Editorial Notes (vol. 8) — Lens protocol and AVAX GameFi

In a bear market, we build. This week on the Grill we're looking into Lens Protocol and GameFi on Avalanche.

Lens Under the Lens

Lens Protocol has been one of the more exciting things to have come out of the Web3 space over the last couple of months. In this feature, we are looking into some of the dApps being built on top of it and a short overview of how it actually works.

Lens is currently deployed on Polygon and is a user-owned, open social graph allowing any app to plug into it. Users have ownership over the content they produce, their data, and the social graph. This is all linked to their Lens Profile NFT which gives users control over their publications. Publications can be posts, comments, or mirrors (essentially retweets or reposts) and can represent anything from text to video. An interesting feature of Publications are the different modules that exist and the fact that more can be created. Some of them are Follow, Collect, and Reference, with each having an additional logic to it.

For more detailed information take a look at the official documentation or be on the lookout for our Lens deep-dive later this week. 👀

Now, let’s dive into a few apps built on top of Lens Protocol.

Phaver – Share-to-earn decentralized social platform.

Phaver was created to collectively build the most interesting feed in the world by rewarding users for sharing the most interesting content they find everywhere on the web, as well as creating new native content on Phaver. To interact on Phaver you don’t need the Lens profile, however, you can link your profile once you get whitelisted.

Subscribe to creator feeds on Iris and get access to token-gated communities.

Iris is a social platform for Web3 creators. On it, you can share content, be it exclusive or not, grow your community, and own your identity and content. Users can pay a subscription price to follow creators, and creators have the ability to set the subscription price. You won’t be able to post without a Lens profile, but you can still explore the platform and find the most popular posts on Iris.

Lenster – Community-built, open social media network.

This decentralized and permissionless social media app allows you to connect with other profiles, join communities, and explore the platform as a whole. The UI is very familiar to the best parts of Twitter and has a similar feel when interacting with it. You’ll need a Lens profile to log in, but just like with Iris, you can explore the platform without it as well.

Become a creator or collect personalized content from your favorite creators on Clipto.

On Clipto, you’ll find your favorite creators and crypto personalities from which you can request a personalized video. It will be minted as an NFT and sent to the wallet you want, but in case the video doesn’t arrive on time as specified, you’ll be refunded. If you are a creator yourself, you can easily become one on Clipto and start making clips for your fans.

Capture, send, sell, and buy trip memories in NFTs with Harfang.

Harfang will enable you to collect trip memories, be it as virtual stamps or cards. It is not publicly available as of yet, but will have the alpha release this summer.

GameFi on Avalanche

GameFi is one of the fastest growing sectors on Avalanche with games like Crabada, DeFi Kingdoms, and others being known all over the Web3 space. Here we take a look at a few games which are already live or in development.

Collect and upgrade your cards in Castle Crush and duel with others to win incredible prizes.

Castle Crush is a multiplayer strategy game with 1.4 million monthly active users that has recently made a move into Web3. They kicked-off their move into the GameFi world with an NFT mint for whitelisted users, which started on June 6th and will last until June 9th. In the game, you can choose among 68 cards representing different minions, and spells. With those NFT cards you get to build your own deck and duel in 1v1 real-time battles using that deck of cards to crush your opponent’s castle.

Collect Chefs and Chef’s tools in Pizza Game and use strategies to become the most efficient pizzeria.

Pizza Game is a P2E Avalanche on-chain game inspired by Cookie Clicker. In order to play Pizza Game, you must own a Pizza Chef NFT and stake them in the Pizzeria. Chefs are NFTs and produce PIZZA tokens every minute when staked and can be used in-game to buy Chef tools and more Chefs. The game has a more relaxed pace and it is focused on strategy. Players need to balance the number of chefs, tools, and Pizzeria levels for the highest efficiency to earn more tokens.

Race with NFTs of one of the fastest creatures in Snail Trail and compete for prizes.

In Snail Trail you get to compete with your Snail NFTs (purchase through the marketplace or incubated by having two Snails, one male and the other female). The game offers daily missions that include races without an entrance fee, where 10 players compete for SLIME  token prizes. The other type of races are competitive which also require 10 participants, however the entrance fee can be manually set with a prize pool 9x the entrance fee.

Team up with your friends and build your empire in Imperium Empires.

Imperium Empires is a 3rd person real-time strategy game that features a wide variety of PvE and PvP gameplay, where players team-to-earn by joining a guild of friends to conquer the Metaverse and build their empires. The game is supposed to launch later this year, but prior to it, they will be launching the web based game “Apollo” where players’ purpose is to manage and send their spaceship fleets to mine, lurk, refine and trade resources in the Imperium Metaverse to maximize profits.

Level up, earn, and go on adventures with your avatar in the Ragnarok metaRPG game.

Ragnarok metaRPG game allows you to enter a new dimension where you can play, chat, and hang out using your NFT as an in-game avatar. It is based on a collection of 7777 Ronin Zero NFTs, which are your exclusive access to the game. In the game you get to explore the Metaverse, slay monsters, craft NFTs, trade, and own real estate — all of which will grant your character extra XP, enabling you to level up and change classes.

Get ready for of the finest looking FPS blockchain based games on SHRAPNEL.

SHRAPNEL is the world’s first First-Person-Shooter game where skill-based competition, creative modding tools, and true digital ownership come together. Players will get to develop and improve the gear of their “Operators” and use them in mission based combats or tournaments. Be on the lookout for the whitelisted mint on June 7th and the public mint on June 9th.