Immutable, one of the better-known builders in the blockchain-gaming space, said Tuesday it is widening the reach of its growth product, Immutable Play, to include traditional “Web2” game studios. The company revealed that Ubisoft will be the first big-name partner to take advantage of the move.
In a post on X, Immutable said Immutable Play is “now open to all games” and that Ubisoft will be the first Web2 studio to join, a development the company cast as the start of a major push to bridge mainstream gaming into crypto incentives. Immutable framed the decision as the next step in a year of rapid growth for its platform: since Immutable Play launched a little over a year ago, the company said it has grown to 5.6 million wallets and onboarded roughly 660 games, which it estimates represents about 70% of the current Web3 gaming market.
Immutable and Ubisoft have already worked together publicly on projects tied to the Might & Magic franchise, and the formal expansion of Immutable Play to Web2 studios signals a broader strategy to offer crypto-native engagement tools, such as token rewards, Passport wallet integration and NFT-based items, to mainstream titles. A company press release says the first Ubisoft title to adopt Immutable Play will be Might & Magic Fates.
Why Now?
Immutable pointed to a cluster of industry and regulatory shifts that it says have made Web2 studios more receptive to blockchain-based incentives. Among those developments, Immutable cited recent legal pressure on the dominant app stores that has loosened restrictions on alternate payment routes and external marketplaces, legislation that would carve out certain in-game items from stricter digital-asset definitions, and the maturing of stablecoin and onboarding infrastructure that makes crypto payments easier for non-crypto users.
The company argued these changes, combined with big improvements in onboarding at scale, mean Web3 incentives have become a realistic, and cost-efficient, user-acquisition strategy for studios that today spend heavily on marketing. Legal rulings and bills are already reshaping the landscape.
A recent Federal Court decision in Australia gave Epic Games a major win against Apple and Google over app-store practices, a judgment industry observers say could make it easier for developers to offer external payment options, including links to NFT shops or other crypto payment rails, without triggering the App Store’s 30% commission in certain jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, in Washington, the CLARITY Act (H.R. 3633) contains language that would explicitly treat some “video game assets” differently when defining digital commodities, a provision that backers say would reduce regulatory friction for in-game tokens and collectibles if the legislation becomes law. Immutable emphasized the potential market upside. The company noted that last year, mainstream (Web2) game launches far outpaced Web3 releases, and that the top five Web2 studios today reach over a billion monthly active users combined.
Bringing even a fraction of that audience into crypto-enabled experiences, Immutable said, would dramatically expand the pool of players who can earn or trade blockchain-based rewards. The firm told reporters it is already in talks with multi-billion-dollar studios about token launches and that from today, any Web2 studio that meets its quality bar can integrate with Immutable Play.
For now, Immutable is positioning Immutable Play as the “soft onboarding” step: a way to let studios experiment with crypto rewards and wallet-based features before committing to deeper tokenomics or NFT strategies such as Passport and native token launches. If the company’s bet pays off, it could accelerate a new wave of mainstream game publishers dipping their toes into blockchain-enabled economies and change how studios think about player acquisition and retention.
