Atari Launches Onchain Arcade on Base Network

The gaming giant appears to be undeterred by the recent downturn in the blockchain gaming sector, which declined 28% in June.

Video gaming giant Atari is continuing to experiment with blockchain technology by launching its classic arcade games on Base, the Ethereum Layer 2 network developed by Coinbase.

Atari has partnered with Coinbase to develop an “Onchain Arcade.” The collaboration also includes Stack, a Bitcoin Layer 2 scaling solution.

Gamers can mint, play, and compete for leaderboard positions in the classic game Asteroids. Rewards include the Atari 2600+, merchandise, and game codes. The leaderboard will reset every week, but the top score will remain until the competition concludes on August 30.

According to Atari’s website, it plans to roll out more on-chain games soon.

Founded in the early 1970s, Atari pioneered arcade games like Pong, Asteroids, and Breakout. These games made Atari a staple in gaming culture for decades.

Illuvium to Ship Three New Games

Gaming studio Illuvium is set to release three interconnected games on July 25. The upcoming titles — Illuvium: Overworld, Illuvium: Arena, and Illuvium: Zero — form part of a larger ecosystem.

Within this ecosystem, in-game progress and items can be transferred across different games. Every asset captured or crafted will be owned by players on the Ethereum blockchain.

Founded four years ago, Illuvium raised $100 million in funding. However, its ILV token was battered by the bear market and remains down more than 95% from its 2021 peak.

Web3 Gaming Sector Declines In June

In June, the blockchain gaming sector felt the ripple effects of the broader crypto market downturn.

According to Footprint Analytics, Bitcoin and Ether dipped by 7.3% and 9.8% respectively in June, which had a notable impact on gaming tokens, with the sector plunging by 28% from $27.2 billion to $19.6 billion.

After migrating to the Ronin network, Web3 game Pixels faced a sharp 74% drop in daily active users (DAUs) to 251.6K on June 19 from 976.1K on June 11.

Meanwhile, network-specific metrics also paint a sobering picture. Ronin and Polygon, which had been the leading chains by DAUs, witnessed notable declines.

Ronin’s share of DAUs fell to 18.4% from 29.8% by the end of June, heavily influenced by the drop in Pixels’ user engagement. Similarly, Polygon’s DAU share dropped to 8.0% from 15.1% due to a downturn in Matr1x FIRE’s user activity.