Gaming news too small for its own thread

[Asura]

This already happens without blockchain though. Every digital asset can be infinitely duplicated and yet people pay for them. People assign value to them. This isn't some new concept. It's a reality right now with or without NFTs.

Yeah, but the value they assign to them is based on their use, not some kind of intrinsic non-fungibility that's designed to simulate value.

I can prove, right now, that I have purchased items in several deactivated MMORPG games. If those games were running, the items would have value, but they don't, because the games aren't running and their data is useless. Even if I had an NFT for these things, they would still be useless and without appreciable value.

[dataDave]

NFTs could quite easily enable a second-hand/trade-in market for digital games. As a publisher you mint a batch of however many of them, creating scarcity, and each time one of those games is traded between individuals 10% of the transaction goes to the publisher.

Thanks to the blockchain the transaction wouldn't even need a middleman like Ebay. We could trade these in our trading forum, with ownership passing over instantaneously. No more middleman fees, just a commission going back to the original owner.

As an indie developer you wouldn't even need a publisher.

[wakka]

What would be the advantage for a publisher in doing that though? Why cede control of the pricing of their game to individual resellers? And why claim just 10% of the sale price when they currently take ~70% when a sale occurs on Steam etc?

Genuine questions, not trying to be a dick.

[fishbowlhead]

Yeah, but the value they assign to them is based on their use, not some kind of intrinsic non-fungibility that's designed to simulate value.

I can prove, right now, that I have purchased items in several deactivated MMORPG games. If those games were running, the items would have value, but they don't, because the games aren't running and their data is useless. Even if I had an NFT for these things, they would still be useless and without appreciable value.

Thats the other side of the coin in games as well, game goes off, item disappears and thats the end of that.

[dataDave]

What would be the advantage for a publisher in doing that though?

That's my whole point. Publishers are middle-men. Outside of handling large marketing campaigns digitisation makes them redundant.

As the developer you could set your own commission rates. You'd have to use some common sense - not many people are going to want to sell on their digital copy of a game they paid €80 for if they're only getting half the cut of the sale. Unless of course that game ends up rare (only 1,000,000 minted and trades rarely take place because the game is so good and people don't want to let go), and could be sold for €800.

[Dogg Thang]

What would be the advantage for a publisher in doing that though? Why cede control of the pricing of their game to individual resellers? And why claim just 10% of the sale price when they currently take ~70% when a sale occurs on Steam etc?

Because when something is sold on Steam, they get that money once. If it's built into the smart contract, the publisher will still get that primary sale money but also a percentage (of their choosing) if it is then sold on again. There is a secondary sale revenue stream.

That said, that could ultimately be less attractive if they think that ability will reduce the amount of primary sales, which is a very real possibility.

[wakka]

OK, yeah, I get that with the smart contracts and the 10%, but currently the situation is that there are 0 situations of a digital game being 'sold on again'. It's not, generally speaking at least, possible.

Why would they create a situation where it is possible? How would it benefit them versus having total control over the supply and the pricing, and always receiving 70+% of any sale of the game?

That's my whole point. Publishers are middle-men. Outside of handling large marketing campaigns digitisation makes them redundant.

As the developer you could set your own commission rates. You'd have to use some common sense - not many people are going to want to sell on their digital copy of a game they paid €80 for if they're only getting half the cut of the sale. Unless of course that game ends up rare (only 1,000,000 minted and trades rarely take place because the game is so good and people don't want to let go), and could be sold for €800.

I missed this one when I originally posted.

OK, swap 'publisher' for 'developer' in my original post where I asked this question.

I still don't get why a developer would want to trade away getting the full fat commission on a brand new sale via a digital marketplace for a smaller cut of a much cheaper sale. They can set their own commission, sure, but not at the ~60-70% Steam would give them, plus they can't set their own prices at that point. Why would they give up the ability to do so?

As regards to creating digital scarcity for games, again, why? If your game is so good that a minority of very keen people are willing to pay £800 for a digital second hand copy, why not simply keep selling the game for £39.99 and sell it to many more people?

I'm still not understanding the advantages for someone who is making and selling games.

[Neon Ignition]

The only way they'd support it is via selling the digital game back to the company itself for them to sell on. Trouble is, being a digital item there's no inherent value to it or product to handle so by selling back your access to a game you're effectively just creating a digital rental service which is in effect Game Pass. Either the market entirely embraces a subscription model (seems increasingly unlikely) or things will stay as they are.

[MartyG]

It opens the door to things like being able to trade your copy of Battlefield 4099 on Xbox Series XXX to PlayStation 12 by relinquishing your ownership of the Xbox copy. The new owner can guarantee you no longer have access to that copy because you no longer have the NFT.

The platform holder benefits by allowing people to move their console ownership like shifting power companies or phone network providers.

[Dogg Thang]

Yep. I think we're a long way off any games company allowing their games to be bought and sold digitally by anyone. But right now, physical games are traded on a very regular basis and publishers and devs get nothing. In the digital space, with systems like these, that same activity could happen digitally - so we get to sell on our purchases while the publishers and devs actually get a cut. This seems like a big move for any publisher and, like I say, I don't see that happening soon. But if you imagine this same scenario only with Skyrim horse armour, I think that's something that could happen and would be good for everyone including the games companies themselves. It builds a secondary market for in-game items where the actual games makers themselves get a cut.

