Perfect Use Case For NFTs In Gaming
So there are a lot of controversy around NFTs - are they scams? are they bad for the environment? they can do the same thing without an NFT? I am not going to answer those questions in this article. I will be looking a one use case which I think is perfect for gaming.
There is a lot of talk in the crypto gaming space about play to earn or play and earn games, these games do make sense from an outside perspective, if you are going to play a game, why not get paid for the time you put into a game? When it comes to gaming I do not see that every game is going to become a play to earn or play and earn game as many people seem to be claiming. God of War or Far Cry or Dark Souls - these non online games are more about the going through the story in that particular world so I am not sure how these will become NFT or crypto games. Sure there are games that are perfect in my mind to easily become crypto games like Eve Online or even an online version of Skyrim or really any online game. Games with battle passes, instead of earning the in game currency - it could be a crypto currency or token, this makes sense to me.
One thing I have yet to see in the NFT / Crypto gaming space (at the time of writing) is a NFT for a game which you earn royalties on the earning of that game. I think this is a perfect use case for NFTs in gaming because of three reasons.
Firstly - Developers need money.
There are many ways to get upfront money especially from the community such as Kickstarter, however NFTs is also another option. Games cannot be made without money and NFTs could help raise some or all the money required to develop the game.
Secondly - Decentralised Funding
This means that it does not involve taking money from a publisher or investor which means they can put influence on how the game turns out. So we can see more of the artist vision for the game. We have seen influence from publishers or investors can mean the game did not turn out well or is release too early and unfinished / buggy so that they can make some money back from their investment.
Thirdly - Community Involvement
This is probably the main reason you would want to use an NFT to raise money for developing a game. The community can possibly earn back something against the investment they put in. When a community gets investing into something it means they have skin in the game and they will help towards the games success. When the developer is struggling with a bug and talks about it on a discord post, the community can jump in and help out and that is just one example of where the community can help. The community could even help create assets for the game. So many good reasons to get the community involved.
Concerns
One of the concerns I have with community involvement is review bombing, a community could band together on sites like Metacritic and put good reviews on a game that is not good. They won’t affect the critic score however some people might buy the game based on the user score. Another concern would be that if you are a buyer of the NFT then you are putting complete trust into the developer using the money for the development of the game and spending it well before the game is even released. Scam NFTs are another concern as there are a lot of unverified NFTs being sold which are copies or very similar to actual NFTs which many people are falling for and losing a lot of money. I am sure there are more concerns which I have not thought of but when an NFT is not implemented properly then it will not work out well for either the developer or the buyer.
My Take
I think there are good and bad reason to implement and NFT in the gaming space. I think make the NFTs can be very compelling buy for gamers if they want to support a developers with also getting something back through royalties. It is also always a risk to invest money into a developer when the game has not been created yet but I do not see that as any different to a Kickstarter campaign, with the NFT, you could also include all the extras you would in levels of donations on Kickstarter. There are also a lot of concerns and I do not recommend buying anything without doing your own research.
Do you think you would buy a NFT for gaming that involved royalties? if so then let me know why and if not then let me know why not in the comments below or on Instagram, Twitter or Tiktok. Also if you like this article or want to see more on NFTs in gaming then follow me on Instagram, Twitter or Tiktok to see more and also to know when new articles are published.
