Web3 gaming-focused non-fungible token (NFT) protocol, Aavegotchi, has decided to leave the Polygon blockchain network and fully transition to Base, an Ethereum layer-2 scaling chain. This decision came as a result of an onchain vote, according to the information found on Aavegotchi’s governance page.
On April 8, the proposal to “Rebase Aavegotchi” received a resounding 93.5% support from the Aavegotchi community. The vote involved depreciating the protocol’s smart contracts on Polygon and reestablishing them on Base. Aavegotchi founder, Dan, stated in a February post, “In light of our ongoing collaboration with the Base team and the recent progress in the Base ecosystem, we believe the most productive move for Aavegotchi is to sunset its Polygon deployment and fully commit to Base.”
The move symbolizes Aavegotchi’s attempt to navigate the 2025 cryptocurrency market downturn, which was exacerbated by President Donald Trump’s plan to impose sweeping tariffs on most US imports. Pixelcraft Studios, Aavegotchi’s developer, has made substantial team cuts to conserve resources, according to Dan.
The decision also points to the ongoing struggles Polygon faces in retaining users and total value locked (TVL) amidst competition from Ethereum layer-2 chains like Arbitrum and Base. Polygon’s TVL has dropped from nearly $10 billion in 2021 to around $725 million as of April 8, as per DeFILlama data. In contrast, both Base and Arbitrum have over $2 billion in TVL each, as per the same source. TVL is a crucial metric in DeFi to measure the total amount of assets deposited in a protocol and indicates user trust, adoption, and available liquidity.
According to Dan, Polygon has not provided any significant updates or features for gaming protocols, whereas “both Base and Arbitrum stand out as being both performant and ‘lindy’ – able to stand the test of time,” adding that he prefers Base because of its stronger retail onboarding.
Base, an optimistic rollup, was launched in 2023 by Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the US. Aavegotchi is a collaboration between Pixelcraft Studios and Aave, a decentralized lending protocol. The protocol’s NFTs are “digital collectibles” that can be personalized with different accessories and traded as NFTs.”
