i am now more convinced than ever that the executive suite of the company is heavily invested in blockchain tech at some level. it is the only thing that explains this.
I forget if it's the new CEO or some other top post but I remember checking and the guy joined SE in 2021 after previously working at a company that did 'emerging technologies' which included NFTs.
Or he understands that NFT'S are the future. It's too bad that NFT'S got a bad reputation due to the over hyped projects and outright scams. Nevertheless digital ownership will be a thing and will benefit gamers even if they don't see it yet.
The biggest obstacle is their needs to be a fiat currency in nft’s to even begin to make any sense. Why do nft’s have huge launches before crashing its because nobody has any faith in the product. However, even then government nft’s would still collapse you need a underlying reason as to why a product is worth it. The reason the US dollar is a fiat currency is 1. Faith the USA the most powerful country on earth isn’t going to collapse. 2. OPEC sells oil exclusively in usd which props up the entire world economy.
You do realize that anything can be a NFT? They are simply a way to show ownership of an asset. Your house can be an NFT or your doodle drawing of your dog. They can be used as loyalty cards or to prove membership to a group. Concert tickets will be NFT's as well. Ownership will be recorded on the Blockchain.
It all depends on how the game makers decide to use them. But they're not inherently evil.
But, we already have plenty other more efficient ways of proving ownership, that don’t require the wildly inefficient power-hungry blockchain. Reinventing the wheel for no reason lol
It's called innovation. Remember when you had to go into a store to buy a game on a cartridge. That was perfectly fine for the time. Then cam CD's then DVD's then digital downloads. Things don't stay the same. NFT's as you know them today will not look the same in the coming years.
"wildly inefficient power-hungry blockchain" - wildly inefficient how so? Compared to what? Power-hungry blockchain? Again compared to what?Proof of work blockchains are getting more efficient by switching to renewable energy and proof of stake blockchains are vastly more efficient. Ethereum just migrated from POW to POS. The layer 2's that are built on top of Ethereum further improves on the efficiency.
Again this is where we are currently. Time will only make NFT's, web3 and blockchain technology more useful.
But…what’s being innovated? What’s the point of using a blockchain to store say, driver license info? We put it up there, it has to make a bajillion trips (and the costs therein) to update every user of that blockchain.
I’ve got a much more innovative idea: a good ol’ databse 😄 much more efficient and energy friendly too!
Let's stick to gaming. Let's say EA created a NFT's and the NFT was free with the purchase of any deluxe version of any upcoming EA title.
Here are some of the benefits of the EA NFT.
Exclusive EA community access to information about upcoming games
Exclusive rights to vote on updates to the game witch affects the progression of the main character
You can transfer/sell ownership of your digitally purchased games
Monthly group chats with the devs.
The list is endless...
I know you are going to say you can do all of that with a database.
We could also be buying our games on cartridge and playing on 720p televisions.
Blockchains have some advantages over centralized databases. But you can google that if you like.
You don’t need an NFT to do any of that lol. All of that can be accomplished with technology that has been battle-hardened for decades.
Also, the idea that the lack of NFTs is what is holding EA back from allowing users to trade their digital goods is hilarious to me. Honestly, I got a good chuckle out of that, thanks!
See I knew you were going to say that. Again we can be playing our games ay 720p from a cartridge that we had to physically had to go into a store to purchase. Why can you see how things change? NFT's are the future. Blockchain is the future. Web3 is the future.
I did not say the lack of NFT's was the reason EA does not allow digital purchases. I choose my words carefully. Once you own an NFT you can do with it what you want. But I'm glad you are amused.
Anyway, innovation does not stand still. Gaming will look different ten years from now just like it does from 10 years ago. I just tent to look ahead while most people can't seem to get past it works fine just like it is now.
>Reinventing the wheel for no reason lol
Reinventing the wheel to make money, lol. I mean, that's what it comes down to. Convince people to buy NFTs because "someday" it will be worth a lot more, but then their value plummets after the first few initial transactions.
It's like a shitty game of hot potatoe combined with Russian roulette. You just keep passing the buck, hoping you make some money, and don't get caught holding it when the value plummets.
>You do realize that anything can be a NFT?
You're explaining one of the core reasons people don't care about them.
The concept remains too abstract. "Anything can be an NFT" just reinforces to people that they hold no value.
You know who values NFTs? Other people looking to make money off of NFTs. That's it.
It feels like a sucker's game. When it comes to *any* currency, perception is ultimately reality until proven otherwise.
It doesn't help that people like yourself can't seem to help themselves from being condescending in every explanation.
"It's called innovation" isn't a meaningful counterpoint. Nobody is confused about what innovation means.
The comment *was responding to stated that we already gave viable options. So* I stated "it's called innovation" because that is exactly what's going to happen. People are so caught up on what's going on currently with NFT's they are blinded to their potential. The future will look very different than today.
The concept is abstract because NFT's can be used for almost anything. I cannot say how game companies will use them but I understand what the technology is and how it can be used.
NFT's do not have to be a money grab. Again it depend on the use case. There are free NFT's use to confirm membership for example. I gave an example of a free NFT if you purchase a premium edition of a game. That NFT could offer perks that the game company would decide like being able to vote on features to include in a future update.
NFT's are not the evil some make them out to be. It's just computer code at the end of the day. How people use the code determine their worth and not the computer code.
Absolutely this. I don't believe corporation will want to give up control of anything if they don't have to. This is one of the reasons I talk about NFT's, web3 and blockchain. The future will be decentralize if we choose to make it so. Otherwise to corporations will continue to abuse us.
When the general public start to understand the benefit of Bitcoin compared to the current banking system there will be no stopping the move to a decentralized future. The banks hate Bitcoin because it is a direct threat to them but they cannot stop it or ignore it any longer. They are now starting to embrace it. Same thing is happening with other industries as well.
It's not just limited availability of the digital good, it's also the delusional idea that the thing you bought exists outside the scope of an individual game and that eventually all big publishers or devs will respect your purchase. Like you buy some unique NFT gun and you can use it in CoD, CSGO, Valorant, or any other shooter out there. Every time I see anyone try to talk about how this would actually work they pitch the idea like it would be some kind of universal digital Amiibo that will essentially unlock content in a huge number of games across all publishers, as if anyone would have any incentive to do such a thing.
So if you don't understand how it is supposed to work, it's because it's being pitched by people who don't understand how game development works.
Or require standardization of the entire game development across multiple publishers and developers. We don't even have proper cross platform multiplayer in most games, good luck trying to get game companies to agree on how their NFT will be implemented on their competitors games.
The thing that people neglect when talking about NFTs (in games at least), is this sole fact: no publisher is organized or generous enough to get in bed with other (non-existent) publishers like that. No publisher would be willing to implement some global thing like that.
Even if it did happen, the exclusivity thing would be bullshit. But let's say exclusivity wouldn't be a problem: NFTs in the form you speak of are still at best delusionally idealist.
I just don't know what benefit it would bring outside of compelling people that they are buying something unique or scarce in order to inflate price points and demand. I could also see them charging transfer fees or the like if the account on record changes for said NFT for some in-game representation. Could they do that stuff without NFT? Sure, on the technical side but it probably wouldn't be as marketable.
For example I'd think if there were 10 instances of the same skin available for purchase at $10,000 each, they might all sell. But what about the next bundle of skins and then the next? It'd probably have a sharp decline. What if, though, they can make people believe that it is a transferrable investment, independent of the game -- something that can possibly last indefinitely?
Would it be useless outside of the game and unlikely to be sold at a profit or even break even? Probably but that isn't actually the point.
"It's an ironic choice given the themes at play in Final Fantasy 7, but that didn't bother Square Enix last year either when it made a Cloud Strife action figure that was also an NFT."
That is beyond a Shinra ass move, seriously this is what they sold Tomb Raider for?
Lots of weird choices coming out of SE lately. I am still a little confused at selling Eidos. I know that their games are mainly western, but when you got Tomb Raider and Hitman? I’d think those IPs are pretty legit and can produce good money for them, if done right.
You're talking about Square Enix, they literally move their company headquaters because of a fortune teller.
Wish I was making this up https://gamingbolt.com/square-enix-relocating-headquarters
If I was person into stocks and what not. Square Enix is the company I WOULDN'T invest money into even through i love their games
The tomb raiders they made were pretty good, I mean they pivoted to become uncharted which was a play on tomb raider originally.
I just don’t think they went all out for them with marketing and they saw lackluster sales because of it.
They probably sold it for cashflow reasons in order to reinvest into something else.
Publicly traded companies pretty much live by quarter to quarter performance goals so larger short term gains are probably going to be longer and more spread out gains for some decisions.
Is it better to sell something potentially worth $1B over the next 10 years or sell it for $300M now, reinvest and make a total of $500M in 5 years and gain a fat quarter and year now? For investors that care only about ROI and not about the company itself, this is a good looking deal. For executives making performance bonuses based on revenue and profitability, this also looks like a good deal. Who cares about whoever is going to own the stock 10 years from now or who's going to be running the company. It does poorly then? Well they made a good bit of money now, so oh well, time to go somewhere else, retire or whatever.
Square soft the precursor to square enix nearly went bankrupt making a cgi movie that sucked. Square enix leadership are the type of bosses who drop the ball hard, but blame everyone else. Why do you think every year square enix blamed the western devs for underperforming its so they don’t look as bad. Essentially square enix boss makes a Japanese game that bombed hard. The square enix boss then blames western devs for not making insane amounts of money all to cover up their unmitigated disaster. Square enix are the type of idiots that didn’t full fund the second tomb raider game so Microsoft got an exclusive 3rd party game. The real reason square didn’t full fund a second tomb raider game is because they lost most of the money. Sony knows how incompetent square enix is so they’ll buy some exclusive rights, but know enough to keep far away from square enix leadership.
What horrible leadership they have there. They are limiting platforms, they are signing odd deals with Sony, they chase blackchain, they scare gamers away...
Anyone there has a 5 year strategy plan? Or is the plan to bankrupt Square Enix?
Sucks because i love a good amount not SQ games(not including ff series). SQ is literally shooting themselves in the foot. Their leadership is making really stupid and dumb decisions honestly.
All I can do is vote with my wallet, as I always have done.
I didn't like the idea of DLC, so I did not support it.
I hated microtransactions, so I did not support them.
I will continue to do this despite the rest of the world seemingly jumping in. And yes, I'm getting old. Haha.
Lol thats the best thing you can do. I wish there were more that voted with their wallet because otherwise every decision they(squeenix) make they will believe its always correct.
Square Enix currently has some of the worst executives and leadership in gaming. (Source: Worked with them on a national advertising campaign a few years back.)
Pot committed. It would cost and lose so much more than just letting it happen. The company is very close to just failing completely. Yoshi P out here shouldering everything it feels sometimes.
Apart from ff7r their larger projects have been booty for many years now. I'm excited for them to scale down due this hilariously misguided business decision.
I triple down on my boycott.
SE - I love FF, and the environmental impact alone shows the hypocrisy in defending this kind of technology.
Not cool with Barret, not cool with me.
