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As a result of Facebook’s makeover, all eyes have been on the metaverse community, a virtual world in which everything is accessible. Many crypto investors have added the metaverse genre to their portfolios. MANA, the native utility token of Decentraland, appears to be cashing in on this trend.

Decentraland is a blockchain-created 3D metaverse that allows users to own land or real estate in the virtual world. In a metaverse, players may buy land and personalize their avatars, meet other players, and explore the virtual terrain. It is the money of the Decentraland community that is called MANA.

So what’s Decentraland?

Decentraland is an Ethereum powered virtual reality platform. Anyone may buy land in this virtual world and build on it, as well as monetize it. You can do everything you put your mind to. It’s the first digital platform that’s owned entirely by its users.

It is an all-encompassing virtual world in the vein of games like Skyrim and Fallout. Rather than interacting with a two-dimensional screen, you’ll be immersed in a three-dimensional environment instead! It appears to be the next logical step before producing full-blown AI-based games, like Westworld, in the real world.

How does Decentraland function?

LAND (non-fungible digital assets purchased in the game) are the locations in Decentraland that you may interact with. It is yours to do as you like with it – once you possess a piece of land. You may build interactive 3D environments, games, apps, and even gambling services. What’s the point, then? Even if it isn’t the major goal of your LAND-based business, you can provide educational, professional development or tourism-related services.

The quantity of LAND is limited, and each plot of LAND is 33 feet by 33 feet; however, there is no limit on its height. You may manage your land more simply by connecting nearby plots using the LAND Estates feature that Decentraland has added. The LAND marketplace is a good place to start if you want to buy land (or simply examine the map).

Districts on the ground are essentially the same. Districts are essentially groups of people who live close to one another and have a common interest. Consider a District for cryptocurrency users, complete with its own set of applications and services. 

With Decentraland’s Agora app, you may cast your vote on District issues. A person’s voting power is directly proportional to the quantity of LAND they own within a certain electoral district. Agora was built by Decentraland to offer more influence over what occurs in your districts and to solicit your opinion on the platform as a whole.

You can buy and sell land in the Decentraland marketplace, where you can also buy wearables and names for your in-game character.  Obviously, they are NFTs. The Decentraland builder, which does not need any technical knowledge on your part, may be used to customize individual parcels of land. As part of the Decentraland builder, you may also give your avatars names. MANA is used to buy parcels, clothing, and names.

Decentraland’s in-game currency is MANA, an ERC20 token. In Decentraland, MANA may be used to buy NFTs from various virtual art galleries, buy tickets for virtual events, and even gamble.

In addition, MANA holders can vote on any changes to Decentraland’s virtual environment, such as changes to land parameters, adjustments to marketplace costs, and the approval of wearable NFTs.

Those who own MANA may also cast a vote on (whether or not catalyst nodes) the servers that power Decentraland’s virtual world.

Why the hype?

Using wallet connect, Decentraland just achieved a native integration with MANA, Ethereum’s premier layer 2 scaling solution, making it suitable to utilize MANA in Decentraland with near-zero gas prices. In 2018, Polygon’s developers collaborated with decentralized developers to improve the viability of Plasma, the ethereum scaling solution currently used by Polygon.

Esteban Ordano, a co-founder of Decentraland and a Polygon early adviser, has been working on a native Decentraland polygon integration since the platform launched.

In May, the Decentraland Foundation unveiled the new and enhanced Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) for Decentraland.

A new crypto project named Big Time, which is described as “a multiplayer action RPG, where you team up with friends to adventure across time and space”, was also disclosed by Decentraland co-founder Ari Meilich.

Sotheby’s launched an NFT gallery and auction house in Decentraland in June, which was significant because Sotheby’s is one of the world’s largest auction houses.

A virtual property developer named republic realm purchased 900K worth of plots from Sotheby’s shortly after Boson Protocol spent 700K on land tracts to establish a virtual mall.

The Decentraland Foundation announced in late June that it would begin awarding community grants in an effort to grow and expand the virtual world.

After months of research and development by the Decentraland Foundation, the archipelago was introduced in August. In order to comprehend the relevance of this, one must have some background information. Decentraland servers were limited to 100 users prior to the archipelago. Now, the virtual environment would feel a little empty since those 100 users would be scattered out all over the place. Using archipelago, users will be able to seamlessly swap servers between these regions. In a nutshell, thanks to the archipelago, all of Decentraland’s active users may now engage with one other rather than being separated in siloed servers.

Decentraland’s first five in-game tasks were released towards the end of August.

It was announced in September that the Decentraland foundation was launching a play to earn incubator in an attempt to construct a game that can compete with Axie Infinity.

Decentraland’s Metaverse event, which included Deadmau5, Paris Hilton, and other well-known figures, took place in October.

Hence, we can clearly see, the team behind the project has been very active.

MANA to the moon

As a cumulative result of all the updates and collaborations, last Thursday, the MANA token of Decentraland reached a new all-time high, rising to $5.84. In the last seven days, it has increased by about 40%.

According to data provider Messari, the Ethereum blockchain-based token for the decentralized virtual reality platform currently has a stated market valuation of $9.2 billion. Axie Infinity’s AXS, a play-to-earn game based on the metaverse, has a stated market cap of $8.6 billion, but this rise puts it ahead of it.

Furthermore, Decentraland and other play-to-earn gaming ventures have recently captured the interest of Ethereum whales for a record size, according to data from Whalestats. An anonymous whale has recently transferred 9 million MANA tokens worth $51,103 (approximately Rs. 38 lakh) to another anonymous wallet.

Conclusion

The so-called Metaverse tokens have risen to the top in the wake of Facebook’s rebranding to Meta. Ahead of the pack is Decentraland (MANA).

Even though Decentraland is one of the earliest Metaverse initiatives, it’s still in its infancy. It’s incredible to watch how the project has progressed despite all of the difficulties it has faced both in public and behind the scenes. Even though MANA is currently undervalued in relation to Decentraland’s fundamentals, this is unlikely to be the case in the future.

Everything relies on whether or not developers at Decentraland can meet community and foundational expectations and deliver on their own mandates and promises. There are still more than half a billion MANA in the Decentraland DAO’s wallet. Because of this, Decentraland has one of the largest cryptocurrency treasuries on the market. As long as this funding is put to good use, Decentraland can grow into the amazing Metaverse that it was always meant to be!

Disclaimer: Cryptocurrency is not a legal tender and is currently unregulated. Kindly ensure that you undertake sufficient risk assessment when trading cryptocurrencies as they are often subject to high price volatility. The information provided in this section doesn't represent any investment advice or WazirX's official position. WazirX reserves the right in its sole discretion to amend or change this blog post at any time and for any reasons without prior notice.