Written by: Shenchao TechFlow

Do you remember the (MapleStory) that accompanied you in monster hunting, teaming up, and changing outfits?

Younger P players may not have experienced it, but this 20-year-old gaming masterpiece carries the internet café memories of most people born in the 80s and 90s, and is also one of the marks of the era when online games entered China after the millennium.

Now, it has transformed into a new darling of chain games.

MapleStory's English name is MapleStory, and on May 15, the governance token NXPC of the chain game version MapleStory Universe, sharing the same IP, was prominently launched on exchanges like Binance, Upbit, Bithumb, Gate.io, Bybit, Deepcoin, Bitget, Weex, and MEXC; the project token NXPC's price directly broke through $3, with FDV skyrocketing to $3 billion.

Accompanying the price surge is the discussion about NXPC's large airdrop.

Under the current Binance Alpha point system, eligible users will also receive NXPC airdrops; based on NXPC's price at the time of writing, an average user can earn over $600 per single transaction, which is considered the most lucrative 'airdrop benefit' of the year.

Many players jokingly ask if there is still a chance to return to BSC, as the wealth effect has once again gathered attention. (MapleStory) itself represents the nostalgia of old players, while also bringing some hope to the lagging chain game sector.

Can chain games, a sector that has essentially been disproved by the market, still succeed?

Is NXPC truly viable?

We can look at NXPC's wild surge from two directions: how well the project itself is doing, and how it compares to predecessors in the chain game track.

NXPC is the governance token of the MapleStory Universe, launched by Nexon’s blockchain subsidiary NEXPACE. MapleStory, a classic MMORPG that has been operating for 20 years, has accumulated over 180 million players worldwide and historical revenue of up to $4 billion, making it one of the evergreen titles in the gaming industry.

Now, Nexon has moved this IP onto the chain, attempting to create a community-driven digital economy ecosystem through MapleStory Universe.

According to the project's white paper, NXPC has a total supply of 1 billion tokens, with 16.37% (approximately 163.7 million tokens) unlocked immediately through airdrops, and 80% allocated for subsequent ecosystem rewards, aimed at incentivizing long-term participation from players and creators.

NXPC also has a sister token NESO, used for in-game trading scenarios, which can be freely exchanged with NXPC, forming a dual-token model. This design attempts to find a balance between game economy and token value, but it also makes many investors smell the opportunity for 'gold farming'.

From this economic model, it's still the cycle of 'main token -- sub-token -- NFT assets', where one token serves as the platform token, possessing governance or staking functions while obtaining various rights in the game's rule design; the other token is purely used as game currency within the game, with both tokens consumed together to support the economic cycle of NFT equipment and items.

This is not fundamentally different from the gameplay of most previous chain games.

If we compare it to previous projects that were once wildly popular in the chain game sector, it seems we can calculate a fair price range.

Is NXPC's current price above $3 already touching its ceiling?

Based on NXPC's current circulation of 16.37% (approximately 163.7 million tokens), and referencing the current market capitalization and historical peaks of leading projects such as Gala Games, The Sandbox, Decentraland, Axie Infinity, and Mobox, a theoretical estimation can be made:

Current market capitalization benchmark: based on NXPC's current price of $3 (at the time of writing), it is already higher than Mobox's $0.24 and Axie Infinity's $2.17, comparable to Decentraland's $3.4.

If benchmarked against Gala Games and The Sandbox's market capitalizations of $703 million and $691 million, NXPC's price is expected to hit the $4.06-4.13 range.

However, compared to the undervaluation of Mobox, NXPC's current price seems to contain higher market expectations.

Historical peak benchmark: looking back at the 2021-2022 chain game bull market, Gala Games and The Sandbox had market capitalizations as high as $6.9-7 billion. If we estimate based on the historical peak market caps of these projects during that market environment, their prices could reach the $15-40 range.

But the premise is that NXPC must replicate the ecological activity and market frenzy of these projects back in their day.

From a fundamental perspective, the game sector itself does not have particularly large narratives or technical breakthroughs; relying on a single old (MapleStory) IP to drive the price to this range seems overly optimistic.

Instant Effect

From the current data, NXPC seems more like an anomaly in capital movement.

The funding rate for the Binance NXPC/USDT perpetual contract once dropped to -2%, and is currently at -0.7%, indicating that short sellers need to pay long holders. This negative premium is often a precursor to a short squeeze—many short positions are forced to close, driving the price further up.

At the same time, NXPC's first-day launch on major exchanges like Binance has ensured short-term trading depth and liquidity; many exchanges continuously launching contracts have further stimulated speculative capital inflow.

MEXC data shows that NXPC's 24-hour trading volume reached $6.85 million, indicating a glimpse of speculative sentiment.

Returning to the fundamentals, NXPC's value realization also faces significant challenges.

First, the game is currently in the public testing phase, and the player retention rate and economic model's stability have not yet been tested by the market. The lesson from Axie Infinity tells us that if chain game projects rely too heavily on speculation while neglecting player experience and economic balance, they are unlikely to last long.

Secondly, NXPC's value heavily relies on the activity of the creator economy.

NXPC emphasizes the creator economy rather than a simple 'gold farming' model. MapleStory Universe allows players and creators to produce content through Synergy Apps, such as designing unique equipment or levels, and minting them through NXPC as NFTs for trading.

If creator participation is insufficient, or the liquidity of the NFT item trading market is low, NXPC's demand may significantly decline. Transitioning from 'Play-to-Earn' to 'Create-to-Earn' is not new; we've seen this frequently in our previous observations of chain game projects.

From the reactions on crypto Twitter, NXPC's popularity indeed benefits from both the IP appeal of MapleStory and the dual boost of wealth effects, but the community's focus is more on short-term gains rather than the long-term value of the game ecosystem.

Another key point is that this is a Korean game, and it is an undeniable fact that young people in Korea are keen on trading cryptocurrencies, which gives the market potential to drive NXPC's rise; changes in indicators on Upbit may be more influential on NXPC's fate.

However, you cannot conclude that the entire garden is flourishing just because one flower is blooming well. The fate of chain games remains undecided.

MapleStory restarts its adventures in the crypto world, but it faces many youths who have already exited due to losses in chain games.