Another opportunity to jump into the metaverse and acquire virtual real estate
Big news in the metaverse over the weekend as The Sandbox announced an upcoming LAND sale, due to take place on Thursday, March 3rd. The Sandbox players will also get the chance to win a Season 2 Alpha Pass in raffle taking place on March 31st.
It might only be in its early stages, but the nascent metaverse already has a select group of established giants. These are the platforms that users adore, critics abhor, and the uninformed recognise from afar. Currently, four behemoths rule the conversation: Decentraland, Somnium Space, Cryptovoxels and The Sandbox. So when the latter announced an upcoming land sale on March 3rd, the online world wasn’t short of talking points and opinions.
Interestingly, one of the main issues to surface is in relation to anti-bot security and questions about how The Sandbox plans to counter automated programs edging out real fans of the game.
This issue isn’t new to NFT asset sales and has already been raised in relation to The Sandbox. How The Sandbox and other big blockchain platforms decide to balance the competing pressures of security and decentralization will have an impact on how all dapps manage this problem in future.
The price of LAND
The Sandbox has always maintained the sale price of its LAND. So on Thursday, anyone lucky enough to buy some LAND can expect to pay the following:
- Regular LAND – 1,011 SAND ($3,215)
- Premium LAND – 4,683 SAND ($14,892). This purchase comes bundled with NFTs.
That’s the cost of LAND straight from the factory. The secondary market is a different story.
On OpenSea, the floor price of LAND in The Sandbox currently sits at 3.29 ETH ($9,195). This means Regular LAND trades on the secondary market for nearly three times what it costs to buy direct from The Sandbox. Premium LANDs surround major partners or social hubs and it’s where players spawn into game. While there is no set price for it, it sells for significantly more than the Regular type.
With the disparity between the price of LAND on the primary and secondary markets, it’s no wonder people program bots to carve out the market with digital precision. And it’s no wonder normal people get so frustrated at their inability to beat the machines in the race to buy.
Alpha Season 2 Raffle
On March 31st, The Sandbox is running a raffle giving participants the chance to win an Alpha Pass. An Alpha Pass ‘empowers you to convert your play-to-earn activity into up to 1,000 SAND’.
There are multiple ways that players can earn raffle tickets:
- Complete Quests – players can earn up to 500 raffle tickets by completing quests.
- Stake mSAND
- Hold a Snoop Dogg Private Party Pass
- Hold a Snoopverse Early Access Pass
- Hold a Season 1 Alpha Pass
- Hold LAND
Winners of the raffle will be contacted on their registered email on March 31st, around 7pm UTC.