some point.
3. Splinterlands Remains Pay2Win.
It basically all comes down to money, as long as there are enough sales of card packs and land, things will likely just continue in the direction where skill is completely neglectable to the point where most matches are won or lost before the first card has been selected. Sales are still going good at the moment since we are still relatively early on and the current crypto bull market on its own likely will make it that enough new people looking to possibly invest in the hope to earn something from the game.
4. No Mainstream Adoption in Gaming
I consider myself a gamer and try to keep up with the latest news of what is going on in the space. I haven't seen anything mentioned all year long about Splinterlands though and I'm sure if you ask 100 real gamers about it, only a few who are also heavily into crypto likely will have heard of it. I don't expect this to change even though Splinterlands certainly has the potential to appeal to the real gaming community. Right now, any real gamer would rate this game as 'the worst pay2win experience ever'.
5. DEC Peg Will trade below 1$
In the end, it's all supply and demand and at least right now, Supply > Demand with many bots and players grinding for-profit and not enough new players coming in to keep the 1000 DEC = 1$ peg. I don't see it going down to the 0.346$ lows (I will be a buyer at that point) but also see it having a hard time staying above 0.85$
6. SPT Gets Integrated and goes to $0.00050$+
Right now it is trading at 0.00013$ giving SPT a marketcap below 10,000$. I expect SPT which is the token from Splintertalk.io to be integrated into the game somewhere in Q2 with the "In-Game Inventory Management for Avatars & Skins" Update making it go up in price considerably.
7. Cards Retain Their Value
I don't see things collapsing anytime soon but also don't see card prices go to the moon. I expect that when someone buys, let's say 200$ worth of cards on the 2nd hand market today (especially with some insights on which are good value ones), they will be able to sell them back for at least around the same price at the end of 2021.
8. Average Daily Users 10,000
Right now the game has around 5000 average daily users and this is bound to go up as more people get into crypto with also the mobile app releasing. The expectations are nearly always higher compared to the reality which was seen with the 'millions of players' the game was going to get exposure to with the Brave partnership which turned out into somewhat of a non-event so far. They should be able to at least double their player base though and I would be surprised if the game didn't at least have 10k average daily players by the end of the year. This is still neglectable to what most real games have though not even talking about the wide adopted or popular ones.
That's about it, I don't really have an opinion on the Land Expansion. Overall, I do expect the game to do well with continued development and the entire economy to hold up. I however continue to have big doubts that the game will actually become fun again as all focus seems to be on the rewards and the economy with likely no direct incentives to change this around if the bull market continues.
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To understand what the game is about and how it can be played check the video below!
Important: Treat games in the first place as games and not as investment opportunities, Splinterlands allows you to earn some money and get good returns but you are much better off flipping burgers in Mcdonalds when looking at the money earned for the time invested. Investing also comes with a risk of card values going down.
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