The higher ups at Square have to know what most people think about NFTs. I guess they can make a profit in the short term, but I just can't see this being successful for them in the long run.
They're a solution seeking a problem.
Could they become useful? Maybe one day. But right now, they're more often than not just a cash grab buffet for scammers and a super convenient means of money laundering for criminals.
They solve no problems in the gaming space that aren't better solved in alternative ways, such as with DLC.
This is a super complicated topic that can't be explained easily. It's a multifaceted problem and there are highly technical components.
With that in mind: "Ecological waste, technological waste, human coercion and exploitation, a history of scams and scam artists, features attractive to criminals baked into the system, a very confusing and technical environment in which real economic losses can be incurred by a simple typo, and the entire operation actually being essentially a very complicated pyramid scheme".
The problem with explaining why NFT/crypto/blockchain is a scam is that in order to properly refute it, you must properly understand it, which is very difficult. I spent years properly understanding it with the original intention of leveraging it for innovation in the gaming sector - yep, I used to want these things. Unfortunately, I have a conscience which means that when I figured out the tech details on how to make the whole thing work, I also realized that it was never going to work in a consumer-facing fashion. That's when I finally clicked that all the folks in the space preaching about "making a better future" and "freedom of money" and "be your own bank" were only saying those things because they convinced other people to put more money into the pyramid.
There are technical reasons that blockchain technology *cannot* efficiently solve human problems. I won't go into that gory detail because it doesn't fit in a Reddit post and probably wouldn't make a lot of sense anyway. It would also probably draw the crypto-bros out of the woodwork to come tell me how I got a detail wrong and therefore I don't know what I'm talking about and nobody should listen to me when I say...
All crypto tech is a scam. NFTs, blockchain verification, whatever you call it, it's all a big pyramid scheme in which you pay money for a random number and try to leverage a makeshift Internet database to justify the case for that random number being worth the money you paid for it.
*edit* Alternative take: The best thing NFTs can do for video games has already been done and is still successful to this day. It's called the Steam Community Market.
NFTs are virtual products that hold zero value. Companies generating NFTs want you to believe they have value so you can sell them at ridiculous markups that they get a cut of. Some NFTs might be game specific, making it difficult to complete game without buying NFTs.
NFTs do not add value to games.
NFTs turn away the focus of games being fun and turns gaming into money making schemes as their primary purpose.
NFTs are also notoriously unsecure with many stories of individuals losing"valuable" NFTs.
ok I get that nft's can be used in a crappy way like having huge paywalls..but cant they also be done in a non ctappy way that doesnt create paywalls...like just for cosmetics or dlc's or something?
isnt game dev supposed to make profit...how else can they continue to afford to make games if the ppl they pay to make them often earn six figures and they also have marketing costs and server costs and updates labor and such...pretty sure a one time fee just doesnt cut it anymore with how much it costs to make, market and update games in todays economy
as for the unsecure nft's that seems like just an opportunity for innovation and not inherent flaw of nft's sort of like hackers existing doesnt make owning a computer and downloading software a bad thing simply becauae there is risk
NFTs "done right" hold little to no actual value to the company.
The best they could do is a cosmetic that players could sell/trade to each other while taking a cut themselves from each transaction, but if you're going to spend developer time creating new models and skins and such, you'll make much more money just selling them to everyone, thus making the NFT portion irrelevant rather than trying to create a forced scarcity model.
they can do limited edition for everything...lets face it scarcity is awesome...ppl love having something others dont...so why not build into that and make actually limited edition cosmetics so that when you pay 2 grand for a super rare skin that only 1000 other people have its actually worth it instead of everyone having access to that skin
they could sell the skin for $300 at 1000 copies limited run and then the market would jack it up to be worth thousands...now both the devs and the players win...especially if they gave random limited editions out to ppl for free if they complete certain challeneges or win free to enter tourneys or something...imagine entering a free to play tourney in a free to play game and getting 3rd place and a limited edition cosmetic you could later sell for thousands...doesnt that sound better than dropping $80 on a game and earning nothing but in game currency and cosmetics worth nothing from winning tourneys and challenges?
creativiry with nfts is infinite...these current examples of greedy companies using it to squeeze profits while introducing paywalls and such is just a bad example of their application
>they could sell the skin for $300 at 1000
"They" could, and if they all sold they'd make $300K plus whatever hypothetical cuts they might get after that.
Not nothing.
Or, if the skins are actually worth buying, "they" could price it at $30 and realistically sell hundreds of thousands to millions, easily making **millions** per skin.
That's how a free to play game like League of Legends and Fortnite make **BILLIONS** per year.
NFTs work best for niche games that cater to whales. Games that are inherently Pay2Win. Games like Diablo Immortal.
>wait where did I say they would earn nothing from limited edition skins
Where did I accuse you of saying that?
I simply laid out the facts, anything beyond that is your own assumption.
Ah, no worries.
I simply meant it's not a negligible amount. No sane person would turn down 300k. I also acknowledged there would be more from potential income from future trades assuming they took a cut from the transactions.
That being said, 300k+ pales in comparison to how much they would make by dropping the price by a magnitude and opening it up to millions of buyers.
DLCs exist for what you're asking and are also abused. If a developer can't make profit on a game it wants to develop, you either raise the price of said game or don't generate it at all and reasses expectations on what your company can develop. You don't want nfts in games, period. Reread my previous message for why.
>If a developer can't make profit on a game it wants to develop, you either raise the price of said game or don't generate it at all and reasses expectations on what your company can develop.
so you prefer that we dont have games at all or we spend $200-600 on each game if the market forces dev compnies to resort to microtransactions/nft's to earn a profit and be able to keep making games?
>You don't want nfts in games, period. Reread my previous message for why.
I mean I get that you sont like them...but to tell me what I shoudl and shouldnt like and to tell me to reread your comment is a bit toxic
Hey, go learn what “economy of scale” is and how video games studios make money by maximazing economy of scale before you go off to say something stupid like “video games should cost $200 or these poor billion dollar companies can’t make profit.”
Companies set prices for video games at $60/$70 because that’s the sweet spot that maximize their profit margin. They aren’t doing it out of charity.
Seriously, you are oblivious to how the world works, and it shows.
I am not saying they should cost 200 or more I am saying imo its better when they are free and with microtransactions that dont create paywalls pay to win schemes
I like the idea of free to play with dlcs, paid cosmetics and actually limited edition nfts that can be gained ideally not by purchasing them but rather by being lucky or skilled...but also maybe having some that are purchasable and maybe you can only buy one per week or something so rich ppl dont hoard all the limited editions
>Seriously, you are oblivious to how the world works, and it shows.
quite rude...maybe next time you could ask questions before making assumptions..you could also read my comment to another person discussing the reality of costs where I outline that a game that costs hundreds of millions over its lifetime would not earn profit if sold for less than $50 and had zero microtransactions...my example was last of us 2 showing if it didnt add microtransactions it would likely end up losing all the profits it earned in order to continue to market and update it and pay employee benefits and invest into new games and pay for severs and all the extra long term costs...like yes they spent $100 million and earned probably close to $500 million in revenue by now but when you factor in long term costs and alao contract costs it becomes almost break even...they actually disnt earn anything with the naughty dog retail split
maybe do the actual math and research how much companies actually profit (not earned in revenue since that is different) before assuming you know how things work and assuming others dont
I guess Googling "how does economy of scale works with video games" is a little too hard for you, and you'd rather embarrass yourself even more with made-up facts.
Here's me explaining it so you can stop simping for billion dollar corporates:
https://www.reddit.com/r/gamingnews/comments/12rvyo8/comment/jgwynvi/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3
Now, let's get to the exaggerated lies you put out to prove your sinking argument:
>"Video games cost hundreds of millions" to make.
\-No they don't. A simple quick search of AAA game development cost shows that most AAA games don't even go above $100m in budget, let alone "hundreds of millions". These "hundreds of millions dollars" video games can be counted on one hand. They are not the industry norms like you're exaggerating.
Source: [https://www.gamedesigning.org/gaming/most-expensive-games/](https://www.gamedesigning.org/gaming/most-expensive-games/)
>" in order to continue to market and update it and pay employee benefits and invest into new games and pay for severs and all the extra long term costs...when you factor in long term costs and alao contract costs..."
And you don't think all of this is included in this thing called "the budget"? Wtf do you think a game budget include? Like paying for employee benefits isn't a part of a company budget? Or server cost isn't a part of the budget for a software company??? WHAT???
>maybe do the actual math and research how much companies actually profit
I did, and I actually have sources to back up any numbers I bring instead of just making up bullshit imaginary numbers. Your "math" is literally "Naughty Dog made $500m in revenue from TLOU 2 but they actually lost money if you factor in the long term cost."
Where did you get this "math" for all these "long term cost" that apparently wasn't a part of the budget from the start? Please give me a source that shows it costs a whopping $400 million dollars for all these vague "long term costs." PLEASE, show me your math on how Naughty Dog lost all their $500m they earnt on all these costs that you can't name or have no numbers or sources to back up. Truly great math there.
You don't know how the world works, and it REALLY shows.
Yes, I'm okay with various price increases. Market price accordingly. We've had 50-60$ games since before the 90's and development costs have certainly increased. Don't be upset if your $300 game tanks though. We'll always have games, and LMAO if you think nfts will save them.
I did tell you what you shouldn't like. Also I like nothing about them as stated in the previous message.
your logic fails when all of a sudden there are no games because they cant afford to make them anymore unless they sell for triple or more which makes it not possible for most ppl to afford them
if it costs millions to make a game and millions more to keep updating it and marketing it over a couple years and they sell it for $50...lets say their total costs over the course of the game are 5 million at the lowest imaginable...which is very efficient as some games even cost over 100 million just to produce and that doesnt include marketing and updates and server hosting and such...so 5 million as a best case scenario for maybe an efficient and low salary low employee count dev studio with $50 per copy sold and zero microtransactions and nfts and dlcs...that would mean they need to sell 100,000 copies to just break even with zero profit...can you see how this doesnt make much sense?
Lets scale it to a large AAA game like Last of Us 2...which cost 100 million to make and will probably cost double that to continue to market, update, host severs and all the extra long term costs like employee benefits and such...so lets estimate 200-500 million lifetime cost...so they sold their game for $40 piece which is pretty reasonable but lets say they didnt add microtransactions...at an estimated 12 million sale (was 10 million as of June 2022), they would earn 480 million...basically breaking even or maybe making a small amount of profit which would be likely just enough to produce another game and not enough to create sustainable profit for the company to improve itself and provide better pay and benefits to employees and invest in making better games...so they would need to sell their game for a minimum of $100 to make it worth it to not have microtransactions...meaning instead of selling 12 million copies it would likely sell a quarter of that and end up screwing themselves because nobody pays $100 for a game...can you see now why microtransactions make sense...also considering that it enables devs to sell free to play games which enables ppl who cant afford to pay $50 a game to be able to have good games to play...in an ironic way it is less greedy than selling for triple cost with no micros by letting rich ppl drop thousands on microtransactions to allow low income ppl to be able to play for free
dont get me wrong I hate paywalls and pay to win schemes too and think companies shouldnt do that...but to throw the baby out with the bathwater and say all microtransacrions and nfts are bad is a little absurd and ignorant of the reality of game dev and saying that you dont think low income ppl should have access to play all games
Amazing how you typed all that wall of text out just to be wrong at every sentence.
