Fortnite Might Open Doors for Blockchain in Gaming

With all the hustle and bustle that blockchain is making in every industry, it comes somewhat as a surprise to not see blockchain disrupting the most tech-ridden sector of Gaming. Professional gamers play and fight for titles and money, earning a fancy lifestyle, while million other amateur players buy, sell, group, and chat in this virtual ecosystem. This clearly depicts that the real value of the virtual ecosystem is not much behind that of the tangible objects.

With widely played video games like PUBG, Call of Duty, and League of Legends – that are running on paid transactions for characters, weapons, and other such primary elements available for purchase, gamers are often confused about how these transactions work, who dictates the pricing, how the goods are traded. They seek clarity and transparency in the processes and they are not getting it.

Addressing the current situation, Insomniac Games – developer of PS4-exclusive Marvel’s Spiderman – spoke about the progress of blockchain integration into the gaming industry.

When asked by a popular tech magazine, if Insomniac Games has been doing any experiments in the blockchain technology, James Stevenson, Community Director at Insomniac Games was quoted as saying,

“We haven’t been experimenting with anything blockchain for our triple-A games as we’re still very much a traditional developer who manufactures discs or sells through the PSN store. But I do think it is very interesting from the perspective of digital rights management. Now you can potentially sell games and through the blockchain have very easy rights management of the various copies.”

Talking about the lack of action that developers are taking in the space, James stated, “…the actual practical implementation of it for managing certain data sets and creating ledgers is very, very interesting. I think developers are only scratching the surface at this point.”

Responding to the question most gaming enthusiasts are dying to ask about Insomniac Games interest in Blockchain, James said,

“I think it is more, that we have guys who are interested in it from a “this is a new technology” perspective. But I’m not sure we’ve seen a way to apply it directly to a game like Spider-Man at this point. I do think from an industry perspective, it will be interesting to see if it can transform how digital rights are handled…..It’s not just rights, but microtransactions, game currencies or the ability to win money. It’s just waiting for that one big game that implements it all really well. The game that allows you to do something cool with blockchain in a special way and so it catches on like a Rocket League or a Fortnite. Then suddenly everyone will take much more interest.”

It definitely could be Fortnite as its creator, Epic Games, has just signed a deal with a blockchain start-up. To that, James had to say,

“Those guys are on the absolute cutting edge and Epic Games are primed to take advantage of something like blockchain given how quickly they iterate their content. Look at the directions they are taking with storytelling. With Spider-Man, we’re making a very different type of game, but what they’re doing with Fortnite, wow. Look at that shared world and how it is interacting with the real world, as well as how quickly they are changing things in the game; the way they are doing eSports; all the different stuff you can buy.”

It shouldn’t come as a shock to the gaming community if Fortnite is soon introduced as the world’s first blockchain-based video game, especially when the speculation is backed by the collaboration of Epic Games, and game development giants like Insomniac Games think like the rest of us.

Courtesy: www.finder.com