Introduction to Web3 Games and Guilds.

Do you remember the first game you ever played? It could’ve been Mario kart, Pokemon, Farmville, or any other game. These games were a great source of entertainment, but they did something more significant: they introduced their users to a platform. Let’s take a look at the popular game “Farmville.” In 2009 Facebook added Farmville to its game library, and what happened afterward was nothing short of remarkable. With successful marketing strategies, Farmville had become so successful that it accounted for 20 percent of Facebook’s user base at the time. Facebook’s user base had grown from 200 to 750 million years during Farmville’s prime years. Users created accounts to play the game and were introduced to the Facebook platform. Fortnite, a free-to-play game, is so successful that it has over 350 million users and generated over 5.1 billion USD in 2020 alone because it has become more than just a ‘game.’ Fortnite has become a social platform. It has become a virtual place where people have fun and socialize. Games aren’t just games anymore — Fortnite has proved that.

The gaming ecosystem is currently going through an evolution. Let’s explore a potential future for the 160 billion USD industry. For now, they are just games, but they will act as the gateway for gamers into a new world, i.e., the Web3.

What is web3 gaming?

In traditional gaming, gamers purchase in-game content with fiat currency(USD, INR, etc.). However, gamers could not trade or sell in-game assets unless the gaming company approved it.

The steam marketplace is one such example. Gamers can buy or sell in-game items at a specific price in the market. However, these items have no inherent value because they are stored on Valve’s servers, and Valve can manipulate the supply of the in-game assets as per their will.

So what does the blockchain have to offer to solve the issue of ownership of assets? Web3 gaming has created an ecosystem that has decentralized the ownership of assets to decision-making from any central authority.

Full ownership

Web3 games allow gamers to earn revenue by engaging in the game ecosystem and are rewarded with in-game items for their contributions and achievements. The players own these assets(NFTs and game tokens) entirely. Since web3 games use blockchain, players can utilize these virtual goods to trade or buy in any marketplace or convert them into fiat currency.

Interoperability

In traditional games, in-game goods lose value once you are out of their ecosystem. That is not the case with web3 games. Since the data stored on the blockchain is publicly available, gamers can put transactions and assets held by a wallet to use on different platforms (or games).

The Interoperability feature is still in its infancy. Since Interoperability ensures moving assets from one game to another, it threatens the game’s user base. Gaming studios don’t want that, so they have created walled ecosystems so that the gamer stays with the game instead of abandoning it. In reality, there is an upside to gaming studios adopting interoperability. Firstly, transactions will happen on-chain, meaning gaming studios do not have to spend money on data storage systems. Secondly, interoperability is a huge incentive for gamers to experiment with new games without necessarily abandoning their primary game. It could strengthen the gaming ecosystem by introducing a “ market value,” allowing different games to interoperate.

Even though it’s an important use case, we don’t see it happening anytime soon due to the non-aligned economic incentives of gaming studios.

How decentralized games will onboard users to web3

Gaming models have evolved from pay-to-play to free-to-play and now play-to-earn. Pay-to-play models consisted of users often paying 60 dollars to acquire a digital or physical game copy. While pay-to-play models are nothing wrong, they cannot generate users and profits over long periods.

Free-to-play earn games changed that. They made games easily accessible and generated their revenue through microtransactions. F2P caused more than a 100% increase in users, and aggregate users grew by more than 34%. For example, the famous ‘Fortnite game has a userbase of 350 million and generated a revenue of 5.1 billion USD in 2020. If playing a game for free has created such a lucrative business model, naturally, the play-to-earn model will show significant growth in increasing userbase and revenue. NFTs and other in-game economies of web3 games are still in their infancy. It may seem that the play-to-earn model is unsustainable. But once the industry releases excellent quality games and garners enough user attention, the marketplace will become sustainable.

Play-to-earn games will eventually introduce their users to other features of web3, such as Defi. As users frequently interact with in-game marketplaces, they will become comfortable using wallets and other Defi features like loans and smart contracts.

Challenges of web3 games

While Web3 games look promising, potential users are hesitant to onboard due to a significant drawback. Most web3 games require a significant initial investment to get started. In Axie Infinity, a gamer must own three Axie NFTs to start the game. It would cost around 110 USD to form an average Axie team. Such an investment without the surety of ROI demotivates the average gamer to participate in web3 games. How do we solve this problem?

GUILDS

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Gaming guilds are organizations that focus on providing socioeconomic support to gamers by reducing the initial financial barrier of web3 games. These guilds would rent out NFT assets or tokens called ‘scholarships’ to gamers or scholars. These scholars would then share their earnings with community managers and the guild. Guilds serve as a guide and provide a sense of community to gamers. They help and train gamers to get started with web3 native games. It creates a sense of community among gamers.

Many guilds that exist today are a part of a larger DAO or are planning to be one. Each guild has its native token to unlock exclusive content or earn rewards. These tokens also give the guild members the right to participate and vote regarding the guild’s management. Participating in the guild’s decision-making process makes members feel valued and responsible.

Problem with Guilds

Guilds are lucrative for gamers, but becoming a member is a long and arduous process. The user onboarding process could be broken down into two stages:

Discovery

Finding the right guild via social media channels is a tricky process. The discovery channels are often isolated and hard to find. It takes a lot of effort for a gamer to find a guild and guild manager suited to their needs.

Onboarding

Training & interview. (7–12 days)

A community manager will give you study material and train you about the basics of the game. After a ton of back and forth communication, a test is conducted. After successfully passing the test, the guild onboards the gamer to its platform.

The entire process is inefficient, with a conversion rate of 0.1%, which means out of every 1000 applications, only one gamer becomes a scholar. This method isn’t sustainable because web3 games and guilds miss out on potential gamers who could generate revenue and increase profits.

Respct

What if the onboarding process only took a few minutes instead of 7 days? At Respct, we are trying to achieve this by creating a platform to manage the discovery, onboarding, and lifecycle management of a scholar.

How it works

Gamers would have to make a Respct profile on our discord server, where they will showcase their gaming portfolio. They would take a short quiz to check whether they understood the rules and mechanisms of the game. If successful, the gamer links with a gaming guild.

The entire process takes about 30 minutes. If a user already has a Respct profile, they can join or switch guilds without hassle since the guild will be able to verify the player’s experience with past transactions on-chain. To unify the ecosystem, we are actively working with some of the most prominent guilds like IndiGG, Blockchain Gaming, and Blast.gg.

We at Respct.co are working day and night to bring this idea to fruition and take great pride in calling ourselves the “Homepage of Web3.” Have a great day!