The General State of Gaming NFTs in 2022 *spawn*

[dskneo]

I mean, those are foundational questions about how blockchain works, shifty.


Regarding how currency is made, cryptocurrency works because it has an economic model. Read this post https://forum.beyond3d.com/posts/2194339/


The size of the economic model surrounding a project dictates its viability adoption and security, which then further increases the economy, which then increases the viability adoption and security again... on and on and on. Hence, the price you see for each Bitcoin or Ethereum, that grew from a few cents to thousands of dollars. The currency you mine or buy or earn is like the US dollar. You can spend it where it is accepted or exchange it for something that is accepted where you want to spend it.


Regarding to how a game interacts with a blockchain, the more simplistic and realistic type of game would consider the blockchain to be just a database where your belongings (assets) or moves (a chess move) are committed. The game consults your blockchain wallet to verify what you own. When you read Ubisoft or whatever talking about implementing NFT into their games. this is what they are talking about.


If you want a more complex blockchain game, the other word for that is "smart contracts". Some blockchains are fully programmable languages (Ethereum) in which you can build game logic on the blockchain itself. But this is slow and expensive on layer 1.


Because both the above models require data to be committed to the blockchain, there are inherent fees that have to be paid (following the economic model in the link I posted above). These fees are paid by each client committing new data to the blockchain, be it a game, a wallet, a token, any transaction.


Iroboto proposed an idea that the game client would mine Ethereum while you play the game, to cover your fees. But this cost issue is mainly only attributable to data sent to the layer 1 blockchains, when in reality most programs and games are meant to run on layer 2 which drops the fees down to a few cents, but it implies you must have some currency in your wallet to process fees. Understanding Layer 1 and Layer 2 is fundamental in this space as well.

 

[orangpelupa]

Layer 1 and 2.... Is matic/polygon is the layer 2 of ethereum?

 

[iroboto]

I'm having trouble getting my head around this. Perhaps because the blockchain is using words with different definitions that aren't transferable or obvious?

Is this game operating in realtime or turn-based?
Why do you get currency for processing a game block?
Is that currency usable as currency in other systems? So can you play the game, accrue 300 Crytobucks, and then buy an NFT avatar on a system that accepts Cryptobucks?
What's the origin of the currency to give to players processing bucks?

Turn based.
The client is only there to let the user decide what they want to do. They must key in their moves and submit them for processing. The blockchain currency is responsible for putting the moves onto the ledger and the actual move occurs. And then the client sees the results of everyone’s new moves. Rinse and repeat. If you don’t submit a move to the ledger, you didn’t make a move.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I mean, those are foundational questions about how blockchain works, shifty.

No, they're questions on how a game fits on the blockchain so I'm not making assumptions. I assumed 'turn based' because the blockchain is just a transactional ledger, but I want clarification. Similarly I'm assuming the cost is somewhere, but want that explained in relation to Iroboto's comment that the blockchain is appealing for someone who can't afford server fees. A comment that maybe doesn't mean what I think it did.

The size of the economic model surrounding a project dictates its viability adoption and security, which then further increases the economy, which then increases the viability adoption and security again... on and on and on. Hence, the price you see for each Bitcoin or Ethereum, that grew from a few cents to thousands of dollars. The currency you mine or buy or earn is like the US dollar. You can spend it where it is accepted or exchange it for something that is accepted where you want to spend it.

Lots of words! My question is who is paying for the game to be played and how? And then, how is that different to other methods?

If you want a more complex blockchain game, the other word for that is "smart contracts". Some blockchains are fully programmable languages (Ethereum) in which you can build game logic on the blockchain itself.

How can it be 'on the blockchain' if the blockchain is a ledger? To process game logic, you need a resource of processors. So is the 'blockchain' a network of computers, or a distributed ledger system, or is the word being overloaded to mean more than one thing without clarification?

Turn based.
The client is only there to let the user decide what they want to do. They must key in their moves and submit them for processing. The blockchain currency is responsible for putting the moves onto the ledger and the actual move occurs. And then the client sees the results of everyone’s new moves. Rinse and repeat. If you don’t submit a move to the ledger, you didn’t make a move.

