Crypto gaming is going to do us a huge favor by removing a rather unsavory element from the gaming ranks. If real money is involved you can bet the scammers, botters, gold-miners, etc are going to flock to those titles. Basically, these games will be like fly paper for idiots.
There will always be room for a game about having fun, telling a story, or hanging out with friends.
Despite McDonald's, there are plenty of places to get a really good hamburger - places that aren't about getting it cheap, dancing clowns, or advertising.
Same will hold true for games.
Prediction: You'll see less morons in your favorite title.
Possibly, but I remember us saying "F2P will get rid of the casual players", look how that worked out.
Crypto gaming is going to do us a huge favor by removing a rather unsavory element from the gaming ranks. If real money is involved you can bet the scammers, botters, gold-miners, etc are going to flock to those titles. Basically, these games will be like fly paper for idiots.
There will always be room for a game about having fun, telling a story, or hanging out with friends.
Despite McDonald's, there are plenty of places to get a really good hamburger - places that aren't about getting it cheap, dancing clowns, or advertising.
Same will hold true for games.
Prediction: You'll see less morons in your favorite title.
Possibly, but I remember us saying "F2P will get rid of the casual players", look how that worked out.
I think F2P did take out a subset of the casual players, well at least those unwilling to pay up front to play.
It's just there's just so many of them out there even games with other monetization models have legions of them.
Besides, what exactly is a casual player and what traits about them are actually true vs stereotypes often associated with this subset?
Probably deserves a thread all by itself to discuss.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
It is good to see that when MMORPG.com ask a cyptogame designer to talk about what effect blockchain will have on gaming and then provide no balance with a second article, this community continues to provide that balance.
Every monetary innovation in the gaming sector has made gaming less about games, be it cash shops, GaaS or now blockchain. But this last one blockchain will cause a sea change in what gaming is about if it comes into fruition.
It will dove tail into gamers streaming for money and make gaming a mercantile pursuit first and foremost. No hobby can survive that unscathed, gaming will be transformed into a speculative, casino like activity, but it seems many players and gaming journalists cannot see past the dollar signs.
You really think there are many game developers out there not thinking about how to take advantage of blockchains, NFTs and Cryptogaming?
Just wondering who be able to provide a reasoned counterpoint outside of gamers themselves?
Even then, I think it was Tim from this site who once said something along the lines of 'gamers have never met a monetization hill they weren't willing if not eager to climb.'
Or in my view, there isn't a monetization cliff they aren't willing to throw themselves off of which we've clearly seen here as well.
I personally think most business think this way no matter what payment model they pick. Some are ruthless, some are fair and some just look for ways to exploit their customers. Thats true of F2P games, B2P, Subs and I am sure this will be true with blockchain games.
I personally think, be it a normal payment model or a blockchain game. We need to take it on a game by game basis to decide whats fair and not lump all blockchain games in the bad pile before looking into it.
It will dove tail into gamers streaming for money and make gaming a mercantile pursuit first and foremost. No hobby can survive that unscathed, gaming will be transformed into a speculative, casino like activity, but it seems many players and gaming journalists cannot see past the dollar signs.
Isn't this part happening already?
Great post overall
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse. - FARGIN_WAR
There's a fundamental lack of understanding of blockchain gaming here. Still. Even after so many people and articles trying to explain it. Here's the first thing people need to understand about "blockchain games".
Every "blockchain game" uses blockchain differently.
You aren't required to make a blockchain game use crypto currency. You aren't required to have NFT's in a blockchain game. You aren't required to have either, or be decentralized. It doesn't have to equate to money at all, blockchain is a tool to use.
Second -
In many games, you don't MAKE MONEY without putting money into the game. For example, blankos block party sells the majority of the blankos on the market for cash. PLAYERS turn around and choose to sell what they've bought, and usually that's because there is a limited number of those blankos, and they make profit by selling them AFTER they are no longer on sale.
There's no crazy, mixed up premise here that makes this some unfair advantage one player has over another to make money. It's simple supply and demand. I bought one blanko to play with a long time ago, it's no longer on sale, if someone wants it and I decide to sell it, they'll pay what I'm asking or buy it from a different seller, if it's available. The longer the game goes on, the more expensive it will become.
To say "well most people won't make money in Blankos", well, the only way that happens is if someone CHOOSES to sell the blankos they own for a loss. The only people that MIGHT end up doing that, are the people who spent a lot of money on multiple blankos in hopes to sell them in bulk later, OR there's no community to buy them.
But the MAJORITY of players who just want to collect and play the game, won't be bothered, attacked or deal with toxicity because of the blankos they have, they paid for them, no matter where or when they bought them.
Third- Players who are in the game to make money and players that end up making enough money to live are irrelevant. The idea that "all players are playing to make money" is not the correct way to think about it. It's not "I'm here to make money". The idea behind blockchain games is, "My time here is worth value". That's a big part of what games today are missing. If you spent 10 years in WoW and decide tomorrow you're done, you get nothing to show for your time, you walk away with zero. You can try to sell something, knowing full and well that the other person or you, will get banned. You might make money, maybe.
But in blockchain games, if I decide I want to stop playing blankos or infinite fleet, I can sell whatever I want from my account. Even AT A LOSS it's better than what you get for leaving other games.
Fourth, and Lastly- One thing that is part of blockchain games, but not other games, are exchange currencies. Those, like land, bring in "investors" who essentially bank on the idea that a games currency will rise in value as the game gets popular, so they bet on the currency.
