Axie Infinity, the most popular Non-Fungible Token (NFT) game, announced its most awaited update, the Axie Infinity: Origin, to come soon sometime end of March. The NFT game developer Sky Mavis has not yet confimed the exact release date as there are a lot to move and transition towards the said update. Sky Mavis posted a lot of teasers already on what players can expect in the upcoming third major update of Axie Infinity. The Origin update has a new battle system that will feature fast-paced gameplay instead of the long usual ones we have now. Players also get to experience Axie Infinity for free as the update gives players three starter Axies for FREE. The update will not come in one big package but will gradually come in phases and expand in further updates. 

After a lot of updates trying to balance the gameplay, not to mention also balancing the marketplace of Axie Infinity, Sky Mavis decided to go to another phase of improving their game. In line with this, the Origin update will give players with three free Axies named Olek, Buba, and Puffy to practice with for the new update. The gameplay will be entirely changed as Sky Mavis wants to make the game more fast paced and interactive. They will transition to Sequential Turns based gameplay instead of having 2 players predict and play according to how they perceive their opponent will play. This means that players will be able to interact with the card the opponent plays during the turn. They also changed the mechanics of energy and cards to encourage players to always play the turns, not conserve energy by skipping a turn.

Of course, with changing the gameplay, there are also changes on the cards themselves. Cards will not have any offensive and defensive stats on them. They will be different this time as each card will either have an offensive or defensive trait. They also included various card effects that can turn the tides of the match or give a player an advantage. Axie Infinity Origin also introduces a new mechanic called Power-Ups, adding runes and charms to further increase the inherent abilities of each axie. These will be creatable with off-chain resources called Moonshards after winning battles and can be equipped to power up each axie. 

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Franz Christian Irorita ·

The origin update will also abolish the critical hit mechanic where a player can be super lucky with RNG. These crits changes the game completely like immediately killing an axie rendering them useless for that turn, leaving the player at the mercy of chance. They instead replaced the mechanic with “Rage.” Sky Mavis has yet to reveal what this mechanic does but most likely, this will be a resource players can use as a last resort move. They also simplified the game further by removing stats like speed, which won't be relevant anymore due to it becoming sequential turn based. Axies will only have HP as their stat.

Sky Mavis has stated that these three starter free Axies are not considered NFTs and cannot earn Smooth Love Potions (SLP), the in-game currency of Axie Infinity. They are still open to the possibility of allowing these Axies to acquire SLP in future updates but in the meantime, they will be used as practice for the big update. Players will be able to unlock more starter Axies by progressing through Adventure mode.

Axie Infinity Origin will receive updates in the future, with the final plans from Sky Mavis. For now, we can only keep track of what Sky Mavis has shared to us, moving to another phase of the NFT game. Players are definitely excited for the update and are already preparing to transition to another chapter of Axie Infinity. Like what Sky Mavis always says “Infinite games. Infinite experiences. That's why it's called Axie Infinity!”