Innovations in blockchain technology have opened up opportunities in various industries, including gaming. But how exactly will this revolutionise the technology?

To answer this question, Marc Mercuri, Chief Blockchain Officer at Shrapnel, begins by explaining how players have been purchasing digital assets in games for a while, but there is not much use of these items outside of the game ecosystem itself.

“It’s a really interesting space because people have been buying whatever digital currency [in games] for a while, but that currency has been locked almost exclusively to the game. They bought items that they didn’t really own,” Mercuri explains.

“Sometimes a game would retire them, and players could not use them from version to version, or they have to rebuy them, and things like that. If you had these items, you really just do not have the agency to use them however you would like. That is one challenge from the gamers’ perspective.”

Shrapnel is an AAA first-person extraction shooter with a creator ecosystem that aims to empower players to own their creations and shape the future of the game.

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It is being developed by a BAFTA and Emmy award-winning team of game industry veterans with experience in transmedia, virtual production, gaming-as-a-service, and blockchain production. As a spin-off from HBO Interactive, the team has enjoyed past successes with leading game companies, including Xbox, Electronic Arts, HBO, LucasFilm, Irrational, and Zombie Ent, working on titles such as Halo, Call of Duty, and Star Wars.

From the creators’ perspective, the democratisation of professional game development tools via blockchain is making AAA-level quality accessible to a broader range of creators.

“If you look at what is happening right now in the world, there is a renaissance of user-generated content. What we have seen with our creator tools is that people are just amazingly creative if you give them tools to do that. But there is no great way for creators to make a living off the stuff that they do,” Mercuri says.

He gives an example of a skin or sticker creator within the game, which might be limited to creating assets that can only be used on one platform. But with Shrapnel and its infusion of blockchain technology, creators are even able to tap into “missed opportunities”, such as tracking asset creation and the development of a hierarchical royalty system.

“I can allow someone to incorporate my things into something else; they can create something new with that. So, you have multiple levels of creativity and making sure that people are getting paid. Those are things you are not really seeing in gaming today.”

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Building with blockchain in mind

Mercuri is not a new face in the tech industry, with 29 years of experience, 26 issues and pending patents, and four published books. Prior to joining Shrapnel, he spent 18 years at Microsoft, where he held senior roles in product, strategy (cloud, architecture, platform), evangelism, innovation, and incubation.

Mercuri led and launched multiple pro code and low code blockchain APIs and developer tools at both Microsoft and ConsenSys.

When asked about developing games that are infused with blockchain technology, he believes that the core of it lies in great storytelling execution and player engagement.

“If you look at gaming in Web3, you have seen lots of games that are not particularly fun to play. They were interesting experiments around technology and patterns and things like that, but they are not fun games. So, I think the key thing for this to move forward is you have to start with a great game,” he stresses.

The game creation process at Shrapnel itself begins with the team discussing about what they want to enable creators and players to do in this game. Mercuri gives an example of implementing skill trees for characters, enabling them to level up their skills. The team will look at how they can infuse blockchain in this aspect of the game.

“The other thing is that, depending on the type of game you have, you have to make sure that you are really cognisant of the regulatory environment,” he says.

“Another challenge is that if you want to do a free-to-play game, that can be really expensive if you want to have heavy interaction with the Blockchain. So what they will do is that … they will only update the NFTs if you ask them to.”

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Something for everybody

It is important to note that Mercuri does not see blockchain gaming as a replacement or competitor to the existing AAA titles.

“It is not necessarily about competing with other games out there; it is sort of proving that the model can be done. And it is not just the technical model … the Web3 mechanics have to be incorporated in a way that is intuitive and natural for both players and creators,” he says.

“People who are building AAA games, franchises such as MARVEL and Star Wars, they are making billions of dollars, and they are very protective of their IP–they are not necessarily willing to try out new models with them. They are more than happy to have someone else do that.”

In promoting the game, there is a need to bring different types of players together, both Web3 enthusiasts and those who are there just to have fun. Mercuri finds that transmedia marketing works well for this; in promoting their works, Shrapnel tackles different fronts, from promoting collectible NFTs to live-action game trailers.

“There is a lot of collaboration that we are doing on the Web3 front that is pretty interesting. Then, there is also [the aspect of] just getting it out there and letting people see and play the game and have fun … It is a mixture of traditional and Web3 marketing, and making sure that we talk to each audience about what they care about,” Mercuri closes.

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Image Credit: Shrapnel

 

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