But not all games have this currency - and some games that do, such as infinite fleet - DON'T SELL IT. You're required to earn the currency in game. blankos doesn't have a public currency at all.
Axie infinity does, ember sword will, and the main question you have to ask is, will these currencies be fixed or are they infinite?
Infinite fleet you cannot buy that currency, but it's fixed, meaning it will only gain in value the longer the game goes on. Players can sell to other players but that is it.
In a game like axie the coin is infinite. You can buy as much as you want, and certain things you earn are paid out in the game as AXS. The coins value is inherently as worthless as any other in game currency, which, if you're a player, it does have value so that you can buy certain axies or whatever, so it's not technically worthless - but, because it's on an exchange, if you bought the coin, the price fluctuates, so investors hold it, in hopes that its going to increase in value. For better or worse it's usually subject to market swings because it's an ethereum based token.
TL:DR Not all games are created equal. People still don't understand the purpose of blockchain games. It's not always about earning, and shouldn't be.
Crypto gaming is going to do us a huge favor by removing a rather unsavory element from the gaming ranks. If real money is involved you can bet the scammers, botters, gold-miners, etc are going to flock to those titles. Basically, these games will be like fly paper for idiots.
There will always be room for a game about having fun, telling a story, or hanging out with friends.
Despite McDonald's, there are plenty of places to get a really good hamburger - places that aren't about getting it cheap, dancing clowns, or advertising.
Same will hold true for games.
Prediction: You'll see less morons in your favorite title.
Possibly, but I remember us saying "F2P will get rid of the casual players", look how that worked out.
I think F2P did take out a subset of the casual players, well at least those unwilling to pay up front to play.
It's just there's just so many of them out there even games with other monetization models have legions of them.
Besides, what exactly is a casual player and what traits about them are actually true vs stereotypes often associated with this subset?
Probably deserves a thread all by itself to discuss.
We did loose them yes, then nearly every MMO went F2P and we got them back and had to play in such MMOs. The number of MMOs which are even B2P today is tiny, let alone have a subscription only approach.
Third- Players who are in the game to make money and players that end up making enough money to live are irrelevant. The idea that "all players are playing to make money" is not the correct way to think about it. It's not "I'm here to make money". The idea behind blockchain games is, "My time here is worth value". That's a big part of what games today are missing. If you spent 10 years in WoW and decide tomorrow you're done, you get nothing to show for your time, you walk away with zero. You can try to sell something, knowing full and well that the other person or you, will get banned. You might make money, maybe.
But in blockchain games, if I decide I want to stop playing blankos or infinite fleet, I can sell whatever I want from my account. Even AT A LOSS it's better than what you get for leaving other games.
TL:DR Not all games are created equal.
You made some good points, but point #3 is kind of contradictory, isn't it?
If a player has an attitude of "I get nothing from this game", then they miss the whole point about "playing games." You get entertainment. You hopefully have "fun." If you read a non-fiction book, what do you get out of it? How about sightseeing or window shopping? Does one go to a movie to "make money", or "waste time?"
If a player views their whole life in terms of "Can I do this activity and make more money then a I spend", it kind of defeats the purpose of "leisure time", doesn't it? There is nothing wrong with that. I know plenty of people who live life with a balance sheet in hand and they enjoy their lives
I'm certainly no "expert" about "data currency", but it seems to me like it all boils down to "Do I place a value on this?" If a bit of data has value to you (general you), by all means collect that value.
It's why I dislike cash shops in games. I place very little to zero value in any items therein.
"Not all games are created equal" should
be recalled with every new game that comes out. Some may be similar,
maybe a tweak here or there, but play differently.
Overall, your post was indeed insightful to me
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse. - FARGIN_WAR
Third- Players who are in the game to make money and players that end up making enough money to live are irrelevant. The idea that "all players are playing to make money" is not the correct way to think about it. It's not "I'm here to make money". The idea behind blockchain games is, "My time here is worth value". That's a big part of what games today are missing. If you spent 10 years in WoW and decide tomorrow you're done, you get nothing to show for your time, you walk away with zero. You can try to sell something, knowing full and well that the other person or you, will get banned. You might make money, maybe.
But in blockchain games, if I decide I want to stop playing blankos or infinite fleet, I can sell whatever I want from my account. Even AT A LOSS it's better than what you get for leaving other games.
TL:DR Not all games are created equal.
You made some good points, but point #3 is kind of contradictory, isn't it?
If a player has an attitude of "I get nothing from this game", then they miss the whole point about "playing games." You get entertainment. You hopefully have "fun." If you read a non-fiction book, what do you get out of it? How about sightseeing or window shopping? Does one go to a movie to "make money", or "waste time?"
If a player views their whole life in terms of "Can I do this activity and make more money then a I spend", it kind of defeats the purpose of "leisure time", doesn't it? There is nothing wrong with that. I know plenty of people who live life with a balance sheet in hand and they enjoy their lives
I'm certainly no "expert" about "data currency", but it seems to me like it all boils down to "Do I place a value on this?" If a bit of data has value to you (general you), by all means collect that value.
It's why I dislike cash shops in games. I place very little to zero value in any items therein.
"Not all games are created equal" should be recalled with every new game that comes out. Some may be similar, maybe a tweak here or there, but play differently.
Overall, your post was indeed insightful to me
You're right, there are a lot of things we do just for the sake of entertainment.
And in that way Quizzical is right that if people go into playing these games as just a way to make money, it's a non starter.
