The Sandbox, Decentraland, and Gala Gaming Tokens Surge After Long Lull

If there’s anything that competitive gaming could teach us, it’s that early setbacks don’t determine future outcomes.

A substantial rally is building among top gaming tokens, with The Sandbox (SAND) leading gains.

Its token, SAND, has seen a jump of more than 32.3% over the last 24 hours, bringing its price to the $0.8 level. It’s also showing signs of strong momentum, with a 7-day increase of 26.2%, CoinGecko data shows.

The numbers are more telling when compared over a longer time period: SAND is up 131% over two weeks and 243% over the past month.

The Sandbox is an Ethereum-based metaverse game platform. In May, the game launched its own DAO, enabling token holders to decide what matters for the game and its on-chain economy.

“Gaming tokens are the backbone of the Web3 gaming ecosystem,” Gabby Dizon, co-founder of Yield Guild Games, told Decrypt. “People hold gaming tokens because they believe in the potential of Web3 to redefine gaming,” Dizon added.

Notably, demand for SAND brought in over $880 million worth of trades over the past 24 hours, an increase of 88% from its previous day, according to historical data.

Bouncing back

Earlier in June, Decrypt reported how gaming tokens were among the hardest hit in the crypto market as Bitcoin and Ethereum rallies cooled down.

Over 30% of these games were discontinued as 2024 started, and the sector later suffered major losses after the Bitcoin halving.

Despite these drawdowns, gaming tokens have maintained a significant following.

According to a Dune dashboard based on research by independent data analyst PanteraFi, SAND has a 13.4% market share for its GameFi Index, which tracks games across decentralized platforms.

“The use case for gaming tokens is about ownership. Players can own their digital assets, trade them freely, and have a say in the direction of the games they play. It’s about aligning incentives between developers and players, so everyone benefits,” says Dizon.

Gaming sector makes a push

Back to numbers, CoinGecko data shows that the intraday changes in volume for SAND has cooled down from November 25, which was when the trading for the asset jumped from $523 million to $5.2 billion overnight. Over the same period, the price also lept from $0.4 to $0.7.

Meanwhile, the native token belonging to Decentraland (MANA), a blockchain gaming ecosystem, has also risen higher on the day, up 17.5% at the time of writing.

Gala Games (GALA), another blockchain gaming ecosystem, also saw its token rise 21.8% over the last 24 hours. That coincided with GALA’s trading volume, which swelled 65.8% to $977 million and clocked a market cap of just over $2.1 billion.

Axie Infinity’s AXS token has also shown remarkable strength, recording an 21.1% gain and reaching $9.29 — its highest price point in eight months. This comes after the game development studio behind it, Sky Mavis, announced a layoff for 21% of its staff and confirmed that it’s working on a new game.

The AXS token’s market cap now stands at $1.4 billion, supported by a healthy 24-hour trading volume of $472 million. The broader gaming governance token market has also seen modest movement, with the total market cap increasing by 6% to $5.4 billion.

“The games that come out on top this cycle will be the ones that are able to target and onboard value-adding communities at scale,” Dizon noted.

Edited by Stacy Elliott.