We don’t need no heroes (or Fortnite)
New not borrowed
Nothing generates headlines like the combination of the word ‘blockchain’ and the name of a tech giant such as Facebook, Google, Apple or Microsoft.
Similarly, in the blockchain game space, Ubisoft’s low-level experimentation has generated far more noise than its small-scale internal prototyping warrants. And don’t get me started on the egregious attempts to shoehorn the words ‘Fortnite’ and ‘blockchain’ into the same headline.
In these cases, the underlying narrative — even when written by supposed blockchain advocates — is clear. Blockchain needs rescuing by established, grown up companies.
It’s totally wrong.
This isn’t to say the news Facebook has acqui-hired the Chainspace team or comment of Microsoft and IBM’s ongoing blockchain activities are in any way negative. Broadly they are a validation of the usefulness of the underlying technology. That’s better news than a random tweet from Jack Dorsey.
But, at a fundamental level, we should understand — even believe — blockchain doesn’t require such topdown validation. If Facebook fires the Chainspace team in a month’s time or never launches its fabled stablecoin that won’t invalidate blockchain either.
For as much as Bitcoin Maximalists match any fundamentalist cult for self righteousness predicated on homogeneity of thought, their kernel of belief is solid; Bitcoin works, blockchain works.
And blockchain will be so much more.
From the bottom up
This is particularly the case when it comes to games, which as a consumer-facing sector certainly require a more nuanced implementation of blockchain in terms of the user experience than in the enterprise IT space.
Also, we need to understand the games industry is not broken. Indeed, by almost every measure — product quality, player numbers, financial standing — it’s never been better or more successful.
Blockchain isn’t going to fix games but, used in the correct manner, it could make them better.
For this to happen, however, we need to consider much more carefully what blockchain’s unique features are for games.
In this context, item ownership is most mentioned, although what’s actually meant is item ownership which enables trading assets for gain, whether that be gain in terms of a closed in-game economy, or via cryptocurrency that can be cashed out fiat.
This is why headlines attempting to crowbar ‘Fortnite’ and ‘blockchain’ together are so wide of the mark.
Fortnite monetizes brilliantly through a revolving set of time-limited aesthetic items that demonstrate a player’s dedication to grinding, their ability to spend real money (at a specific point in time), or some personal combination of the two.
If, however, Fortnite’s items were fully and legally tradable on the blockchain, the reason players spend money buying them would vanish. For the Fortnite community, item ownership is a regular time-stamped validation of their commitment to the game and their in-game group.
Item ownership in Fortnite isn’t the important thing. It’s secondary to the process and social context of item ownership.
If all items in Fortnite were always available for purchase, the game’s entire economy would puncture and eventually collapse.
Thinking more deeply
Hence the rise of blockchain games (or games using the blockchain) must be a bottom-up process.
Item ownership will need to be there from the getgo, with developers and community finding their own equilibrium when it comes to how new items are created, traded and valued, emotionally and financially.
That will not be an easy process, but as the ongoing example of CryptoKitties — a game misunderstood by most blockchain game developers — demonstrates, it can and will be accomplished.