And in that way the developers are wrong when they go into building these games as an "earn first" project.
There are experiences that we all have where the take away is simply, we enjoyed our time. Like going to a movie, or eating at a fancy restaurant.
My personal belief is that we go into these games to have fun, but the time we spend and the gear and items we earn do inherently have some kind of value, whether it's in game or out of it.
That's why you have people selling items on Fallout 76 or selling off their accounts in MMOs all the time, and they do sell, unsurprisingly.
The ideal blockchain game is the game that is enjoyable and fun to play outside of any earning aspects. I think there may be only a few games in development that might hit that mark right now, and that's a big if.
Really all these crypto games are swirling around the idea of building the "metaverse" which is basically a grand scheme of gaming, earning inside and even outside of the game. So many companies are infatuated with building these "metaverses".
But right now they want to build "Ready Player One" but end up with Wall Street.
There's always been a subset of people who have made money from online gaming.
Asian plat farmers. Selling Power leveling services. etc.
At least the blockchain games are being more open about it.
Although to be fair, games in the past 10 or so years have started to embrace this, and usually offer some sort of cash-to-ingame currency option, where they can at least control the amount and affect that real cash has on the not-quite-separate in-game economy. EVE PLEX, Rift REX, WoW Tokens, etc.
The big difference is that the cash-to-currency tokens that are non-blockchain are specifically there to keep players from making real money --- ensuring the real money only flows to the publisher/developers, and the effect on the in-game economy is able to be controlled.. Blockchains are trying to pay out players in cash while also maintaining some semblance of control on the in-game economy, so there is a difference.
It's certainly possible for some players to on net take money out of the game. But the money that players take out must always be less than the amount that players put in. And the latter is inevitably limited.
It's quite possible for a tiny fraction of the playerbase to pull out so much money that they can treat it like a job. The game's developers themselves effectively do this, and as you point out, a handful of gold farmers do, too. But for each player making the game into a job like this, there must be many, many players putting money into the system.
It's also possible for a more substantial proportion of the playerbase to make a modest amount of money. It could, for example, be common among the top end raiders in a game to make $10 or $20 per month selling off spare resources that they don't need. But that's only a nice bonus for a game that you play because you like it, not a real justification for spending 100 hours per month on a game that you don't enjoy.
What is not practical is for a large fraction of the players to each make a lot of money off a game. That just doesn't work. That would mean players taking too much money out of the game, and far more than is paid into it.
It is good to see that when MMORPG.com ask a cyptogame designer to talk about what effect blockchain will have on gaming and then provide no balance with a second article, this community continues to provide that balance.
Every monetary innovation in the gaming sector has made gaming less about games, be it cash shops, GaaS or now blockchain. But this last one blockchain will cause a sea change in what gaming is about if it comes into fruition.
It will dove tail into gamers streaming for money and make gaming a mercantile pursuit first and foremost. No hobby can survive that unscathed, gaming will be transformed into a speculative, casino like activity, but it seems many players and gaming journalists cannot see past the dollar signs.
You really think there are many game developers out there not thinking about how to take advantage of blockchains, NFTs and Cryptogaming?
Just wondering who be able to provide a reasoned counterpoint outside of gamers themselves?
Even then, I think it was Tim from this site who once said something along the lines of 'gamers have never met a monetization hill they weren't willing if not eager to climb.'
Or in my view, there isn't a monetization cliff they aren't willing to throw themselves off of which we've clearly seen here as well.
I'd bet that only a small fraction of game developers are actively thinking about how to make money off of blockchain. For most of them, that's just not the portion of the game that they work on. For large projects with many developers, it's unusual for everyone on the project to be actively changing things everywhere in the project. There's just too much there for any one person to understand it all, and people have to specialize more in order to be able to get much done.
Certainly, among developers who actively deal with designing a game's monetization model, it's a much higher percentage thinking about blockchain. But it would be very foolish for most of them to press ahead with making their game heavily dependent on cryptocurrencies, for two reasons:
1) Blockchain is very complicated, and very few people understand it well enough to really do much with it. 2) Cryptocurrencies are notoriously unforgiving, and all it takes is one little mistake for your stuff to all get stolen by hackers, and then you're not getting it back. That will shut down a project in a hurry.
Either one of those is survivable on its own, but the combination of them is lethal.
It is good to see that when MMORPG.com ask a cyptogame designer to talk about what effect blockchain will have on gaming and then provide no balance with a second article, this community continues to provide that balance.
Every monetary innovation in the gaming sector has made gaming less about games, be it cash shops, GaaS or now blockchain. But this last one blockchain will cause a sea change in what gaming is about if it comes into fruition.
It will dove tail into gamers streaming for money and make gaming a mercantile pursuit first and foremost. No hobby can survive that unscathed, gaming will be transformed into a speculative, casino like activity, but it seems many players and gaming journalists cannot see past the dollar signs.
Blockchain is not going to take over gaming entirely. Cryptogaming might end up being a small niche akin to VR gaming. At most, it could become a large market akin to mobile gaming. But as big as mobile gaming is, it has hardly meant the end of more serious games. Rather, it has supplemented the other types of games that preceded it, not replaced them.
If blockchain does become ubiquitous in gaming someday, it will only be as a minor tool that most people don't even realize is there. It won't be anything like the caricatures that are the early cryptogames. For comparison, do you even know exactly what tools any particular existing MMORPG uses for their databases?
