Axie players in the Philippines are said to be struggling to make money because of too many participants, making the non-fungible token (NFT) character — the technology needed in the game to earn — very cheap.
According to players, there are now almost three million participants in the country, pushing the value of smooth love potion (SLP) — Axie’s main in-game currency — to go down to 0.6 to 0.5 recently.
“No more P20,000 income compared to two years ago. The number of scholars or actual players must be limited so income will go back to level two years ago,” Christian Llloyd Navarez, a player told Newsbytes.PH.
Navarez said gone were the days from 2019 to 2020 that the value of SLP was P20. During those years, an actual player or scholar can earn P15,000 to P20,000 per month, depending on his ability to win.
Actual players are those who invest directly and play while scholars are those employed by investors whose income can be cut by investors depending on the agreed terms. The problem with scholars is that they can be replaced or fired if they can’t win and earn SLPs.
When Navarez first played in September 2021, he earned P4,200 out from earning 400 SLPs. His last income in January 2022 was only P1,300 out of 2,000 SLPs. “Sobrang baba na. Talo pa sa puyat,” he said.
However, Axie investors are still prevalent in wealthy countries because they can afford to buy expensive Axie characters. There are four expensive characters whose price ranges from $4,444 to $23,000. A $4,444 character is valued at $11,280 while the $23,000 is valued at $64,282, as of Feb. 4, 2022.
As of now, the average investment in Axie is P50,000. Anyone who wants to invest needs to buy SLP from Binance, an online exchange where users can trade cryptocurrencies, via bank transfer or e-wallet. When fund transfer is done, Binance will transfer the SLPs to the ronin wallet of the investor, allowing him or her to play Axie Infinity.
