In an innovative move, Arbitrum Foundation and Japanese gaming blockchain Oasys have joined forces to bring L2 scaling solution Arbitrum Orbit beyond Ethereum. 

As part of the partnership, Oasys will integrate the L2 and L3 Ethereum tech stack into its infrastructure, the first time Arbitrum Orbit has gone beyond Ethereum in terms of gaming specific chains. 

Further, Oasys will support new L2 chains, which it calls verses, on its L1 blockchain using Arbitrum Orbit, hoping this will serve as a bridge to the ever growing Arbitrum game ecosystem. 

Arbitrum Orbit is also used by the likes of Proof of Play and Xai for their Ethereum-based L3 blockchains.

Recently unveiled Uprising Verse from new outfit Uprising Labs will be the first L2 to integrate the solution, through which it will launch naval battle royale title Maelstrom. Thanks to the collaboration between Oasys, Arbitrum, and web3 scaling tech provider AltLayer, Oasys says any game developer will now find it both faster and easier to deploy Arbitrum Orbit onto Oasys. 

Oasys director or technology Ryo Manzoku, commented, ”We are honoured that the Aribtrum Foundation is collaborating with Oasys as part of their strategy to expand Arbitrum Orbit beyond Ethereum. By tapping into the vast potential of the Arbitrum ecosystem through Uprising Verse, we can grow and enhance the Oasys blockchain.”

Arbitrum Foundation head of partnerships Nina Rong, said, “It is fantastic to see Oasys choose Orbit as the gaming stack of choice going forward, further entrenching Arbitrum as the leading stack for web3 gaming. The Oasys team has an amazing foothold in the Asia gaming sector which aligns with our strategic goals of deepening adoption of the Arbitrum technology in the regional home of gaming.”

Singaporean game developer Confiction Labs has announced its flagship title Riftstorm is coming to Arbitrum-based gaming L3 Xai.

As part of the collaboration, Xai will support Riftstorm with blockchain integration and the forthcoming game launch. No official release date has yet been announced. 

In terms of the game, it’s described as a top-down roguelite shooter with co-op elements, entailing various weapon skills and challenging dungeons. Currently based on PC, the game will eventually expand to mobile and console platforms too.

In March 2024, Confiction rolled out an early Riftstorm playtest via Steam. It attracted 22,000 players from 110 countries, including over 800 live streamers and content creators.

“When Riftstorm launched its Steam playtest, we knew that this was a truly special title and one that would be a perfect fit for Xai,” commented Ex Populus head of strategy Soby Saqib.

“Blending some of gaming’s greatest hits from Diablo to the original Helldivers, Riftstorm unlocks a brand new co-op shooter for gamers in our ecosystem and will represent one of our next generation flagship titles, with critical support from our team as we transition the game into a web3 framework.”

“With cross-platform play, deep lore, and a thriving community-driven ecosystem, Riftstorm will offer a truly immersive experience. To deliver that vision, we need a technology that is not only scalable but also seamless to the users,” said Confiction Labs CEO Arief Widhiyasa.

“We’re excited to partner with the Xai Foundation to leverage their technology as the first gaming L3 blockchain that’s proven to be the fastest and most scalable EVM gaming chain.”

As for Confiction Labs’ wider vision for collaborative gameplay, it recently unveiled Proof of Exposure, a new system for verifying players. Due to the increasing bot activity in web3 games, it aims to tackle issues such as cheating by distinguishing real players from automated bot accounts.

Discover more via Riftstorm’s official website.

Paxos, a leading tokenization platform, will integrate Arbitrum, marking its first foray into the Ethereum layer-2 ecosystem, according to a Sept. 10 statement shared with CryptoSlate.

This move aims to streamline institutional integration on Arbitrum for on-chain tokenization of real-world assets.

Using Arbitrum, Paxos will tap into Ethereum’s liquidity, benefiting from faster speeds and lower costs. This move will also allow enterprises and institutions to leverage DeFi capabilities, driving innovation in financial products and services.

Both platforms are set to bring tokenized assets to the Arbitrum protocol soon. Details about these products have yet to be released.