I personally think most business think this way no matter what payment model they pick. Some are ruthless, some are fair and some just look for ways to exploit their customers. Thats true of F2P games, B2P, Subs and I am sure this will be true with blockchain games.
I personally think, be it a normal payment model or a blockchain game. We need to take it on a game by game basis to decide whats fair and not lump all blockchain games in the bad pile before looking into it.
I agree that we need to take it on a game by game basis. But when developers present their pitch for their game, if they start by talking about blockchain and cryptocurrency and players making money off the game, there's no real need to look further at the game. If they start by talking about game mechanics that sound interesting and eventually mention that they use blockchain for something or other, blockchain shouldn't mean you lose interest in the game unless it's used for something in the monetization model that makes the game a non-starter for you.
There's always been a subset of people who have made money from online gaming.
Asian plat farmers. Selling Power leveling services. etc.
At least the blockchain games are being more open about it.
Although to be fair, games in the past 10 or so years have started to embrace this, and usually offer some sort of cash-to-ingame currency option, where they can at least control the amount and affect that real cash has on the not-quite-separate in-game economy. EVE PLEX, Rift REX, WoW Tokens, etc.
The big difference is that the cash-to-currency tokens that are non-blockchain are specifically there to keep players from making real money --- ensuring the real money only flows to the publisher/developers, and the effect on the in-game economy is able to be controlled.. Blockchains are trying to pay out players in cash while also maintaining some semblance of control on the in-game economy, so there is a difference.
It's certainly possible for some players to on net take money out of the game. But the money that players take out must always be less than the amount that players put in. And the latter is inevitably limited.
It's quite possible for a tiny fraction of the playerbase to pull out so much money that they can treat it like a job. The game's developers themselves effectively do this, and as you point out, a handful of gold farmers do, too. But for each player making the game into a job like this, there must be many, many players putting money into the system.
It's also possible for a more substantial proportion of the playerbase to make a modest amount of money. It could, for example, be common among the top end raiders in a game to make $10 or $20 per month selling off spare resources that they don't need. But that's only a nice bonus for a game that you play because you like it, not a real justification for spending 100 hours per month on a game that you don't enjoy.
What is not practical is for a large fraction of the players to each make a lot of money off a game. That just doesn't work. That would mean players taking too much money out of the game, and far more than is paid into it.
If we can agree that the primise "all players are trying to make money" is false. I beleive that a lot of the angst will subside.
We did loose them yes, then nearly every MMO went F2P and we got them back and had to play in such MMOs. The number of MMOs which are even B2P today is tiny, let alone have a subscription only approach.
I'm still convinced that a premium MMORPG could do very well in this space, even with a monthly subscription of $25.00 and an initial box price of $99.00.
I say this because as an established older gamer I'd be happy to pay that for a carefully curated environment (1) with good story telling by a developer that is working towards a simulation, player freedom, and several other desirable qualities.
Look at what people have spent on SC long before it could even be playable? The money is out there for the right product.
NOTES ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1: Ban people who create characters with names like P|mPM@sTEr and Lukie Streetwalker and other people who show that they just don't get it.
There's too many options for people to pay $300-400 a year for a MMO....I wouldn't even play most of the ones out now for free. They just aren't that great of games...We've basically been getting the same kind of MMOs since 2004.....
We did loose them yes, then nearly every MMO went F2P and we got them back and had to play in such MMOs. The number of MMOs which are even B2P today is tiny, let alone have a subscription only approach.
I'm still convinced that a premium MMORPG could do very well in this space, even with a monthly subscription of $25.00 and an initial box price of $99.00.
I say this because as an established older gamer I'd be happy to pay that for a carefully curated environment (1) with good story telling by a developer that is working towards a simulation, player freedom, and several other desirable qualities.
Look at what people have spent on SC long before it could even be playable? The money is out there for the right product.
NOTES ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1: Ban people who create characters with names like P|mPM@sTEr and Lukie Streetwalker and other people who show that they just don't get it.
There's too many options for people to pay $300-400 a year for a MMO....I wouldn't even play most of the ones out now for free. They just aren't that great of games...We've basically been getting the same kind of MMOs since 2004.....
I would have no problem with paying $300 per year for a game that I really liked. The problem is that my idea of what makes a game worth paying so much for wouldn't match other people's ideas of it.
In many games, you don't MAKE MONEY without putting money into the game. For example, blankos block party sells the majority of the blankos on the market for cash. PLAYERS turn around and choose to sell what they've bought, and usually that's because there is a limited number of those blankos, and they make profit by selling them AFTER they are no longer on sale.
There's no crazy, mixed up premise here that makes this some unfair advantage one player has over another to make money. It's simple supply and demand. I bought one blanko to play with a long time ago, it's no longer on sale, if someone wants it and I decide to sell it, they'll pay what I'm asking or buy it from a different seller, if it's available. The longer the game goes on, the more expensive it will become.
To say "well most people won't make money in Blankos", well, the only way that happens is if someone CHOOSES to sell the blankos they own for a loss. The only people that MIGHT end up doing that, are the people who spent a lot of money on multiple blankos in hopes to sell them in bulk later, OR there's no community to buy them.
But the MAJORITY of players who just want to collect and play the game, won't be bothered, attacked or deal with toxicity because of the blankos they have, they paid for them, no matter where or when they bought them.