So the player has to pay with cryptocurrency? Also, what is processing the moves to produce a game state? And were you talking about using the blockchain not as a substitute for paid servers, but as an alternative product, instead of making a server-based shooter making a blockchain based amusement?

And did you edit the fact players have to mine to play - "LOL the players would need to mine for the game to actually run." - after my reply? I don't remember seeing that part.

 

[iroboto]

So the player has to pay with cryptocurrency? Also, what is processing the moves to produce a game state? And were you talking about using the blockchain not as a substitute for paid servers, but as an alternative product, instead of making a server-based shooter making a blockchain based amusement?

And did you edit the fact players have to mine to play - "LOL the players would need to mine for the game to actually run." - after my reply? I don't remember seeing that part.

lol it was there. In my mind, the moves could be computed on the block chain using dApps or a variant of smart contracts. But you could be right that I may need dedicated computation to process moves; I think combat is one of them.

In the original idea, a player with only 10 other users, nothing would happen; they would make their moves, but have to mine the block chain for moves to occur. Make a move, mine it again, so I thought that was funny.
But with dedicated people mining, to keep the world running, they could just focus on playing the game.

I'm not talking about using block chain to pay for dedicated servers, though, that's also a possibility (perhaps simpler now that I think about it). But I was just referring to actually playing the game on the block chain, so the game technically couldn't run unless the ledger was changing.

 

[dskneo]

So the player has to pay with cryptocurrency? Also, what is processing the moves to produce a game state? And were you talking about using the blockchain not as a substitute for paid servers, but as an alternative product, instead of making a server-based shooter making a blockchain based amusement?

And did you edit the fact players have to mine to play - "LOL the players would need to mine for the game to actually run." - after my reply? I don't remember seeing that part.

The game state is always run locally on your PC or web browser or phone, like any cryptowallet or regular PC/android game. Whereas a regular game accesses the developer owned servers to determine what your account has (assets etc), with blockchain the game accesses the blockchain. Again, whats different from developer owned servers, are the advantages inherent to blockchain,

Yes, client-side software needs to pay fees to commit new data to the network. Or the fees can be supported by the developer like coinbase does, depending on your income model.

No, they're questions on how a game fits on the blockchain so I'm not making assumptions. I assumed 'turn based' because the blockchain is just a transactional ledger, but I want clarification. Similarly I'm assuming the cost is somewhere, but want that explained in relation to Iroboto's comment that the blockchain is appealing for someone who can't afford server fees. A comment that maybe doesn't mean what I think it did.

How can it be 'on the blockchain' if the blockchain is a ledger? To process game logic, you need a resource of processors. So is the 'blockchain' a network of computers, or a distributed ledger system, or is the word being overloaded to mean more than one thing without clarification?
Lots of words! My question is who is paying for the game to be played and how? And then, how is that different to other methods?

Its all explained in my previous posts in this topic, Shifty.

Blockchain is merely a methodology of storing information. The word blockchain does not limit the projects that use blockchain to be limited to be a transacional ledger only.

On top of this methodology, some networks such as Ethereum are in fact full turing complete programming languages that you can use to build programs that are executed on the Ethereum network. These are called smart-contracts.

The Ethereum network is composed by miners and nodes. Smart-contracts (logic, game logic, contract logic etc) is run on the nodes. Security is guaranteed by the miners. These smart-contracts are deployed into the network like "bots" on reddit, that execute on the nodes. Your client-side program (game, wallet, software of any kind) invoques access to this smart-contract to run and execute data according to the algorithm stipulated in the smart-contract, such as NFT.

Lots of words! My question is who is paying for the game to be played and how? And then, how is that different to other methods?

Not only its a lot of words, they were repeated 3 or 4 times in this topic is my patience who suffers.

Blockchain replaces developer owned server-side logic that handles what your account has access too (assets etc). Therefor, the advantages are obvious to see. And the disadvantages as well.

