The Etherbots gaming platform is now the third most popular decentralized application on the Ethereum blockchain. The dapp held the number one spot on the charts for much of Wednesday. What Is It? Etherbots is the next digital gaming craze to sweep the cryptosphere. Despite the fact that the game has yet to launch, more ethers are being exchanged for Etherbots than CryptoKitties right now. It’s what’s hot right now. But don’t assume it’s just a craze. Etherbots attracts users thanks to the same two basic principles that CryptoKitties embraces:ScarcityComplete ownership of digital assetsBeyond creating value and providing true ownership of digital characters, Etherbots adds in meaningful gameplay and competition to the mix. Bots compete against each other in battles. Bots win and lose based on the decisions of users. Buy parts, build bots and upgrade the attributes. Compete against others and increase the value of the bots. Building The BuzzEtherbots is only selling 3,900 bots during the pre-sale, but the creators aren’t telling anyone when that number will be reached. The bot sale ends in six days. The price of buying a bot and participating in the ecosystem also goes up every time a new user purchases. Outside of the obvious scarcity built into the sale of bots, there’s a 500% greater chance your bot ‘crate’ contains a rare shadow or legendary gold item over post-launch purchases. This is how Etherbots is gaining steam. The question is, will it be enough to permanently outperform the transaction volume of CryptoKitties? Shooting For The MoonIt wasn’t that long ago that one of the first ever CryptoKitties on the market sold for 131 ether tokens. At the time those tokens were worth over $63,000 USD. The popularity of these virtual cats is responsible for over $12 million in sales to end 2017. The kitties are also responsible for slowing down for the Ethereum network. Etherbots will undoubtedly do the same thing if the valuations associated with this virtual game explode. That said, Ethereum’s community of programmers aims to implement a scalability upgrade, Casper, in 2018. It just might make virtual gaming frenzies a lot easier to stomach for the network. If that happens, Etherbots’ take off may take off even faster than its kitten companion. Either way, it looks like more and more ether holders will be battling for robot upgrades in a big way. Featured image from Etherbots