Sparkball Launches on Steam and Fifa Rivals Is Ready for Kickoff

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Hello everyone! It's Kostas - welcome back to this week’s edition of Gaming Crypto. This week we are going over two significant game releases and how the launch of the Nintendo Switch 2 might affect web3 gaming.

Sparkball Changes Ecosystems and Launches on Steam

Sparkball announced its migration from Monad to Somnia this week. Despite announcing its move to Monad only last October and raising $2M in a round that included Monad's co-founder Keone Hon as an angel investor, Sparkball has now decided to move to Somnia. While this could initially be viewed as a head-scratcher, the reason behind it seems quite simple. Sparkball is now ready to launch and is ramping up its playtests and game nights, but Monad is still on testnet. Even though blockchains have been highly commoditized, there is still one key requirement that every game needs: availability. Monad wasn't yet ready for Sparkball.

Another interesting fact about Sparkball is that it has launched during Steam's June Fest. SteamFest is a week-long event where players have the chance to download hundreds of early access games or demos and wishlist them if they like the sneak peek they experience. This is the event Sparkball is taking advantage of to introduce itself to Steam's audience.

How will Sparkball launch on Steam as a web3 game, though? Will there be a web2 version of the game? Are they going to circumvent Steam's ban? Or has something changed in how Steam approaches web3 gaming? We will likely explore this in the coming weeks as more details are revealed.

FIFA Rivals Goes Live on June 12

With the FIFA Rivals Marketplace already live on the Mythical website, the game itself is set to launch today, June 12th. The arcade-style football game has already announced a partnership with Adidas to release a series of NFTs. Considering that Adidas also recently collaborated with Xociety, the brand might be showing renewed interest in the space through gaming this time.

Not all players are tradable from the start, but they can all be upgraded to NFTs. Mythicals seem to be the highest tier of players and they are crafted from 5 unique fragments. Fragments can be earned via events, packs, or leaderboard rewards. If you get extra fragments, you can use them to level up your Mythicals. The fragments themselves can be traded on the marketplace. Balls, Kits and Shoes are also tradable!

In many ways, NFL and FIFA Rivals are very similar. The difference maker is that FIFA Rivals is in a sport with a much wider audience and that it comes almost two years after the release of NFL Rivals, meaning FIFA Rivals will hopefully have embedded all the learnings from NFL Rivals. One thing is certain: FIFA Rivals is launching with considerably more hype than NFL Rivals, partly because of the latter's success.

Nintendo Switch 2 Launches and What That Means for Web3 Gaming

June 5th will be marked as the date the Nintendo Switch 2 launched. While we will need to wait a few years before we see where it ranks on the all-time console list, one thing is certain: it's off to a very hot start. Nintendo said that the Switch 2 had set the company's record for the fastest-selling console, with over 3.5 million units sold in four days. The inclusion of Mario Kart World as one of the launch bundles was obviously a big factor in driving up the console's sales.

What does that mean for web3 gaming? First, let me remind you of the three web3 gaming studios that were approved to publish games on Nintendo's consoles.

Andromeda was the first web3 gaming studio to become an accredited Nintendo publisher. They were planning to release SWRMS and a number of other, undisclosed titles on the Nintendo Switch. ChronoForge, an open-world MMORPG, was also approved to launch on Nintendo Switch shortly after. The trio is completed with the approval of Forgotten Runiverse, a fantasy MMORPG.

Will these games now launch on Nintendo Switch 2? The assumption should be yes, since they were only approved a few months before its launch, which means they already knew about it and could plan for its release.

Another obvious connection one can make in web3 gaming is SuiPlay. The handheld console that sits at the forefront of Sui’s gaming strategy. The Nintendo Switch 2 itself shouldn’t impact SuiPlay, but, if Nintendo decides to open up its gates to web3 games, then this could potentially severely stump SuiPlay’s growth opportunities.

🎮 More Gaming & Web3 Stories

• Orange Cap Games, who recently acquired the Moonbirds IP, raised $3.5M in a seed round led by 1kx and Yuga Labs. [Read more here]

• Pirate Nation is removing previously added complexity from its gameplay. [Read more here]

• Pengu Clash is going live on June 18th. [Read more here]

• Angry Dynomites debuted Project Voyager, a meta-game built on top of Craft World, designed to reward their most loyal, engaged players. [Read more here]

• Proof of Play’s vRNG is expanding to HyperEVM. [Read more here]

• Aria Fantasy’s closed beta is launching this week. [Read more here]

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