A clicker game on Steam recently became the talk of the town after flipping among the hottest games on the platform. ‘Banana’ became a sensation for its NFT-like rewards, which will be sold for over $1,000 on Steam’s marketplace. Nonetheless, the click phenomenon has sparked a debate amongst crypto community members concerning the state of crypto and web3 gaming.
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Peeling Steam’s Clicker Game Sensation
Banana is an indie game on Steam that consists of clicking the image of a banana to acquire rewards. Although not the primary of its kind, its players are rewarded with digital bananas every few hours. Rewards can go from common bananas price pennies to rare bananas, which will be sold for as much as $1,300.
The free-to-play game hit the news after it surpassed among the hottest titles on the platform. Banana flipped Elder Ring and Baldur’s Gate 3 within the most-played games list. The clicker game only got here second to Counter-Strike 2.
As of this writing, the sport stays the fourth most played game on Steam, with over 344,000 current players and a 578,000 peak within the last 24 hours. Furthermore, it reached an all-time peak of 917,000 players earlier this month.
Banana is the fourth most-played game on Steam. Source: SteamDB
Nonetheless, the simplicity of the sport raised some alarms amongst gamers. Many believed the clicker game contained malware that turns devices into crypto miners. While others wondered if the sport was a scam of sorts.
One among Banana’s developers, Hery, denied the accusations. Hery told news media outlet Polygon that it “is just about a silly game” with bananas, not a scam.
Many users also speculated if the sport was related to NFTs and cryptocurrencies, because it had an NFT-like feeling but without the blockchain technology. A Banana team member clarified that “Banana wants nothing to do with crypto.”
They explained that the sport had no intention of integrating crypto because it doesn’t “mix well” with Steam. Moreover, they emphasized that it began as “a goofy game to gather some bananas in your Steam profile.”
Are Crypto And Web3 Gaming Going Banana?
Although Banana doesn’t plan on integrating with the crypto industry, the sport sparked several conversations among the many community. Several members took the chance to debate its implications for web3 gaming.
A user highlighted the sport’s popularity despite its easy mechanics, proposing the industry doesn’t need ‘AAA games’ to interrupt out. Several community members agreed and suggested there’s a misconception concerning the kind of games needed in web3.
Although complex and super motion games are believed to be the one option, “dudes just wanna rejoice and make points,” said an X user. Seemingly, the sentiment amongst many was that the industry is “making it more complicated than it’s.”
Some users imagine that Banana and similar games could help with web3 gaming. The meme quality of the sport was identified as a possible catalyst for broader adoption.
Similarly, this week, Avalanche Gaming discussed Banana’s implications on its Gamified Show. In response to Paul Bettner, game developer and co-founder of Playful Studios, Banana might be a getaway to the larger world of crypto gaming.
To Bettner, “the behavior that all of us love and take part in web3 as degens and web3 and crypto native users is, in truth, universal.” While watching the phenomenon of Steam’s clicker sensation evolve, the sport developer noticed that users were “a bunch of degens that don’t know they’re degens yet.”
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Ultimately, he considers that “persons are learning degen.” If most of those users knew “what a wallet or a blockchain was, they might realize they may try this at 1000x the size on a blockchain.”
In response to the weekly chart, the full crypto market capitalization is at $2.24 trillion. Source: TOTAL on TradingView
Featured Image from Unsplash.com, Chart from TradingView.com