5 companies using blockchain to level-up the games industry

Overview 💭

Some 2.3 billion gamers will spend $137.9 billion on games this year, according to gaming research firm Newzoo. That’s a lot of gaming. But while gaming is bigger than ever, there have been some challenges: global-scale hacks, spiralling development costs and a disappearance of independent games developers.

Could blockchain help ease these issues? We take a look at five companies looking to do level up the gaming industry. 👨‍💻

Allow games to create their own tradable currencies with Enjin Coin 💸

If you’ve played games you’ll know one of the big monetisation strategies developers use is in-game purchases. But those in-app purchases and the currencies that developers create are siloed within the game itself.

Enjin Coin wants to change that.

Enjin Coin allows gaming communities to create currencies, items, and even attributes that are backed by the parent Enjin Coin.

The company’s ERC-20 Token allows developers to create a monetisation mechanic inside their game without having to go through the time-consuming process — not to mention third-party processing costs — of building one themselves.

Once a gamer earns or buys a token within a certain game, they can easily trade them for currencies in other games in an open and transparent system.

Creating a virtual world players can own with Decentraland 🗺️

Virtual reality isn’t new, nor is sandbox style games where players are free to explore. But what would happen if pushed both of them together — and allowed people to own land, build and develop new products inside that game? You get Decentraland.

Decentraland is a virtual world that you can own a piece of. Think Minecraft meets SimCity.

You purchase land in the Decentraland world, and the record of ownership is recorded on the Ethereum network. Once that’s done, you’re free to do whatever you choose with your land.

To access it you put on a VR headset or use your web browser, and you can become a property developer inside this virtual world. Plots of land and the buildings on them are valued in MANA, a native cryptocurrency.

At the time of writing people are building cities, roads and houses that are selling for as much as $800,000 in fiat currency.

Create a legal and transparent eSports wagering service with Unikrn 🥊

The eSports industry is projected to make $700 million in revenue this year, and hit $1.5 billion by 2020 according to gaming research company Newzoo.

As you might expect, a gambling industry has built up around eSports. But there’s a problem: it’s largely unregulated and, according to reports, often involves minors under 18 participating in placing bets.

Unikrn wants to change that.

Unikrn is an ethereum-based wagering platform that provides eSports fans and newcomers alike a safe and legal place to gather, game, and bet on eSports.

Bets are more secure and backed up on the blockchain. More recently, the company created its own cryptocurrency to allow wagering to take place in areas with tighter gambling laws, and even created a currency that can’t be cashed out for jurisdictions where gambling is illegal.

Allow gamers to trade their virtual assets with OPSkins 💱

“Skins” or digital decorations for weapons and characters inside games is a $50 billion industry. While there’s a burgeoning trade appearing around players selling their skins for real cash, the industry is rife with scams and misinformation.

Enter OPSkins.

OPSkins is a blockchain-based marketplace for turning virtual items into real assets.

Whenever a player earns a skin inside a game, they can take that skin to the OPSkins exchange and trade it for real cash or cryptocurrency. Or, if they’re in the market for one, pick up one safely and securely.

Powering this platform is the Worldwide Asset eXchange, a cryptocurrency that allows the exchange of digital assets to occur on a decentralized platform.

It means players in different countries now no longer need to calculate exchange rates — and pay transfer fees to banks — in order to buy and sell their favourite skins.

Creating decentralised gaming platforms with Chimaera 🎮

Game development is costly. The average cost of producing a game in a mid-sized to large studio is $20 million and involves dozens of people and years in development.

Other barriers include independently managing game complexity, infrastructure costs, and publishing and account administration. This often makes it impossible for independent developers to bring their concepts to the market.

Chimaera wants to change that, using blockchain.

Chimaera allows online games to be built, published, and played directly on a blockchain-based gaming network.

Developers are able to run, manage and distribute games on the network at a fraction of the costs.

Video games are powered by CHI tokens on its blockchain, and Chimaera has created its own API so that games written in any language can connect to it, giving designers the opportunity to design games in their language of choice.

The goal is to foster creativity and bring concepts to life without worrying about infrastructure.

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