US-based crypto gaming company Bling has reported a significant increase in the number of people using its products since most of the world entered various stages of lockdown in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. According to statistics shared exclusively with Cointelegraph, Bling’s user statistics are up almost 50% over the month of March. The platform is reaching 70,000 users per day, and over 400,000 active users per month. Bling’s flagship app, Bitcoin Blast, has furthermore passed one million downloads from Google Play Store. The COVID-19 crisis as an opportunity Bling CEO Amy Wan told Cointelegraph that she chalks these statistics …

The firm behind major South Korean social gaming app GameTalkTalk has rolled out a blockchain project for gamers. The new platform includes a reward-based social media DApp, a matchmaking peer-to-peer gaming platform and a digital item exchange. Vinetree Corporation, the company behind GameTalkTalk, announced the Ludena Protocol on April 20, saying that, in the second quarter of 2020, users worldwide will be able to receive the app’s internal digital assets — know as "stars" — for completing in-game missions and downloading new games. A native token and user data collection are on the roadmap Stars can be used to purchase …

Infinite Fleet, a space adventure game, is partnering with blockchain marketplace STOKR to launch a security token offering (STO). In an April 20 blog written by Infinite Fleet, the gaming company announced it would use the tokens issued by Luxembourg-based STOKR to raise funds for its development: “We are making the foray into capital markets and we believe this will offer our supporters the opportunity to own a piece of equity in Infinite Fleet itself… our team has a wealth of experience across both the gaming and crypto industries, and we have always been strong proponents of a new digital …

Nationwide lockdowns have become commonplace in a number of countries across the world as the global community tries to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus. For weeks on end, people have had to hunker down in their homes and practice social distancing in order to “flatten the curve” of COVID-19’s spread. Setting aside the dire consequences this has had on the global economy, the situation has forced people to come up with a wide variety of ways to entertain themselves. While this lockdown may have brought a new meaning to “Netflix and chill,” even watching TV series and movies …

April 16 saw the opening of the Blockdown 2020 online blockchain conference. One of the early panel discussions revolved around the use of blockchain in the gaming industry, and how this is likely to develop in the future. One of the biggest misconceptions that many have about blockchain in gaming is that it is limited to the addition of non-fungible tokens which can be traded independently between players. As Sebastien Borget, co-founder of Sandbox developer Pixowl explained, games like CryptoKitties may have popularized the idea of blockchain in gaming, but in reality, only really scratched the surface of what blockchain …

As more people self-isolate due to the coronavirus pandemic, gaming platforms all over the world have seen a spike in traffic. One report notes that cell network company Verizon claimed that online gaming platforms have seen a 75% increase in traffic with an overall 20% spike in streaming across the web. Despite the fact that the boost in traffic on online gaming platforms is as a result of the unfortunate pandemic, blockchain games have not been left out. A recent report shows Microsoft Azure, a service that allows developers to operate blockchain networks for applications such as Xbox, registering record-high …

As the global economy struggles to adapt to the rapid changes the coronavirus pandemic has forced upon the world, the virtual conference space is booming. The need to engage, communicate and expand our network has perhaps never been so necessary as businesses struggle to survive what may be the next great economic depression. Blockchain and cryptocurrency are sectors of the financial technology industry that are used to leading the way when it comes to innovation, and it’s no surprise that blockchain conferences are quickly moving online in an effort to keep people in the crypto community connected while also maintaining …

Developer 1st Playable has denied rumors one of their games was used to hijack Nintendo’s Switch console to mine Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. While the recent Nintendo release, Cooking Mama: Cookstar, is connected to blockchain technology — it’s not in the way some players have speculated. Addressing the rumors on Twitter, 1st Playable said there was absolutely nothing “shady in the code”: As the developers we can say with certainty there is no cryptocurrency or data collection or blockchain or anything else shady in the code. The Nintendo Switch is a very safe platform, with none of the data and …

Tezos co-founder Kathleen Breitman has left open the possibility that her trading card game Emergents may not be built on the company’s blockchain, according to statements made on April 5. According to the Reddit post, Kathleen pointed out that Emergents might not be using Tezos blockchain technology, saying she had not yet decided on the platform she will use in the game. In a comment left on the post, she added the following: “The alpha doesn’t have a marketplace, it’s an alpha. The white paper doesn’t describe any feature that could not be satisfied by any other smart contract platform. …

Dapper Labs, the company behind the blockchain-based game CryptoKitties, has entered into a partnership with the National Basketball Association (NBA) enabling them to create collectible digital tokens in Brazil. According to the March 24 edition of the Intellectual Property Magazine of Rio de Janeiro, Dapper Labs now has the rights to use NBA branding — including photos of players and games — for its collectibles in Brazil. The program, called “NBA Top Shot”, will allow basketball fans to have more interactions with their favorites by using these engagement tokens linked to games and player contracts. This isn’t the first time …

Refereum, a blockchain-based platform that rewards users for video game engagement and streaming, has partnered with Tron. The collaboration allows Refereum to pay out its video game streaming users in Tron’s TRX coin, and BitTorrent’s BTT token, said an April 2 statement provided to Cointelegraph. Partnerships, more partnerships, and purchases Tron bought software company, BitTorrent Inc, in 2018. BitTorrent also utilizes an associated crypto asset called BTT, which is built on Tron’s blockchain. Refereum teamed up with DLive, a blockchain streaming service, near the end of 2019, giving video game live streamers reward-collecting potential. Furthering the connective web, Tron made …

The Sandbox (TSB), a mobile creation game on Ethereum, announced on April 1 that its third presale of virtual land had generated 3,400 Ether ($450,000) in sales. The March 31 presale sold 12,384 pieces of LAND — virtual spaces in the game — in just five hours. That equates to approximately 10% of the total 166,464 pieces in the game, with most of it snapped up in the first thirty minutes. TSB has quickly become one of the most coveted blockchain games on the market, with more than 40 million downloads. The first presale for the game occurred in Dec. …