Back to collectionLondon Goes Live, but an NFT Minting Surge Pushes Gas Back into Three Digits
Background: As the London upgrade went live, the studio was still preparing the second public-test round, and the group hoped EIP-1559 would ease players’ complaints about gas. Today: Ethereum’s London upgrade went live, and EIP-1559 began burning ETH. Impact and next steps: The upgrade introduced a burn mechanism but did not remove high fees when demand concentrated; the group’s expectation that “upgrade means lower fees” was corrected by experience.
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Background: As the London upgrade went live, the studio was still preparing the second public-test round, and the group hoped EIP-1559 would ease players’ complaints about gas. A-Zhen understood the chain-side mechanism and knew a rule change would not automatically create more block space; she had to bring expectations back in line with the experience people actually had.
Today: Ethereum’s London upgrade went live, and EIP-1559 began burning ETH. The group cheered, “Gas is going to get cheaper,” while A-Zhen explained that the mechanism had changed but fees could still be high when demand surged. Sure enough, an NFT minting wave that evening pushed gas back into three digits, and players’ surprise became a matter of concrete bills. She then suggested tracking transaction costs alongside congestion periods in the next test.
Impact and next steps: The upgrade introduced a burn mechanism but did not remove high fees when demand concentrated; the group’s expectation that “upgrade means lower fees” was corrected by experience. That evening’s minting rush bore out A-Zhen’s assessment, but infrastructure’s underlying problem could not be cured by this patch, and the team still had to contend with how usable game actions would be during congestion.