On May 10th, MetaOasis DAO invited several Web3 practitioners to share their opinions about the trend of land NFTs and PFP NFTs. MetaOasis DAO Founding Contributor John attended as the host, together with Dorothy, a Web3 builder and investor. The conferees reached a consensus that land NFTs have great potential, meanwhile, there are challenges that must be met.

Let’s review what topics they discussed.

- Yuga Labs has expanded its business from PFP NFTs to metaverse land NFTs. Sandbox and NFT worlds, on the other hand, started from the lands and then issued 3D PFP NFTs. Is it a trend that all the bluechip PFP NFTs will consider the land sale, and vice versa?

Honaka(from Skyverse): The trend is not set yet, but I think in the near future, we will see more and more projects trying to come out with lands. I have a brand management background, and I can actually see how these land NFTs are able to help, even for real life brands to promote themselves.

Rebecca(from BetaMars): It’s a kind of innovation to break through when they reach the limit of development, for both PFP NFT projects and land NFT projects. Also, it is a wise way to expand industry ecology and inject energy to their original track.

NoAuto(from Antebellum): In the future, the land NFT projects could be really beneficial for whoever owns it, whatever Web2 companies or any sort of organizations implement on that land. It’s tricky right now to navigate on metaverse lands because there is not too much going on. It’s hard to tell how popular, or what metaverse lands will be.

Robin(from Easy Demons Club): PFP NFTs will always have a big market because somebody would like to have an identity in the Web3 space. PFP is easy to display the aspiration and values in a certain community. Flexing is always a part of the human: we buy Rolex and BMW to show off social status and wealth. NFT space is a new way of doing it. As there are so many developing projects, we are looking for one metaverse that can easily unite us and have proper utilities. When it comes to the best features and utility, I think the land price will go up crazily.

William(from Swords & Dungeons): We don’t believe that land NFTs and PFP NFTs are in a competitive relationship. They are more like a coexisting relationship with each other. In our Swords & Dungeons, for example, we provide you Kingdoms as land and you can use your PFP characters in the game and enjoy the privilege that comes with the PFP that you purchase.

Adam(from POD): I agreed with William: they are not exactly competitive. Projects with land NFTs will have more value and more interest in a certain future. I’ve been in the game industry for over 20 years, and we’ve seen some of these issues before. When you spend more time in the metaverse, you will spend more energy, resources and money on the land and items. Metaverse land is a broad topic that can be your house and your office and community space, even cars and other stuff. It is a general category of what we could buy and own, and have utility, and liquidity in the metaverse. That will be 95% of the economic value and transactions going on. People are excited about avatars, but what you are doing, what place you are building, what community you are building, all these experiences that people spend time and money on, are more important than avatars or PFP pics eventually.

Dorothy: In my view, Yuga Labs wants to duplicate the Marve mode: create famous IP and merchandise or build theme parks for more experience. For me, the question is whether they are capable of building a theme park,which is a game in the metaverse. It’s complicated work. For IP operators, developing games is a challenge.

John: We will see cross-over of PFP and land more often. They are compatible. PFP is more about identity and culture. Land is more about utility and experience. It takes different skills and recipes to build successful PFP and land projects, because they have different focuses. Will the lands launched by Yuga Labs be successful? It depends on experiences, tokenomic and many other things. The previous success in PFP can’t guarantee their success in metaverse lands. From the investment perspective, we are seeking land projects that allow bluechip PFP avatars to play inside, which have a greater potential to generate value.

What are the opportunities and obstacles for metaverse land projects now? Do metaverse land NFTs have the potential to flip PFP NFTs in the near future?

Robin: We haven’t seen actual, proper gameplay and utility in metaverse lands. Easy Demons Club has created some great 3D pieces of products and is looking for a place to display and integrate. This could be a showcase of our real store, but we haven’t seen a place which is universally acceptable for everyone. We are waiting for the time to come.

