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The video gaming industry is huge and growing. The market is forecast to hit a staggering $128.5 billion by 2020, with solid year on year growth.
This is all down to the enormous popularity of video gaming. There are thought to be about 2.2 billion active gamers in the world, spread across multiple countries and pumping money into the industry on a regular basis.
This community isn’t just made up of gamers. It also contains developers and game producers ranging from established experts to up-and-coming amateurs. There’s always demand for spaces where this community can come together and share ideas, but unfortunately such opportunities can be rare.
The community of gamers and developers is fragmented, and places to gather and co-operate are hard to find.
A lack of community for developers
Although the gaming community is global and growing, developers are often cut off from one another. Forums like Reddit and even in-game discussion platforms are common ways for gamers to connect and share ideas, but these still have their limitations.
There are many reasons why it’s so important for developers and producers to have access to a thriving community of video gaming enthusiasts.
It’s important to stay up-to-date with trends in the market, find out what people are looking for in games, and test the water with new ideas. This can only be done by bouncing ideas off potential customers who know what they want and know how to tell a good game from a bad one.
Still more important, however, is the need for game producers to connect with skilled people in the industry who they can build working relationships with. Designing, building, and releasing a video game is not a simple process and it requires a multi-faceted team of people with a range of different talents. It isn’t a one-person job.
Finding a team of talented enthusiasts to collaborate on a project is a big challenge for game producers. This need to build a solid team is a big factor in what drives game developers to big-time publishers and studios.
These established giants in the gaming market can connect entrepreneurs and budding developers with the teams and contacts they need. The downside to this is that developers lose money and creative control over their project.
Game developers can often feel like it’s impossible to build a team without help from a big publisher, and this forces them to sacrifice autonomy. It can hurt developers to give up control of a game that they’ve invested so much passion in, but this can feel like the only way to be put in contact with the people they need.
The result of this difficulty in finding co-workers is that many promising projects fail. Even worse, they never get started because the task seems so daunting from the beginning.
There’s a real demand for a solution, for some kind of platform that can bring developers in contact with other skilled individuals and gamers.
Blockchain’s solution
Blockchain technology could provide a way to link game producers with the people they need to help their projects take shape and become a reality.
There are a number of reasons why blockchain is so well-suited to this. It’s great for building decentralized systems and communities, where members can safely collaborate and share ideas in safety and transparency.
This is what companies like Game Protocol are working on — online spaces where developers and game enthusiasts can get in touch with a wide range of different people in the same industry. It’s a novel and exciting approach to the game industry, and could be the answer to many of its problems.
The platform provides a space where producers can link with developers and other skilled professionals who might be interested in working on their game. Users can also get valuable feedback on their projects and raise money for the initial launch.
Games can cost millions of dollars to produce, and even indie games can run up high costs quickly. Community-based crowdfunding is rare, and funding from big studios comes at the cost of creative control. Game Protocol offers members a platform to crowdfund their projects in a community of like-minded gaming enthusiasts.
By using tokens to pay and reward participants, and smart contracts to build safe agreements and relationships, Game Protocol will make the process of starting solid working partnerships secure and efficient. This is much safer and more reliable than using an internet forum or social media site, where it’s hard to be sure of how trustworthy a potential partner is.
Blockchain’s decentralized and transparent nature make it perfect for bringing relative strangers together, and providing a safe and open space for discussion and collaboration. It could be the thing that allows game producers to build a strong team and grow their project without having to sacrifice control to a big organization.
