At the surface, it doesn't seem like SteemMonsters invented the wheel. After all, it's not the first collectibles game, not the first online deck cards game, probably not the first combination of the two.
Everyone has special offers, and gift cards you can see elsewhere online. Plus, having free options and paid options (i.e. reward edition versus alpha and beta booster packs), there are entire niches based on this business model.
But that's about where the "not the first" list ends...
Watching a failing game on the Etherium blockchain, because it became too popular for that blockchain to support, SteemMonsters was created on Steem because it is fast, offered free transactions and something very cool for programmers: json transactions.
While not the first app to take advantage of json transactions, SteemMonsters surely showed that Steem was definitely more than a blogging and a social media platform!
On a serious crypto market downtrend, when other projects barely survive, SteemMonsters soared, in a matter of months. That obviously attracted more eyes on them.
But why did they soar? You could say because they knew how to attract quite a few influencers and investors in their project early on, when the project was in alpha stage. And that is true. Marketing is an important part of selling your product/service. Marketing usually starts before the product/service is ready, but if you expect a lot of pressure, you gotta be able to handle it and deliver as promised, or it all can turn against you. Expectations were and are high for SteemMonsters, but so far they delivered, which is an important point when we think why they soared.
The other thing that I think concurred to their success was the fact that prices were set in US dollars, not in Steem, and that helped on the dropping crypto market. And the fact that payments can be done directly with fiat, while not extraordinary online, it's pretty damn rare in the crypto world. Not as rare as being able to sell directly for fiat though, and that they do not have. That would be something, to have a STEEM-fiat exchange that is not really an exchange. But I figure there might be some risks associated with attempting such a thing. But if not, wow, possibilities are endless!
And a final reason I think made possible this ascension of SteemMonsters. A catching gameplay that continuously evolves. Pro-looking site, ease of use, even for a person who knows nothing about crypto. Regular updates and fixes, continuous delivery. Quick addressing of threatening behaviors with the potential to affect the business model stability on the long term.
Many of these are probably premieres on the Steem blockchain, but certainly in a combination that creates a working business model in the Steem ecosystem, where there are few such working models, especially in an unfavorable market.
In a few hours Season 3 ends and a few changes will be implemented starting with the next season. Soon tournaments will start as well, and they are awaited impatiently.