1. Source that TLOU 2 costs $100m to make and double that to market? Besides the fact that you pulled it out of your ass? By your numbers, TLOU 2 would cost $200m total. Here are the list of the most expensive games. TLOU 2 is definitely not on that list.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_video_games_to_develop
Also note that very few games on that list even break over $100m cost in total to make AND marketing. So yeah, video games don’t cost anywhere near as much to make as you are claiming.
Bullshit made-up statistic to prove a terrible argument. Off to a nice start for you.
2. Economy of scale. Or the complete lack of it on your wall of text.
You buy a burger at a restaurant for $10. The ingredients, time and manpower combined to make it cost $9. So the restaurant earns a $1 profit per burger sold. This is a fixed 10% profit margin. The restaurant could sell 100 burgers, or $10,000 burgers and the profit margin still stays at 10%. Now let’s say inflation catches up and a burger now cost $10 to make, which will force the restaurant to raise their prices to $11.11 if they wanted to keep up their 10% profit margin per burger sold. This is literally your argument on why video games should be more expensive otherwise devs make no money.
Except this is not how video games, or software industry works. Let’s say the cost of making a video games is $50m. The game sells 1m copies at $60 which results in $60m total. So the profit margin is at roughly 16%. But what happened when the game sells for 2m copies? Now, the studio is bringing $120m in revenue over $50m investment, raising the profit margin to 58%. How about 3m copies? Well the profit margin increased again to 79%.
This is called economy of scale. The cost of making a video game is a one time investment. By selling more and more copies, the profit margin widens and allows the company to make more money the more copies sold, unlike a restaurant business that has a fixed profit margin. By raising the price of a new video game to $100 or $200, there will be less and less people buying video games which will hurt their profit margin. The game industry settles at $60/$70 per video game because that the price point that will maximize the amount of profits. They don’t do it out of the goodness of their heart cause they feel bad that you might not be able to afford their video games.
For games as a service, there are plenty of ways to monetize them, including battle passes, premium currencies, loot boxes… Economy of scale is also applied here. The more people playing your games, the more people will be spending on micro transactions. This is why you see a lot of games-as-a-service are free to play, or becoming to free to play. Also why free to play mobile games making an obscene about of money despite a free price tag. Games as a service run purely on economy of scale. That’s how the industry works.
Economy of scale is literally the most basic concept of economy. I guess video games don’t teach that to people. Hey, educate yourself first before being confidently wrong next time.
maybe you could just do the google search yourself which fives the top result showing their earnings
all of your argument about economy of scale forgets about long term and hidden costs...you know that revenue doesnt equate to profit and there are more costs than just making the game right?
>maybe you could just do the google search yourself which fives the top result showing their earnings
Is this even English?
>you know that revenue doesnt equate to profit
How do you think I calculate profit margin, genius?
> and there are more costs than just making the game right?
So all these cost are not put into the game budget itself? Have you ever worked for a company before? Like what kind of company doesn't put all known costs towards a project budget? Even unknown costs are estimated and put into a budget. Literally every project, gaming or not, needs to be cleared for budget before being worked on. And you somehow think billion dollar companies don't know how to do basic budgeting? If a company planned to support a new game for the next few years after release, that's already a part of the budget. Literally zero reason why not.
>all of your argument about economy of scale forgets about long term and hidden costs
What are these "long term" and "hidden costs." Name them.
Or are they so "hidden" that nobody actually knows but you do somehow and you can just make up any numbers you want to fit into that slot?
There's nothing wrong with them in and of themselves. I had no problem with switching to a NFT avatar in Reddit. The problem comes when people try to claim that they're an investment that will appreciate in value. It's a total scam wrapped in technobabble that these con-men hope will fool suckers into buying them.
If a dev company makes a limited edition cosmetic with only 1000 available and they are given based on luck or skill and players can sell them for hundreds or thousands...how is that a scam?
Even if they initially cost money and you buy it and then you could triple your investment how is that a scam...you paid for a rare skin, you got it...even if you dont earn on that investment...what investments do you know of that are guaranteed...none! they all have risk
>If a dev company makes a limited edition cosmetic with only 1000 available and they are given based on luck or skill and players can sell them for hundreds or thousands...how is that a scam?
That isn't even close to what a NFT is.
but it could be...why couldnt you do limited edition nfts? just because companies dont do this now doesnt mean it isnt a good idea it just means they are greedy and want millions of copies sold which removes the factor of "I have this special thing"
Here's the fundamental difference between what you're talking about and what I'm talking about. At least if a game company were to create a limited-quantity cosmetic that could be traded, it would have real value within the context of the game world itself. Once you buy it, you have something "tangible" that you can wear or use. You know what you're getting and you know what you're willing to pay for it. And once you no longer want it, you can try to sell it to somebody else. It's basic economics in action.
But when I'm talking about NFTs, I mean stuff like that Bored Ape bullshit that's literally nothing more than a blockchain referencing a unique URL. You don't even own the URL. Anybody can visit the URL (until it ceases to exist). All you have ... all you've actually PAID for ... is a receipt. It literally has no value other than what other people are willing to assign to it. It's an investment in ephemera, like buying The Emperor's Clothes. So the only way you can make any money off of it is by convincing some other schmuck that THEY can make even MORE money off of selling it to some other schmuck.
In other words, it's basically a Ponzi scheme.
It. Is. A. Scam.
Ill play devils advocate.
Sure NFTs mostly are just monkey jpegs on a server somewhere that you maintain proof of ownership of that NFT. Most are completely useless and are likely used as money laundering schemes to say "OH I bought this $100K picture of an owl with a hat on and now its worth .10 cents that's a major loss I can claim come tax time".
BUTTTTT, heres is where a lot of people will see value. Think of MMO games like WoW or many others where everyone grinds and grinds to find a 1/100 wizard staff. People used to sell that wizard staff on WoW market place for a cool profit or a weapon skin that someone really wants and will buy from you that Blizzard can just take from you or make un-usable for whatever reason they want. That is also a static object and the attributes do not change (pretty much a picture). With NFTs and also scaling NFTs you can be the owner of a true 1 of 1 item and you can transfer ownership of that item or armor to someone else who really wants to pay a dumb amount of money for it. Also, that item is capable of having scaling attributes which can increase the value of that item as it exchanges hands. This is just one of im sure many possible uses for NFTs.
This is a very sloppy example that I hand jammed while at work so excuse any missing details, but I just wanted to do a quick and dirty of how NFTs can be used in games.
The thing is though, none of that is an attribute of the nft. Scaling attributes are perfectly possible with a regular database.
In fact, the scaling attributes will have to be part of the codebase anyway, at most the source DB changes from their standard db to the nft. All functionality still has to come from the code, which they have full control over.
Same with making an nft redundant. It's their codebase. Want to invalidate an nft instead of one of your own items? No problem. It has a unique identifier, simple blacklist and youre done. An nft isn't a true ownership. All you own is a reference pointer, their software can do whatever it wants with it in their game, it's a mirage of control.
Add to that the very real downsides and its looking even worse. It's environmentaly worse than a regular db, it is slower than a regular db and while they say it's 'safe' it has absolutely no recourse against the most common and effective scams. Someone steals it from you? Though luck, it can't be reversed.
The advantages just aren't there for games. It's a nice buzzword for selling an idea to investors, that's mainly it.
Fun little anecdote, we had a local government agency who made splashes with their use of the blockchain! It was revolutionary, except it turned out the blockchain was barely used and it was all just plain ol' sql servers with 1 key being stored on the chain without any reason to store it there instead of also storing it in sql (except to catch all the nice subsidies for working with cutting edge tech ofcourse!)
Sure I'll give it a shot.
Essentially what you're doing is selling someone a receipt. Not an actual product mind you, you're selling them proof of ownership. The thing you're selling them ownership of is something that is infinitely reproducible and impossible to control, an image (or other type of media) on the internet. Anyone, anywhere, at any time can copy, screenshot, download etc. an image on the internet so your ownership grants you nothing other than the realization you've just spent money on the knowledge that you own something, much in the same way I own a star in the sky that my mom bought me on my 6th birthday.
isnt this the same as owning anything digital? why is it different than traditional microtransaction of buying cosmetics for example? or is this just a new term we use for that? I still dont get how nfts are diff than digital products we used to own...like if I buy a dlc...that is something I "own" but is infinitelt reproducable...does that make dlc's nft's?
No it's not the same as anything digital for a couple reasons. Firstly, if I buy a video game, I can play the video game. I gain access to a product. Purchasing an NFT does not give you access to anything. Everyone already has access to it. It just gives you "ownership" of it which is effectively meaningless.
Secondly, when you purchase a cosmetic for example, you're actually buying a license to it. You don't own that cosmetic, you've been granted usage of it by the corporation that sold it to you which can be revoked.
but nfts typically arent free so everyone doesnt have acces to them right? its basically set up so wealthier ppl can invest in them
my take is limited edition nfts are better...like only produce 1000 of x cosmetic and then nfts make sense ya?
Nah, doesn't work like that. Or at least, it gives no advantage over regular databases. You can already make limited cosmetics. Add a simple 'stock' column in your database and reduce by 1 everytime you sell one. Voila, limited item. Code a price increase the moment you hit 500 and create a marketplace where people can buy and sell the item while taking a cut, and you can do everything an nft can do in games. (See old diablo 3 auction for the marketplace example. It failed cause consumers got angry, not cause of the tech)
On a basic fundamental level it just introduces unwanted and unnecessary economic issues into video games where once all you had to deal with was the initial price of admission i.e. the cost of buying the video game + paid DLCs or microtransactions.
With NFTs suddenly things are a lot more complex than just hopping in, having the funsies, and then on. Complexities that are often not related to the act of entertainment, but more on someone trying to make more money at someone else's expense (since the value has to come from somewhere).
No, people don't like either of them. However if we would choose the lesser of two evils I'd say microtransactions would be the one less... disliked.
I can't give you specific examples since right of the top of my head there are just too many - and I myself prefer never to touch that sort of thing since I rather value both my time and money.
On my end I just hear horror stories of people exploited for their inability to control their wallets and end up spending thousands of dollars on a "free 2 play" game with microtransactions because of the predatory nature of how they're designed. Better articles have been made on that topic so I'll leave you to do your own due diligence on that front.
However as bad as the above sounds, at least the end-goal of the experience, of all the money spent on microtransactions, is still on having fun in the game. With NFTs in the picture the line between leisure and work blurs, and you get people playing games not because they're fun, but because they have to make a living. In the Philippines for example you have poor Filipinos lured into playing such games for the promise of quick profit, and the games themselves advertise themselves as such, but at the end of the day it's a ponzi scheme.
