Square Enix president Yosuke Matsuda has published a letter in which he expresses hope that NFTs and blockchain technology will become a “major trend” in gaming.
In a New Year’s letter, Matsuda expressed what he believes will be major areas of growth for the industry in 2022, including cloud gaming, AI, and blockchain games.
The latter “are built upon the premise of a token economy and therefore hold the potential to enable self-sustaining game growth,” said Matsuda.
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“NFTs were met with a great deal of enthusiasm by a rapidly expanding user base. However, we do observe examples here and there of overheated trading in NFT-based digital goods with somewhat speculative overtones, regardless of the observed value of the content provided.”
The idea of NFTs in games has generally been met negatively by many players, despite developer enthusiasm to integrate the technology. Following the letter’s publication, Square Enix share prices rose eight percent, according to Bloomberg.
In his letter, Matsuda wrote of a distinction between those who “play to have fun” and those who “play to contribute”.
“I realise that some people who ‘play to have fun’ and who currently form the majority of players have voiced their reservations toward these new trends, and understandably so,” he says.
In his view, however, NFTs will incentivise contributions and inspire more user-generated content in games.
“I believe that this will lead to more people devoting themselves to such efforts and to greater possibilities of games growing in exciting ways. From having fun to earning to contributing, a wide variety of motivations will inspire people to engage with games and connect with one another. It is blockchain-based tokens that will enable this.