SE's pivot towards crypto and NFTs has me scared

[Vahlnir]

Fidget Spinners

My "old" mind still fails to understand the fascination with those things.

[PMSJordan]

Square's started to court Epic and their store. I could easily see them pulling XIV from Steam and moving it to EGS.

Pulling FFXIV and its player base off Steam would be the biggest PR disaster this game has faced since 1.0's launch. There's no way they would do that.

[GordonLiu]

If it gets into anything it'll be 'service' games, likely mobile stuff, things like First Soldier.

Do you have any basis whatsoever for this statement?

its no different then any other microtransaction, just because it gets added to the game does not mean you are forced to buy it.

^^^ and this type of player, right here, is who we will have to thank if every nook and cranny of video games is infested with blockchain nonsense pushed by predatory hucksters, and all our games built around the idea of transferrable assets.

First of all, microtransaction also suck and have been a negative presence in the market for gamers, and we have people like you and sentiments like yours to thank for that already. Had you white knights of corporation hadn't been aggressively pushing a myopic, blase attitude around the phenomenon when it first began, the game market might look different than it does today.

Second of all, this is very different from a normal microtransaction. The underlying promise of NFTs, in and outside of video games, is that you can get rich off of them like some sort of stock - which is essentially what they are, only with zero regulation around them, a framework that allows for flagrant gaming of the marketplace, and virtually zero security in terms not only of your possession of your investment, but of its continued existence. At least when you purchase items on a game's marketplace, you know what you're getting. All these corporations and individuals trying to force-feed us NFTs are trying to sell people on a promise that will go virtually completely unfulfilled for the overwhelming, vast majority of gamers.

That aside, if you have any concept of how game design has been compromised by the need to cultivate a framework for monetization beyond the sales of the games as a result of microtransaction, you should be disturbed by what the impact would be should those in-game items be treated as the main course of a title, with the games themselves being a side-dish that the vultures driving blockchain commerce can take or leave.

Here's a question for you to consider that can maybe prevent you from making such uninformed statements on any matters in the future:
If NFTs in games are just like microtransactions, that why does anyone want to incorporate NFTs? If they're the same thing, we already have microtransactions, and don't need the NFTs, right? These aren't wild philosophical musings, it's just basic scrutiny that you seem to have neglected when printing a comment about something you know absolutely nothing about.

[ArkenaeuxBelmont]

Pulling FFXIV and its player base off Steam would be the biggest PR disaster this game has faced since 1.0's launch. There's no way they would do that.

Agreed, not just for the PR nightmare but for the nightmare they'd have untangling all the Steam options from their account services. We all know how laughable the spaghetti coded account services website is. Imagine having to untangle all the Steam options in it. They'd probably melt their own servers/website trying to do it.

Steam taking the stance pretty much 99% guarantees NFT's won't come to XIV. SE will most likely pursue them in their mobile market, which is already a cesspool of greedy monetization the way it is.

[Midlithe]

SE - Please do not implement NFT's in the FF world. I've no interest to see the game(s) I love become cash cows for corporate greed. That has led to the downfall of many other companies and it's sad to see SE going down that path. Microtransactions is a reason why I don't buy some of your other recently created games. You need to follow FFXIV example and leadership on how to balance "selling digital items" and keeping a game good enough for people to continue paying subscriptions as well expansions.

[Derio]

They will most likely implement it and the community will shun people who partake in it.

[Doragan]

Do you have any basis whatsoever for this statement?

Actually, yeah, there is. Back during SE's NFT announcement in early 2021, they announced Shi-San-Sei Million Arthur using LINE's blockchain/bitmax wallet tech. Considering how big mobile-wise LINE in Japan is, it's not a stretch to believe this will target phone games first, or any card game in general. I wouldn't be surprised to see the DQ Hearthstone ripoff to have NFT soon, since it's JP only.

Now.. to be sure if it will (or not) ever target FFXIV, that will depend on Sony allowing that stuff on their platform. Which I sure hope they will forbid entirely. Lord knows they need to. Fast.

[KizuyaKatogami]

I think a majority of the people who are heavily against NFT’s won’t care whether or not 14 specifically includes them. If SE period starts messing with them, that will more than likely completely turn them off of the company itself and its games. Just because it doesn’t affect 14 doesn’t make it entirely right is how most people see it from what i’ve seen on the forums.

[Katie_Kitty]

I am going to sound very ignorant. I really don't understand what an NFT is, and explainations from what i've looked up don't really explain. All i know is that apparently it was done to Stan Lee, which caused outrage among the comic community.

The fact that you don't understand NFT means that you do understand NFT. It's a make-believe fantasy world idea. The people who claim to understand and support NFTs are the ones who put their money into them, so now they're stuck on the bandwagon.

[Shibi]

Now.. to be sure if it will (or not) ever target FFXIV, that will depend on Sony allowing that stuff on their platform. Which I sure hope they will forbid entirely. Lord knows they need to. Fast.

Well, in news today

Samsung has revealed a new "NFT Aggregation Platform" designed for its smart TVs. The platform, which will be available on Samsung's MicroLed, Neo QLED and The Frame models, allows users to browse and buy NFTs directly from their sets. The platform pulls in NFTs from several marketplaces, so users can preview the art and see other relevant details, like who created the work, as well as relevant blockchain metadata.

So, I don't thinkit's a far stretch to imagine another CEO who, looking at their Bravia and Playstation lines, thinks... "you know, we could put ugly apes into these too"