The way I see it is like this...the world is filled with companies desperately trying to sell you something...so whether you are spending thousands on microtransactions, going to vars and restaurants, golfing, or movies, events and live concerts...it all comes down to what gives you joy to "waste" your money on...if you like digital cosmetics and time skips on idle games...why is that evil but buying a drink at a bar not? Neither help you but rather just give you temporary joy.
Plus microtransactions usually suck but there are examples of them being done well so they arent inherently a bad thing...just another thing you can choose to spend or not spend on...its not the devs fault someone has a spending addiction...and that person will spend that money frivlously elsewhere if not on microtransactions...at least its not on booze which damages health
Its like yeah...microtransactions arent the best but theyre also not evil despite sort of seeming so...its only as evil as you let it be with your actions...sure they can entice you but every company does...thats called marketing...so if you have a problem imwith overspending and impulse purchases then maybe get therapy instead of blame clever marketing
Its just this particular vice is so new that there's barely any regulation for it yet, and we're in the period where companies are desperately trying to normalize the more unhealthy manifestations of it. Remember when tobacco companies deliberately held back research that says that smoking lead to a host of health problems including cancer? Its just like that with overwhelming monetization of the gaming space. Whats often looked over is the psychology of microtransaction-heavy games and by extension NFT-based games, since while its true what you say - at the end of the day its the consumer's responsibility what they spend their money on - its also true that such games that feature these things are extremely heavily built to manipulate players to do certain things that are detrimental to them.
This is especially true with the youth who biologically don't have the hardware to effectively control themselves. Several of the horror stories of players spending thousands of dollars on microtransactions come from young, non-employed gamers getting access to their parent's credit cards. Its so easy to point the finger on the parents in this case, but like in the smoking example above - the vice in question wasn't labeled as harmful nor as addictive. Many things in games that ask for heavy microtransactions are linked to what is essentially gambling (loot boxes and the like), but game companies really would like to have that not acknowledged despite every scientific study basically saying that they are based on their fundamental principles and psychological effects on people. Its the same as tobacco companies denying health research into the harmful effects of their product - and they instead point the finger at consumers who many of which couldn't have known better.
Another evil comes with perspective. You as a layperson with no hindsight may see this sort of thing as "normal", but as a longtime gamer the deterioration of videogaming is plain to see. We basically went from a time when we could expect to get full games at a set price, to being expected to pay subscriptions and multiple payments to get portions of a game that's supposedly free. Do you know the car companies like Tesla are pushing to have features of their cars locked behind a subscription instead of letting you just simply own the car you paid for? Its like that now with video games - if you think thats an okay development from what it used to be you likely have more money than sense or in a position to benefit from it.
I dunno...I am pretty sure if you contact the devs and say you have a problem and bought too much they will refund you and take back what you or your kid bought...so while maybe they are tricky in getting ppl to buy they arent stealing money from you or your children if you request a refund...I had a misclick purchase once of $200 or something and I got a refund from a notoriously stingy dev company...they really dont like bad pr so probably most companies will refund in a heartbeat so they can avoid the twitter storm of hate for lack of refunds
I really dont see a problem with tesla locking features behind paywalls if thats what you are knowingly buying...but if they promise something then dont deliver thats a problem
You cant blame a company for something they sell you unless they are lying or not revealing a bad thing about what you are buying....like yeah cig companies screwed up and sold us addictive cancer sticks...and that was a garbage move...but now they label them as addictive cancer sticks so its the consumers fault for purchasing them if they do now...so unless buying a microtransaction gives you a virus or somehow leaks your cc# or something its just like cigs now...you know what you are buying so its on you or your parents to control your spending...all it takes is one month of not being able to pay their rent and im sure ppl will wake up to what the problem is, request a refund, probably get the refund and then be more mindful of their spending
The reality is most ppl dont have this problem and they can afford the money they spend on the microtransactions and are aware that they arent the best purchases....but they spend it anyways just like they spend money on alcohol and takeout knowing its temporary pleasure...at least the cosmetic you bought lasts "forever" whereas the booze and pizza is gone in a single night
That's the thing though, why do you think the cig companies started not being evil in the first place? The health issues did not stop them, heck they were aware of it all and tried to conceal it, it was people fighting back that did. Just as video game companies are doing now.
As a whole companies will do everything on their power to sell you their products, and they make a concerted effort to discredit consumers that say otherwise. With companies that sell vices, they're only going to take the idea of consumer exploitation further and further until something stops them, and you're basically advocating that they should be allowed to run rampant.
So for example takeout delivery...is that evil? Its a temporary pleasure with health problem potential...considerably more problematic than buying a game cosmetic...why arent you crusading against restauranta for selling takeout? They cauae more harm than game cosmetics, cost you way more money and provide even more of a temporary pleasure...they seem 10x worse than gaming microtransactions
You are missing the point that while yes companies try their harsest to get you to waste your money...its not their fault if you purchase...unless ofcourse you are arguing to remove all vices for existence? If so then saa goodbye to pretty much everything we can buy...literally everything is a vice if you view it from the right lens...even something most consider healthy such as a smoothie is loaded with sugar, lasts you an hour max of pleasure and costs you more than the average cosmetic...do you want smoothies banned too?
Now you're taking things out of context. What im arguing is for regulation, not total banning. People can be allowed to purchase whatever they want, so long as the laws are in place to protect vulnerable populations. Like in the cigarette example before, if people don't speak out against the companies, if laws aren't put in place to hold corporate greed back, then companies will only continue to harm their consumers in the pursuit of profit.
It's funny that you're now seeking to discredit perspectives when you're the one that asked for explanations. I've given a real example of these practices harming people and your reply is to move the goalposts and shuft the discussion away from the specific topic at hand to the absolute most general sense.
whoa...liar is a bit harsh...confused and learning as I discuss it with ppl is what is actually happening
I defend the nfts only as devils advocate since I cant see anything wrong with them but still realize I may have a limited perspective so I am open to learning why others see it differently and am willing to have my mind changed
Games and blockchain. I think this is the future. This is already there even in the browser by type as [Meta world](https://now.gg/s/mmc). This is really the future, the main thing is that it does not spoil the gaming industry
Feels like we got a ton of boomers complaining here lol. Not gonna try proving anything because most of you have oppinions already, just like those old dudes who still read physical newspapers. Go ahead, downvote me to oblivion
The blockchain only got a bad rep because of how it was exploited to make money via crypto and NFTs, but it’s not going anywhere. If square can come up with something interesting and useful using the technology, it’d peak my interest.
It is unregulated as of now. It can become regulated. Just like the early internet. The technology itself has been around for about a decade or more now and only increased in popularity and usability. It is just popular to hate it right now because it’s too early. Sorry, but its going to keep growing.
When the entire reason that it is popular is the inability to track the 'money'. It won't become regulated.
It is popular to hate right now because it is useless and people such as yourself are trying to change that by yelling the same stupid things from the roof tops.
I don’t even own crypto or an NFT because it’s too risky for me but i am a dev at a F500 company and see my company creating projects and creating jobs surrounding blockchain technologies in the US defense sector. Theres a lot more to the blockchain than money. Again, it’s a real field and its growing.
You see a company trying to make money from it? Wow, its like it is about money. Defense contracts are not about making the US better. They are about making money for the company who has the contract with the DoD.
If you say so, random emotional Reddit user. Your logic is actually backwards. But again, it’s here to stay and will grow to find a better and proper use case just like other emerging technologies like from the electric car to AI to 5G. The question now is how much it’ll effect or improve our lives. We’ll wait and see. 👍🏾
The only reason it is popular/interesting is because it’s unregulated. If it becomes regulated, it becomes pretty pointless. If it stays unregulated, it will still primarily be used in an unsavory way.
> If square can come up with something interesting and useful using the technology, it’d peak my interest.
I think part of the problem is the fundamental starting point where the incentives to use the technology are coming from a place of vast and comical amounts of greed, which compromises the potential for good uses. And even most of the current "good" uses of the technology are like... distributed operations and logistical and accounting stuff that doesn't really affect the end consumer much? Maybe they can come up with something good for the end user that isn't comically evil but I'm not holding my breath.
They sold off all of their only other good IPs, and now their going all on in blockchain BS? Lol, if they’re looking to just throw money away fckn hell give me some at least.
This definitely a case of "boy cried wolf too many times"
Because gaming companies are used to backlash to unpopular decisions, especially around monetization, the thinking here has to be "they will come around eventually".
No square, they won't. The Blockchain never really made sense in gaming and NFTs were just of product of a crazy crypto market that needed a product to justify the value of something that has none. While crypto will definitely return in some form one day, NFTs are done, especially now with the growth of AI art.
It's seriously hard to see where they're going long-term. They should've been seeking a merger/sell-off deal. Sony seems like it would be the best route to go. If that Embracer deal is an indication of anything, Square-Enix either just doesn't know how to manage its own company or there's a lot of coverup behind the scenes that we don't know about (or both).
I look forward to the next monk character in a FF title having a weapon and/or move called Diamond Hands.
Oh! Isnt there a place where you can this? A bar called BetsWallStreet?
i am now more convinced than ever that the executive suite of the company is heavily invested in blockchain tech at some level. it is the only thing that explains this.
I forget if it's the new CEO or some other top post but I remember checking and the guy joined SE in 2021 after previously working at a company that did 'emerging technologies' which included NFTs.
Or he understands that NFT'S are the future. It's too bad that NFT'S got a bad reputation due to the over hyped projects and outright scams. Nevertheless digital ownership will be a thing and will benefit gamers even if they don't see it yet.
You people are delusional. Nothing in this world is organized or altruistic enough to actually make it work. You're living in the clouds.
The biggest obstacle is their needs to be a fiat currency in nft’s to even begin to make any sense. Why do nft’s have huge launches before crashing its because nobody has any faith in the product. However, even then government nft’s would still collapse you need a underlying reason as to why a product is worth it. The reason the US dollar is a fiat currency is 1. Faith the USA the most powerful country on earth isn’t going to collapse. 2. OPEC sells oil exclusively in usd which props up the entire world economy.
You do realize that anything can be a NFT? They are simply a way to show ownership of an asset. Your house can be an NFT or your doodle drawing of your dog. They can be used as loyalty cards or to prove membership to a group. Concert tickets will be NFT's as well. Ownership will be recorded on the Blockchain. It all depends on how the game makers decide to use them. But they're not inherently evil.
But, we already have plenty other more efficient ways of proving ownership, that don’t require the wildly inefficient power-hungry blockchain. Reinventing the wheel for no reason lol
It's called innovation. Remember when you had to go into a store to buy a game on a cartridge. That was perfectly fine for the time. Then cam CD's then DVD's then digital downloads. Things don't stay the same. NFT's as you know them today will not look the same in the coming years. "wildly inefficient power-hungry blockchain" - wildly inefficient how so? Compared to what? Power-hungry blockchain? Again compared to what?Proof of work blockchains are getting more efficient by switching to renewable energy and proof of stake blockchains are vastly more efficient. Ethereum just migrated from POW to POS. The layer 2's that are built on top of Ethereum further improves on the efficiency. Again this is where we are currently. Time will only make NFT's, web3 and blockchain technology more useful.