Meanwhile, Paxos’ regulated framework would ensure its tokenization offerings comply with financial regulations. Further, the integration will allow its institutional clients to benefit from Arbitrum’s scalable and efficient infrastructure.

According to L2Beats data, Arbitrum is the largest Ethereum network, controlling around 40% of the layer-2 ecosystem, far ahead of rivals like Optimism and the Coinbase-backed Base network.

Driving stablecoin adoption

Luke Xiao, Fintech Partnership Lead at Offchain Labs, emphasized the collaboration’s impact on Arbitrum and the broader DeFi landscape.

Xiao expressed enthusiasm about introducing stablecoin issuance and regulated tokenization through Paxos on Arbitrum.

Xiao stated:

“Arbitrum’s high performance network and robust ecosystem makes it a natural home for Paxos’ tokenization platform. This collaboration brings together Paxos’ industry-leading infrastructure and Arbitrum’s robust onchain ecosystem. We’re excited to see the transformative impact this will have on DeFi and the broader Arbitrum ecosystem.”

Walter Hessert, Paxos’ Head of Strategy, expressed optimism about the partnership and highlighted its potential to drive the widespread adoption of stablecoins. He said:

“Arbitrum is known for its speed, security and scalability, which is critical to driving long-term adoption of digital assets across industries.  In the next three years, the adoption of stablecoins by both retail and institutional user will explode and Paxos will drive that paradigm shift.”

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Coinbase’s layer-2 network Base has recently achieved a key milestone, hitting over 1 million daily active addresses.

According to data from blockchain analytics platform GrowThePie, the Ethereum layer-2 network surpassed the 1 million mark for the first time on Aug. 24 when its active addresses reached 1.05 million.

Blockchain analytics platform Token Terminal corroborated this and compared Base’s growth to other layer-2 networks, concluding that Coinbase’s solution has outperformed its competitors.

Record-high transactions

Unsurprisingly, this milestone has translated into a record-high number of transactions on the network.

GrowThePie’s data shows that Base processed more than 4 million transactions during the last 24 hours, while Arbitrum—the largest Ethereum layer-2 network by total value locked—facilitated only 1.97 million transactions in the same period.

Further, the decentralized exchange’s total trading activity across Base has soared recently. Per DeFillama’s data, the network now accounts for around 10% of the sector’s volume, behind Binance Smart Chain (BSC) but ahead of major layer-1 blockchain networks like Avalanche and Tron.

Notably, Token Terminal stated that the Base network accounts for 84% of the daily active addresses on Uniswap, the largest decentralized exchange in the industry.

Market analysts highlighted the significance of these numbers, noting the strong adoption of Base despite its lack of a native token, unlike other layer-2 networks. Instead, Base has been able to attract increasing users to its platform via its seamless interoperability features and introduction of several innovations.

This has propelled it to become the second-largest Ethereum layer-2 network within a year of its launch. L2Beats data shows that its market share stands at around 17%, with the total value of assets locked on it at $6.3 billion.

Basenames launch

Meanwhile, these important milestones coincide with the network’s recent launch of Basenames.

On Aug. 21, Base introduced Basenames, allowing users to purchase a name linked to their Base wallet addresses. This service, built on the Ethereum Name Service platform, aims to enhance communication between users on Base.

By Aug. 26, Base’s lead developer Jesse Pollak announced that Basenames had attracted 200,000 users in its first week. Pollak also revealed that the network is exploring using multi-address domains with Basenames, allowing users to link multiple addresses to a single name.

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The Arbitrum Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) has passed a proposal to introduce ARB staking for the largest Ethereum layer-2 network.

Staking initiative

The proposal, which received overwhelming community support, aims to launch ARB staking to enhance the token’s utility and governance participation.

This initiative seeks to protect the DAO Treasury from potential attacks. According to Tally’s Arbitrum data, the DAO currently holds approximately $1.9 billion in assets, including Arbitrum and Ethereum.

This significant holding makes the DAO an attractive target for malicious actors, as the cost of purchasing ARB for voting power isn’t rising proportionally to defend against attacks.

