Jon Lai Profile picture
6 Oct, 10 tweets, 4 min read
Play-to-earn games like @AxieInfinity have introduced a brilliant new endgame: the management sim

There are more jobs to be done in a P2E game than ever before. Player, manager, scout, breeder, coach etc

Thread 👇 on my journey from player to manager in @AxieInfinity Image
1/ Historically most folks think of games as an activity to complete - "I beat the game"

Free-to-play games can extend player lifetimes through updates and events. Yet eventually power users reach the highest level - the "endgame"
2/ With some rare exceptions, most endgames are pretty boring - players do a set of repetitive activities (ex. raiding, PvP) for decreasing marginal gain. Players slowly churn until the next game comes along Image
3/ I discovered @AxieInfinity early this year and spent 40+ hours learning the cards / builds. I eventually battled my way up to 1800 MMR across a roster of 12 Axies, some of which I theorycrafted into non-meta teams (❤️triple aqua) Image
4/ Last month, I hit a skill ceiling and decided to take a break from the game. I felt I had reached my personal best

In a non-P2E game, this would have been the end - i would soon move onto a new game and become the dreaded lapsed power user 🪦
5/ But in @AxieInfinity, this was just the beginning of a new endgame

I met a scholar on the Axie Discord who offered to take over one of my teams. Within a week, she had surpassed my prior MMR and was teaching me new strategies - all while being a stay-at-home mom of 2 kids
6/ We grew through referrals. She had a friend who was curious about Axie. I interviewed him and was impressed by his grit - he was a construction worker who had lost his job during COVID, but was a high-ranked League player

We built a team together and he became my 2nd scholar
7/ Today, I have loaned out all 4 of my teams to scholars. I monitor the meta, suggest new strategies, and scout the marketplace for new axies

We have a Discord server where we chat every day. My scholars are my friends and allies in this new management endgame 🔥
8/ Most importantly, my in-game assets are positively changing the lives of others vs just collecting dust

My scholars earn $10-20/day and keep the majority of the income. They live in Venezuela which is struggling with the pandemic and would otherwise be unemployed
Wrap/ as someone who's experienced the journey from player to manager in @AxieInfinity, I'm incredibly optimistic on the future of play-to-earn and think we're still in the early innings as new mechanics, ways to play, and jobs are being created 🚀

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More from @Tocelot

19 Sep
Why do play-to-earn games work when real money trading in games has (mostly) not worked? 💸

What can @AxieInfinity @Diablo @EveOnline @CSGO learn from each other?

Thread 👇 proposing a framework for what makes play-to-earn work. Stay a while and listen =)
1/ First, a few popular games where real money markets worked and didn't:
- Didn't work: Diablo 3, Artifact, Star Wars Battlefront II
- Worked: Counterstrike, World of Warcraft, Eve Online, Genshin Impact
2/ Framework: play-to-earn / real money trading works when
- There are multiple paths to winning 🏅
- Inputs are tokenized rather than finished goods ⚒️
- Markets are decentralized 🧑‍🤝‍🧑
Read 23 tweets
15 Jun
The future of games is instant ⏱️

A new generation of instant games is melding the accessibility of Flash games with the performance of native apps. These games are poised to reshape the market for both players & creators 🎨

But wait, what are instant games? Thread 👇 Image
1/ Instant games are games instantly playable within a browser or message without downloads / installs

First popularized by Flash games in the 2000s, there are more instant game platforms today than ever: @FacebookGaming @XboxGamePass, Snap Games, iOS AppClips, Wechat Miniapps
2/ Modern web tech enable 3D games to be rendered in-browser and run at scale in near app-native performance today. The days of laggy HTML5 apps are long gone

Mojang recently launched @Minecraft as a full multiplayer web game Image
Read 11 tweets
1 Jun
Games have some of the best onboarding flows

'Time-to-fun' is a key metric in game design relevant for all software. As apps that compete for free time, games deliver value quickly & unpack complexity slowly 🎢

Thread 👇 on onboarding best practices from games Image
1/ Time-to-fun is how long it takes a product to deliver value (h/t @ibjade)

Top mobile games have TTF <60secs. Longer TTF = greater risk users churn to social media, netflix etc

High utility apps (ex. email, banking) can have high TTF, but shorter still better. Users are busy!
2/ Take Tencent's @PlayCODMobile (>300M downloads) for example:

Upon opening the app, users enter a name and are immediately parachuted into action. No account set-up, cutscenes, or customization options (revealed later). TTF is measured in seconds ImageImage
Read 13 tweets
13 Mar
The best apps today are games in disguise

@calm @tiktok_us @superhuman @chime - many of the top consumer / enterprise / fintech apps embrace game design. These 'game-like' experiences feel fun and have great retention

Thread 👇
1/ First, game-like != gamification

- Game-like apps incorporate the design principles behind good games into the core product 🍎

- Gamification merely applies the surface mechanics like points, badges, leaderboards without understanding the design principles 📋
2/ The best game-like experiences focus on retention

Well-designed games retain extraordinarily well - @Warcraft @CandyCrushSaga have thrived for 10+ yrs

In contrast, most gamified programs boost short-term engagement but wear out users quickly
Read 22 tweets
6 Feb
Thread/ all social products need to choose between real-life vs anonymous identity when they reach a certain scale. Users want to know if that 'Elon_Musketeer' raving about Mars is really Elon or just an imposter. 🚀 This is a design choice I’ve been thinking a lot on 👇
1/ on one hand, the largest social networks today lean toward real identity: @Facebook @Twitter @tiktok_us etc. Enforcing real identity is fundamental for enabling creators on these platforms to build audiences – simply put, users want to know if that person is real!
2/ but folks crave anonymity as well. The largest anonymous social networks today are games. Part of the appeal of @FortniteGame @Minecraft is escaping from the doldrums of school/work to be anyone you want. Fictional identity is fundamental to immersion 🤠
Read 6 tweets
28 Dec 20
As we wrap 2020, here are my top 5 essays for the year:
1) The digital future of tabletop games ♟️🐉
2) The rise of "lifestyle" livestreamers 🤳
3) Cloud-native gaming ☁️🎮
4) New social modalities in the Metaverse 🎢
5) Tencent's investment strategy 🌏

Essay links & recaps 👇
1/ The next big innovation in social play will likely come from tabletop games: D&D, Warhammer, Mafia etc are exploding & being reinvented by modern digital tools. Since essay was written, @AmongUsGame has emerged as the latest example of our noted trends
bit.ly/3rt92rr
2/ Livestreaming (@Twitch @Youtube @Caffeine) has grown beyond gaming to become a medium for creators to chat about everything from food to falconry to politics. "Lifestyle" streamers see higher engagement, deeper community, & new biz models

bit.ly/3pvgi4i
Read 7 tweets

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