Shuji Utsumi, Sega’s co-CEO, comments in a new statement that there is no point in implementing blockchain technology if it doesn’t make games ‘fun’. Sega...
Shuji Utsumi, Sega’s co-CEO, comments in a new statement that there is no point in implementing blockchain technology if it doesn’t make games ‘fun’. Sega...
All the NFT stuff has gone above and beyond to be as dumb as possible. There was one possible use case, the proof of uniqueness, showing that you genuinely own the one and only, and all others are copies.
So people used this technology to mass produce copies of the least unique things, because of course the actual use case is a pyramid scheme to scam people for money, and all the value of a blockchain item is the promise that it will make the buyer more money.
Exactly this. There's been an obsession with tech laypeople execs to put blockchain tech into anything because it's what they perceive to be the cool hip thing to do, but it's a just tool with certain benefits and should only be added if and when it makes sense.
What could you do with a blockchain in a video game? Well, you could make in game assets into tokens that can be traded outside of the game, creating a secondary market for things that is entirely outside of the game publishers control. Why would you want to do that, though? It might be attractive for MMO gold farmer types, but the MMO game makers themselves are going to want to run in the opposite direction from such a thing. Maybe an Steam achievement trading card scheme? Again, why would anyone do that, though, when the system Steam uses works just fine and there's no risk of things getting out of control as Valve has full control over the marketplace.
Honestly, I struggle to think of a single other real use. That doesn't mean that there's no use for it, but it's definitely not something that should just be crammed into any product, let alone video games.
One of my favorite physical game creators, Exploding Kittens (and Matthew Inman), decided to put NFC's into their games...
I used to buy hundreds of dollars worth of games for myself and others from them. Ever since I got the email about it, I wrote back to them telling them I'll never buy another one unless they reverse course of that decision. To this day, I've kept my word.
Crypto is bullshit, and I don't want it sewn into the games I play.
I didn't really think about it until just now, but I would totally get a new Sega console. They at least have the internal developers to make meaningful first party exclusives to justify getting one.
I have no problem with a blockchain used in non-monetary context. Consider, for example, a competitive RTS/TBS which recorded RNG events or keystrokes to the blockchain, which helps show if there was lag, and helps to verify that the RNG is fair, and that both players aren't cheating. Or a game with a "Speedrun" mode, recording input as blocks, and making sure it's all publicly verifiable. Think of a Doom demo file, but encompassing all attempts from all connected players; new routes can be discovered quicker and cheaters can be outed near-instantly.
Blockchain as a concept is of great value to anything where public auditing is wanted. We've associated it to scams and money, and that bugs me. Including more aggressive monetization, speculation, and a profit motive makes a game less fun. Including a publicly auditable log of past events in a game built for multiplayer feels like it would be a value-add.
That doesn't need to be a distributed ledger, that can just be a database. The only use cases for DLT/Blockchains is where it is undesirable to have a central authority.
Games will always have a central authority - the devs - so there's just no point. Nothing is gained by decentralizing trust, and quite a lot - especially speed and simplicity - must be sacrificed.
Do you really want billions of computers solving arbitrary random math problems just to write in a random keystroke, of which there are kapillions per hour?
A huge number of users posting on social media are just stealth marketing accounts. They literally make fake accounts with personality profiles (e.g. some guy that's into sports) and they will make regular comments and content. But occasionally they will drop links to promotional content which matches the personality.
I'd much rather they were up front about it. So I really don't get the hate for self-promotion because you're complaining about the one guy being honest in a sea of liars.
If prefer that website owners are appropriately named and share and the community votes on relevance, than the alternative, which is astroturfing links.
What we want is content here. If websites have relevant content to share, let them. If they abuse it and spamz block them.