Overview
TDeFi organized a panel discussion on “Is Play to Earn Economy Sustainable” on October 14 at the Future Blockchain Summit at GITEX (Dubai). The discussion’s panelists were Mark Turestsky, co-creator of Goons of Balatroon; Jamie Thomson, CEO of Vulcan Forged; Prasoon Agarwal, founder of BornToDieGame; and Rutherford Atayobo, COO ~Sinverse. The panel was moderated by Vasu Sharma (Investment Analyst at TDeFi).
Insights from the discussion
The panel focused on the principles of the “play to earn” economy and how a gaming enterprise should develop a sustainable business plan.
To be precise, the “play to earn” and “play and earn” narratives are sometimes misunderstood to be similar, but there is a significant distinction between the two. Jamie quoted this and said,
“It depends on the semantics of the game and what it represents. While play-to-earn games would attract a player just to earn profits, play-and-earn hosts those players who wish to have fun while playing and earning”.
Following the discussion, it was also questioned what factors should a blockchain game have other than immersive gameplay to retain the player’s interest. Prasoon mentioned that the company/devs behind the game shall analyze the requirements of the players. Some players only play to make money, thus the game should allow them to start out at a low cost and allow them to maintain a profit throughout.
On the other hand, there are web 2 players that want to enter the blockchain gaming ecosystem and for them, the game along with being highly immersive should also consider factors like minimum entry barriers, a smooth onboarding process, a good storyline/narrative, and social aspects. Most importantly, these players should feel like they are playing a web 2 game that also allows them to earn money simultaneously.
Closing Thoughts
Lastly, the founders of these flagship games shared a piece of advice for entrepreneurs who are entering the P2E space. Firstly, patience is for every ‘BUIDLER’ who is entering this emerging technology. Furthermore, the KPIs and milestones should be clear and aligned with the vision that the entrepreneur wishes to achieve by entering the play to earn space. Finally, the developers must concentrate on simplifying the game’s UI and keeping it as basic as possible in order to onboard as many users as possible from web 2 to web 3.
As a closure, it was discussed that in order to make a sustainable play to earn economy, a project must consider that the inflows are more than the outflow (distributed as rewards) and it is able to retain the player’s interest in the best possible manner.
You can watch the entire panel 👇
