People of all ages, from children to older adults, have a deep love for video games. Some individuals spend hours playing games on their smartphones, while others invest significant amounts of money to build the ultimate gaming PC. Regardless of the platform, video games have the incredible power to connect people from all over the world through play, cooperation, and competition.
The rapid growth of the Web3 industry has opened up new possibilities for people to connect and collaborate globally. It only seems natural, then, that these two worlds would eventually come together.
In the latest episode of “Decentralize with Cointelegraph,” host Jonathan DeYoung interviews executives from five gaming-focused projects — Shrapnel, Ex Populus, Saga, HyperPlay, and MetalCore — to gain a comprehensive understanding of how Web3 games are being developed alongside the current state of blockchain gaming and its projected future.
A common theme expressed by many of the gaming executives is that Web3 games must offer frictionless gameplay in order to appeal to both crypto enthusiasts and skeptics and achieve mainstream success.
Marc Mercuri, the chief blockchain officer of Shrapnel, an upcoming extraction shooter game, shared his team’s perspective on this issue. He stated, “If I just want to play this game, and it’s great, I shouldn’t even know anything about Web3. But if I believe in DeFi and I want to bridge my assets in and out, and I want to get this skin and take it out and get a loan against it in a DeFi protocol and all the rest of that, you should be able to do that too.”
For players who want to delve deeper into the crypto ecosystem, it is crucial that they can do so seamlessly. DeYoung asked JacobC.eth, the founder and CEO of HyperPlay, a Web3-enabled games store with integration with MetaMask, about a recent viral meme in the crypto community. The meme humorously depicted a shooter game where each shot fired triggered a MetaMask popup requiring a transaction confirmation. This meme highlighted the potential friction that could arise from blockchain-based games.
JacobC.eth explained that onchain games can easily avoid this issue by utilizing account abstraction. This feature allows users to fund an in-game wallet and automatically approve or execute transactions in the background based on the spending limits and thresholds set by the user. He added that while most games only call the wallet when buying or selling in-game assets, certain games with onchain logic, such as Pirate Nation, DeFi Kingdoms, and Dark Forest, employ account abstraction wallets to auto-approve player transactions.
In a recent episode of “Decentralize with Cointelegraph,” Yat Siu, co-founder, and chairman of Animoca Brands, expressed his belief that gaming will pave the way for mass adoption of crypto. The question then arises: do other gaming executives share this perspective?
Toby Batton, founder, and CEO of Web3 game studio Ex Populus, strongly agrees with Siu. He stated, “We feel that if blockchain technology is really going to hit the mainstream, it’s number one going to be through gaming. Gaming obviously has a massive audience of billions of players around the world, and the use case of blockchain technology fits so perfectly with games.”
Rebecca Liao, founder, and CEO of Saga, a scalable layer-1 blockchain designed for game developers, shares a similar viewpoint but with some additional nuances. She believes that gaming will indeed drive mass adoption of crypto, but it may not be the first application to do so. Liao explained, “I do think that’s true. Is it the thing that has hit first? Obviously, no. I mean, we’ve seen that cryptocurrency as a product in its own right was the first to hit in Web3. […] But in terms of true mass adoption — so people are on their phones using crypto, not noticing their crypto — that is all to come, I think. And that will come from gaming.”
Liao also mentioned in a previous interview with Cointelegraph Magazine that major game studios are already exploring blockchain technology, albeit discreetly as internal experiments. She emphasized that these studios don’t want to inform their player base about their involvement with blockchain, as many gamers still hold negative opinions about Web3 gaming, considering it a scam with poor-quality games.
Despite rumors, many believe that it may take some time before we see large-scale AAA games fully integrate crypto. Dan Nikolaides, the chief technology officer of MetalCore, an upcoming mech combat game, argued that what is needed is a collection of games like Shrapnel and others that may have a lower budget than AAA games but still offer high-quality experiences comparable to AAA games.
To gain further insights into the promises and challenges of Web3 gaming and its potential for mass adoption, listeners can tune in to the full episode of “Decentralize with Cointelegraph” on Cointelegraph’s podcast page, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or their preferred podcast platform. Additionally, Cointelegraph offers a diverse lineup of other shows worth exploring.
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