OP Games Then and Now
OP Games enables developers and the community to own, run, and monetize games as a collective. Founded in 2018 by gaming veterans, OP Games seeks to lower down the barrier to game ownership.
The new OP Games logo signaling its pivot from Alto.io which mostly focused on interoperable game assets on the blockchain.
From Alto.io to OPGames
Over three years ago, we founded Alto.io in the hopes of changing the status quo for small and mid scale game developers. It was a time when non-fungible token (NFT) was still a struggling buzzword, a time when idealistic founders and developers such as myself and many others liken this early premise of a metaverse to Ready Player One. I’d like to think it still is, although much has changed since.
Coming in from the web 2.0 game development and publishing sphere meant a couple of things, that we’ve seen how centralized platforms and gatekeepers tilts the balance on game discovery away from smaller game developers, that revenue share tilts heavily towards the platforms more than the creators. We initially tried to address this with Alto.io by building picks and shovels for developers wanting to cross the chasm to web 3.0.
Halfway through, we realized we were too early; that a paradigm shift is needed before slowly dismantling the old ways of doing things to pave way for the new, and even this isn’t a guarantee to success. This isn’t just about slapping in crypto and blockchain to an already ongoing centralized game economy, it requires building from the ground up, creating a model deeply rooted in the principles of web 3.0 and decentralization.
Moving the Needle from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0
These challenges hit us hard early on. Not being able to create and prove the traditional game market’s willingness to dabble into web 3.0 was a tough pill to swallow. That left me realizing, not everybody drank the Kool-Aid yet and it will take time. Nonetheless we persisted, I always believed there is promise to our premise, just not in the way I thought it would be. We took a step back, cleared our heads and went back to the core of why we are doing what we do. There was a moment of clarity, we thought, less NFTs as game assets and focus more on crypto tournaments for competitive casual games.
Hard as it was, we shelved Alto.io and pivoted to OP Games, a suite of tools that enable game developers to turn their games into competitive multiplayer tournaments with crypto as a buy in and pay out . We ran with this idea for a year but were also faced with the same issue, while a majority of casual and hypercasual games on the App Store and Play Store are struggling to monetize, it takes time to move the needle. I thought that for developers there’s nothing to lose and everything to gain in this model, but that seems entirely inaccurate given that these developers are struggling and any time given on risks and embarking on unfamiliar journeys is a steep enough price to pay.
Link to GIF: http://gph.is/2b21Hsp
Going Back to our NFT Roots
OP Games have come full circle from NFTs, crypto tournaments and back to NFTs. We are now fully focusing on a very specific subset of games, HTML5 web games to be exact. This is the most underserved segment of the game development space, with no clear pathway to monetization relying mainly on intrusive advertisements for whichever game platform they join. While indie friendly platforms like Steam and Itch.io provide games a level of discovery, gaming is still a hit driven business and the path to success isn’t always in the cards.
The OP NFTs: Turning Games into Investable Assets
“Classic Snake” is one of the pilot NFTs of OP Games. The card was airdropped last May 30 to promote the upcoming launch of the OP NFT collection in Paras.id.
At OP Games, we seek to lower down the barrier to game ownership by enabling developers and the community to build, run and operate games together.
We work with game developers by turning their entire games into NFTs, fractionalizing it to however many, selling it to the community and enabling a DAO for game owners to make proposals, vote for game updates, fund additional development or elect new developers into their games. In this model, we are derisking a huge chunk of the games success dependency from a single developer to the entire community, giving games more viability to succeed.
Exit to the Community
Mockup for the OP Games platform. It invites users to help shape the future of the games OR become a top scorer in the game tournaments.
Through OP Games, small scale creators and game developers now have the option to exit to community and hand over the keys to the people that value these games the most. This enables game developers to work on future interests and projects, while the community runs the games, with developers on the receiving end of royalties.
DAO and game governance
The community will become the central pillar on how games are operated. A fully functional Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) that contributes through usage, governance participation, and even investing. Each game is equipped with game treasuries where a percentage of the initial OP NFT pre-sale will be funneled into the treasury along with all the earning of the games on pooled crypto tournaments and any other revenue generating methods. The community can use the treasury to disburse money back to them, fund additional developments in the game or elect a permanent developer to work on the game.
Creating Opportunities
With the rise of collectively-owned games in OP Games, the demand for communities seeking talents like developers and artists increases. This creates a need for game communities to work with developers, artists or marketers with aligned financial incentives to further improve the quality of their existing games. As the game becomes better and the user base becomes larger, the value of these NFTs also appreciates.
For players, this isn’t just an opportunity to discover games and support communities, they earn rewards based on the amount of time they sink into the games and the platform. Implementing the right kinds of incentives is a powerful driving force in increasing user satisfaction and loyalty.
We aim to create more opportunities for people, whether you’re a developer, an NFT investor or a player. You all have a role to play in disrupting the biggest roadblock for independent and small scale creators; centralized gatekeepers and their rules that govern us. We are very fortunate at OP Games to have experienced these problems first hand and to be in a capacity to do something about it and we’d love for you to join us in our journey.
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About OP Games
OP Games enables developers and the community to own, run, and monetize games as a collective. Through OP Games’ suite of tools and SDK, developers can turn entire HTML5 games into fractionalized NFTs offered to the public as investable assets. Founded in 2018 by gaming veterans, OP Games seeks to lower down the barrier to game ownership.