The developers do not need to pay for servers for the duration the blockchain exists. Developer owned servers its an expense they do not have in this model.

Blockchain also provides access to world markets with billions of USD in liquidity, making in-game markets another cost developers do not need to support.

Whats different from developer owned servers, are the advantages inherent to blockchain, and the disadvantages are the current speed and costs of committing data to a blockchain.

 

[dskneo]

Layer 1 and 2.... Is matic/polygon is the layer 2 of ethereum?

Ethereum has a lot of Layer 2 projects. Matic I believe is both a side-chain and layer2 for Ethereum layer 1.

 

[Jay]

Just wondering why do these publishers/studios keep mentioning their going to use NFT especially given everytime they back track a day later.
They must be aware it keeps happening, is it for the investors, a new buzz word that sounds good to them?

They could just implement it without all the PR, and sell things with it and 95% of people would be none the wiser.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Just wondering why do these publishers/studios keep mentioning their going to use NFT especially given everytime they back track a day later.
They must be aware it keeps happening, is it for the investors, a new buzz word that sounds good to them?

They could just implement it without all the PR, and sell things with it and 95% of people would be none the wiser.

What I've found interesting when listening to established developers talk is that developers are generally against NFTs in games because they don't see anything good that NFTs bring to games. In general they all feel it's a big scam (NFTs in games and how they are currently used, not NFTs themselves) and that gaming will only get worse if NFTs are forced into games. These are the people actually designing and programming the games. They postulate that there might possibly be something that NFTs are good for although they can't think of any good use for them and they are absolutely certain there is no good use for them in games.

Indie developers especially really dislike and question the sincerity of people that claim NFTs are good for gaming.

OTOH, I've seen a lot of Publishers, CEOs, CFOs and PR teams talk about how great NFTs are and that anyone saying they are bad are just ignorant people that don't understand why NFTs will make games great.

Regards,
SB

 

[Albuquerque]

OTOH, I've seen a lot of Publishers, CEOs, CFOs and PR teams talk about how great NFTs are and that anyone saying they are bad are just ignorant people that don't understand why NFTs will make games great.

Eg the people who have become rich on speculation want to shove more speculation into the market. This doesn't sound anything ilke cryptocurrency at all, does it?

 

[Jay]

OTOH, I've seen a lot of Publishers, CEOs, CFOs and PR teams talk about how great NFTs are and that anyone saying they are bad are just ignorant people that don't understand why NFTs will make games great.

It's got to the point that when a studio says their going to use NFT's, they are purposely doing so for the backlash. To force the "higher ups" etc to say to pull it.

You don't need to publicise the fact a game is going to use it. It's like publishing your going to use some anti theft tech in your game.

 

[Malo]

Unless you're Ubisoft, who seemingly want all in on NFTs.

Sorry, game-related speculative investment transactions that are loosely tied to the incredibly awesome technology called NFTs. Is that better?

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Is the anti-NFT movement working? Voice actor Troy Baker and Team 17 drop plans, EA's enthusiasm cools | TechSpot

People do not want NFTs in their games.

More importantly, at Team-17 there was a LOT of internal backlash by their employees and developers when management announced they were going to have a game using NFTs. When the internet also voiced their opinions about it, management wised up and cancelled all plans to have NFTs used in any games from Team-17. Good for them.

Regards,
SB

 

[dobwal]

People do not want NFTs in their games.

Correct. People want games for their NFTs which is the problem. You might find a handful of games that uses NFTs. You'll find dozens upon dozens of NFTs waiting on the development of their associated game.

Its a solution searching for a problem. Or worse for alot of these NFTs its just a way to market and create value for their tokens and the game itself will never see the light of day. They just need to extract a lot of value from the initial sale and secondary market before the hype wears off.

Honestly if the need for NFT was so obvious and great, actual game devs would be incorporating them already.

 

[Malo]

Honestly if the need for NFT was so obvious and great, actual game devs would be incorporating them already.

Ubisoft is already selling NFT-based "unique" armor for Ghost Recon, lookup "Ubisoft Quartz". They didn't sell very well.