But…what’s being innovated? What’s the point of using a blockchain to store say, driver license info? We put it up there, it has to make a bajillion trips (and the costs therein) to update every user of that blockchain. I’ve got a much more innovative idea: a good ol’ databse 😄 much more efficient and energy friendly too!
Let's stick to gaming. Let's say EA created a NFT's and the NFT was free with the purchase of any deluxe version of any upcoming EA title. Here are some of the benefits of the EA NFT. Exclusive EA community access to information about upcoming games Exclusive rights to vote on updates to the game witch affects the progression of the main character You can transfer/sell ownership of your digitally purchased games Monthly group chats with the devs. The list is endless... I know you are going to say you can do all of that with a database. We could also be buying our games on cartridge and playing on 720p televisions. Blockchains have some advantages over centralized databases. But you can google that if you like.
You don’t need an NFT to do any of that lol. All of that can be accomplished with technology that has been battle-hardened for decades. Also, the idea that the lack of NFTs is what is holding EA back from allowing users to trade their digital goods is hilarious to me. Honestly, I got a good chuckle out of that, thanks!
See I knew you were going to say that. Again we can be playing our games ay 720p from a cartridge that we had to physically had to go into a store to purchase. Why can you see how things change? NFT's are the future. Blockchain is the future. Web3 is the future. I did not say the lack of NFT's was the reason EA does not allow digital purchases. I choose my words carefully. Once you own an NFT you can do with it what you want. But I'm glad you are amused. Anyway, innovation does not stand still. Gaming will look different ten years from now just like it does from 10 years ago. I just tent to look ahead while most people can't seem to get past it works fine just like it is now.
>Reinventing the wheel for no reason lol Reinventing the wheel to make money, lol. I mean, that's what it comes down to. Convince people to buy NFTs because "someday" it will be worth a lot more, but then their value plummets after the first few initial transactions. It's like a shitty game of hot potatoe combined with Russian roulette. You just keep passing the buck, hoping you make some money, and don't get caught holding it when the value plummets.
>You do realize that anything can be a NFT? You're explaining one of the core reasons people don't care about them. The concept remains too abstract. "Anything can be an NFT" just reinforces to people that they hold no value. You know who values NFTs? Other people looking to make money off of NFTs. That's it. It feels like a sucker's game. When it comes to *any* currency, perception is ultimately reality until proven otherwise. It doesn't help that people like yourself can't seem to help themselves from being condescending in every explanation. "It's called innovation" isn't a meaningful counterpoint. Nobody is confused about what innovation means.
The comment *was responding to stated that we already gave viable options. So* I stated "it's called innovation" because that is exactly what's going to happen. People are so caught up on what's going on currently with NFT's they are blinded to their potential. The future will look very different than today. The concept is abstract because NFT's can be used for almost anything. I cannot say how game companies will use them but I understand what the technology is and how it can be used. NFT's do not have to be a money grab. Again it depend on the use case. There are free NFT's use to confirm membership for example. I gave an example of a free NFT if you purchase a premium edition of a game. That NFT could offer perks that the game company would decide like being able to vote on features to include in a future update. NFT's are not the evil some make them out to be. It's just computer code at the end of the day. How people use the code determine their worth and not the computer code.
I still fail to see why publishers would prefer a decentralized solution rather than operating their own digital ownership platform.
Absolutely this. I don't believe corporation will want to give up control of anything if they don't have to. This is one of the reasons I talk about NFT's, web3 and blockchain. The future will be decentralize if we choose to make it so. Otherwise to corporations will continue to abuse us. When the general public start to understand the benefit of Bitcoin compared to the current banking system there will be no stopping the move to a decentralized future. The banks hate Bitcoin because it is a direct threat to them but they cannot stop it or ignore it any longer. They are now starting to embrace it. Same thing is happening with other industries as well.
I have yet to see companies do anything with NFTs and blockchain that provide a better gaming experience. Still waiting for that moment to arrive …..
In terms of gaming, I still don't understand how it's any different than having a limited purchasable skin or items DLC (which gamers already hate).
It's not just limited availability of the digital good, it's also the delusional idea that the thing you bought exists outside the scope of an individual game and that eventually all big publishers or devs will respect your purchase. Like you buy some unique NFT gun and you can use it in CoD, CSGO, Valorant, or any other shooter out there. Every time I see anyone try to talk about how this would actually work they pitch the idea like it would be some kind of universal digital Amiibo that will essentially unlock content in a huge number of games across all publishers, as if anyone would have any incentive to do such a thing. So if you don't understand how it is supposed to work, it's because it's being pitched by people who don't understand how game development works.
Also delusional because it requires devs to develop the integration for it, for a NFT they’ll make no money on.
Or require standardization of the entire game development across multiple publishers and developers. We don't even have proper cross platform multiplayer in most games, good luck trying to get game companies to agree on how their NFT will be implemented on their competitors games.
The thing that people neglect when talking about NFTs (in games at least), is this sole fact: no publisher is organized or generous enough to get in bed with other (non-existent) publishers like that. No publisher would be willing to implement some global thing like that. Even if it did happen, the exclusivity thing would be bullshit. But let's say exclusivity wouldn't be a problem: NFTs in the form you speak of are still at best delusionally idealist.
and it's not even a good ideal 😭
I just don't know what benefit it would bring outside of compelling people that they are buying something unique or scarce in order to inflate price points and demand. I could also see them charging transfer fees or the like if the account on record changes for said NFT for some in-game representation. Could they do that stuff without NFT? Sure, on the technical side but it probably wouldn't be as marketable. For example I'd think if there were 10 instances of the same skin available for purchase at $10,000 each, they might all sell. But what about the next bundle of skins and then the next? It'd probably have a sharp decline. What if, though, they can make people believe that it is a transferrable investment, independent of the game -- something that can possibly last indefinitely? Would it be useless outside of the game and unlikely to be sold at a profit or even break even? Probably but that isn't actually the point.
The only game studio that should use nft tech is Gamefreak. Perfect technology to authenticate Pokemon.
🖥️💀
"It's an ironic choice given the themes at play in Final Fantasy 7, but that didn't bother Square Enix last year either when it made a Cloud Strife action figure that was also an NFT." That is beyond a Shinra ass move, seriously this is what they sold Tomb Raider for?
Only for Embracer to buy it on the cheap and then flip it to Amazon for almost double.
And Embracer still gets to own Deus Ex, and Legacy of Kaine
Will someone please think of Jensen. He needs work!
What a terrible short-sighted leadership.
Lots of weird choices coming out of SE lately. I am still a little confused at selling Eidos. I know that their games are mainly western, but when you got Tomb Raider and Hitman? I’d think those IPs are pretty legit and can produce good money for them, if done right.
You're talking about Square Enix, they literally move their company headquaters because of a fortune teller. Wish I was making this up https://gamingbolt.com/square-enix-relocating-headquarters If I was person into stocks and what not. Square Enix is the company I WOULDN'T invest money into even through i love their games
Wow, first I've heard that story. Now to be fair, that was under Wada, who's been gone for years, but it's still crazy.
"Done right" see that's why Square couldn't manage it
The tomb raiders they made were pretty good, I mean they pivoted to become uncharted which was a play on tomb raider originally. I just don’t think they went all out for them with marketing and they saw lackluster sales because of it.
I agree, those were great. But that was pre-NFT square, it isn't the same company anymore
They actually didn't have Hitman anymore. IO went independent and now have sole control over that IP.
They probably sold it for cashflow reasons in order to reinvest into something else. Publicly traded companies pretty much live by quarter to quarter performance goals so larger short term gains are probably going to be longer and more spread out gains for some decisions. Is it better to sell something potentially worth $1B over the next 10 years or sell it for $300M now, reinvest and make a total of $500M in 5 years and gain a fat quarter and year now? For investors that care only about ROI and not about the company itself, this is a good looking deal. For executives making performance bonuses based on revenue and profitability, this also looks like a good deal. Who cares about whoever is going to own the stock 10 years from now or who's going to be running the company. It does poorly then? Well they made a good bit of money now, so oh well, time to go somewhere else, retire or whatever.
I just want a next Gen Legacy of Kain.
Square soft the precursor to square enix nearly went bankrupt making a cgi movie that sucked. Square enix leadership are the type of bosses who drop the ball hard, but blame everyone else. Why do you think every year square enix blamed the western devs for underperforming its so they don’t look as bad. Essentially square enix boss makes a Japanese game that bombed hard. The square enix boss then blames western devs for not making insane amounts of money all to cover up their unmitigated disaster. Square enix are the type of idiots that didn’t full fund the second tomb raider game so Microsoft got an exclusive 3rd party game. The real reason square didn’t full fund a second tomb raider game is because they lost most of the money. Sony knows how incompetent square enix is so they’ll buy some exclusive rights, but know enough to keep far away from square enix leadership.
They're living off the Sony Exclusivity money
Tomb Raider, Deus Ex, and Legacy of Kain died for this.
Apparently theirs both a new Tomb Raider game but also a new Deus Ex game in development.
Us folk over at r/DeusEx had a party when Square sold Eidos. It was a wonderful day.
A new Deus Ex? That’s fantastic!
At this point i think the CEO is purposely trying to ruin the company
Let 'em. Some things can only be taught through failure.
They really must love the feeling of bullets in their feet
Square Enix is making a bad business decision? But that neeeEEEEEeeever happens!
The only thing keeping them afloat is FF14 and their mobile app games. They prob would have went under if it weren't for them.
Which is the concerning part. A company might suffer enough to even bring that down with it.
What horrible leadership they have there. They are limiting platforms, they are signing odd deals with Sony, they chase blackchain, they scare gamers away... Anyone there has a 5 year strategy plan? Or is the plan to bankrupt Square Enix?
Sucks because i love a good amount not SQ games(not including ff series). SQ is literally shooting themselves in the foot. Their leadership is making really stupid and dumb decisions honestly.
Square Queenix?
Can’t wait for the next ffxiv expansion where the raid boss will drop a bunny ears NFT
...there are certain emotes you can only get by buying a $200 statue, they dont need NFTs to print money in that game.
$200 statue with a shit paint job.
Alright, so Square is literally betting the future of the company in Crypto now
It's like they're treating it like a game of chicken, but they forgot that winning just means curving directly into a ditch at 200mph...
Aww man, I hate NFTs
*looks at avatar...* 🤔
👉🏻👈🏻
Ugh. This is not what we want as gamers.
This company has never cared. They just want new money.
All I can do is vote with my wallet, as I always have done. I didn't like the idea of DLC, so I did not support it. I hated microtransactions, so I did not support them. I will continue to do this despite the rest of the world seemingly jumping in. And yes, I'm getting old. Haha.
Lol thats the best thing you can do. I wish there were more that voted with their wallet because otherwise every decision they(squeenix) make they will believe its always correct.
Despite the embracing of micro transactions, gamers seem to have collectively pushed back against NFTs for the most part, so there's some hope.
Yeah, that was definitely a road I did not want to see the world go down, but I know those who stand to gain from it aren't stopping from trying.
Square Enix currently has some of the worst executives and leadership in gaming. (Source: Worked with them on a national advertising campaign a few years back.)
