Nonetheless, that cryptocurrency’s rally has investors and enthusiasts hardening their stance on Solana overtaking Ethereum as the go-to blockchain platform for smart contracts someday. At the time of writing, the only other cryptocurrencies ranking higher than Solana are Binanace Coin, Ether and Bitcoin.

The latest surge in Solana’s price, currently resting at $246.16 after its investment arm, Solana Ventures, announced a new $100 million fund to boost gaming on the blockchain in partnership with Lightspeed Venture Partners and the derivatives exchange — which recently raised $420 million, putting its valuation at $25 billion — FTX.

The money will be used to help gaming studios, technology companies and other projects that intersect between ‘blockchain and gaming’.

What does Solana have to do with blockchain gaming?

Solana has seen its popularity sour in the era of decentralised finance (DeFi) and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). It is popular among developers who no longer want to deal with Ethereum’s volatile transaction fees with Solana advertising itself as the cheap and more efficient alternative. It’s one of the primary reasons that Ethereum is looking to upgrade to Ethereum 2.0 by next year.

And, NFTs are the common thread between the crypto universe and blockchain gaming. Just like cryptocurrencies, NFTs rely on digital ledgers — blockchains — to authenticate digital items.

Axie Infinity, currently the largest NFT project in the world worth nearly $3 billion as per CryptoSlam’s stats, is a play-to-earn (P2E) blockchain game. And, it’s not just Pokemon-like pets that have caught the attention of developers. In game assets range from spaceships to land plots to jetpacks and other items.

Solana doubles down on blockchain gaming:

None of the gaming projects on Solana are nearly as big but Star Atlas, which is looking to create its own metaverse akin to the Sandbox, is pegged to beat Axie Infinity.

Faraway, one of the leading blockchain studios in the world, raised $30 million in early-stage funding to develop browser-based games on the Solana network. It is looking to launch its flagship browser-based game titled Mini Royale: Nations, a first-person shooter game, as the first live multiplayer game on Solana.

The overall global gaming industry currently stands at $175 billion and is estimated to cross $200 billion by 2023, according to games and esports analytics company Newzoo. And, investments in blockchain gaming have been ramping up.

In the first half of 2021, crypto gaming companies closed 24 deals — double the amount of deals in the entire last year — with a total value of $476 million as per data collated by Invest Game.

Provided the demand for NFTs and DeFi continues to build, Solana’s price could have more room to run and hit a new all-time-high before the year is up.