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Steam is banning games with NFTs and cryptocurrencyEthereum’s no good here
Ethereum’s no good here
NFTs have wormed into gaming throughout this year. Enough so anyway that Devolver aresatirizing themandWill Wright’s next gameis built on them. If you’d not spotted them popping up in the rest of everywhere recently, they’re essentially digital certificates bestowing proof of ownership of often intangible items. They run on the same blockchain tech as cryptocurrencty but aren’t currency themselves. Here’san explaineron NFTs generally if that still sounds like a lot of jargon.
Year In Review | Mystery Steam Reviews (2021 Video Games)Watch on YouTube
Year In Review | Mystery Steam Reviews (2021 Video Games)
As for Age Of Rust, theSteam store page, on which the game is not actually for sale now, explains that “Age Of Rust is a blockchain game, which uses NFT’s on theEnjin Platform. Some of the puzzles in Age Of Rust are eligible for players to receive an NFT as an achievement. The game also uses NFTs from other games as well as the Multiverse NFTs from Enjin.”
So then, in-game achievements which bestow in-game items which are even more unique than unique in-game items usually are. Also, the blockchain says it’s your extra unique item, which grants it value amongst other folks who really like extra unique in-game items. All that and thenthe environmental impact issuesof creating and trading them, of course.
“Behind the scenes, we’ve had good communication and have been upfront with Steam,” SpacePirate games say. Steam’s perspective on NFTs, according to SpacePirate, is that “items have value and they don’t allow items that can have real-world value on their platform.”
Steam already traffics in digital items sold between players with itsMarketplace, mind. SpecialCS:GOknives for wild prices, right? They aren’t built on blockchain though, and are bought and sold with non-crypto currencies.
I’ve reached out to Steam to find out if this policy is actually new, though it doesn’t appear in their Steamworks portalearlier this month, and what made their decision to kick NFTs and crypto games off their store. I’ll let you know if they answer with their own words on the subject.
