No longer "Game Over" Why did the magic change on the chain rise?

By SerenaTaN5, Gaming Analyst at Smrti Lab

Translation: Jack, BlockBeats

Editor's note: For many veteran gamers, magic reform may be one of the most important elements that determine their game experience. In my own gaming career, the most vivid memory is pouring all kinds of cool vehicle and weapon mods into the world of "GTA San Andreas" all day long. Game Modification, the English abbreviation "MOD", mostly refers to the modification of the original video game functions by game manufacturers or enthusiastic players. Any part of the game, such as props, characters, modes, and storylines, may belong to the scope of modification. Famous cases of magic modification games include "Red Alert", "My World", "The Elder Scrolls" and the classic "Grand Theft Auto" series.

Because of the constant availability of free game mods on the web, I always take it for granted that I enjoy all kinds of mods made by fans. But in reality, developing and maintaining these modules requires different aspects and degrees of cost input. And because most of the mods are not legal in terms of copyright, it is difficult for mod developers to obtain the motivation for continuous creation at the economic level, which is also an important reason why mocha burnout often occurs. Today, discussions about full-chain games are becoming more and more frequent. Can the openness and financial attributes of the blockchain provide a reliable solution to the burnout of magic reform?

Games are a medium of expression

As a game designer, creating games is a way of expressing yourself that would not be possible through any other form, such as writing poetry or fiction.

Today's gaming landscape is dominated by gaming giants. However, most of their game creations are no longer used as expressive art forms. Instead, they over-commoditized the online experience, and game design and content gradually became more interchangeable. "There is nothing new under the sun." (Old Testament Ecclesiastes 1:9)

So where is the problem? The problem is not that game designers themselves don't understand how to design games. In fact, many of them do. The problem is that as gaming companies scale, they become less and less risk-averse and instead focus on generating safe and predictable revenue streams. For example, if it costs more than $200 million to make a AAA game, the company may choose to make a game that is similar to an existing successful game, with minor tweaks, because they believe this approach will ensure at least the same level of success. financial success.

But what if the production team tried a different path? They would have to risk the entire $200 million for the tiny chance of getting $2 billion. Indie scenes, on the other hand, are more willing to take risks due to lower production costs, enabling the discovery of previously unseen elements. It's like opening a door randomly, you never know what's hidden behind it.

Stand-alone scene and module scene

Self-published game developers are those who develop games alone or with smaller groups, and they have more freedom of expression than large AAA studios. They're usually neither involved in indie games nor in the modding scene. An indie scene is an indie game built from the ground up, usually simpler in art but more creative in game design. Modding scene is the process of replacing official existing game content. Most mods are free, giving it an open-source community-like feel. Modding is more fun and easier than indie development - you don't feel the pressure to release your game, and you don't need to build from source. However, modding is harder and more complicated than it looks, and there are two main reasons for high burnout rates.

Two reasons why magic reform burnout occurs

First, the lack of compensation for retrofit costs makes it economically unsustainable.

Modders are not paid by companies or organizations. No matter how popular mods are, they are created by rabid fans with no financial interest. But maintaining mods takes long-term effort and time, especially when you start amassing large communities. If they're lucky, some people might get some financial support through donations on platforms like Patreon. While a donation-based model might work for smaller mods, for larger mods, donations don't cover all costs. Arguments then arise when these larger modders want to get more out of it - are they benefiting from previous development by the "official developer".

Unfortunately, it is illegal to accept payment of any kind other than donations. Most of the games they build are protected by the company's intellectual property and licensing agreements, and modders face legal consequences if they profit from them. As such, it's a shame that most modders are in the awkward position of not being fully recognized for the independence and ownership of their contributions.

Second, changes to the base game rules can be disruptive, creating extra work for modders who have to re-write their mods every time the game mechanics change.

As explained by Tslat, the lead on the development team at AdventOfAscension (one of the largest Minecraft mods), changes to the base game can result in an exponentially greater amount of rework for large mods compared to small mods.

"When something does break, it takes us longer to fix than an equivalent small mod due to the size of the content and the extra boilerplate (see preemptive tech debt above), and you can see How much does this affect our big mods." - Tslat

Modders often find themselves in a passive position, having to adapt unconditionally to each update of the base game. Since these games weren't designed with mods in mind, developers gave little thought to maintaining compatibility with each update. Every time a game developer makes a major modification to the source code, it causes mods to burn because of incompatibilities. This occurs even in mod-friendly games like Stardew Valley and Minecraft, which try to use APIs built from source, such as SMAPI and Forge. Despite these efforts by publishers, mod burnout still happens.

SMAPI mod compatibility trend graph, which shows how SMAPI mod compatibility for Stardew Valley has changed over time

So, what are the possible ways out?

Transitioning to the field of on-chain games, the on-chain community encourages experimental modding with a wider range of content. At the same time, they provide an economically sustainable and long-lasting environment for retrofitting scenarios in a trustless manner. In a permissionless environment, modders are not just players, but powerful game influencers and game changers. This is the power of permissionless innovation; modders become an integral force in co-creating an on-chain ecosystem, while sustaining themselves from full-on-chain in many different ways.

First, modders have a more flexible way of distributing profits.

They now have the governance power to determine their own profit margins. Open source on-chain projects are not licensed. Instead, their protection comes from liquidity, which acts as a moat. Mods can earn money based on the amount of on-chain activity outlined by their smart contracts. They can turn their creations into public goods and achieve positive sum through staking and liquidity. The amount of liquidity they capture helps them avoid unnecessary forks. Therefore, only innovative and beneficial creations have the ability to be profitable on-chain.

Secondly, the game on the chain is immutable, which makes the mod change from a mere extension to an indispensable component in the game, and gradually becomes a part of the game structure.

Modders will no longer have to worry about being platformed or burned out by constant updates to the base game. Due to the inherent immutability, modders can build mods based on the underlying physics without worrying about maintenance. Once deployed, no future maintenance is required. Most importantly, public real-time data on-chain opens up the possibility of a new type of game, as Ronan describes a “meta-meta game,” a modded game that runs on real-time data from another infinite game. In this case, the stacked mod mechanism can be imagined as more than a prediction market where tactical game mods are run against real-time data from existing games/mods. This in turn further enriches the ecosystem.

in conclusion

Once modding scenarios become economically viable and permanent through the blockchain, we expect an influx of rich, extensive mod content crafted from original game versions, transforming the on-chain gaming ecosystem into a hyperstructured space . However, we are still a long way from witnessing large-scale modification and co-creation within on-chain ecosystems. Nonetheless, we are ready and excited to foster open source public products, surmounting technical and design hurdles on this adventurous path.