The gaming industry has been divisive lately due to the ongoing debate on whether non-fungible tokens should have a place in the gaming industry or not. However, with the recent announcement of Mojang Studios, the developers behind the mega-popular crafting game Minecraft, saying that NFTs have no place in their internal properties, Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney says otherwise.
According to him, developers have the right to “decide how to build their games.”
Tim Sweeney says Epic Games won’t follow up on the actions from Minecraft devs’ NFT ban.
The decision from Mojang caused massive applause from the majority of the gaming community, although the NFT supporters think they are foolish for such a decision.
While Epic Games is not entirely supportive of cryptocurrency, it does consider its smash hit battle royale game, Fortnite, a Metaverse platform. Yet, with all these statements from Epic Games and its CEO, they claim they will not force their views on Web3 on their players.
Will Epic Games Create P2E Titles?
In a tweeted reply to the Minecraft announcement, Tim Sweeney said, “Developers should be free to decide how to build their games, and you are free to decide whether to play them. I believe stores and operating system makers shouldn’t interfere by forcing their views onto others. We definitely won’t.”
This tweet met with varied feedback, some saying he makes a good point.
In contrast, others call him a hypocrite due to his September 2021 tweet saying that NFTs are full of scams “We aren’t touching NFTs as the whole field is currently tangled up with an intractable mix of scams, interesting decentralized tech foundations, and scams.”
As of now, Epic Games never stated anything about creating play-to-earn games in their library, nor will they implement one in Fortnite.
Not Stopping the GameFi Industry
Mojang’s NFT ban did raise eyebrows for the GameFi developers. NFT worlds – the supplier for NFTs in Minecraft – are looking for solutions to make up for the change. They also mentioned that they’re doing their best to contact Minecraft to know if both parties can find a solution. If the reconsideration fails, they must opt for another survival crafting game similar to Minecraft.
It would take more than two rags-to-riches games to persuade the entire gaming community that NFTs are the future.
Even though games like Axie Infinity and Alien Worlds found success, the P2E business is still a project in its infancy. Announcements of NFT games still pop up here and there, although the gaming community has been more vocal about their negativity towards GameFi.
Even with the negative press surrounding NFTs in games, gaming publishers like Microsoft, Ubisoft, and Square Enix would like to move forward with creating brand-new IPs that include P2E but with good gameplay, extreme replayability, and overall high-quality experience.
From here on out, only time will tell what Epic Games will do in the Metaverse and if Mojang reconsiders NFTs in their games.
