> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://playnetwork.gitbook.io/play/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://playnetwork.gitbook.io/play/market-making/dev-to-earn.md).

# Dev to Earn

#### Dev to Earn <a href="#vq0a8tojk9s" id="vq0a8tojk9s"></a>

* Developer teams and studios can apply for”up front” token grants prior to a game’s release, which in turn can be used to fund their internal game mechanics:
  * Minting NFTs, and creating their own relevant “play to earn” and “create to earn” mechanics with incentives, in each title.
  * Create branded game currency derived from the $PLAY token to be used to reward players in their specific game
    * For example, a PvP golf game that qualifies could use the token grant to fund achievement rewards by players and golf leagues; fund loyalty programs, rewarding players for inviting high-quality friends to the game; even fund IP tie-ins with golf themed “merch” by giving the IP holder an advance against future cosmetic sales in the game.
  * The dev team can also decide, at their discretion, to hold their tokens, to fund investment into the game, by covering engineering costs.
* Additionally, PLAY may opt to to provide “backend grants”- these are token issuances to dev teams whose games have met certain performance benchmarks, deemed markers of a valuable ecosystem contribution:
  * Games with retention metrics in the top decile of the ecosystem.
  * Games with relatively high ARPDAU/ARPPU in the ecosystem.
  * Games with highly efficient customer acquisition costs.
  * Games with high install rates.
* Dev teams building software solutions, more broadly, which are then shared with the ecosystem may also qualify for “up front” and “backend” grants. For example:
  * A dev team building a conversion tool to allow avatar content to be exported from the PLAY ecosystem to third-party ecosystems (e.g. Roblox, Minecraft).
  * A team working on more efficient “off chain” transaction processing, which reduces “gas fees” system wide.