Crypto Gaming causes a blockchain storm at Gam3 awards

The Gam3 Awards were hosted on the 8th of December and paved the way for the first award ceremony of its kind. A night to pay homage to the top Web3 talent this year has had to offer.

With a panel of 39 judges, the ceremony was a way to earn bragging rights in this evolving economy. The top games you know and loved were voted for by the panel and gamers at home.

Crypto gaming has been on a substantial rise this year as we have seen games move into unknown territory with gameplay and graphics. Millions of “Unique Active Wallets” have been recorded and billions of dollars of funding from both institutional and retail investors have entered the space.

Let’s look more indepth at how the Gam3 game awards paid homage to the blockchain’s gaming efforts this year.

Which games got featured at Gam3?

At this year’s Gam3 Awards, there were 16 categories under the Web3 part of the ceremony. Hosted by Polkastarter Gaming, some of the top games were shortlisted for a chance of gaining a highly coveted award.

This year has spawned a few different Web3 related prizes and awards so we hope the trend continues. Over 200+ crypto games were shortlisted making this a close knit competition for the coveted awards.

The following categories and winners for the Web3 awards were:

• Game of the Year: Big Time
• Most Anticipated Game: Shrapnel
• Best Graphics: Star Atlas
• Best Action Game: Superior
• Best Mobile Game: Thetan Arena
• Best Adventure Game: Big Time
• Best Casual Game: Blankos Block Party
• Best RPG: Illuvium
• Best Shooter Game: MetalCore
• Best Strategy Game: Gods Unchained
• Best Card Game: Gods Unchained
• Best Multiplayer Game: EV.io
• Best Esports Game: EV.io
• Best Content Creator: Brycent
• People’s Choice Awards: League of Kingdom
• Games’ Choice Awards: The Harvest

All of the above awards were voted for by the panel of judges, however awards such as The People’s Choice, Content Creator, and Games’ Choice were voted for externally.

“People’s Choice” & “Best Content Creator” Awards“Games’ Choice Award” was voted for by game teams to promote more of a community feel.

The Gam3 Awards panel featured individuals who were representative of Web3 companies such as:

• Animoca Brands
• Solana Foundation
• BNB Chain
• Fractal
• Polygon
• DappRadar
• Immutable X

The above winners of the Gam3 Awards, were placed into a prize pool that reached up to $1 million! The funding came from sponsors from within the Web3 industry, such as Immutable X, Blockchain Game Alliance, Machinations, Ultra, Naavik, Galxe, Hacken, Venly, HackenProof, Shorooq, Elixir, Arcade and MetaCon.

Games were judged on accessibility, gameplay, replayability, graphics and the playing experience. All of these criterias have developed quite drastically over the past 12 months. It has never been easier to access a Blockchain related game. Players can do so through a number of platforms, integrating their best crypto wallets for gaming, mobile appstores and through signing up to the games’ site.

In October to November alone, DappRadar alone recorded over 800, 000 unique active wallets over a number of different networks. This number may grow going into the New Year months of 2023.

Overall thoughts on the Gam3 Awards

Firstly congratulations to all those who were shortlisted, winner’s of awards and who were a part of the proceedings for the ceremony. Whilst it’s evident many of the titles were deserving of their titles. It must be noted there are some irregularities to the winners.

Whilst Star Atlas is a promising game after the release of their Beta on the Epic Games Store they won an award despite not even having a full release yet. Also the short gameplay that has been presented to us so far, cannot be compared to a game that has had multiple stages of its project released such as Phantom Galaxies.

Furthermore, it may be more beneficial to have more say from voters at home in the next awards. Individuals on the panel are representing companies that had games shortlisted for awards, potentially showing some.