To counter this risk, the proposal suggests ARB staking to unlock utility and align governance. It plans to create a mechanism that streams future rewards from DAO-generated sources—such as sequencer fees, MEV fees, validator fees, token inflation, and treasury diversification—to token holders delegated to active governance participants.

This initiative will introduce ARB staking using the Tally governance system and launch a liquid staking token, stARB. However, fee distribution to token holders will not begin immediately.

Staking will also allow token holders to earn value on their assets. The Tally Protocol system for stARB supports auto-compounding and restaking of future rewards while remaining compatible with DeFi.

Token unlock

This approval coincides with the network’s planned release of over 92 million ARB tokens—accounting for 2.77% of the circulating supply—later today. The project will execute a “Cliff Unlock,” releasing the tokens simultaneously. At current prices, these tokens are worth more than $50 million, according to Token Unlocks data.

Typically, token unlocks can cause significant market volatility for digital assets because it could lead to a supply shock and a potential price drop. This possibility has fueled speculation that many holders might take short positions against the token.

Already, the anticipated unlock appears to have negatively impacted ARB’s price, which has dropped more than 2% in the last 24 hours to $0.60 as of press time, according to CryptoSlate’s data.

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Web3 game developer Pixelcraft has rebranded its Arbitrum L3 gaming chain as Geist, also unveiling a members-only approach for its Aavegotchi game ecosystem.

Earlier in 2024, Pixelcraft announced its forthcoming L3 rollup, then codenamed Gotchichain, was settling on Ethereum L2 Base. Prior to the move, Aavegotchi had been announced to deploy to Polygon.

Now the developer has announced its L3 Gotchichain will be called Geist, which it describes as “the first members-only blockchain, built for gaming.”

As such the permissioned gaming chain is limited to games and apps approved either by Pixelcraft or the AavegotchiDAO. In another attempt to tackle bot activity, only members who are invited will be able to claim rewards such as airdrops and giveaways. Notably, non-members will still be able to play and transact on the chain, but not be eligible to claim any benefits.

To become a Geist member, you have to get an invite code, which will initially be airdropped only to Aavegotchi NFT holders. From then on, it hopes the network effect will take over. Additionally, some invites will also be given to users with “good onchain history”. 

This approach is the result of what Pixelcraft identifies as a gap in the market for gaming blockchains focusing on quality over quantity, both in terms of games and users. In contrast to these, Geist is focused on genuine followers and players, rather than driven by impressive user numbers.

You can find out more via the Aavegotchi whitepaper.

Arbitrum said it has collaborated with stablecoin issuer Circle to support the use of bridged USD Coin (USDC) as a custom gas token for Orbit Chains, according to an Aug. 7 statement shared with CryptoSlate.

The Ethereum-based scaling solution stated that this development is part of a broader set of initiatives it is currently pursuing with Circle.

Arbitrum is the largest Ethereum Layer 2 blockchain network, with the total value of assets locked on it at $3.3 billion, according to DeFiLlama data,

The network’s native ARB token hit an all-time low of $0.4317 on Aug. 5 amid a broader market decline that resulted in over $1 billion in liquidations.

Orbit Chain gas fees

Orbit Chains, introduced in March 2023, enable the creation of highly customizable networks with advanced throughput and governance features. Initially, these chains only accepted Ethereum for gas fees.

However, Arbitrum has allowed these Chains to use any ERC20 token as transaction fees since January.

This change has now been extended to Circle’s USDC, which the platform believes will significantly enhance transaction processes within its ecosystem while offering users greater convenience, price stability, and accessibility.

Why USDC?

Arbitrum explained that USDC’s adoption streamlines payments, removing the need for multiple tokens for gas fees. As a stablecoin, USDC ensures more stable and predictable gas costs, mitigating concerns over ETH’s price fluctuations.

Additionally, the integration of USDC is expected to boost liquidity and accessibility by tapping into USDC’s significant $1.6 billion supply on Arbitrum. This lowers entry barriers for projects developing on Arbitrum Orbit Chains and simplifies user interactions by removing the need for USDC conversions.

For builders, this move facilitates easier customization of Orbit Chains through Orbit RaaS providers, including platforms like Alt Layer, Caldera, Conduit, Gelato Network, Ankr, and Alchemy.

