Play-to-earn gaming has taken the crypto world by storm, and it's easy to see why. With this unique gaming model, which is geared to adults, participants are rewarded with cryptocurrency or NFTs just for playing games they would probably play for free. Axie Infinity, the most popular platform for play-to-earn gaming now, allows users to build up a collection of "Axies" they can use across the company's universe of games. From there, the company uses Blockchain to reward its players for taking part

By this example alone we see both the immediate changes it has been producing and the long-term changes that are yet to come.

However, it's worth noting that play-to-earn gaming isn't technically "free" — at least not at first. With Axie Infinity, you need three Axies to get started in the first place, and these Axies cost cold, hard cash. To meet this requirement, you may have to fork over $1,000 USD or more, make the game highly profitable for the company even during early phases.

According to Steven Walters, CEO and founder at Gallant Token, it's no wonder Axie Infinity has such a huge following. The ability to earn real-world value by playing a blockchain game is luring people into the market for the simple reason that value can be earned by having fun, he says. He also adds that, with the addition of NFTs, you are not only earning money for your time, "but you are also gaining an asset.".

Diego Di Tommaso, co-founder and COO of OVR.ai, points out that play-to-earn gaming also showcases how NFTs are the building blocks of the internet of the future. The fact that you can truly own a digital asset and then sell it in permission-less fashion outside of the platform where it was initially created is a game-changer and its easy so see why.

This trend has also created Crypto gamin guilds which thrive on this play to earn games by purchasing in-game items like land and in-game assets in the form of NFTs, then lending them out for hundreds and thousands of players to play, earning yields by using those gaming assets in the respective virtual worlds. The guilds will then take profit by sharing a portion of the earnings, as well as the rent paid to the guild

There is definitely money to be made but the volatile nature of trading NFTS and Crypto currencies have also cause speculation on the future viability of such games.

But regardless of this big companies are in the middle of making their own tokens and linking them to their game to offer similar play to earn models.

Ultimately, play-to-earn gaming seem more of an evolution of how we see games, it's a way to earn money doing something you love.