 

[dobwal]

Ubisoft is already selling NFT-based "unique" armor for Ghost Recon, lookup "Ubisoft Quartz". They didn't sell very well.

LOL. Probably why I never heard of it. Most of the gaming NFT noise isn't being led by those within the gaming market. Its being led by those within the NFT and Crypto market.

Or better yet, the push for gaming NFTs isn't being driven by gamers but rather speculators.

 

[milk]

The game state is always run locally on your PC or web browser or phone, like any cryptowallet or regular PC/android game. Whereas a regular game accesses the developer owned servers to determine what your account has (assets etc), with blockchain the game accesses the blockchain. Again, whats different from developer owned servers, are the advantages inherent to blockchain,

Yes, client-side software needs to pay fees to commit new data to the network. Or the fees can be supported by the developer like coinbase does, depending on your income model.








Its all explained in my previous posts in this topic, Shifty.

Blockchain is merely a methodology of storing information. The word blockchain does not limit the projects that use blockchain to be limited to be a transacional ledger only.

On top of this methodology, some networks such as Ethereum are in fact full turing complete programming languages that you can use to build programs that are executed on the Ethereum network. These are called smart-contracts.

The Ethereum network is composed by miners and nodes. Smart-contracts (logic, game logic, contract logic etc) is run on the nodes. Security is guaranteed by the miners. These smart-contracts are deployed into the network like "bots" on reddit, that execute on the nodes. Your client-side program (game, wallet, software of any kind) invoques access to this smart-contract to run and execute data according to the algorithm stipulated in the smart-contract, such as NFT.







Not only its a lot of words, they were repeated 3 or 4 times in this topic is my patience who suffers.

Blockchain replaces developer owned server-side logic that handles what your account has access too (assets etc). Therefor, the advantages are obvious to see. And the disadvantages as well.

The developers do not need to pay for servers for the duration the blockchain exists. Developer owned servers its an expense they do not have in this model.

Blockchain also provides access to world markets with billions of USD in liquidity, making in-game markets another cost developers do not need to support.

Whats different from developer owned servers, are the advantages inherent to blockchain, and the disadvantages are the current speed and costs of committing data to a blockchain.

Isn't what you are describing more easily achieved through vanilla peer-to-peer netcode? All the blockchain seems to add is extra layers of encription and uneeded (for a game) security at the cost of tons of extra computation and latency.

 

[dskneo]

Isn't what you are describing more easily achieved through vanilla peer-to-peer netcode? All the blockchain seems to add is extra layers of encription and uneeded (for a game) security at the cost of tons of extra computation and latency.

Yes indeed. The extra layers inherent to blockchain are only a benefit when the use case justifies it. Its understandably justified on a financial market that moves150 billion $ per day, but when a gamer collects a rare card that somehow others are willing to pay 100k or even just 100$ for it, if things go wrong in 100 possible ways in a centralized service, that gamer will be asking why his assets weren't better protected in the first place.

I guess devs from big corps are anticipating these items to be worth a lot, given the right conditions. They also know they can code the NFT tech to given them a % of kickback in every transfer.

 

[milk]

Yes indeed. The extra layers inherent to blockchain are only a benefit when the use case justifies it. Its understandably justified on a financial market that moves150 billion $ per day, but when a gamer collects a rare card that somehow others are willing to pay 100k or even just 100$ for it, if things go wrong in 100 possible ways in a centralized service, that gamer will be asking why his assets weren't better protected in the first place.

I guess devs from big corps are anticipating these items to be worth a lot, given the right conditions. They also know they can code the NFT tech to given them a % of kickback in every transfer.

Ok, but verifying ownership of an item through smart contracts is very different from an online game in which every single step of the server-side code is hitching a ride in the blockchain... What I don't see is the advantage of the later.

 

[orangpelupa]

Btw is there an nft game where it is a proper video game?

I mean.. With proper gameplay, story, music, and so on?

The few I've known are pretty barebones.

It would be nice if something like.... diablo with its auction house. Or like destiny 2 but you can trade the nft items and cash out.