Moreover, it opens up opportunities for applying to Circle’s USDC Grant Program, which supports projects utilizing USDC as gas tokens.

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Ubisoft Labs has announced the particularly titled Captain Laserhawk: the G.A.M.E.

Based on the animated TV series Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix, which was inspired by Ubisoft’s Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon game — also including IP from other Ubisoft games including Assassin’s Creed, Rainbow Six and Beyond Good and Evil — the game is set in an alternative universe in which the US has become a dystopian technocracy called Eden and Rayman is the face of the regime.

Labelled a “transmedia gaming adventure where the community drives the narrative through innovative governance”, Captain Laserhawk: the G.A.M.E. will be underpinned by 10,000 Citizen ID NFTs, which gate early access to the game, as well as recording governance activity. They will also provide users with the ability to earn in-game currency and rewards.

And as the story unfolds, the entire community will have the opportunity to influence the plot and participate in key decision-making moments by unlocking, creating, and sharing content.

In terms of actual gameplay, Captain Laserhawk: the G.A.M.E. will be a competitive top-down shooter, while its blockchain elements will be handled using Sequence’s tech, running on Arbitrum.

“With Arbitrum’s supercharged blockchain infrastructure and Sequence’s full web3 stack as the foundation, Captain Laserhawk: the G.A.M.E. is poised to be a groundbreaking player-driven project,” commented Ubisoft Labs VP Nicolas Pouard.

“Here, players can have fun and actively contribute to the lore and evolution of the game. Blockchain features empower us to give the community a real voice in shaping the story, gameplay, and even side experiences. This fosters transparency and shared creation, paving the way for a truly collaborative future for Captain Laserhawk.”

You can check out more of the weirdness at the Eden Online website.

DeFi protocol Li.Fi has announced its expansion into the Solana ecosystem, aiming to enhance user experience across decentralized applications (dApps) by facilitating cross-chain interactions, according to an Aug. 7 statement shared with CryptoSlate.

Phillip Zentner, the CEO and Founder of Li.Fi emphasized the significance of this expansion, pointing out that it would allow the protocol to offer a straightforward and secure way to manage assets within Solana’s ecosystem.

Notably, LiFi’s expansion is coming less than a month after the platform suffered a $10 million hack on the Ethereum and Arbitrum networks. The protocol has since resolved the issue and is working with law enforcement to recover the stolen funds.

Solana expansion

Li.Fi said this expansion builds on last year’s initial connection with Solana’s Phantom wallet.

The platform believes that integrating with Solana will allow crypto applications to deliver a more user-friendly experience, making cross-chain interactions simpler and more intuitive.

This would be achieved by enabling in-app swapping and bridging capabilities for Solana users through new options for cross-chain transactions with Wormhole-powered Mayan bridge and Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol (CCTP).

Additionally, Li.FI has integrated with Jupiter, a Solana-based DEX, to provide users with swapping rates that are deemed cost-effective and efficient.

The integrations are already live through the Li.Fi API, SDK, and Widget. Looking ahead, Li.Fi plans to support SVM chains, starting with Eclipse and expanding to other chains.

The DeFi platform believes these moves would help attract more users to the Solana ecosystem, which is currently one of the fastest-rising blockchain networks in the industry.

Further, it will help crypto applications generate revenue from asset-swapping fees while opening up new liquidity opportunities from sources like DEXs and bridges.

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Token Unlocks data shows that several crypto projects—Avalanche, Wormhole, Aptos, Sandbox, Arbitrum, Optimism, and others—are set to unlock tokens valued at about $1 billion in August.

Approximately $260 million will be released in the first three days of the month.

Crypto projects frequently plan token unlocks to control asset supply and prevent market oversaturation. This gradual release helps avoid significant sell-offs by early investors or team members holding large quantities of the crypto asset.

Wormhole, Avalanche to release over $400 million worth of tokens

The largest unlocks this month will come from Wormhole and Avalanche.

On Aug. 3, Wormhole, a cross-chain messaging protocol, will release 600 million tokens worth $151.67 million, constituting 33.33% of its circulating supply.

Avalanche will follow on Aug. 20, unlocking 9.54 million AVAX tokens valued at approximately $251 million, representing 2.42% of its circulating supply.