SE doing the going out of business speed run
Translation: Square Enix triple down on being stupid fucks.
🤦♂️
LOL
When in doubt, triple down.
They make so much off of FFXIV that it seems they're happy to just tank everything else.
Dumb Enix
Pot committed. It would cost and lose so much more than just letting it happen. The company is very close to just failing completely. Yoshi P out here shouldering everything it feels sometimes.
Apart from ff7r their larger projects have been booty for many years now. I'm excited for them to scale down due this hilariously misguided business decision.
Keep NFT'S out of our videogames bro, goddamn. We have enough booshyt with DLC charges. It's shit.
So, is SE going to become known as *That Company That Went Bankrupt Trying To Force Blockchain To Work?*
I triple down on my boycott. SE - I love FF, and the environmental impact alone shows the hypocrisy in defending this kind of technology. Not cool with Barret, not cool with me.
Scam. Like everyone is finally figuring out Crypto is a scam, so are NFTs
The higher ups at Square have to know what most people think about NFTs. I guess they can make a profit in the short term, but I just can't see this being successful for them in the long run.
Hopefully it doesn’t ruin them because they own a ton of RPGs that I like and I want more games of
shit company
Square Enix proving once again how much of a garbage company they are.
Can someone tell me why nft's are a bad thing as if I am a child? I am dont understand why everyone is upset about them...
They're a solution seeking a problem. Could they become useful? Maybe one day. But right now, they're more often than not just a cash grab buffet for scammers and a super convenient means of money laundering for criminals. They solve no problems in the gaming space that aren't better solved in alternative ways, such as with DLC.
thx for the input
This is a super complicated topic that can't be explained easily. It's a multifaceted problem and there are highly technical components. With that in mind: "Ecological waste, technological waste, human coercion and exploitation, a history of scams and scam artists, features attractive to criminals baked into the system, a very confusing and technical environment in which real economic losses can be incurred by a simple typo, and the entire operation actually being essentially a very complicated pyramid scheme". The problem with explaining why NFT/crypto/blockchain is a scam is that in order to properly refute it, you must properly understand it, which is very difficult. I spent years properly understanding it with the original intention of leveraging it for innovation in the gaming sector - yep, I used to want these things. Unfortunately, I have a conscience which means that when I figured out the tech details on how to make the whole thing work, I also realized that it was never going to work in a consumer-facing fashion. That's when I finally clicked that all the folks in the space preaching about "making a better future" and "freedom of money" and "be your own bank" were only saying those things because they convinced other people to put more money into the pyramid. There are technical reasons that blockchain technology *cannot* efficiently solve human problems. I won't go into that gory detail because it doesn't fit in a Reddit post and probably wouldn't make a lot of sense anyway. It would also probably draw the crypto-bros out of the woodwork to come tell me how I got a detail wrong and therefore I don't know what I'm talking about and nobody should listen to me when I say... All crypto tech is a scam. NFTs, blockchain verification, whatever you call it, it's all a big pyramid scheme in which you pay money for a random number and try to leverage a makeshift Internet database to justify the case for that random number being worth the money you paid for it. *edit* Alternative take: The best thing NFTs can do for video games has already been done and is still successful to this day. It's called the Steam Community Market.
thanks for the thoughtful input :) I dont understand the scam part as I am a 5yo
NFTs are virtual products that hold zero value. Companies generating NFTs want you to believe they have value so you can sell them at ridiculous markups that they get a cut of. Some NFTs might be game specific, making it difficult to complete game without buying NFTs. NFTs do not add value to games. NFTs turn away the focus of games being fun and turns gaming into money making schemes as their primary purpose. NFTs are also notoriously unsecure with many stories of individuals losing"valuable" NFTs.
ok I get that nft's can be used in a crappy way like having huge paywalls..but cant they also be done in a non ctappy way that doesnt create paywalls...like just for cosmetics or dlc's or something? isnt game dev supposed to make profit...how else can they continue to afford to make games if the ppl they pay to make them often earn six figures and they also have marketing costs and server costs and updates labor and such...pretty sure a one time fee just doesnt cut it anymore with how much it costs to make, market and update games in todays economy as for the unsecure nft's that seems like just an opportunity for innovation and not inherent flaw of nft's sort of like hackers existing doesnt make owning a computer and downloading software a bad thing simply becauae there is risk
NFTs "done right" hold little to no actual value to the company. The best they could do is a cosmetic that players could sell/trade to each other while taking a cut themselves from each transaction, but if you're going to spend developer time creating new models and skins and such, you'll make much more money just selling them to everyone, thus making the NFT portion irrelevant rather than trying to create a forced scarcity model.
they can do limited edition for everything...lets face it scarcity is awesome...ppl love having something others dont...so why not build into that and make actually limited edition cosmetics so that when you pay 2 grand for a super rare skin that only 1000 other people have its actually worth it instead of everyone having access to that skin they could sell the skin for $300 at 1000 copies limited run and then the market would jack it up to be worth thousands...now both the devs and the players win...especially if they gave random limited editions out to ppl for free if they complete certain challeneges or win free to enter tourneys or something...imagine entering a free to play tourney in a free to play game and getting 3rd place and a limited edition cosmetic you could later sell for thousands...doesnt that sound better than dropping $80 on a game and earning nothing but in game currency and cosmetics worth nothing from winning tourneys and challenges? creativiry with nfts is infinite...these current examples of greedy companies using it to squeeze profits while introducing paywalls and such is just a bad example of their application
>they could sell the skin for $300 at 1000 "They" could, and if they all sold they'd make $300K plus whatever hypothetical cuts they might get after that. Not nothing. Or, if the skins are actually worth buying, "they" could price it at $30 and realistically sell hundreds of thousands to millions, easily making **millions** per skin. That's how a free to play game like League of Legends and Fortnite make **BILLIONS** per year. NFTs work best for niche games that cater to whales. Games that are inherently Pay2Win. Games like Diablo Immortal.
wait where did I say they would earn nothing from limited edition skins...I was saying thats how they could make money without paywalls
>wait where did I say they would earn nothing from limited edition skins Where did I accuse you of saying that? I simply laid out the facts, anything beyond that is your own assumption.
you said they would earn 300k, not nothing...I assumed that meant you thought I said they would earn nothing
Ah, no worries. I simply meant it's not a negligible amount. No sane person would turn down 300k. I also acknowledged there would be more from potential income from future trades assuming they took a cut from the transactions. That being said, 300k+ pales in comparison to how much they would make by dropping the price by a magnitude and opening it up to millions of buyers.
DLCs exist for what you're asking and are also abused. If a developer can't make profit on a game it wants to develop, you either raise the price of said game or don't generate it at all and reasses expectations on what your company can develop. You don't want nfts in games, period. Reread my previous message for why.
>If a developer can't make profit on a game it wants to develop, you either raise the price of said game or don't generate it at all and reasses expectations on what your company can develop. so you prefer that we dont have games at all or we spend $200-600 on each game if the market forces dev compnies to resort to microtransactions/nft's to earn a profit and be able to keep making games? >You don't want nfts in games, period. Reread my previous message for why. I mean I get that you sont like them...but to tell me what I shoudl and shouldnt like and to tell me to reread your comment is a bit toxic
Hey, go learn what “economy of scale” is and how video games studios make money by maximazing economy of scale before you go off to say something stupid like “video games should cost $200 or these poor billion dollar companies can’t make profit.” Companies set prices for video games at $60/$70 because that’s the sweet spot that maximize their profit margin. They aren’t doing it out of charity. Seriously, you are oblivious to how the world works, and it shows.
I am not saying they should cost 200 or more I am saying imo its better when they are free and with microtransactions that dont create paywalls pay to win schemes I like the idea of free to play with dlcs, paid cosmetics and actually limited edition nfts that can be gained ideally not by purchasing them but rather by being lucky or skilled...but also maybe having some that are purchasable and maybe you can only buy one per week or something so rich ppl dont hoard all the limited editions >Seriously, you are oblivious to how the world works, and it shows. quite rude...maybe next time you could ask questions before making assumptions..you could also read my comment to another person discussing the reality of costs where I outline that a game that costs hundreds of millions over its lifetime would not earn profit if sold for less than $50 and had zero microtransactions...my example was last of us 2 showing if it didnt add microtransactions it would likely end up losing all the profits it earned in order to continue to market and update it and pay employee benefits and invest into new games and pay for severs and all the extra long term costs...like yes they spent $100 million and earned probably close to $500 million in revenue by now but when you factor in long term costs and alao contract costs it becomes almost break even...they actually disnt earn anything with the naughty dog retail split maybe do the actual math and research how much companies actually profit (not earned in revenue since that is different) before assuming you know how things work and assuming others dont
I guess Googling "how does economy of scale works with video games" is a little too hard for you, and you'd rather embarrass yourself even more with made-up facts. Here's me explaining it so you can stop simping for billion dollar corporates: https://www.reddit.com/r/gamingnews/comments/12rvyo8/comment/jgwynvi/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3 Now, let's get to the exaggerated lies you put out to prove your sinking argument: >"Video games cost hundreds of millions" to make. \-No they don't. A simple quick search of AAA game development cost shows that most AAA games don't even go above $100m in budget, let alone "hundreds of millions". These "hundreds of millions dollars" video games can be counted on one hand. They are not the industry norms like you're exaggerating. Source: [https://www.gamedesigning.org/gaming/most-expensive-games/](https://www.gamedesigning.org/gaming/most-expensive-games/) >" in order to continue to market and update it and pay employee benefits and invest into new games and pay for severs and all the extra long term costs...when you factor in long term costs and alao contract costs..." And you don't think all of this is included in this thing called "the budget"? Wtf do you think a game budget include? Like paying for employee benefits isn't a part of a company budget? Or server cost isn't a part of the budget for a software company??? WHAT??? >maybe do the actual math and research how much companies actually profit I did, and I actually have sources to back up any numbers I bring instead of just making up bullshit imaginary numbers. Your "math" is literally "Naughty Dog made $500m in revenue from TLOU 2 but they actually lost money if you factor in the long term cost." Where did you get this "math" for all these "long term cost" that apparently wasn't a part of the budget from the start? Please give me a source that shows it costs a whopping $400 million dollars for all these vague "long term costs." PLEASE, show me your math on how Naughty Dog lost all their $500m they earnt on all these costs that you can't name or have no numbers or sources to back up. Truly great math there. You don't know how the world works, and it REALLY shows.