[wakka]

It opens the door to things like being able to trade your copy of Battlefield 4099 on Xbox Series XXX to PlayStation 12 by relinquishing your ownership of the Xbox copy. The new owner can guarantee you no longer have access to that copy because you no longer have the NFT.

The platform holder benefits by allowing people to move their console ownership like shifting power companies or phone network providers.

This is an interesting idea.

Would this be a net benefit to the platform holder, though?

OFCOM and the Current Account Switching Service have to drag mobile phone networks and banks kicking and screaming into more easily facilitating changing provider. It's only easy because of regulation. The phone networks and the banks didn't elect to do it. I'm not sure that Sony and MS would want to actively develop such a system.

Yep. I think we're a long way off any games company allowing their games to be bought and sold digitally by anyone. But right now, physical games are traded on a very regular basis and publishers and devs get nothing. In the digital space, with systems like these, that same activity could happen digitally - so we get to sell on our purchases while the publishers and devs actually get a cut. This seems like a big move for any publisher and, like I say, I don't see that happening soon. But if you imagine this same scenario only with Skyrim horse armour, I think that's something that could happen and would be good for everyone including the games companies themselves. It builds a secondary market for in-game items where the actual games makers themselves get a cut.

I think we'll probably just have to agree to disagree. Even if we look at Skyrim horse armour, I don't understand how I, as Bethesda, would choose to go from a system where I control the total horse armour supply, the price of the horse armour, and receive at least 70% of the price of any horse armour sale, to a system where the price is set by the market and I receive 10 or 20 or 30%.

But maybe I'm just thick!

[fishbowlhead]

It opens the door to things like being able to trade your copy of Battlefield 4099 on Xbox Series XXX to PlayStation 12 by relinquishing your ownership of the Xbox copy. The new owner can guarantee you no longer have access to that copy because you no longer have the NFT.

The platform holder benefits by allowing people to move their console ownership like shifting power companies or phone network providers.

Year this is never going to happen , platform holders are competing companies selling rival products, they want to sell as many products on their platform for maximum profits, they are not utilities.

[chopemon]

That's my whole point. Publishers are middle-men. Outside of handling large marketing campaigns digitisation makes them redundant.

This isn't true at all.

This is just my personal experience from our game Paradise Killer (out now on Switch and PC!!!!) but publishers do A LOT more than that. I am not allowed to disclose financial details of our deal but our publisher has:

• Funded development
• Sorted our trailers
• Done our marketing
• Worked with a PR agency to distribute review codes
• Created and maintained our store pages
• Worked with platform holders to secure featuring, exposure and sales spotlights
• Helped do our age ratings
• Helped with platform submissions
• Performed biz dev to get us released on more and new storefronts
• Secured us some stuff I can't talk about on platforms I can't talk about
• Secured our localisation deal
• More miscellaneous things that helped towards our success

All of the above is something an indie developer theoretically could do but that's a full time job on top of actually making the game. Also, we don't have the connections to make those things happen. Our publisher has a team of people that have existing relationships and connections and business sense to allow those things to happen. All of the things I listed above are extremely non-trivial tasks that require time and skillset we don't have inhouse because there isn't enough budget to develop them.

Publishers are somewhat essential in the modern world where a billion games are released each week and everyone is clamouring for the attention of purchasers and platform holders.

Also blockchain isn't needed to solve the problem of being able to resell digital games. Steam already has a record of the games I own and how they were purchased. Blockchain is just adding in a redundant method. Rather than solving a problem, people want to force blockchain into something where it isn't needed.

As a consumer, it sure would be great to resell my digital games but as a developer, it sure would suck because our profits would take a massive dive. We are not rich. I used up all my savings to make Paradise Killer and the three staff we have all took large pay cuts to work here. That is our choice and no one forced us to but the indie game space is so competitive with so many games released that we need all the money we can get. That is my personal view and something I'm conflicted about being both a consumer and developer.

[MartyG]

Year this is never going to happen , platform holders are competing companies selling rival products, they want to sell as many products on their platform for maximum profits, they are not utilities.

This would be a short-sighted view on their part. If you can easily move someone to your platform by allowing them to move some of their games across with them, you've gained a customer who's then going to spend further money with you who might otherwise stick with the competition.

Innovation happens by opening the blinkers, not narrowly starring down the same tunnel for all time - those that do that get left behind. But admittedly, some like having their feet stuck in the mud.

[fishbowlhead]

This would be a short-sighted view on their part. If you can easily move someone to your platform by allowing them to move some of their games across with them, you've gained a customer who's then going to spend further money with you who might otherwise stick with the competition.

Innovation happens by opening the blinkers, not narrowly starring down the same tunnel for all time - those that do that get left behind. But admittedly, some like having their feet stuck in the mud.

This type of system might be good for yourself and your photography, you take a photo, process a single ntf off it and assign a value, or dogg thang producing a single short animation and assigning value to it, but doesn't work for gaming, seems similar but its the wrong industry to apply nft's too.