Why gamers and web3 are complicated

Web3 has faced some rather stark pushback when it comes to including aspects of NFTs and Cryptos or even their concept of ownership to the world of gamers.
A couple years ago it lead to companies like Valve to make announcements of standing in support of gamers and not allowing Web3 games, or more specifically NFTs, on their platform.

The question is why that is, and a number of articles and reasons came to be. Environmental impact, the scarcity of affordable graphics cards for gamers (at the time these were bought up by crypto miners, inflating their price in combination with a general electronics and chip shorts following the covid19 pandemic), perception of scams and quick money grabs, questionable added value, unlikelihood of promised interoperability of carrying one NFT into another game, and the gamer’s fear of greedy developers and publishers using the technology to squeeze just that little bit more money out of their players.

All of them are valid reasons and concerns that lead to the negative backlash against the industry. But all can ultimately be explained when looking at the more fundamental dynamic. The above are symptoms of an underlying deeper behavioural dynamic.

We first need to know the three types of community, to understand why these two groups clashed.

The first type is a community centred around place: your neighbourhood, a city, a country, or a more  abstract example the reddit community. The binding factor for the community is a location, physically or in the abstract sense.

The second community type is centred around a common interest: your local football club, pottery, etc. This is also where we find video games, as it’s the video game as the common interested that creates the community around it.

The third and final type is a community centred around a common believe: most obvious example here is religion, but also political parties or affiliations would fall under this type of community. Interestingly, when we look at the behavioural dynamics of how the web3 community conducts itself, web3 falls under this category. At the hight of it, social media was rather prominent with messages that can be translated into “believe, believe, believe, and you will be rewarded when the big day comes”. The meme coin culture didn’t help, as it was a rally of believers to have a chance at rewards, if only you were to join and believe.

All types of communities follow different approach in terms of growth, what they care about, how they establish social norms within, how they accept new members, etc. When Web3 met video gamers these two dynamics lead to a clash of an interest based community, gamers, and a believe system that is Web3. When a believe systems that you are not part of infringes on one of your interest, the resulting behaviour is that of resistance, disapproval, and conflict. All of which are emotional charged, and the fundamental drivers of community behaviour. Which you can read more on in our article: here.

We have seen this before, even though to a much lesser degree, when games introduce diverse characters. It too is a clash of a gamer’s believe system misaligned with a believe system that infringes on their interest group. As any believe system disagreement this too provokes an emotion of disagreement and repellent. Very similar to the one we saw with web3.

Now that we understand the origin of the conflict what could have been done differently?

1. Instead of a blanket approach that introduces the concept to all gamers at once, a different approach would have been to find the overlapping group where gamers that do follow the Web3 believe system would be targeted more specifically. Effectively define and identify the target audience on a much narrower basis.
   It’s not an easy to task to find the group that believes in Web3 and is an avid gamer interested in NFTs, Cryptos, etc. within their games. An example approach would be finding reddit users who follow both gaming sub reddits, and crypto/nft subreddits. It’s a starting point from where to grow and branch out.

2. In order to recruit others into the believe system, one must understand the added value and benefit of why you should believe. In Religion it’s the promised paradise once our corporeal existence ends. Why are you introducing these systems into your game at what benefit to the player? NFTs specifically hold a reputation of the “Monkey Jepg”, just make money. While the technology in and of itself is one of transferability, introducing NFT based cosmetics in your game, without the transferability option, the problematic perception of “here to make money” remains. Where monetisation is a touching topic with gamers at the best of times, introducing such mechanics without a clear believe attached of why it is beneficial to the user, it is a rather difficult ask for them to start believing.
   (If you genuinely introduce these technologies in your game with the sole purpose of making money, maybe take a moment and ask yourself, what is the value to the player? Afterall, they are the most important person in the studio).

Lastly, we should consider the reason why these communities form in the first place, and why we play. Gamers are not gamers because they want to earn money from playing (yes that group exists, but is comparatively small). We play to build, create, ‘get away from it all’, to immerse ourselves in a world, to make social connections and take on challenges together. To share experiences, and do so in a fun, playful way. The purpose of games (for the players) is not to make money. But for competition, enjoyment, challenge, story telling, etc.
If such technologies do not support the underlying reason for the interest based community to exist and form in the first place, it’s a simple case of being at odds of what the function of games is.

It's a difficult relationship, and one that is either clearly in the corner of Web3 gaming, and has it’s cohort of believers. Or a case of staying away from it in order to prevent further alienation. How do you build communities around such a complex dynamic is not an easy challenge, but ultimately comes down to a strategy that clearly understands what type of community it is building. A believe system community, an interest based community, or even a community of place on a new platform. All of them are valid and possible, just need to unify your community efforts to build the right one, in alignment with the type of community it i