We strongly believe that in the next few years there will be some element of ‘play-to-earn’ or ‘play-and-earn’ in most games,” said Michael Rubinelli, CEO of WAX.
With Blockchain slowly making its way into the gaming industry, industry veterans and non-fungible token (NFT) Blockchain executives WAX believe there will be more connections between gaming and Blockchain networks in the future.
In an interview with Cointelegraph, WAX Publishing Head David Kim and WAX Gaming Studios Head Michael Rubinelli shared their thoughts on NFTs, the metaverse, and Blockchain gaming.
Kim’s Thoughts
According to Kim, despite having less search interest on Google, engagement with games, the metaverse, and NFTs is not dead. “On the WAX Blockchain, we saw a doubling of the number of sell transactions at the start of Q4 2021, and it has remained elevated ever since,” he said.
“I’m undecided if the ‘hype’ will return up, however, we imagine that long run, curiosity in and engagement with metaverses and NFTs will develop advert infinitum as utility will increase and safety issues are allayed.”
Rubinelli’s Sentiment
On the other hand, when asked about the future of play-to-earn (P2E) gaming models, Rubinelli compared the introduction of P2E to the adoption of free-to-play and microtransactions within games. With more than 20 years in the gaming industry, the executive believes a similar pattern is taking place.
“We imagine strongly that there will probably be some aspect of ‘play-to-earn’ or ‘play-and-earn’ in most video games inside the subsequent few years. Most of those will probably be Blockchain-connected; however, not totally working on Blockchain.”
Thoughts Based upon Hard Data
In a 2021 report published by the Blockchain gaming alliance, a survey showed that many respondents share the same sentiment as WAX executives when asked how much the Blockchain industry is likely to leverage Blockchain in the next two years.
Speaking about the challenges facing Blockchain games, Rubinelli mentioned that scalability remains a top concern. “Right now, the biggest challenge is the lack of ability of most Blockchains to scale,” he said.
The game veteran noted that Layer2 solutions could not scale unless they are “100% dedicated to a single game like Ronin for Axie Infinity.” He also recalled when the Sunflower Farmers game’s user base grew; then it had “caused Polygon to stop.”
As for esports, David Kim mentioned that most of the games played on WAX are “too simple to be adapted for esports.” However, the WAX exec noted that there are games in development that could be adapted for esports.
“There are multiple Blockchain-connected games currently in development with an eye toward esports. These include Hearthstone-like card battlers like Skyweaver, battle royales like Hodlgod, and team-based first-person shooters like The Forge Arena.”
Kim pointed out that esports games need more time to develop. According to him, it has only been 9 months since Alien Worlds, Splinterlands and Axie Infinity proved that Blockchain games can attract many gamers. “You can’t develop the kind of sophisticated game mechanics needed for esports at that time,” he added.
By Audy Castaneda