That's fine for a game mostly filled with players who just want to play the game and have fun, and where the ability to resell game assets is just a minor side feature. But that's not what most of the early cryptogames are advertising themselves as. Rather, when the developers want to talk about the game, they mostly want to talk about how you can make money off of it. If there's an interesting game somewhere buried in there, the developers sure want to keep it secret from you. That's precisely the tendency that I'm criticizing here. If I'm just looking for a fun game to play and the developers don't think they have anything interesting to offer me, then why should I suspect otherwise.
Infinite Fleet is an exception to this, as I noted in the original post. But it sure doesn't speak well of the genre that for a game's developers to actually seem like they care if the game itself is any good is exceptional.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
It seems to me getting involved with cyrptogaming is a matter of personal choice, the freedom of which I don't find fundamentally problematic.
Well yeah, sure, but when you see something like this you feel obligated to speak out.
Why? It will make neither the competent or incompetent less so in their decision making. The former don't need the advice and the latter won't heed it.
The way I read your post, you are basically describing a speculative market and presenting it as a fundamental problem.
Negative sum game - what you describe here is like any other speculative market. You enter the market by buying some assets speculating that they will appreciate in price which means nothing else than that in the future, someone else will be willing to pay a higher price for them. You go in with certain risk hoping for a reward. The player who is then buying the asset off you is doing exactly the same thing just later and with a higher price tag. This does not mean that if the speculative assets keeps going up, they cannot make money off it as well. And then another person after them.
For each person that makes a salary...it's going to take an awful lot of people paying into the system - if you buy a piece of land in this kind of game for say 1000 USD speculating that it will go up in price, it takes exactly one person who is willing to pay 100 000 USD for it a year later for you to make a close to six figure profit. That person is speculating that someone else will buy it off them for a millie a year later and so on.
Handful of players making money - why would they be handful...you do not know whether the ingame assets will be going up in price or not. If they dont, then yea...someone speculated and lost money. They better evaluated the risks and only speculated with money they could afford to lose. However, if they go up long term, many people can make money off them. Its just like any other speculative market. Someone buys a piece of gold for 1 buck and sells it for 10 bucks to another person after some time, that person then sells it to another person for 100 bucks, etc. etc...and there are many people who actually made money on that asset. Dont see why this should be any different.
....then the price collapses before they sell - price of assets goes up and down...if it goes down before you sell, keep holding and wait for the price to recover. No assets only go up in price. If it doesnt, you held for too long...you speculated and lost...just like you would in any other asset class. People who speculated on copper in 1980 waited 7 years to get back to green numbers. The rule is buy low and sell high. It is a simple rule, but hard to follow for humans because it goes against their nature. This is where learning market cycles come in handy.
If I'm looking for a fun game to play and am instead presented with a speculative market without any interesting underlying game attached, then yeah, that's a problem. That's definitely not what I'm looking for.
People have long tried to argue that loot boxes aren't really gambling because you don't win money from the game. You get a random item that stays inside the game, and your money is gone regardless. Maybe you buy that argument or maybe not.
But you can't make that same argument with the new cryptogames. They're pretty explicit about making the case that you pay money now in hopes of getting more money back later. That's very much a casino. Or perhaps worse than a casino, as Vegas will give you better odds.
I'm not against the existence of commodity markets. There is only so much copper, gold, oil, and so forth available at any given moment, and it's expensive to go get more. How to distribute them between the people who want them is a challenge, and commodity markets answer it pretty well--including allowing people to buy things now in anticipation of higher demand later.
But there's a fundamental difference between commodity markets in things that have some fundamental uses that are intrinsic to the nature of the universe, versus speculative markets in things whose primary reason for existence is so that people can have something to speculate on.
Yes, yes, I'm keenly aware of the theory that goods don't have intrinsic value, and everything is worth what its purchaser will pay for it. But a lot of goods do have intrinsic uses, and that makes a huge difference. Gold is an excellent conductor and highly resistant to corrosion. That makes it highly valued in everything from jewelry to electronics, and there would be a lot more things that would get used for it if were cheaper. Even a lot of goods that we don't value much because they're so abundant still have intrinsic uses.
NFTs in online games don't have any such intrinsic uses. A game creates an NFT and then creates a game to give it some use inside of the game, but if the game closes, or simply makes the NFT incompatible with the game, then it has no further use.
....you need to have a whole lot of people willing to pay money into the game because they think the game is fun, and without expecting to take any money out of it - this is not factually accurate, in my opinion. You do not need a whole lot of people who dont expect to take money out. You just need couple of bulls who believe the price of the assets keeps going up...just like in any other speculative market. Anyone who is buying gold for 57 thousand bucks / kg today from someone who bought the same amount for a thousand a long time ago is doing it because they expect that it will continue appreciating in time. I expect the same from trading these ingame assets.
Some people might get lucky, but you probably won't be one of them, in roughly the sense that someone will win the lottery, but not you - I think a parallel with speculative market is a more fitting one than lottery. Its just about playing the market...early entrants take more risk, but are usually rewarded more should their speculation prove to be a good one. Either enter at the beginning or wait how the market develops and enter later taking less risk, but going after lower rewards.
I'd strongly advise staying far away from such "games". Even if you see other people making money off of the games, by the time you see it, it's probably too late to get in and be one of the early adopters who makes good money - this is what people been saying about crypto in general for a decade now...to stay away from it...meanwhile there are millions of people around the globe retiring early just because they were willing to take some risk and speculate understanding the risks involved. Instead of staying away, people should only speculate with money they can afford to lose and mindful of the risks.
by the time you see it, it's probably too late - does this apply to other speculative assets as well? People been speculating in gold for how long. Is it too late to jump in now? or is there a chance that it will keep going up long term. I would bet on the latter. The assets in these games may be the same. You can buy a piece of land for 10k in a year from someone who bought it now for 1k only to sell it for half a mil 3 years from now.