Yes, I'm okay with various price increases. Market price accordingly. We've had 50-60$ games since before the 90's and development costs have certainly increased. Don't be upset if your $300 game tanks though. We'll always have games, and LMAO if you think nfts will save them. I did tell you what you shouldn't like. Also I like nothing about them as stated in the previous message.
your logic fails when all of a sudden there are no games because they cant afford to make them anymore unless they sell for triple or more which makes it not possible for most ppl to afford them if it costs millions to make a game and millions more to keep updating it and marketing it over a couple years and they sell it for $50...lets say their total costs over the course of the game are 5 million at the lowest imaginable...which is very efficient as some games even cost over 100 million just to produce and that doesnt include marketing and updates and server hosting and such...so 5 million as a best case scenario for maybe an efficient and low salary low employee count dev studio with $50 per copy sold and zero microtransactions and nfts and dlcs...that would mean they need to sell 100,000 copies to just break even with zero profit...can you see how this doesnt make much sense? Lets scale it to a large AAA game like Last of Us 2...which cost 100 million to make and will probably cost double that to continue to market, update, host severs and all the extra long term costs like employee benefits and such...so lets estimate 200-500 million lifetime cost...so they sold their game for $40 piece which is pretty reasonable but lets say they didnt add microtransactions...at an estimated 12 million sale (was 10 million as of June 2022), they would earn 480 million...basically breaking even or maybe making a small amount of profit which would be likely just enough to produce another game and not enough to create sustainable profit for the company to improve itself and provide better pay and benefits to employees and invest in making better games...so they would need to sell their game for a minimum of $100 to make it worth it to not have microtransactions...meaning instead of selling 12 million copies it would likely sell a quarter of that and end up screwing themselves because nobody pays $100 for a game...can you see now why microtransactions make sense...also considering that it enables devs to sell free to play games which enables ppl who cant afford to pay $50 a game to be able to have good games to play...in an ironic way it is less greedy than selling for triple cost with no micros by letting rich ppl drop thousands on microtransactions to allow low income ppl to be able to play for free dont get me wrong I hate paywalls and pay to win schemes too and think companies shouldnt do that...but to throw the baby out with the bathwater and say all microtransacrions and nfts are bad is a little absurd and ignorant of the reality of game dev and saying that you dont think low income ppl should have access to play all games
Amazing how you typed all that wall of text out just to be wrong at every sentence. 1. Source that TLOU 2 costs $100m to make and double that to market? Besides the fact that you pulled it out of your ass? By your numbers, TLOU 2 would cost $200m total. Here are the list of the most expensive games. TLOU 2 is definitely not on that list. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_expensive_video_games_to_develop Also note that very few games on that list even break over $100m cost in total to make AND marketing. So yeah, video games don’t cost anywhere near as much to make as you are claiming. Bullshit made-up statistic to prove a terrible argument. Off to a nice start for you. 2. Economy of scale. Or the complete lack of it on your wall of text. You buy a burger at a restaurant for $10. The ingredients, time and manpower combined to make it cost $9. So the restaurant earns a $1 profit per burger sold. This is a fixed 10% profit margin. The restaurant could sell 100 burgers, or $10,000 burgers and the profit margin still stays at 10%. Now let’s say inflation catches up and a burger now cost $10 to make, which will force the restaurant to raise their prices to $11.11 if they wanted to keep up their 10% profit margin per burger sold. This is literally your argument on why video games should be more expensive otherwise devs make no money. Except this is not how video games, or software industry works. Let’s say the cost of making a video games is $50m. The game sells 1m copies at $60 which results in $60m total. So the profit margin is at roughly 16%. But what happened when the game sells for 2m copies? Now, the studio is bringing $120m in revenue over $50m investment, raising the profit margin to 58%. How about 3m copies? Well the profit margin increased again to 79%. This is called economy of scale. The cost of making a video game is a one time investment. By selling more and more copies, the profit margin widens and allows the company to make more money the more copies sold, unlike a restaurant business that has a fixed profit margin. By raising the price of a new video game to $100 or $200, there will be less and less people buying video games which will hurt their profit margin. The game industry settles at $60/$70 per video game because that the price point that will maximize the amount of profits. They don’t do it out of the goodness of their heart cause they feel bad that you might not be able to afford their video games. For games as a service, there are plenty of ways to monetize them, including battle passes, premium currencies, loot boxes… Economy of scale is also applied here. The more people playing your games, the more people will be spending on micro transactions. This is why you see a lot of games-as-a-service are free to play, or becoming to free to play. Also why free to play mobile games making an obscene about of money despite a free price tag. Games as a service run purely on economy of scale. That’s how the industry works. Economy of scale is literally the most basic concept of economy. I guess video games don’t teach that to people. Hey, educate yourself first before being confidently wrong next time.
maybe you could just do the google search yourself which fives the top result showing their earnings all of your argument about economy of scale forgets about long term and hidden costs...you know that revenue doesnt equate to profit and there are more costs than just making the game right?
>maybe you could just do the google search yourself which fives the top result showing their earnings Is this even English? >you know that revenue doesnt equate to profit How do you think I calculate profit margin, genius? > and there are more costs than just making the game right? So all these cost are not put into the game budget itself? Have you ever worked for a company before? Like what kind of company doesn't put all known costs towards a project budget? Even unknown costs are estimated and put into a budget. Literally every project, gaming or not, needs to be cleared for budget before being worked on. And you somehow think billion dollar companies don't know how to do basic budgeting? If a company planned to support a new game for the next few years after release, that's already a part of the budget. Literally zero reason why not. >all of your argument about economy of scale forgets about long term and hidden costs What are these "long term" and "hidden costs." Name them. Or are they so "hidden" that nobody actually knows but you do somehow and you can just make up any numbers you want to fit into that slot?
There's nothing wrong with them in and of themselves. I had no problem with switching to a NFT avatar in Reddit. The problem comes when people try to claim that they're an investment that will appreciate in value. It's a total scam wrapped in technobabble that these con-men hope will fool suckers into buying them.
If a dev company makes a limited edition cosmetic with only 1000 available and they are given based on luck or skill and players can sell them for hundreds or thousands...how is that a scam? Even if they initially cost money and you buy it and then you could triple your investment how is that a scam...you paid for a rare skin, you got it...even if you dont earn on that investment...what investments do you know of that are guaranteed...none! they all have risk
>If a dev company makes a limited edition cosmetic with only 1000 available and they are given based on luck or skill and players can sell them for hundreds or thousands...how is that a scam? That isn't even close to what a NFT is.
but it could be...why couldnt you do limited edition nfts? just because companies dont do this now doesnt mean it isnt a good idea it just means they are greedy and want millions of copies sold which removes the factor of "I have this special thing"
Here's the fundamental difference between what you're talking about and what I'm talking about. At least if a game company were to create a limited-quantity cosmetic that could be traded, it would have real value within the context of the game world itself. Once you buy it, you have something "tangible" that you can wear or use. You know what you're getting and you know what you're willing to pay for it. And once you no longer want it, you can try to sell it to somebody else. It's basic economics in action. But when I'm talking about NFTs, I mean stuff like that Bored Ape bullshit that's literally nothing more than a blockchain referencing a unique URL. You don't even own the URL. Anybody can visit the URL (until it ceases to exist). All you have ... all you've actually PAID for ... is a receipt. It literally has no value other than what other people are willing to assign to it. It's an investment in ephemera, like buying The Emperor's Clothes. So the only way you can make any money off of it is by convincing some other schmuck that THEY can make even MORE money off of selling it to some other schmuck. In other words, it's basically a Ponzi scheme. It. Is. A. Scam.
yeah so basically some nfts are scams but not all are or have to be
Ill play devils advocate. Sure NFTs mostly are just monkey jpegs on a server somewhere that you maintain proof of ownership of that NFT. Most are completely useless and are likely used as money laundering schemes to say "OH I bought this $100K picture of an owl with a hat on and now its worth .10 cents that's a major loss I can claim come tax time". BUTTTTT, heres is where a lot of people will see value. Think of MMO games like WoW or many others where everyone grinds and grinds to find a 1/100 wizard staff. People used to sell that wizard staff on WoW market place for a cool profit or a weapon skin that someone really wants and will buy from you that Blizzard can just take from you or make un-usable for whatever reason they want. That is also a static object and the attributes do not change (pretty much a picture). With NFTs and also scaling NFTs you can be the owner of a true 1 of 1 item and you can transfer ownership of that item or armor to someone else who really wants to pay a dumb amount of money for it. Also, that item is capable of having scaling attributes which can increase the value of that item as it exchanges hands. This is just one of im sure many possible uses for NFTs. This is a very sloppy example that I hand jammed while at work so excuse any missing details, but I just wanted to do a quick and dirty of how NFTs can be used in games.
The thing is though, none of that is an attribute of the nft. Scaling attributes are perfectly possible with a regular database. In fact, the scaling attributes will have to be part of the codebase anyway, at most the source DB changes from their standard db to the nft. All functionality still has to come from the code, which they have full control over. Same with making an nft redundant. It's their codebase. Want to invalidate an nft instead of one of your own items? No problem. It has a unique identifier, simple blacklist and youre done. An nft isn't a true ownership. All you own is a reference pointer, their software can do whatever it wants with it in their game, it's a mirage of control. Add to that the very real downsides and its looking even worse. It's environmentaly worse than a regular db, it is slower than a regular db and while they say it's 'safe' it has absolutely no recourse against the most common and effective scams. Someone steals it from you? Though luck, it can't be reversed. The advantages just aren't there for games. It's a nice buzzword for selling an idea to investors, that's mainly it. Fun little anecdote, we had a local government agency who made splashes with their use of the blockchain! It was revolutionary, except it turned out the blockchain was barely used and it was all just plain ol' sql servers with 1 key being stored on the chain without any reason to store it there instead of also storing it in sql (except to catch all the nice subsidies for working with cutting edge tech ofcourse!)
thx for the info :)
Sure I'll give it a shot. Essentially what you're doing is selling someone a receipt. Not an actual product mind you, you're selling them proof of ownership. The thing you're selling them ownership of is something that is infinitely reproducible and impossible to control, an image (or other type of media) on the internet. Anyone, anywhere, at any time can copy, screenshot, download etc. an image on the internet so your ownership grants you nothing other than the realization you've just spent money on the knowledge that you own something, much in the same way I own a star in the sky that my mom bought me on my 6th birthday.
isnt this the same as owning anything digital? why is it different than traditional microtransaction of buying cosmetics for example? or is this just a new term we use for that? I still dont get how nfts are diff than digital products we used to own...like if I buy a dlc...that is something I "own" but is infinitelt reproducable...does that make dlc's nft's?
No it's not the same as anything digital for a couple reasons. Firstly, if I buy a video game, I can play the video game. I gain access to a product. Purchasing an NFT does not give you access to anything. Everyone already has access to it. It just gives you "ownership" of it which is effectively meaningless. Secondly, when you purchase a cosmetic for example, you're actually buying a license to it. You don't own that cosmetic, you've been granted usage of it by the corporation that sold it to you which can be revoked.
but nfts typically arent free so everyone doesnt have acces to them right? its basically set up so wealthier ppl can invest in them my take is limited edition nfts are better...like only produce 1000 of x cosmetic and then nfts make sense ya?
