The term "blockchain" is currently on everyone's lips. The world's movers and shakers are rushing to be the first to adopt blockchain as the most transformational technology since the Internet, from finance to healthcare and logistics.
Is blockchain the game industry's future?
Blockchain technology has already taken the banking and financial world by storm, but there is another intriguing field which blockchain technology is poised to disrupt, and that is the gaming industry.
Blockchain technology enables features and services present in gaming worlds safer, secure, and managed, from in-game virtual money to collectible and ownable digital goods. As a result, it's no surprise that the two industries are forming a symbiotic relationship, with the gaming business being one of the first to embrace the technology. Gaming is currently regarded as a stepping stone to the future adoption and application of blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies in our daily lives.
You may already be familiar with and play some of the most popular crypto games. CryptoKitties, Ethermon, and Blockchain Cuties are examples of collectible games. Or role-playing games like LostRelics and LiteBringer, world-building games like Decentraland and The Sandbox, or real-time strategy games like Dark Forest.
With the global pandemic driving more people to stay at home and widespread adoption of 5G technology on the horizon, the gaming sector is set to take off, with blockchain technology poised to accelerate growth. Around 2 billion people play video games, and they spend $50 billion on in-game assets. Gaming businesses typically receive 100% of the whole revenue. Things are changing now.
Why is blockchain so appealing to the game industry?
Blockchain is particularly well suited to the gaming industry since it allows:
The production and exchange of non-fungible, one-of-a-kind assets that are validated by the blockchain.
Purchasing in-game goods quickly and securely without the use of a third-party payment service
In-game assets are owned by the players rather than the game producers.
Players will be able to earn cryptocurrency while playing games.
A cross-platform decentralized marketplace for trading and exchanging game assets
Players can take part in consensus protocols and have an impact on the game's progress.
Fairness of game results, with winners and losers recorded on a permanent ledger
NFTs with blockchain gaming: a match made in heaven?
The expanding world of non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, is one of the most compelling reasons for games to embrace blockchain.
NFTs, also known as crypto-collectibles, are one-of-a-kind digital things that cannot be duplicated or traded.
Are you familiar with the game CryptoKitties? The Ethereum blockchain collectibles game became extremely popular, and at one point in December 2017, it accounted for 10% of all transaction volume, clogging the whole Ethereum network.
Players may buy, collect, mate, and sell virtual cats in CryptoKitties. Each CryptoKitty is a non-fungible token (NFT) that is unique to the user, validated by the blockchain, and cannot be copied or transferred without the user's permission. Each cat has its own number and genome, which contains DNA and many "cattributes" like as eye color, eye shape, fur, and pattern, which can be passed on to children.
At the time of the transaction, the most valuable CryptoKitty, Dragon, sold for 600 Ether, or $170,000. CryptoKitties surpassed a milestone of 1 million cats bred in October 2018, with 3.2 million transactions on its smart contracts.
In-game assets such as game skins, virtual cards, weapons, and more are examples of NFTs that end up being owned and controlled by the user rather than the game developer. If in-game goods are really rare, they can be worth thousands of dollars, and putting them on a blockchain allows them to be exchanged on third-party marketplaces like Super Rare, Wax, OpenSea, and Rare Bits.
Platforms for blockchain video gaming
Enjin, dubbed the "Ethereum of Gaming," is a blockchain gaming platform that is capitalizing on the burgeoning blockchain gaming demand. The platform provides a ready-to-use collection of development tools, such as wallets, plugins, and applications, as well as services, to help developers and gaming communities create and administer blockchain games without having to write any blockchain code or maintain any blockchain infrastructure. With over 300,000 gaming communities and 19 million registered gamers, Enjin is presently the most popular blockchain gaming platform. Dapper Labs, Horizon, and Cocos Blockchain Expedition are some of the other companies in the space.
Blockchain is altering the game by tackling numerous difficulties in the video game industry, the first of which is ownership.
Players buy in-game assets with real money in traditional games, but they never actually own them. They only have a license, which the game developer can withdraw at any time. This means that if a player is banned or locked out of a game, they will lose all of their assets or currency that they have worked so hard to accumulate.
Players will be able to purchase and own their assets with the legitimacy of their assets validated and transactions transparent on the blockchain for all to see with the advent of blockchain-based NFTs. Crypto wallets can safely store assets and protect them from hacker attempts. Players can also choose to keep their assets and watch them appreciate in value, or trade and sell them on the open market whenever they like.