TLDR - There is no fundamental problem. It is just like any other speculative market. Assess the risks and rewards and invest your money responsibly and you will be fine.
Just like some people make money off of Ponzi schemes. That doesn't mean it's a good idea to put money into them. It doesn't mean it's a real investment. Taking longer to collapse than most doesn't turn it into a good investment. Bernie Madoff's investments lasted 48 years before collapsing, though it it may have been completely legal for a while, and isn't entirely clear when it turned into a Ponzi scheme.
All mined cryptocurrencies are eventually going to lose their value. It's not a question of if, but when. And the more value people thought they had in those cryptocurrencies, the more that people are going to be hurt by it. So long as people realize that they're gambling with money that they wouldn't be particularly hurt by losing, it's no worse than going to a casino. But encouraging people to treat it like a real investment is dishonest and destructive.
It's not a matter of examining and understanding the risks. Game NFTs, as with mined cryptocurrencies, are fundamentally irrational markets. Maybe you can predict that the value of gold or oil will go up or down as major uses of them become more or less important, or as new methods of obtaining them become available or old ones are exhausted. But there isn't anything analogous to that for irrational markets such as mined cryptocurrencies. All that you have to base your guesses on is what you think other people will guess as to their value at some point in the future, and they won't have anything more than that to base their guesses on, either.
The way I read your post, you are basically describing a speculative market and presenting it as a fundamental problem.
Negative sum game - what you describe here is like any other speculative market. You enter the market by buying some assets speculating that they will appreciate in price which means nothing else than that in the future, someone else will be willing to pay a higher price for them. You go in with certain risk hoping for a reward. The player who is then buying the asset off you is doing exactly the same thing just later and with a higher price tag. This does not mean that if the speculative assets keeps going up, they cannot make money off it as well. And then another person after them.
For each person that makes a salary...it's going to take an awful lot of people paying into the system - if you buy a piece of land in this kind of game for say 1000 USD speculating that it will go up in price, it takes exactly one person who is willing to pay 100 000 USD for it a year later for you to make a close to six figure profit. That person is speculating that someone else will buy it off them for a millie a year later and so on.
Handful of players making money - why would they be handful...you do not know whether the ingame assets will be going up in price or not. If they dont, then yea...someone speculated and lost money. They better evaluated the risks and only speculated with money they could afford to lose. However, if they go up long term, many people can make money off them. Its just like any other speculative market. Someone buys a piece of gold for 1 buck and sells it for 10 bucks to another person after some time, that person then sells it to another person for 100 bucks, etc. etc...and there are many people who actually made money on that asset. Dont see why this should be any different.
....then the price collapses before they sell - price of assets goes up and down...if it goes down before you sell, keep holding and wait for the price to recover. No assets only go up in price. If it doesnt, you held for too long...you speculated and lost...just like you would in any other asset class. People who speculated on copper in 1980 waited 7 years to get back to green numbers. The rule is buy low and sell high. It is a simple rule, but hard to follow for humans because it goes against their nature. This is where learning market cycles come in handy.
If I'm looking for a fun game to play and am instead presented with a speculative market without any interesting underlying game attached, then yeah, that's a problem. That's definitely not what I'm looking for.
People have long tried to argue that loot boxes aren't really gambling because you don't win money from the game. You get a random item that stays inside the game, and your money is gone regardless. Maybe you buy that argument or maybe not.
But you can't make that same argument with the new cryptogames. They're pretty explicit about making the case that you pay money now in hopes of getting more money back later. That's very much a casino. Or perhaps worse than a casino, as Vegas will give you better odds.
I'm not against the existence of commodity markets. There is only so much copper, gold, oil, and so forth available at any given moment, and it's expensive to go get more. How to distribute them between the people who want them is a challenge, and commodity markets answer it pretty well--including allowing people to buy things now in anticipation of higher demand later.
But there's a fundamental difference between commodity markets in things that have some fundamental uses that are intrinsic to the nature of the universe, versus speculative markets in things whose primary reason for existence is so that people can have something to speculate on.
Yes, yes, I'm keenly aware of the theory that goods don't have intrinsic value, and everything is worth what its purchaser will pay for it. But a lot of goods do have intrinsic uses, and that makes a huge difference. Gold is an excellent conductor and highly resistant to corrosion. That makes it highly valued in everything from jewelry to electronics, and there would be a lot more things that would get used for it if were cheaper. Even a lot of goods that we don't value much because they're so abundant still have intrinsic uses.
NFTs in online games don't have any such intrinsic uses. A game creates an NFT and then creates a game to give it some use inside of the game, but if the game closes, or simply makes the NFT incompatible with the game, then it has no further use.
It's a risk investment, not gambling. A bit like someone buying a work of art, an antique item, or other collectible item IRL. Those items don't have any intricint value to speak of.
Imho it's a stupid risk investment. IRL collectibles normally retain their value indefinitely so that no investor really loses, whereas the game's lifespan is limited and it's not a question if the investment loses its value, just a question of whether you manage to sell yours off before that happens. But it's risk investment rather than gambling.
I personally think most business think this way no matter what payment model they pick. Some are ruthless, some are fair and some just look for ways to exploit their customers. Thats true of F2P games, B2P, Subs and I am sure this will be true with blockchain games.