Token Unlocks dashboard shows that 4.5 million AVAX worth $118.53 million will go to the Avalanche team, 2.25 million AVAX worth $59.27 million to strategic partners, and the remainder will be allocated to the Foundation and as airdrops.

Farid Rached, the former Ecosystem Growth Manager at Avalanche, pointed out that this planned unlock would be the most bullish in its history because “it is the last major one for team and public/private investors.”

Other major unlocks

Sui, a layer-1 network, will unlock 64 million tokens valued at $50 million, representing 2.56% of its circulating supply on Aug. 1.

Similarly, the decentralized exchange dYdX will release 8.33 million tokens worth nearly $11 million, amounting to 3.65% of its circulating supply. These tokens will be distributed to investors, founders, staff, and future employees.

Aptos will unlock 11.31 million APT tokens worth $74.64 million on Aug. 12. These will be allocated among the Aptos Community, Core Contributors, Foundation, and Investors, with Core Contributors receiving the most significant share—3.96 million APT valued at $26 million.

On Aug. 14, Sandbox will release 205.6 million SAND tokens worth $66.75 million. This release will be divided among the team, advisors, and a company reserve.

Finally, Ethereum’s layer-2 networks Arbitrum and Optimism will collectively unlock over $110 million worth of tokens by Aug. 16 and Aug. 31, respectively.

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Arbitrum’s Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) is reviewing a proposal to expand the network’s Orbit Chain to other blockchains beyond Ethereum.

Expansion program

In January, the Arbitrum Foundation introduced the Arbitrum Expansion program to extend its Orbit Chain to other Ethereum-based chains.

The program allowed crypto projects to fork the Arbitrum codebase and tailor it to their business needs while sharing 10% of their profits with the broader Arbitrum ecosystem. These chains have gained significant adoption in recent months as they enable the development of highly customizable throughput and governance-enabled networks.

So, due to this growing demand, the Foundation proposed expanding the Orbit Chain to non-Ethereum networks. It stated:

“Over the past few weeks, the Arbitrum Foundation has received inbound interest from projects that want to deploy their own Orbit chain on other networks including, but not limited to: Bitcoin, Binance Smart Chain, Cosmos, and others.”

The Foundation expects this interest to continue growing, especially as the Arbitrum Tech Stack gains popularity on Ethereum.

Community supports move

Early feedback shows strong community support, with 99.8% of the over 14 million ARB token votes in the “temperature check” favoring the proposal. The voting will conclude on July 31.

The community’s backing is tied to the numerous benefits the Arbitrum Foundation claims the expansion will bring to the ecosystem.

The Foundation stated that expanding Orbit deployments could boost ArbitrumDAO’s revenue and enhance the dominance of Ethereum Virtual Machines (EVM) and Stylus (EVM+).

The Foundation also noted that limiting Orbit chains to only Ethereum might hinder the adoption of the Arbitrum Tech Stack because other rollups continue to deploy freely.

Arbitrum is one of Ethereum’s most extensive layer-2 scaling solutions with a total value locked (TVL) of $3.1 billion, according to DeFiLlama data.

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Blockchain games won’t flourish as long as their underlying infrastructure can’t facilitate their growth. At least this notion is what motivated web3 gaming company Ex Populus to build gaming-centric chain Xai, which is an L3 built on Arbitrum. In addition to its infrastructure, Ex Populus is also busy making games, including upcoming fully onchain deck builder Final Form.

We thought it a good time to check in with founder and CEO Tobias Batton.

When networks aren’t designed with a priority on gaming, they severely limit what can be built, leaving players with games that are just okay and not great.

Tobias Batton, Ex Populus

BlockchainGamer: With plenty of existing web3 infrastructure already, why did you think the industry needed an additional gaming L3 chain?

Batton: Web3 infrastructure at present isn’t designed to allow web3 games to grow, which is what drove the creation of Xai. When we started to look for a network for our games at Ex Populus, it became clear that none of the options on the market were optimized for gaming or have the processing speeds needed to make incredibly ambitious projects possible.

