In brief
- Off the Grid is migrating players onto mainnet, enabling items to be traded as NFTs. Some are selling for thousands of dollars.
- The game will expand to Steam in June, despite the platform’s 2021 blockchain game ban, raising questions about crypto feature implementation.
- Some collectors are holding onto rare items, anticipating sizable demand after promised updates.
Avalanche shooter Off the Grid has slowly started to shift its player base onto the GUNZ mainnet, where they can trade in-game items for GUN tokens. Even with approximately 0.13% of its player base now able to trade items, the marketplace is heating up, with some items going for thousands of dollars’ worth of crypto.
This all comes as the hit battle royale shooter plots its June expansion to PC platform Steam—a marketplace that banned blockchain games from the platform in 2021. That said, Off the Grid is also on PlayStation and Xbox, despite those platforms also apparently not allowing crypto features in games.
Up until this point, all console Off the Grid gamers have been playing the game solely on testnet, meaning that a test blockchain was running behind the scenes but that player-facing features were missing. As a result, they can’t trade their items on the marketplace for GUN tokens, potentially cashing out thousands of dollars for rare guns and more.
Theodore Agranat, director of Web3 at Off the Grid creator Gunzilla Games, told Decrypt this week that the migration to mainnet has first started for only PC players, but eventually all wallets will be on mainnet. How exactly this will work with crypto features has yet to be revealed, given that they’re prohibited by Steam and still M.I.A. in PlayStation and Xbox games.
Eagle-eyed players have spotted that the official Steam listing for Off the Grid claims the game will have an in-game marketplace, possibly referencing functional crypto features.
At the time of writing, there are just shy of 16.5 million wallets on the GUNZ testnet, a dedicated Avalanche L1 network created to support Off the Grid and potential future games. Meanwhile, there are just 21,000 players on the mainnet—approximately 0.13% of its player base.
Even with such a small amount of players being able to transact on mainnet, already there have been some sizable trades. A Prankster tactical vest sold for $2,393 last week, a ZipperMouth mask was shifted for approximately $1,100, and a Convict chest rig traded hands for more than $500.
These items are super rare, with the community believing that less than 300 ZipperMouth masks were ever minted, but Gunzilla “reserves the right” to reissue both ZipperMouths and Convict gear—Agranat explicitly told Decrypt that Convict gear will “absolutely” be released in the future.
As such, skin collectors now see the Pioneer items—which were handed out in the first OTG Pro subscription and will not be re-released—as likely the most rare set in the game. Avid skin collector MoneyMagician reported that this has led to a lack of Pioneer items being listed on the marketplace.
This has also been the case for the Kestrel Legacy, a gun that had modified stats in the closed play test but were discontinued, and now is effectively an ultra-limited skin of the stock gun. There are other Legacy weapons, as well as Retro weapons, however the Kestrel Legacy is the most hyped due to its importance to the game’s lore.
MoneyMagician explained that players expect an update is coming for these weapons, which would include a reskin and a deepening of the lore behind the items. This update is what the skin collector anticipates will kick-start the first batch of five-figure NFT sales. For this reason, he said most collectors plan to hold onto their rarest items for now, expecting demand to explode.
“I think when we see sales of five figures, the FOMO will kick in hard, triggering a flywheel,” MoneyMagician told Decrypt. “[The update] would cause new waves of hype and attention onto them, and surely their price will rise along with market volume.”
Agranat declined to offer any additional information on the progression of this update, adding that the mainnet rollout is Gunzilla’s main priority for now.
For now, Prankster items are the most sought-after items despite being marginally less rare than the Pioneer set; Prankster was released in the second battle pass in the closed play test, while the Pioneer was the first one. MoneyMagician believes this is because, well, the Prankster set simply looks cooler.
Over the past 24 hours alone, according to OTG DegenRadar, two Prankster Woodpecker guns have sold for approximately $600 and $570 as well as a pair of Prankster shades for $467. On Tuesday, a Prankster Mask sold for $1,008. But none of those sales compare to the Prankster tactical vest, which commanded a whopping $2,393 last week.
“Rarity isn’t always what sticks, but [rather] what the community feels the most compelled with,” MoneyMagician explained. “The Pioneer set is green, a very showy color, making it hard to splash on just some shorts or a vest to make it look good. But the Prankster, it looks amazing. Gives this Joker vs Batman rivalry feel.”
Edited by Andrew Hayward
GG Newsletter
Get the latest web3 gaming news, hear directly from gaming studios and influencers covering the space, and receive power-ups from our partners.