I personally think, be it a normal payment model or a blockchain game. We need to take it on a game by game basis to decide whats fair and not lump all blockchain games in the bad pile before looking into it.
I agree that we need to take it on a game by game basis. But when developers present their pitch for their game, if they start by talking about blockchain and cryptocurrency and players making money off the game, there's no real need to look further at the game. If they start by talking about game mechanics that sound interesting and eventually mention that they use blockchain for something or other, blockchain shouldn't mean you lose interest in the game unless it's used for something in the monetization model that makes the game a non-starter for you.
Not sure I agree. People have preferred payment models. I know when I hear a game is subscription pay model, I tend to look deeper into the game. Same if its B2P with only a cosmetic shop.
Same when I hear a game is 100% F2P, it leads me to questions to make sure its not a P2W situation. I personally like it when you dont need to dig to find out the payment model. To many games it takes work to figure that out.
Also, Blockchain Game dont know always mean there is Crypo Currency in the game. So making that clear IMO, would be good info up front. Personally, if the game does let you earn RL money or has Crypto, I will look deeper but thats not gonna drive me away from a good game, just like I have had a few months of fun playing even P2W games.
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It's just there's just so many of them out there even games with other monetization models have legions of them.
Besides, what exactly is a casual player and what traits about them are actually true vs stereotypes often associated with this subset?
Probably deserves a thread all by itself to discuss.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I personally think, be it a normal payment model or a blockchain game. We need to take it on a game by game basis to decide whats fair and not lump all blockchain games in the bad pile before looking into it.
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
Every "blockchain game" uses blockchain differently.
You aren't required to make a blockchain game use crypto currency. You aren't required to have NFT's in a blockchain game. You aren't required to have either, or be decentralized. It doesn't have to equate to money at all, blockchain is a tool to use.
Second -
In many games, you don't MAKE MONEY without putting money into the game. For example, blankos block party sells the majority of the blankos on the market for cash. PLAYERS turn around and choose to sell what they've bought, and usually that's because there is a limited number of those blankos, and they make profit by selling them AFTER they are no longer on sale.
There's no crazy, mixed up premise here that makes this some unfair advantage one player has over another to make money. It's simple supply and demand. I bought one blanko to play with a long time ago, it's no longer on sale, if someone wants it and I decide to sell it, they'll pay what I'm asking or buy it from a different seller, if it's available. The longer the game goes on, the more expensive it will become.
To say "well most people won't make money in Blankos", well, the only way that happens is if someone CHOOSES to sell the blankos they own for a loss. The only people that MIGHT end up doing that, are the people who spent a lot of money on multiple blankos in hopes to sell them in bulk later, OR there's no community to buy them.
But the MAJORITY of players who just want to collect and play the game, won't be bothered, attacked or deal with toxicity because of the blankos they have, they paid for them, no matter where or when they bought them.
Third-
Players who are in the game to make money and players that end up making enough money to live are irrelevant. The idea that "all players are playing to make money" is not the correct way to think about it. It's not "I'm here to make money". The idea behind blockchain games is, "My time here is worth value". That's a big part of what games today are missing. If you spent 10 years in WoW and decide tomorrow you're done, you get nothing to show for your time, you walk away with zero. You can try to sell something, knowing full and well that the other person or you, will get banned. You might make money, maybe.
But in blockchain games, if I decide I want to stop playing blankos or infinite fleet, I can sell whatever I want from my account. Even AT A LOSS it's better than what you get for leaving other games.
Fourth, and Lastly-
One thing that is part of blockchain games, but not other games, are exchange currencies. Those, like land, bring in "investors" who essentially bank on the idea that a games currency will rise in value as the game gets popular, so they bet on the currency.
But not all games have this currency - and some games that do, such as infinite fleet - DON'T SELL IT. You're required to earn the currency in game. blankos doesn't have a public currency at all.
Axie infinity does, ember sword will, and the main question you have to ask is, will these currencies be fixed or are they infinite?
Infinite fleet you cannot buy that currency, but it's fixed, meaning it will only gain in value the longer the game goes on. Players can sell to other players but that is it.
In a game like axie the coin is infinite. You can buy as much as you want, and certain things you earn are paid out in the game as AXS. The coins value is inherently as worthless as any other in game currency, which, if you're a player, it does have value so that you can buy certain axies or whatever, so it's not technically worthless - but, because it's on an exchange, if you bought the coin, the price fluctuates, so investors hold it, in hopes that its going to increase in value. For better or worse it's usually subject to market swings because it's an ethereum based token.
TL:DR
Not all games are created equal. People still don't understand the purpose of blockchain games. It's not always about earning, and shouldn't be.
- Al
Personally the only modern MMORPG trend that annoys me is the idea that MMOs need to be designed in a way to attract people who don't actually like MMOs. Which to me makes about as much sense as someone trying to figure out a way to get vegetarians to eat at their steakhouse.- FARGIN_WAR
And in that way Quizzical is right that if people go into playing these games as just a way to make money, it's a non starter.
And in that way the developers are wrong when they go into building these games as an "earn first" project.
There are experiences that we all have where the take away is simply, we enjoyed our time. Like going to a movie, or eating at a fancy restaurant.
My personal belief is that we go into these games to have fun, but the time we spend and the gear and items we earn do inherently have some kind of value, whether it's in game or out of it.
