NFTs Collapse As Square Enix Sells Tomb Raider To Invest In Blockchain

After Square Enix announced that it was selling Tomb Raider and more to fund blockchain projects, a new report claims the NFT market is collapsing. 

Earlier this week, Square Enix announced it would be selling off studios like Crystal Dynamics and IP like Tomb Raider. Part of the plan of the $300 million deal was to invest in things like blockchain. Which lines up with the company’s desire (which it regularly reminds us of) to invest in NFTs.

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Credit: Square Enix

What was in the report?

However, a new report from the Wall Street Journal puts it plainly: “The NFT market is collapsing,” (paywalled, via Kotaku). The report covers how there was a 92 percent drop in sales since November, and a huge drop of “active wallets” by 88 percent in the same timeframe. Apparently, this is partially to do with rising interest rates, which mostly won’t affect the rich that mindlessly buy these JPEGs, but does change their spending habits when it comes to speculative purchases.

Fact of the matter is, NFTs just don’t provide any kind of real benefit to anyone. The person who bought Jack Dorsey’s first tweet (the founder of Twitter) as an NFT bought it for $2.9 million, but only received an offer of $3600 when looking to sell it on. This is just a huge waste of money, and didn’t contribute anything to anyone in a meaningful way.

And that’s not even mentioning the massive amount of environmental issues with NFTs. Sure, the NFT market could recover. But it doesn’t make any sense that Square Enix is putting all its eggs in a basket that’s essentially been set on fire.

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Featured Image Credit: Crystal Dynamics