Off The Grid, battle royale game with planned crypto features, nabs #1 slot on Epic Games Store

A new battle royale game that plans to integrate crypto features through an Avalanche Subnet has gained in popularity online, racking up viewers on the streaming site Twitch and briefly topping the list of popular free-to-play games on the Epic Games Store.

While its crypto features have yet to launch, developer Gunzilla plans to utilize the network to run the game’s in-game economy while also opening up its features to other developers.

Off The Grid,

a cyberpunk-themed battle royale video game currently available as an early release, recently ranked as the #1 free-to-play game on the popular Epic Games Store distribution service, outpacing popular titles such as Fortnite and Genshin Impact. The title is currently ranked around #11 on the same list, as of Sunday, and is also available on PlayStation and Xbox consoles.

Co-created by Neil Blomkamp, the filmmaker behind sci-fi hits such as District 9 and Elysium, the game has attracted a fair number of viewers on Twitch through a partnership with Tyler “Ninja” Blevins, with the game featuring a cosmetic skin modeled after the streamer, and after a feature from controversial streamer Dr. Disrespect. The game currently ranks #32 in popularity among all games being streamed on Twitch, according to analytics site TwitchTracker.

Notably, Off The Grid’s digital economy runs on Gunz, an Avalanche Subnet designed for the game by its developer Gunzilla. The blockchain network, currently running as a testnet, is “…customized to enable seamless gameplay, utilize only in-game tokens for gas fees, and provide an intuitive, rewarding user experience for both Web3 and traditional gamers,” according to a press release.

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The game allows players to use the in-game GUN token to purchase and trade items, which are represented as NFTs, granting players “complete ownership” over their in-game items. However, the crypto features have yet to fully launch, with the token currently only functioning as an in-game currency.

Gunzilla plans to allow other gaming studios to leverage GUNZ’s SDK and components such as its built-in companion app and marketplace to launch their own projects on the GUNZ network. “More projects building on GUNZ will be announced soon,” the press release teases.

“Others post announcements of announcements and write up techno-gobbledygook, while Avalanche enables top-notch people with incredibly demanding use cases to launch high-quality products that just work,” Emin Gün Sirer, founder and CEO of Ava Labs, which develops Avalanche, posted on X in reference to the game.