That's why you have people selling items on Fallout 76 or selling off their accounts in MMOs all the time, and they do sell, unsurprisingly.
The ideal blockchain game is the game that is enjoyable and fun to play outside of any earning aspects. I think there may be only a few games in development that might hit that mark right now, and that's a big if.
Really all these crypto games are swirling around the idea of building the "metaverse" which is basically a grand scheme of gaming, earning inside and even outside of the game. So many companies are infatuated with building these "metaverses".
But right now they want to build "Ready Player One" but end up with Wall Street.
It's quite possible for a tiny fraction of the playerbase to pull out so much money that they can treat it like a job. The game's developers themselves effectively do this, and as you point out, a handful of gold farmers do, too. But for each player making the game into a job like this, there must be many, many players putting money into the system.
It's also possible for a more substantial proportion of the playerbase to make a modest amount of money. It could, for example, be common among the top end raiders in a game to make $10 or $20 per month selling off spare resources that they don't need. But that's only a nice bonus for a game that you play because you like it, not a real justification for spending 100 hours per month on a game that you don't enjoy.
What is not practical is for a large fraction of the players to each make a lot of money off a game. That just doesn't work. That would mean players taking too much money out of the game, and far more than is paid into it.
Certainly, among developers who actively deal with designing a game's monetization model, it's a much higher percentage thinking about blockchain. But it would be very foolish for most of them to press ahead with making their game heavily dependent on cryptocurrencies, for two reasons:
1) Blockchain is very complicated, and very few people understand it well enough to really do much with it.
2) Cryptocurrencies are notoriously unforgiving, and all it takes is one little mistake for your stuff to all get stolen by hackers, and then you're not getting it back. That will shut down a project in a hurry.
Either one of those is survivable on its own, but the combination of them is lethal.
If blockchain does become ubiquitous in gaming someday, it will only be as a minor tool that most people don't even realize is there. It won't be anything like the caricatures that are the early cryptogames. For comparison, do you even know exactly what tools any particular existing MMORPG uses for their databases?
There's too many options for people to pay $300-400 a year for a MMO....I wouldn't even play most of the ones out now for free. They just aren't that great of games...We've basically been getting the same kind of MMOs since 2004.....
Infinite Fleet is an exception to this, as I noted in the original post. But it sure doesn't speak well of the genre that for a game's developers to actually seem like they care if the game itself is any good is exceptional.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Why? It will make neither the competent or incompetent less so in their decision making. The former don't need the advice and the latter won't heed it.
People have long tried to argue that loot boxes aren't really gambling because you don't win money from the game. You get a random item that stays inside the game, and your money is gone regardless. Maybe you buy that argument or maybe not.
But you can't make that same argument with the new cryptogames. They're pretty explicit about making the case that you pay money now in hopes of getting more money back later. That's very much a casino. Or perhaps worse than a casino, as Vegas will give you better odds.
I'm not against the existence of commodity markets. There is only so much copper, gold, oil, and so forth available at any given moment, and it's expensive to go get more. How to distribute them between the people who want them is a challenge, and commodity markets answer it pretty well--including allowing people to buy things now in anticipation of higher demand later.
But there's a fundamental difference between commodity markets in things that have some fundamental uses that are intrinsic to the nature of the universe, versus speculative markets in things whose primary reason for existence is so that people can have something to speculate on.
Yes, yes, I'm keenly aware of the theory that goods don't have intrinsic value, and everything is worth what its purchaser will pay for it. But a lot of goods do have intrinsic uses, and that makes a huge difference. Gold is an excellent conductor and highly resistant to corrosion. That makes it highly valued in everything from jewelry to electronics, and there would be a lot more things that would get used for it if were cheaper. Even a lot of goods that we don't value much because they're so abundant still have intrinsic uses.
NFTs in online games don't have any such intrinsic uses. A game creates an NFT and then creates a game to give it some use inside of the game, but if the game closes, or simply makes the NFT incompatible with the game, then it has no further use.
All mined cryptocurrencies are eventually going to lose their value. It's not a question of if, but when. And the more value people thought they had in those cryptocurrencies, the more that people are going to be hurt by it. So long as people realize that they're gambling with money that they wouldn't be particularly hurt by losing, it's no worse than going to a casino. But encouraging people to treat it like a real investment is dishonest and destructive.
It's not a matter of examining and understanding the risks. Game NFTs, as with mined cryptocurrencies, are fundamentally irrational markets. Maybe you can predict that the value of gold or oil will go up or down as major uses of them become more or less important, or as new methods of obtaining them become available or old ones are exhausted. But there isn't anything analogous to that for irrational markets such as mined cryptocurrencies. All that you have to base your guesses on is what you think other people will guess as to their value at some point in the future, and they won't have anything more than that to base their guesses on, either.
Imho it's a stupid risk investment. IRL collectibles normally retain their value indefinitely so that no investor really loses, whereas the game's lifespan is limited and it's not a question if the investment loses its value, just a question of whether you manage to sell yours off before that happens. But it's risk investment rather than gambling.
Same when I hear a game is 100% F2P, it leads me to questions to make sure its not a P2W situation. I personally like it when you dont need to dig to find out the payment model. To many games it takes work to figure that out.
Also, Blockchain Game dont know always mean there is Crypo Currency in the game. So making that clear IMO, would be good info up front. Personally, if the game does let you earn RL money or has Crypto, I will look deeper but thats not gonna drive me away from a good game, just like I have had a few months of fun playing even P2W games.