That’s when we set out to create a truly purpose built network for gaming and believe we’ve created the only true gaming option on the market.

In what way is Xai different from other gaming rollups?

For starters, we’re the fastest network building on Ethereum out of all of the other gaming rollups. This allows us to process more onchain and makes high throughput operations like gaming much more efficient on Xai. On top of this, we’re redefining the way that gamers interact with web3 games through innovations like wallet abstraction, improving the user experience for newcomers.

Our team prides itself on truly supporting developers as they build on Xai and giving them the tools they need to succeed with programs like our Tokenomics Bootcamp. This is in contrast to other gaming chains that will promise developers the world but not provide real support to bring games to their platform.

Why did you choose to leverage Arbitrum?

With our vision for Xai, we needed to make sure we had technology that could sustain the scalability of a proper gaming network, and work with a team that shared our ambitious outlook on what web3 gaming can provide for the industry. Offchain Labs and Arbitrum fit that bill and we worked collaboratively with their team to develop Xai as a Layer 3 in its Arbitrum Orbit network. As we’ve grown into a standalone chain, their team has remained supportive and we’re thrilled with the partnership we’ve been able to forge for the benefits of both parties.

Is it more important for such ecosystems to have a large number of games or a few high volume games?

It’s definitely important for ecosystems to have multiple games available for their players and to have a healthy schedule of new releases. With that said, it’s less about having high volume games and more about having developers who are making engaging and fun experiences that happen to be built on, or incorporate, web3 technology.

The volume and player numbers will follow if the game makes players want to keep coming back, with consistent content releases to keep it fresh. That’s a lot of what we are seeing with games like Helldivers right now. It’s a fantastic game with a great design, but there’s not enough content to keep players around long term. That’s what makes games great and what will drive the volume numbers behind flagship titles.

Why do you think web3 gaming isn’t mass market yet?

There’s multiple factors but the lack of purpose built infrastructure is definitely a leading cause. When networks aren’t designed with a priority on gaming, they severely limit what can be built, leaving players with games that are just okay and not great. On top of this, there still hasn’t been that “wow” moment for a blockchain game that naturally brings a traditional gaming playerbase into the web3 gaming ecosystem. The evolution of gaming has always been on the back of a breakout experience in a new market. Web3 will be no different.

With the advancement of infrastructure in our space, combined with real developers and studios that have been grinding for years on a tried and true gaming experience, it feels like the market-moving game is likely around the corner.

How will Xai contribute to the mainstream adoption of blockchain?

The easiest way to bring about mainstream adoption is to just build great games, which is what is driving our Vanguard: Genesis campaign. We’re also continuing to push the capabilities of our network, having led all ETH-based blockchains in transactions per second over the last few weeks. As mentioned, in order to have great games there has to be great infrastructure – Xai is proving to be the chain to support those games and we’re confident that we’ll be at the center of mainstream adoption for blockchain-based games.

Can you tell us more about where your own games – Final Form, LAMOverse, and others – are currently up to?

Final Form is next to be released, and we are very excited about the project.  The game is fully onchain while also boasting AAA production values. This opens a world of possibilities for composability and modability, while also improving security. 

From everything we have seen, we believe Final Form is the most ambitious fully on chain game in the industry and we believe it has the potential to put a big dent in how the industry makes and publishes games.

There are examples of developers being too ambitious and spreading out too thinly in trying to combine both game making and infrastructure. Do you see any risks in this regard?

There is definitely a learning curve for developers moving from web2 to web3, so there can be issues that arise in the development process. This is where the support of the chain comes in, helping to fast track developers onto the platform and get them leveraging web3 capabilities without hassle. The goal is to have developers focused on the actual building of the game, while allowing the chain itself to provide the infrastructure needed for the title to be successful.

If you entered the web3 gaming space as a developer today, would your priorities be different in any way?

Traditional game developers entering the web3 gaming space should educate themselves on the discipline of tokenomics. When done correctly, tokenomics open a world of possibilities for traditional gamers.  Games can be truly free to play, with no need for a premium price, or paid in-game items.  You are in essence designing your own municipality, with its own economic levers and dials. It’s an amazing new world.

Discover more via Xai’s official website and X account.