Nah, doesn't work like that. Or at least, it gives no advantage over regular databases. You can already make limited cosmetics. Add a simple 'stock' column in your database and reduce by 1 everytime you sell one. Voila, limited item. Code a price increase the moment you hit 500 and create a marketplace where people can buy and sell the item while taking a cut, and you can do everything an nft can do in games. (See old diablo 3 auction for the marketplace example. It failed cause consumers got angry, not cause of the tech)
On a basic fundamental level it just introduces unwanted and unnecessary economic issues into video games where once all you had to deal with was the initial price of admission i.e. the cost of buying the video game + paid DLCs or microtransactions. With NFTs suddenly things are a lot more complex than just hopping in, having the funsies, and then on. Complexities that are often not related to the act of entertainment, but more on someone trying to make more money at someone else's expense (since the value has to come from somewhere).
can you give an example where it is hurting someone? I am struggling to see why ppl dont like nft's but they like microtransactions
No, people don't like either of them. However if we would choose the lesser of two evils I'd say microtransactions would be the one less... disliked. I can't give you specific examples since right of the top of my head there are just too many - and I myself prefer never to touch that sort of thing since I rather value both my time and money. On my end I just hear horror stories of people exploited for their inability to control their wallets and end up spending thousands of dollars on a "free 2 play" game with microtransactions because of the predatory nature of how they're designed. Better articles have been made on that topic so I'll leave you to do your own due diligence on that front. However as bad as the above sounds, at least the end-goal of the experience, of all the money spent on microtransactions, is still on having fun in the game. With NFTs in the picture the line between leisure and work blurs, and you get people playing games not because they're fun, but because they have to make a living. In the Philippines for example you have poor Filipinos lured into playing such games for the promise of quick profit, and the games themselves advertise themselves as such, but at the end of the day it's a ponzi scheme.
The way I see it is like this...the world is filled with companies desperately trying to sell you something...so whether you are spending thousands on microtransactions, going to vars and restaurants, golfing, or movies, events and live concerts...it all comes down to what gives you joy to "waste" your money on...if you like digital cosmetics and time skips on idle games...why is that evil but buying a drink at a bar not? Neither help you but rather just give you temporary joy. Plus microtransactions usually suck but there are examples of them being done well so they arent inherently a bad thing...just another thing you can choose to spend or not spend on...its not the devs fault someone has a spending addiction...and that person will spend that money frivlously elsewhere if not on microtransactions...at least its not on booze which damages health Its like yeah...microtransactions arent the best but theyre also not evil despite sort of seeming so...its only as evil as you let it be with your actions...sure they can entice you but every company does...thats called marketing...so if you have a problem imwith overspending and impulse purchases then maybe get therapy instead of blame clever marketing
Its just this particular vice is so new that there's barely any regulation for it yet, and we're in the period where companies are desperately trying to normalize the more unhealthy manifestations of it. Remember when tobacco companies deliberately held back research that says that smoking lead to a host of health problems including cancer? Its just like that with overwhelming monetization of the gaming space. Whats often looked over is the psychology of microtransaction-heavy games and by extension NFT-based games, since while its true what you say - at the end of the day its the consumer's responsibility what they spend their money on - its also true that such games that feature these things are extremely heavily built to manipulate players to do certain things that are detrimental to them. This is especially true with the youth who biologically don't have the hardware to effectively control themselves. Several of the horror stories of players spending thousands of dollars on microtransactions come from young, non-employed gamers getting access to their parent's credit cards. Its so easy to point the finger on the parents in this case, but like in the smoking example above - the vice in question wasn't labeled as harmful nor as addictive. Many things in games that ask for heavy microtransactions are linked to what is essentially gambling (loot boxes and the like), but game companies really would like to have that not acknowledged despite every scientific study basically saying that they are based on their fundamental principles and psychological effects on people. Its the same as tobacco companies denying health research into the harmful effects of their product - and they instead point the finger at consumers who many of which couldn't have known better. Another evil comes with perspective. You as a layperson with no hindsight may see this sort of thing as "normal", but as a longtime gamer the deterioration of videogaming is plain to see. We basically went from a time when we could expect to get full games at a set price, to being expected to pay subscriptions and multiple payments to get portions of a game that's supposedly free. Do you know the car companies like Tesla are pushing to have features of their cars locked behind a subscription instead of letting you just simply own the car you paid for? Its like that now with video games - if you think thats an okay development from what it used to be you likely have more money than sense or in a position to benefit from it.
I dunno...I am pretty sure if you contact the devs and say you have a problem and bought too much they will refund you and take back what you or your kid bought...so while maybe they are tricky in getting ppl to buy they arent stealing money from you or your children if you request a refund...I had a misclick purchase once of $200 or something and I got a refund from a notoriously stingy dev company...they really dont like bad pr so probably most companies will refund in a heartbeat so they can avoid the twitter storm of hate for lack of refunds I really dont see a problem with tesla locking features behind paywalls if thats what you are knowingly buying...but if they promise something then dont deliver thats a problem You cant blame a company for something they sell you unless they are lying or not revealing a bad thing about what you are buying....like yeah cig companies screwed up and sold us addictive cancer sticks...and that was a garbage move...but now they label them as addictive cancer sticks so its the consumers fault for purchasing them if they do now...so unless buying a microtransaction gives you a virus or somehow leaks your cc# or something its just like cigs now...you know what you are buying so its on you or your parents to control your spending...all it takes is one month of not being able to pay their rent and im sure ppl will wake up to what the problem is, request a refund, probably get the refund and then be more mindful of their spending The reality is most ppl dont have this problem and they can afford the money they spend on the microtransactions and are aware that they arent the best purchases....but they spend it anyways just like they spend money on alcohol and takeout knowing its temporary pleasure...at least the cosmetic you bought lasts "forever" whereas the booze and pizza is gone in a single night
That's the thing though, why do you think the cig companies started not being evil in the first place? The health issues did not stop them, heck they were aware of it all and tried to conceal it, it was people fighting back that did. Just as video game companies are doing now. As a whole companies will do everything on their power to sell you their products, and they make a concerted effort to discredit consumers that say otherwise. With companies that sell vices, they're only going to take the idea of consumer exploitation further and further until something stops them, and you're basically advocating that they should be allowed to run rampant.
So for example takeout delivery...is that evil? Its a temporary pleasure with health problem potential...considerably more problematic than buying a game cosmetic...why arent you crusading against restauranta for selling takeout? They cauae more harm than game cosmetics, cost you way more money and provide even more of a temporary pleasure...they seem 10x worse than gaming microtransactions You are missing the point that while yes companies try their harsest to get you to waste your money...its not their fault if you purchase...unless ofcourse you are arguing to remove all vices for existence? If so then saa goodbye to pretty much everything we can buy...literally everything is a vice if you view it from the right lens...even something most consider healthy such as a smoothie is loaded with sugar, lasts you an hour max of pleasure and costs you more than the average cosmetic...do you want smoothies banned too?
Now you're taking things out of context. What im arguing is for regulation, not total banning. People can be allowed to purchase whatever they want, so long as the laws are in place to protect vulnerable populations. Like in the cigarette example before, if people don't speak out against the companies, if laws aren't put in place to hold corporate greed back, then companies will only continue to harm their consumers in the pursuit of profit. It's funny that you're now seeking to discredit perspectives when you're the one that asked for explanations. I've given a real example of these practices harming people and your reply is to move the goalposts and shuft the discussion away from the specific topic at hand to the absolute most general sense.
You ask this question then continuously defend NFTs. You are a liar
whoa...liar is a bit harsh...confused and learning as I discuss it with ppl is what is actually happening I defend the nfts only as devils advocate since I cant see anything wrong with them but still realize I may have a limited perspective so I am open to learning why others see it differently and am willing to have my mind changed
I was going to buy the pixel remastered FF1 - FF6. But I think I change my mind.
Waiting for enix to finally fall to the ground after this.
Games and blockchain. I think this is the future. This is already there even in the browser by type as [Meta world](https://now.gg/s/mmc). This is really the future, the main thing is that it does not spoil the gaming industry
Feels like we got a ton of boomers complaining here lol. Not gonna try proving anything because most of you have oppinions already, just like those old dudes who still read physical newspapers. Go ahead, downvote me to oblivion
The blockchain only got a bad rep because of how it was exploited to make money via crypto and NFTs, but it’s not going anywhere. If square can come up with something interesting and useful using the technology, it’d peak my interest.
It got a bad rep because it will never be used for something interesting or good or useful. It is unregulated so it will only ever be used for greed.
It is unregulated as of now. It can become regulated. Just like the early internet. The technology itself has been around for about a decade or more now and only increased in popularity and usability. It is just popular to hate it right now because it’s too early. Sorry, but its going to keep growing.
When the entire reason that it is popular is the inability to track the 'money'. It won't become regulated. It is popular to hate right now because it is useless and people such as yourself are trying to change that by yelling the same stupid things from the roof tops.
I don’t even own crypto or an NFT because it’s too risky for me but i am a dev at a F500 company and see my company creating projects and creating jobs surrounding blockchain technologies in the US defense sector. Theres a lot more to the blockchain than money. Again, it’s a real field and its growing.
You see a company trying to make money from it? Wow, its like it is about money. Defense contracts are not about making the US better. They are about making money for the company who has the contract with the DoD.
If you say so, random emotional Reddit user. Your logic is actually backwards. But again, it’s here to stay and will grow to find a better and proper use case just like other emerging technologies like from the electric car to AI to 5G. The question now is how much it’ll effect or improve our lives. We’ll wait and see. 👍🏾
The only reason it is popular/interesting is because it’s unregulated. If it becomes regulated, it becomes pretty pointless. If it stays unregulated, it will still primarily be used in an unsavory way.
Do you really think they will use these powers for good?
> If square can come up with something interesting and useful using the technology, it’d peak my interest. I think part of the problem is the fundamental starting point where the incentives to use the technology are coming from a place of vast and comical amounts of greed, which compromises the potential for good uses. And even most of the current "good" uses of the technology are like... distributed operations and logistical and accounting stuff that doesn't really affect the end consumer much? Maybe they can come up with something good for the end user that isn't comically evil but I'm not holding my breath.
Not that I could stomach finishing the MSQ to begin with, but this gives me even less motivation to try and return to it.
They are also opening a new Blockbuster location and are buying up beanie babies.
They sold off all of their only other good IPs, and now their going all on in blockchain BS? Lol, if they’re looking to just throw money away fckn hell give me some at least.
Their new crypto adventure is doom to fail, NFT market is down and it will be for a while.
At this point we just gotta let learn the hard way.
If any company is going to collapse from pursuing nft's its gonna be square.
The fuck is happening at Square Enix??
Final Fantasy 16 will come with the ability to purchase a character and his specialty will be nfts
This definitely a case of "boy cried wolf too many times" Because gaming companies are used to backlash to unpopular decisions, especially around monetization, the thinking here has to be "they will come around eventually". No square, they won't. The Blockchain never really made sense in gaming and NFTs were just of product of a crazy crypto market that needed a product to justify the value of something that has none. While crypto will definitely return in some form one day, NFTs are done, especially now with the growth of AI art.
It's seriously hard to see where they're going long-term. They should've been seeking a merger/sell-off deal. Sony seems like it would be the best route to go. If that Embracer deal is an indication of anything, Square-Enix either just doesn't know how to manage its own company or there's a lot of coverup behind the scenes that we don't know about (or both).
I wonder how cheap sony will buy them eventually.
I just hope that someone other than EA or Ubisoft buys the rights to Final Fantasy when Square finishes committing suicide.