Napoleon once said “China is a sleeping giant. Let her sleep, for when she wakes she will move the world.” Similarly, when the Play and Earn market awakes in India, it will shake the gaming world. The lessons learned from onboarding India into blockchain gaming will help onboard the rest of the planet.
Most of the Play and Earn ecosystem is centered around South East Asia, which makes sense given that half of Axie Infinity’s user base is in the Philippines. Although a fantastic market for P2E gaming, there is another market that does not get nearly the same attention.
The Philippines has a population of 109 million. India has 1.4 billion and the second largest population in the world, 10x the population of the Philippines. A young population, growing internet & smartphone access, and a rapid demand from casual to mid-core games may make India the largest opportunity for Play and Earn games globally.
To understand the opportunity for blockchain gaming, it’s helpful to discuss the gaming market in India more broadly.
Market
India’s gaming market is now the world’s 2nd largest by volume with more than 400 million gamers. According to Salone Seghal’s podcast on Monetizing Media, Indian gamers spend 4-5 hours a week on mobile games. The $2.2 Billion gaming industry in India is expected to grow to $7 Billion in the next 5 years. Lumikai, a VC fund focused on seed stage gaming startups in India, points out a few structural drivers that will spearhead this growth.
Source: Leveling Up - India’s Gaming Market
Growth of Internet Users
Over the past 5 years, the number of internet users in India accelerated significantly. Growing from 368 million total internet users in 2016 to 750 million internet users by the end of 2021. This makes India the second largest online market in the world.
SmartPhone Penetration
The number of Smartphone users in India has increased to over 600 million, driven by increased affordability of high-quality smartphones and strong demand from tier 2 (non-metro) cities. 38% o Indian’s population owns a smartphone and can access mobile games from app stores. Additionally, replacement cycles have increased tremendously due to the improved quality of smartphones from 2015-2020. These longer replacement cycles will increase user retention for games.
High Data Consumption
Reliance Jio, a 4G mobile network launched in 2016, lowered the price of mobile data tremendously. Data consumption hit an all time high of 13.5 GB/month in 2021. Cheaper data allows users to spend more time on games and media.
Supply Side
Technological innovations from the supply side also support the continuous growth of the Indian gaming sector. Better processing power in phones allows better graphics and enablement of more complex games. Modern screen technologies allow for longer screen times on every phone. With the rollout of 4G, internet speed has increased from 3 Mbps in 2015, to 18 Mbps in 2021.
Covid-19
Gaming has increasingly become the more popular medium of recreation in India. With the extended leisure time over the past two years, many Indians turned to gaming for a more interactive social experience. Friends and family took to social games to maintain social connections.
Source: WARC
Vernacular Games
The introduction of Hindi games and Indian themes are also starting to expand the gaming user base to non-English speaking clusters. Most of the internet growth over the past year has been in rural areas where people do not speak English. Indian gaming studios are starting to produce Hindi games to cater towards the growing audience who prefer vernacular content. This has the potential to bring in several million users who wouldn’t otherwise play mobile games.
Demand for mid-core Blockchain Games
Hyper-casual and casual games have demonstrated the largest growth in India and are a popular entry point for first time mobile gamers. These apps have simple game mechanics and can be picked up rather quickly. Examples are Temple Run, Candy Crush, and Subway Surfer.
As these casual mobile gamers start to crave a more demanding and immersive experience, core-games will see the largest growth. Core games usually feature a multiplayer experience and complex game plan. This may be a perfect entry point for blockchain based gaming. Mid-core blockchain games hoping for users within the Indian gaming market, can capture a portion of the pool of casual gamers open to a more alluring game-play experience.
Source: Leveling Up - India’s Gaming Market
An example of this would be Pegaxy. A play-to-earn PVP style horse racing game on Polygon where players compete for top 3 placements amongst 11 racers. Each race has random elemental variables like water, wind, fire, and speed, creating a more immersive and challenging experience for users. Utilizing various strategic upgrades users must place in the top 3 to earn the platforms utility token Vigorus (VIS).
Source: Pegaxy
IndiGG, an India-focused SubDAO of Yield Guild Games, commit $100,000 to buy Pegas (the NFT horse required to play the game) and will offer scholarship opportunities to players in India. IndiGG is uniquely positioned to provide scholarships to the casual Indian gamer who is open to complex gameplay and an additional source of income. The team is making the world’s best play-to-earn games accessible to the gaming community of India. A few other crypto games IndiGG is supporting are Axie Infinity, Nyan Heroes and Fancy Birds.
Challenges to Indian Adoption
A significant barrier to entry for Indian adoption is the time and commitment required to play blockchain games. Setting up Metamask & Ronin wallets and buying ETH are just a few of the requirements to play Axie Infinity. Furthermore, a quick transition to the world of Web3 is challenging for India’s first time internet users.
According to Salone Seghal, the user psychology of an Indian gamer is different from that of a western gamer. Most western gamers have had time to adapt to games as a form of entertainment. There was a linear trajectory from arcades, to consoles, to PCs, and these gamers were exposed to various business models from payed games, free to play, and subscription models. On the other hand, many Indian gamers will go from nothing, to smartphones, to blockchain gaming. The majority of players are experiencing the internet for the first time, so the digital sociology varies greatly from that of the west. The majority of westerners still find Web3 extremely complicated and need assistance with onboarding. This may be even more challenging for a population with limited experience on the internet. Taking the time to educate the Indian gamer on Web3 is of upmost importance.
Nevertheless, projects like IndiGG launched to address these challenges. With the support of Yield Guild Games and Polygon Studios, IndiGG is well suited to address these difficulties and ensure Indian gamers are equipped with the best Blockchain games. The team is currently bringing their first cohort of scholars in India into P2E gaming. This will provide further insight into what is necessary to help onboard more users to the ecosystem. If guilds are successful in overcoming the onboarding challenges in India, there is no market that can’t be touched.
Final Thoughts
India is well positioned to become the largest presence in Play and Earn gaming globally. A young population, increased internet & smartphone access, the impact of Covid-19, and a growing demand for casual to mid-core games, make India an attractive market for quality blockchain games. Overcoming the onboarding challenges will set the stage for efficiently onboarding gamers globally. When the Play and Earn market awakens in India, it will shake the gaming world. The lessons learned from onboarding India into blockchain gaming will help onboard the rest of the planet.