Honaka: Whatever you can think of is possible in the metaverse, but the road to it is not easy. Like Robin said, we are still waiting. There isn’t any team that is able to develop something very comprehensive.

Rebecca: I agree that people haven’t accepted the application of metaverse lands. I believe PFP NFTs can develop their 3D avatars on land to launch 3D RPG games and achieve VR metaverse social interactions. The metaverse based on crypto lands is totally a sustainable solution for both of them. They complement each other.

NoAuto: You have to make it worldwide for end users to be implemented into the system. It must have useful utility that users want to or have to do. I feel that many land projects right now haven’t really given end users a reason to manifest and use their lands in full scope, so a lot of domains are not as high as they could be.

William: Most land projects don’t give purpose to invest time and develop the growth of lands. You own it and you can do whatever you wish, but they don’t tell how or provide a mechanism. That’s why people are not very willing to purchase or develop lands right now.

Adam: I have 2 points. Firstly, Robin mentioned that people are waiting for Weibo, Facebook or some metaverse killer things, but I think the idea is not what Web3 needs. As early adopters, we should push it in a way where there aren’t just big companies to realize the vision of the metaverse. Secondly, real life lands are always about location, location and location. Lands in a virtual world should be associated with entertainers and creators, and what utility they have. Fun is the new location for metaverse lands. Land projects have to cooperate with creators to make fun places to go.

Dorothy: It reminds me of the film Ready Player One. People were excited about a metaverse like that, where you can enjoy a second life. But the biggest problem is that the metaverse can be controlled and shut down by one single person. That’s not the metaverse we expect. We want an ecosystem with different metaverses where we can deploy avatars and travel across. We have to take action to make it happen.

John: It’s not useful if you just own a land, you will turn the land to something you can experience. The key in metaverse land projects is kind of similar to Web2: it’s all about attracting more population to stay and spend time. The DAU and MAU of leading land projects are still very low, compared to Web2 platforms and games. We see a huge potential to grow. How to help them grow? As a DAO, we’d like to help these projects to explore more experiences, for a blooming and prosperous future of the whole ecosystem. Another problem is that there is no specific type of metaverse land. This is a direction that all land projects should consider.

Many traditional brands dip their toes into the metaverse and the web3.0 universe. What are their next steps? Is it just marketing or are their real use cases in the metaverse that we could see very soon?

Robin: We are Web2 brands, trying to embrace the Web3 world. We want to purchase land and design a super polished store. For sure, we want to build it in a place with the highest traffic. Ideally, metaverses are interoperable and we can travel across. This will be helpful to do promotion in Web3.

Honaka: For web2 companies, how to integrate their real products with Web3 is important. Web3 needs them because they have tons of followers. What they can do in the metaverse is essential to bring huge traffic to Web3. This is just a start: the possibilities are endless, but we just need time to figure out. It’s not just about marketing, but also about what can really attract people and retain them in Web3.

Rebecca: In 2019, LOL cooperated with Louis Vuitton to release an outfit, both in game and in real stores. This is a good application if it can be applied to Web3 projects. People can buy outfits of certain brands for avatars.

Adam: I have a question: how can we bring more game industry members into the metaverse? I think we need big gaming brands to do cool stuff to bump up the level. As many traditional game players are anti NFT, most game companies are really careful. We have to come up with ideas to attract them because they are proven good at creating wonderful experiences in a virtual world.

Dorothy: Very good question. I’ve always heard that “NFT is evil”. If we want to get into the mainstream, this is a problem we must face. I believe that PFP NFTs have attracted many people from the real world. That’s a huge advancement for us at least. It takes a great project and time to change people’s mind, I believe. Maybe we also need to think outside of the box and show something very different from usual stuff in Web2 to illustrate how Web3 could actually work.

MetaOasis DAO expresses gratitude to every speaker and listener. The exchange of insights is an effective means for common development, from which the whole industry will benefit. More Twitter Space seminars are underway. Stay tuned and don’t miss out!

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