Overview
GM Tigers,
Last week, we hosted a dynamic Twitter Spaces session on the topic "The Era of eSports in Web3 Gaming." We brought in our friends from IndieGG, GGNation, and MetaGuild to discuss how Web3 gaming can leverage the booming eSports industry. The conversation traversed a variety of topics and had many juicy insights. Don't worry if you missed it, though; we have got a recap for you right here. But we highly recommend checking out the original recording to hear from the speakers firsthand. With that out of the way, let’s get into the recap!
First up, introductions:
IndieGG: IndieGG is India’s biggest Web3 gaming guild. They have a community of over 500 000 players.After successfully pioneering the traditional guild model, where they bought game assets and lent them to the players in exchange for a percentage of the players' income, IndieGG came to the realization that this business model is not sustainable. From there, the organization pivots to becoming a powerful distribution house for blockchain gaming in India. Essentially, they partner with up-and-coming Web3 games and help them onboard the Indian gaming market onto the Web3 scene.
GGNation: GGNation or GoodGame Nation is on a mission to build India’s largest student gaming community. They have tied up with nearly 600 colleges across the country. They help the student understand the tricky ways of Web3 and provide them with an opportunity to build a career in gaming. GGNations believe that students are the most open minded segment of the population and do not have entrenched interests in the systems of the past. Making them the ideal group to accelerate the adoption of Web3.
MetaGuild: next up, a hybrid guild that’s working on a global level. MetaGuild started operations in 2020.It's a hardcore Web3 gaming collective that focuses primarily on competitive gaming. They routinely host web3 gaming esports by partnering with the hottest blockchain games in the space.
The rise of eSports
In the past decade, esports has seen a tremendous rise in popularity as a competitive sport. The evolution of eSports has been unbelievable. In the early days of esports, tournaments were held in small venues and were viewed as niche activities, but as technology improved, communities and cultures began to form around them.
The growth of streaming services, such as Twitch, allowed for players to reach a much larger audience and for tournaments to be broadcasted to the world. The increased exposure to esports led to more media coverage and attention from sponsors, which, in turn, helped fund more tournaments and teams.
The eSports revolution essentially started novel career tropes such as professional gamers and gaming streamers, which have helped legitimize the sport and make it more accessible to a larger audience. Esports has also seen a huge surge in popularity in the last decade due to the rise of mobile gaming. Mobile games have allowed players to access esports titles on the go and have helped increase the accessibility and spread of esports to new countries and cultures.
At the moment, there’s arguably no bigger trend in gaming than eSports. It’s just the perfect storm of community, attention, and culture that Web3 needs for mass adoption.
How money flow works in traditional esports
All the revenue in traditional esports comes from players and fans. Most people might be unaware of this, but professional gamers often pay game publishers and event organizers to create content for their games and venues. These players then earn their piece of the pie by sharing the content with their community. This loop can only exist as long as the games and the content creators that are sharing them are fun to watch.
Igor from Metaguild told us that Web3 won’t have a thriving eSports scene until content creators and game developers optimize the viewer experience to be more fun and engaging. Simply put, if a streamer is playing a click-and-earn grind of a game, the streamer and his patrons will not receive many eyeballs and thus will not receive much revenue.
Monetization has been a part of the gaming world for a while, but the only way to attract gamers who will stay is to make the game itself enjoyable. The use of soulbound tokens will revolutionize this, as players will need to earn them instead of simply buying them.
Web3 and Esports
Blockchain games need to partner with streamers ASAP. Gaming streamers are some of the most prolific content creators on the planet, with many having millions of followers across multiple channels. We don’t think that gaming streamers have any ideological issues with gaming, as many of them routinely promote crypto projects. The problem appears to be that blockchain games are not prioritizing partnering with these streamers (maybe because streamers can be expensive). But in our opinion, onboarding streamers is absolutely crucial to accelerating Web3 gaming adoption.
Traditional gamers may find it difficult to understand the value of web3 technologies, as web2 may appear to have it all figured out. Misconceptions about web3 gaming, such as Axie Infinity being its peak, are debunked as there are many AAA-style titles in the space.
The problem with early games in web3 gaming was that they leaned more towards the financialization aspect of games. The result was a tainted image of Web3 games as grinds to earn money rather than games to enjoy. There’s a fundamental challenge in front of web3 gaming stakeholders to change this image. This can be achieved by creating really fun games that are on par with the best of Web2 gaming and then communicating this to the gaming community.
Interoperability, transparency, and content creation
Lastly, some of the scattered gems from the conversation
Web3 games are no different than Web2 games, unless players can take their in-game assets to different ecosystems. We expect this to change once metaverse technologies improve.
Transparent digital ownership is essential for valuable in-game assets. Instead of web2games acting as black markets for in-game assets, blockchain rails can make the asset transfer process more secure and transparent.
Players can also use other avenues, like content creation, to earn a living in gaming. eSports platforms and streaming services such as Loco make content creation an enjoyable and easy process.
Web3's best publicity will come when amateurs start playing competitive Web3 games and sharing their content.
In Closing
Woah! This whole conversation was jam-packed with insights. We hope that the builders in our community get some actionable advice from this article. Web3 gaming absolutely needs to ramp up its eSports efforts. That’s where the next inflow of players isked with insights. We hope that the builders in our community get some actionable advice from this article. Web3 gaming absolutely needs to ramp up its eSports efforts. That's where the next inflow of players is. If you want to learn more about Web3 gaming from some of the key opinion leaders in the space, make sure to tune into our Twitter spaces every week.
Ciao!
